Today, we were being a fancy puppy: we went to a pet store chain (fancy by my standards) and a park in a fancier part of town! (You can tell by looking at the kinds of cars and the foreigners in my video.) It was Saturday too, so decently busy with lots of new experiences.
We started out by grooming: the announcement “brush” means that Chai is about to be brushed. I’m not asking, just announcing. It is not a cue – just letting her know what’s about to happen. This is okay for Chai because she isn’t body sensitive, which is a reason that I focus my training time elsewhere. With a body sensitive dog, I’d work on cooperative care protocols instead.
Then we went to Petco and conquered the sliding doors of the entry: at first, Chai did not think she could make it through!
I then let Chai take the lead exploring Petco – of course, she led us right into the food aisle:
The toy aisle is interesting too – and the people, the sounds, the smells!
We also met a few dogs, I had 3 (?) people follow my let-Chai-take-the-lead-and-then-feed-treats protocol, and then we braved the sliding doors again and walked along a busy sidewalk to Parque México!
Dog encounters at Petco.
Parque México
Exploring, watching dogs, people and the playground at Parque México.
Here’s a compilation of all the things we saw and heard, encountered and smelled at Parque México! Note how Chai’s confidence grows throughout this outing. I’m not only seeing progress between, but also within socialization outings and I love it!
On the way back to the car, Chai got to approach and be fed by a kid in rollerskates and their adult, and then we played another round with the sliding doors at Petco before heading home. The doors were still a little suspicious to her – we’ll have to find some more in the future!
The rest of the day was spent playing with Game and with me and toys: chase the ball – bring it back – trade for food – chase again. We are practicing not only an informal retrieve game, but also switching back and forth between food and toys and the marker cues “chase” (a thrown toy), click (eat food) and “scatter” (part of our end-of-session ritual).