July 11, 2013

Mirth Watch Thursday: Educating Rita

I know I mostly only post about how cute and sweet Rita is (and how she hardly ever gets into any mischief, leaving me scrambling for ideas for Monday Mischief posts) but she does have some ... issues. Because of her issues, we started working with a trainer.
95% of the time, a very happy girl & a good walker
As I've mentioned before, Rita is a rescue, found on the beach in Baja. We have no way of knowing if anyone hit her, but at a minimum she was probably at least scared by someone brandishing something threatening. (She's afraid of, and barks at, anyone with anything that could be a weapon - gardeners with tools, men with pool skimmers, old ladies with canes, etc. She's gotten much better about the canes, but still hates gardeners!) 

She also was bit by her foster mom's dog. (The foster mom told me, and Rita has a scar above her eye to prove it.) We've also been charged at by a snarling, scary off-leash dog, so Rita can be reactive to other dogs when she's on-leash (although she's mostly fine off-leash, running up to other dogs happily to say hello).
You can see the scar over her right eye in this shot.
I've been working with her when we go on walks and when strangers come by, and in some ways she's a lot better, but in other ways she's getting worse (e.g. she's suddenly started lunging at noisy trucks or motorbikes on our walks, which she never did before). So, we hired a trainer.

We'll do some private lessons and then maybe take a class as well. Our homework after the first session was to avoid anything that triggers her on walks.

This is NOT easy! She has so many triggers! And there are so many houses in our 'hood with construction crews or gardeners, not to mention all the other folks out walking their dogs. If we see something ahead, we are supposed to duck down a side street or turn around and go the other way.

To give you a taste of how these walks are going, I diagrammed a small portion of yesterday's walk for you: (it ended up looking like one of those old Family Circus cartoons...)

We were heading up the road when we saw dog #1 coming at us, so we ducked down a small side street while they passed. Back out on the main road, we saw dog #2 ahead. We ducked down the next side road, but there was a gardener (the little green stick figure) so quickly went back to the main road. Dog #2 turned left at the end of the road (the way I'd intended to go) so I planned to go right... until I saw dog #3 coming our way. So we turned back. We headed down the side road intending to take a different route home, but at the cross street we ran into a woman (with a big floppy hat). Rita was okay with the woman, so we kept going, but then saw dog #4.

We had to turn back down the side street, where the woman had started walking backwards (the black stick figure). Rita doesn't do well with folks who are doing things outta the norm, so we loitered a bit and then finally were able to get to the next side street and finally get to our alternate route home. 

See what I mean about it not being easy?? This wasn't even at prime walkies time - this was at like 10a.m. on a Tuesday. Where were all these folks coming from??

If you ever have to take your dog on an Avoidance Walk, here are some tips:
  1. Don't even think about setting a route. Just go with it. I'd intended to go to the end of that road and turn left. Then I thought we'd turn right. We barely made it to the end of the road!
  2. Walk in an area with lots of side streets! (We haven't been 100% successful at avoiding other dogs. Sometimes they sneak up on you, and sometimes there's just nowhere else to go, especially if you are on a long straight street.)
  3. Just accept the fact that you'll probably look crazy to anyone who sees you as you mutter "Shoot!" and cover the same bit of ground three or four times. 
  4. Carry a lot of water and wear your most comfy shoes. You might end up taking a long route home!

Now, for some Mirth Watch fun... I googled "well-trained dog" and Skidboot came up right at the top of the results. You may have seen Skidboot a few years back - I think he was on Pet Star, and I know he made the rounds of all the talk shows. Here he is doing his thing:
 
I looked up his web site and he passed away in 2007 at the age of 15. There was a nice note from his dad on the site thanking people for their condolences. He said, "I consider Skidboot's passing a positive thing; as for him, he had no regrets in life." A good lesson - no regrets, people!

BTW... I've never seen the movie Educating Rita. I'm pretty sure it's not about dog training. But I would probably like it anyway, since I usually enjoy Michael Caine movies.

As for educating our Rita, I'm pretty sure she'll never be Skidboot reincarnated, but it would be nice if we could have people come to our house without her scaring them! And I'm hoping a nice calm walk isn't too much to hope for.

