CAL THE WONDERDOG'S TEST/COMMENTS

My human has been trying to get his email to work for the past several days so I am behind in reading my friends' blogs.

I wanted to comment on Cal's Human Intelligence Test, Cal's Place - Ahhrooooo! The doggiest smelling place on the web, but I found too much to say in his comment column. So I hope, with apologies to Cal, I may comment here. The Twinkie test will not work on my male human. His wife has him better trained than even I am. No “treats” like Twinkies, Krispy Kremes, etc. Sounds boring. (He did put his foot down about chocolate though. So, he has some backbone.) Lots of salads, fruits and, of course, the proper sources of protein. No, he doesn't eat my food. So any food based tests won't work in my home. The other tests may work. I will try them when I get the chance. They sound like a lot of fun.

There is one thing I need to warn every canine out there about. Don't let your human watch Animal Planet or read any of those know-it-all books about training, especially, if they are written by the two legged beings. Unfortunately, my human got hold of the remote, which I thought well hidden, and saw an episode of “The Dog Whisperer” this weekend. Now he is retraining himself and I am experiencing the results of his reprogramming. I used to be out front on our walks (Alpha! Ha, ha!) on my 15' lead. Now I am walking next to his leg on a 5' lead. How embarrassing. But I think I know where my follow ambulator is coming from.

As you may know, I was on the streets for an unknown length of time, see my 11 Jan 05 post. Having to fend for myself I became a bit aggressive. Perhaps I was not properly socialized as a kid, too. Anyway, I became leash aggressive, or maybe I always was. In an attempt to help me and my new human get along with my fellow canine comrades, Bark Busters (Bark Busters - Home Dog Obedience Training) was brought in. Some help was obtained for a while, but my buddy had recently injured his back quite severely and my pulling on the lead had an adverse effect on his injury. So whenever we approached new or known incompatible “dogs” (I don't like to use that word. Humans have turned it into some bad connotations), we would alter our course a bit to put a little more distance between us until we knew how the “meeting” would go.

With time (four years) we have become accustomed to each other's quirks on our walks, but I would like to meet more dogs and I would like to be calmer when I see others of my own kind that I don't get along with. Some times I can really get out of hand. Well, what my buddy learned this weekend has really helped retrain himself and is helping me. I am now letting him feel more alpha on our walks, the part I don't like, but with a light touch and a soft vocalization, he is distracting my focus in uncomfortable situations. Hopefully we can get it together where my human feels alpha and I can meet new friends in a more congenial manner.

So maybe some training isn't so bad. There may be some good come out of it, but loosing the alpha feeling on our walks is a bit difficult to take. I will certainly keep up the alpha pressure in other areas though.
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