Just in case you thought we were getting far too smug I can inform you that all dogs no matter how far on in their training can have a bad day.
We were out tonight and Sonny apparently about to 'perform' my partner was relaxed and taken completely by surprise when Sonny suddenly pulled away from him to attack a miniscule adversary, a young jack russell about 1 year old. How ridiculous, he was clearly using eyes not nose so I immediately took charge and brought the puppy back to Sonny who was now back under control and had been muzzelled all the way through to meet it. He wanted nothing to do with it, however our other confident dog was able to politely greet and the puppy after initially shaking was happy to meet me and became a bit playful.
This is such a different me to the one of 6 months ago. Such an incident would have sent me home, probably in tears, feeling that the police were about to jump on me and remove the dog. However this incident is such a rarity now and today was partly our fault in that my partner must have not had firm hold of the lead for him to pull away from him. Also very helpful was the owner of the puppy's attitude. She was very laid back and taken as much by surprise as we were. It is so important to ensure we do not overreact when our dogs have an adverse experience. The more panicked and tense we are the more we create a memory for them that could lead them to see all dogs as a threat in the future. This puppy is still learning and hopefully learned today that even a bad experience good turn out well. As I said to the owner at the end she was more under threat from the open poo bag which flew out of my hand rather than Sonny who could never have done any damage! In turn Sonny learnt that he could not avoid a situation with a dog he found threatening and had to face it. What a nana !
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