33 comments:

  1. LOL love Educating Rita the film. We hope with training Rita gets better. It must be hard with so many triggers. Have a tremendous Thursday and we have your review tomorrow.
    Best wishes Molly

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    1. Yes, hopefully she'll get better. As the trainer said, it's going to be a marathon, not a sprint.

      Looking forward to tomorrow! :)

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  2. What I used to do to avoid looking like a complete idiot when I dodged triggers was say, loud enough for people to hear, "good girl" or "watch Mama" or "leave it." I'm sure she'll get better. Indy has, but that might just be that she's getting old and it's too much trouble to go all ape shit on something.

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    1. I do try that - but the trainer says only say somthing to her when she's doing what I want. If she's in the process of going ape-shit, I'm not supposed to say anything. I look forward to her getting older and calmer!

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  3. We have the same issue with maggie concerning people or dogs coming to our house. we are hoping classes next month will help mom and her. good luck!
    stella rose

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    1. I knew Maggie was signed up for classes but didn't realize it was for the same thing. Hopefully both Maggie and Rita do well with their training!

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  4. I love Skidboot, may he rest in peace.

    I was disappointed to see no references to Billy, PJ or Dolly. Work on that for next time?

    I amd certain that Shoot is exactly what you say when changing direction while on walkies. It's what I would say.

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    1. Okay... you're right... I didn't *exactly* say Shoot - but it was something close to that. :)

      Billy? PJ? Dolly? Guess I have some googling to do.

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  5. Well, you must go to Netflix and get "Educating Rita" at once! It's great. I like the drawing of your "silly walk." I'm thinking maybe we'll just rely on Reggie to tire Rita out during Sat. sleepover and avoid walkies this time.

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    1. It was definitely a "silly walk." And, yes, I was thinking you might want to skip the walking for the sleepover!

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  6. I've never seen Educating Rita so I can't comment, but I can sympathize with you regarding reacting dogs on walks. There are still times where I literally have to drag Delilah away from a dog that is barking at her. We work on it constantly but it still happens.

    Keep up the good work, you'll get there!

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    1. Yep, as I commented above - we are prepared for this to be a marathon and not a sprint!

      And, yeah, if the other dog is reactive too - that's when she reacts the worst!

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  7. Have you done just a regular obedience class with Rita or is she too reactive for that? Sometimes just learning to focus more on the handler helps the dog be less reactive.....That way, when on walks, you ask for eye contact when you see a trigger, and provide an extra yummy treat. I imagine your trainer will work through that kind of stuff....

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    1. I wanted him to check her out before signing up for a class, but he said she would be fine to sign up. After we do a couple more one-on-one sessions, we'll sign up. He said it would be good for her to be in a controlled environment w/ other dogs on leash.

      I was trying on my own to train her to focus on me and then give her a great treat. It would work sometimes, but other times I just couldn't get her to look at me. She's on VERY high alert once we see another dog.

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  8. Another avoidance tip - go early in the morning before most folks are out. That's what I do with Jack as he has some challenges too. A trainer is a great idea - has helped us immensely. Also, My sister rescued a dog from Mexico - her name is Tally, she looks like a cousin of Rita's. Check out our Tale of Tails my sister wrote about her on our Blog.

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    1. We are not early folks... Especially Rita! She LOVES to sleep in. We went out again today at 10 and only saw one other dog and she actually walked past it with zero reaction. (Whoohoo!) Unfortunately, she did lounge at one gardener and one motorcycle though. Oh well - the dog thing was one for the win column.

      Wow - just looked up Tally - she looks a lot like Rita! (Rita also had mange when we first got her.) Funny, because I've since met/seen a lot of dogs that look like Rita, and I've had 2 folks ask me if she was from Mexico. They said, "She looks like a Mexico dog."

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  9. I love Skidbood. He probably did more to encourage people to train their dogs than any other dog or person. And he always seemed to have so much fun and to know how entertaining he was.

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    1. You're probably right. He was a great ambassador!

