The Casual Diner

Hello, hello! Orianna is doing great, and this week we've made some progress. She is finally not pawing at her gentle leader so badly, although I can tell she still loathes it deeply (which I think you can tell by the picture). We've made a lot of progress on wait, and she will do a "wait" when I put down her food bowl before I say "release" when she goes to eat. She is still a casual diner, and is eating only about two cups a day, but this is better than when she first arrived, when she was only eating about a handful of food a day.

The fact that she's not so interested in food is a bit challenging, because it's hard to lure a pup to do a command if she's not interested in the lure! So, I've been experimenting with treats to find something she'll really be interested in and "follow" the down. She is good at sit, but when I try to get her to follow a treat to do a down, once the treat goes down, she just stops worrying about it. So, I've tried several brands of treats, but I think I may have to bring out the big guns: the hot dogs. I had some success with this with Rogue by putting some kibble in a baggie with a few hotdog pieces just enough to give the kibble an extra yummy flavor. So, I think that may be where I'm headed with Annabelle.

So, I'm off for now...see you soon!