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Last week was our last obedience training session. It was a good experience, I'm strongly considering taking the intermediate training course. We got a cute little certificate that's up on my fridge right now. The last 2 classes dealt with the "come" command. So basically the dog has to come to you in the most distracted state. we practiced this with a long leash. CK would distract him with food while I would call to him. If he didn't respond I would yank on the leash. And we would do this vice versa. I didn't think it was much of a distraction though. I think his most non-responsive time is late at night when he's been sleeping on his circle pillow. So what I've been doing is calling to him and if he doesn't come I drag him by his collar. Not for very long, just to get the point across. We'll see if that is effective or not. Most corrections have to be immediately after they don't respond. it takes a few seconds for me to actually get to him to tug his collar. he may associate me walking to him with tugging and completely not get the point that i'm doing it because he didn't respond to my "come" command.

He's been a little unruley on walks. it's very odd. some days are great and some days he wants to mark. It's been raining lately and I've been worried that I wouldn't be able to take him on his walks. Luckily this one morning it was still clear and at lunch I came home and noticed it was still clear so i took him out for a quick 5 - 10 min just so he could pee. then at night when I came home it was still clear so I was able to take him for a walk and he was walking very well. I deduced from this one scenario that it may perhaps be that he just has a lot of energy as opposed to disobedience. In obedience class the teacher taught us to do this exercise where we walk a little and quickly turn directions and keep doing this... to teach your dog they need to watch you because at any point you may go in any direction. I've found marley to only walk behind me when I do that exercise but it never translated on the walk. perhaps i need dedicated sessions where i do this for 10 mins straight and then continue on the walk.

this morning it was sprinkling but since it was light I geared up and took him out. I had slept in 90 mins later than usual because it's saturday. it was amazing because when I took him out he pee'd, not marked, and immediately "did his other business". luckily I could see the blue sky an hour later and so we went on a real walk.

So the update on the separation anxiety is that I've been reverting back to the Kong. But this time I put high value rewards. I was bored one day and put some trader joe organic low fat cheese in his Kong and was amazed as he chewed on it for well over an hour trying to get the cheese. He did not care about me at all, it was great for him to be independent. So what I've been reading about treating separation anxiety is to associate me leaving with "good". Depending on the severity of your dog's SA you may have to take much longer steps. Marley was not a severe case. he basically whines for 20 mins and then stops. So I've been giving him a Kong stuffed with some combination of cheese, beef stick, duck treats, kibble, dog bisket, yogurt, peanut butter, and hot dog. I timed him this morning and it takes him a while to get it all out.

I also found out he loves beef intenstine. that seems to be an insane reward.

We also were able to successfully clip his nails. it wasn't that hard to get him comfortable as I know it's a bad experience for other dogs.