You are, and always have been a good man, Charlie Brown, or at least I have agreed with all posts on this forum for a very long time. It is not surprising that your mate is a good person too. Thank you for your patience with this dog.

Keep on plugging, ajbrown. It surely takes a lot of patience, doesn't it. Nothing can make one feel more inadequate than having a dog you can't "fix." We have a foster now who simply won't eat dog food. And even with the people food she'll eat, we never know from meal to meal if she'll eat it or turn up her nose. She came to us after a traumatic week for her, losing her home at age 11.5, needing six pills a day. Thank goodness for my vet suggesting marshmallows, because she shuns cheese, fake cheese (Velveeta), hotdogs, bread, peanut butter... you name it.

Forget about Come, Sit, Stay. She's apparently hard of hearing. Obviously never walked on a leash. But at this point I'd be happy if she just ate on a regular basis. Her owner died after a long illness, and the daughter took her to a shelter in Louisiana. She was driven 18 hours to Tampa in a van wth other dogs. My vet thinks she's grieving and traumatized somewhat. But she's starting to wag her tail.

All these poor rescues have their back stories & problems. I hope to achieve the same level of patience as you have. Sorry for hijacking the thread, but I thought you might like to know you're not alone.:o

To those who foster dogs who have been through traumatic situations, my hat is off to you. :ho: :BigApplause:

You are a really neat & kind person.


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Aw shucks, DB. Thanks. Just a sucker for old animals in need.

Cfrance, posts like yours are not off topic. Sharing experiences good and bad is perfect for this thread. I have only shared the good ones :D

The older the dog, the tougher the task. It is wonderful you are taking on such a task, have fun with it and please let us know how it goes...

Another important post - sand away!
 

I now can ‘sand’ Z’s nails with the Dremel. I am doing them more frequently than normal to reduce the length of the quick. Sometimes a do one paw, sometimes two, never four yet. I stopped doing just one as I would forget which one I did :). After the whole process there is much ‘good dog’ praising and ‘tail wagging’ and a half of a cookie.

I have learned a couple of things. The front paws are tougher for a dog that is nervous as their nose and eyes are closer. They can smell the ‘naildust’, see the Dremel. Physically restraining a dog is not the best method; it just makes everyone more nervous and a handler can never be frustrated or nervous. I am fortunate with the fact that I do not have to worry about any behavioral issues to humans <knock on wood>. My ‘knock on wood’ should not be taken to mean I think Z may have aggression issues to humans. I do not, she is a sweet girl. I just often add that in for my own superstition…

What does this process look like? I rely heavily on her other training and IMO this is critical to everything we work on. I use the commands come, sit, down and stay when doing the nails. It is not until Z is down and somewhat relaxed that I get in position. Even before the process starts the Dremel is on. <IMO> This is not the time to comfort the dog by petting or saying things like "it's OK" and " do not worry". All the dog knows is that she is working on come, sit, down and stay and hopefully learning that nothing bad will ever happen while she is with me.</IMO>

I recently did her front paws. It was about noon, I was headed out to find out why my step mom’s cart only goes in reverse and on a whim, I decided to cut her nails. I am in the living room, I turn on the Dremel and set it on the floor. I call Z, ‘Z… come’… and she comes over. I tell her to sit and she does. Down takes a bit more convincing. I will repeat a command two or three times in a situation like this (but ordinarily I never like to repeat a command). She lays down and I move into position, I am trying to lay on my elbows with an elbow on each side of her and almost no weight on her. I do this and pick up the Dremel and she backs out. I do not try to stop her or restrain her. I set the Dremel down and we start all over. The second time she let me take her paw and almost start; the third time was the charm.

You get to the point when handling the same dog that you know the task at hand is going to happen. The dog may not know that but the handler must. It may take 10 times to start, but this is going to happen, even if it is only one nail. It is also not done until the handler says it is done. If she leaves it must restart, the handler must end it. As stated, this time it took three times before we started sanding. The fact that she comes back, sits, lays down is a huge deal and tells me she is becoming a darn good dog. :clap2:

Once she is down, we start, if she moves I simply say ‘stay’. If she breaks stay, this is not the time to correct, I just start the whole process over. That day we did both front paws.

