This dog is a natural!

Even though one of the things we are cutting back on is boarding, I am keeping a few places open for clients with only one or two dogs and keeping our total boarding numbers down to only two or three clients. Currently all these spots are filled and each one will be staying with us for a month or more. These are the type of clients I prefer to take on since it gives me time to work with them (at their owners request) and they can easily fall into our normal kennel routine.

One of our boarders is Skookum... a very large, very energetic husky. His owner gave us full permission to work with him as much as we would like and considering he is still intact this was a very good thing. Dogs that have not been fixed usually have more anxiety and dominance issues, especially males, and considering that I have a few youngster boys exhibiting the same behavior the match up is sure to be 'interesting' if all the dogs are not introduced properly and order is not enforced right from the start.

Now if the owners prefer that we not work with them their dog they can stay in the boarding pen and have full use of that area, safe and away from any of the others that might cause trouble. But since Skookum has shown clear signs of hyperactivity I hated to keep him on a chain for long. We soon found ourselves working with this guy and were blown away by his willingness to learn.

Below you will see a short video taken last night of our work with Skookum. This was only after three evenings of working with him around the yard, walking him on a leash. Tonight was his first night leash FREE... yes that's right, this active, super high energy husky has no leash on while I'm working with him! And I don't have any treats in my pockets... imagine what this guy would do for food!

In the first section of the video he breaks away and runs to James who is manning the camera but quickly recovers and comes back to continue with his work doing a loose heel at my side.

You can see he still has a ways to go in focusing but for a working dog he is waaaaay beyond what most huskies can do. Granted all dogs can all do this with time but Skookum is a VERY fast learner and Ive applied all the basic dominance work before hand. I believe this is key to his willingness to be by my side. Many dogs need a leader to follow and I know hes been watching me work the other dogs and taking notes. My guys know who their leader is and this stops a lot of troublesome behavior before it has a chance to start...

You can see how much distraction there is in the yard. All the dogs are loose except for Hera, our other boarders and the foster dogs. I'm not sure exactly how many dogs are running around there but as you can see its quite a distraction.

Two of those dogs, Remus and Thani, are ones he previously had fights with when we were doing introductions in the boarding pen. Those fights were my fault since I was turned away from Skookum and didn't see his dominance behavior before it escalated. But you can see Thani quite close to Skookum and Thani responds well when I call him away from getting too close. These early training episodes need to be worked in gradually without too much stress and having another young dominant male next to Skookum so soon might start another fight.

Ive been working with him on his tail set (straight up, stiff and still is dominance) and hes getting the idea that I want to see a 'happy butt' not a angry one. If the other dogs (especially my intact males) see a stiff tail they are more likely to start a fight. If Skookum has a happy tail he is able to learn in-and-out interactions where he can sniff and walk away knowing that every confrontation doesn't have to be a fight and every dog isn't going to give him trouble.

There are about a thousand and one tricks Ive been using to teach him and the rest of the dogs but it would be impossible to list them all here so the video can speak a bit on the success of that process...