Training Addie: Session #3

Today Matt reinforced heel, sit, and down. I had been working with Addie since Monday focusing on down and she was getting better with me but with him she was doing really well working on the mat. Once she got off the mat she was not as reliable so he worked with her some more. 

Addie is pretty smart and caught on to down while off of the mat pretty quickly. Then he introduced stay. He tied a very long leash to a tree in our yard with her mat next to it. Matt walked her around heeling then placed her in a down on the mat. Without her knowing, he attached the leash that was around the tree and visably to her removed her current leash to give her the impression that she was free.  Matt then told her to stay and moved away from her. He did this several times and she never budged, not even an inch. He worked on stay for about 10 minutes leaving her in a stay while walking farther and farther away. At one point he looked at us and said. Am I on candid camera? Are you having me train an already trained dog to see what I will do? We laughed and said nope. I had worked on stay with Addie but it was never very reliable.

To add more difficulty to her stay, he introduced his dog Letay again. She did real well and only moved once when my husband came outside. This gave Matt the opportunity to correct her to reinforce the stay command. I am very happy with Addie's progress and can't wait to see him bring all of her talents out.