My best experience to date was doing her back paws. I was watching TV on the couch, she was lying near my feet. The Dremel is tucked under the end table. I turned on the Dremel and get off the couch to get next to her and she flees, not fast, just nonchalantly walks away like shes getting a drink. I call her, sit, down and this time I give her a light shove on her shoulder and say 'over' (she does not know this command yet). To my amazement she stayed there on her side. I moved in and started sanding; by the time I was done with her two back paws Z almost looked asleep. I looked at my wife who was in the kitchen and said wow, did you see that? :shocked:

Next we need to get back to dog on dog work… my wife is visiting friends up north, so Z and I will be spending lots of time together…

Love this thread!
 

Z and his handler get a big fat A :popcorn:

I second that!

Your story is such a great reminder that these things take time and patience. I've often read the key to teaching a dog new tricks is to break the process down into individual steps and address them one at a time. You seem to have done that and achieved good results. Bravo!

Awww What a wonderful story!

What a wonderful thing you are doing.

Thank you!
Angie Fox

Miss Z and thunder day
 

I know what you are thinking... another post already... Z was too adorable yesterday to not share.

A couple of weeks ago a typical FL downpour started. Z gets up and casually goes under the end table in a corner of the room between a chair and a couch (thunder cave).

I was surprised as there was no thunder just wind and rain. I opened the lanai door a bit and called her and she came over. She would not even look out the door never mind go out. I went out she went back to the cave and slept.

This leads up to yesterday. First she had a long ‘detoured’ ride to Chatham from Mallory, then spent a couple of hours in my step mom’s HOT garage watching me work on a golf cart. On the way home, I took her down to the Polo Field to let her run. She does not run wild, she will heel to the cart so she is never far away. I can allow her off leash when there is no one around. I can see someone coming from a quarter mile away and if someone comes she goes back on leash.

Yesterday, she never did run, we were just hanging out walking around off leash about 50 feet from cart when a distant thunder could be heard. With no panic or rush, Z simply turns to the cart and walks back and hops in. I laugh when I see her do this like if she goes slow enough no one can see her. One time I called her and she came out of the cart all the way to me long enough for me to say ‘good come’ and then she walked back.

She is not in a state of panic, not panting, licking licks or shaking… I called her again and this time she would not come. This is the first time she has done that for quite a while, but it is understandable in this situation. I could have headed home, but the storm was distant and right or wrong I felt this was a moment to help her and learn more about her (selfishly I was hoping she would poop so I could drop it in the poop canister :evil6:).

I put the leash on her (normal collar) and gave her a slight tug to get her started and off we went, as we walked we heard another distant rumble, and I could feel her try to turn on the leash. I do not even look at her and keep going which she follows :2excited:. Again we are about 50ish feet from the cart, no one around, so I take her off the leash. She walks around a bit but then ‘sneaks’ back to the cart. This time as she was about half way back I head out another 20 feet and hide behind one of the big trees on the edge of the driveway that runs around the property.

I was extremely curious what she would do. I peeked out from behind the tree and she was standing next to the cart looking back trying to find me. She then started sprinting to where I last was and as she approached I popped out and she came over with a big tail wag. She is always such a happy dog.

If you are familiar with the Polo Field, I cross over the driveway towards where the horse fields are and still off leash, she follows. We walk around a bit, I could not hear any more thunder and she finds a spot and … well you know… We head back to the cart, drive over and drop off her payload and head for home.

To top the day off as we head back to Mallory we were caught in a heavy downpour. She managed just fine.

There is no point to this post, Z is not ‘cured’ of thunder, I just found Z adorable through all of the drama.

" I laugh when I see her do this like if she goes slow enough no one can see her."

I love this story, especially the part quoted above. We had a big black fluffy dog when I was a kid, and he would hide his head behind a tree if he didn't want to come inside when my mother called him. His whole body from the neck back sticking out, but he thought he was hiding!

Nice to see that "Z" and you are bonding nicely while I am away!