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  10. Sorry for rita's issues. far too often things happen to rescue dogs or shelter dogs that the ne owners don't know and have to take care of the issues because they love them and want to help them. glad yr working with a trainer and in time patience and desenisation i think you will makw rita less reactive and scared. good luck to you both. love yr map

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    1. Yeah, sometimes it takes a little work, but it's so worth it. We are working with the trainer who works part of his time at the shelter where I volunteer.

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  11. Hi Jackie!
    Aw, Rita sounds and looks lovely, but what a lot she's been through! That walk sounded so hard, good luck with training her. I'm scared of most other dogs too, but that's because I'm a wimp!
    Pippa :)

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    1. Oh, Pippa - Rita's a wimp too! Just last night she shrieked when she accidentally got caught up in a branch out in our yard in the dark. Scared the heck out of herself (and me!).

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  12. Typist dog has similar problems and she has been on similar walks herself, and then just when things seemed to be going better this dog got loose and came and bit her dog. The other dog ran from the other side of the field - past other dogs - to get to hers. SO it's a few more steps back!

    Good luck

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    1. Oh, that's awful about the dog passing other dogs to get to hers! Something like that would definitely set Rita back! So many things to be on the watch for when out on a walk!

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  13. My mom confronts this problem head on. She refuses to avoid other dogs and sometimes we react to other dogs but she holds on tight and forces us to go by. Most of the time it works well, sometimes it is a bit scary but she figures if we avoid others it will never change. Good luck training with Rita.

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    1. We do have one walk we do where we walk past a coffee shop that always has lots of dogs outside. I call it "walking the gantlet". Rita actually does really well when (most of the time) if we walk confidently right up to another dog - but I'd like to feel more certain about it. I'm sure we'll be fine eventually - we just both need some work.

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  14. Apologies... laughing so much at your walk map and description. Good luck with that avoidance thing! Sounds to me like good mental exercise for the human ;-)

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    1. Yes, it is good mental exercise for me! Have to stay on my toes - sometimes literally as we jog to duck down a side street and avoid an oncoming dog!

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  15. Loved your map! I understand your trainer's thinking in trying to keep Rita below her "threshold" and know how hard it can be to accomplish sometimes. When we adopted Wrigs nearly 7 years ago, we discovered that he had a few issues. He overcame most of them, though he still gets excited when people walk past our house on the street.

    Susan and Wrigs

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    1. Yes, she has a low threshold! Glad to hear Wrigs overcame most of his issues. I think Rita will too!

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  16. I so love your diagram of The Avoidance Walk! The wieners are maniacs, maniacs I tell you, so all walks are avoidance walks. Thankfully not a lot of people are walking their dogs at all hours of the day around here, so it's pretty easy to avoid other dogs. Cats, however, are a different story. It's funny, because whatever they see pass by outside the front window, they go absolutely ballistic over... whether it's a dog, a person, a cat, the UPS truck, the mailman, or God forbid - all of those at once! They don't just bark - they lunge at the window. But on walks, they mostly (MOSTLY) control themselves and don't get too crazy. Except when Austin sees a cat. Then it's all over. You better have a tight grip on the leash and be ready. Whatever he is mixed with... he is STRONG. Walking him feels like walking a much bigger dog. Anyway, we have been considering training for all of their "issues". Will definitely have to be one-one-one. They are not ready for a group class.
    Rita is such a doll. I'm sure she will improve with her issues with a little work. As for the "anything that could be a weapon" fear... does she also react when you or hubs has something like that in your hands, or only strangers? Like is she bothered when you break out the broom?

    P.S. I keep up with all your posts - I'm just super far behind on commenting.

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    1. Oh, no worries - I understand. It's so hard to keep up with the commenting on all the blogs I like to read!

      She's fine with us having anything weapon-like in our hands. It's just strangers. For instance, the first time she met my 86 yr old friend, who walks with a cane, she was very scared and cowered, but now she knows Mazli is okay. One weird thing she does though is keep barking at any overnight visitors. Like when my mom stays over, she gets used to her being here, but then when my mom comes out of the guest room in the a.m., Rita will run and bark at her! It's like she forgets!

      It's funny how a little dog can make themselves into this FORCE that seems to weigh about 10X as much!

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  17. Interesting! I wish there's a turtle trainer too.
    Good luck...hope Rita can be much better after the training :)

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