Freaking Out on a Wednesday night

Kasey had obedience class last night. Sometimes he is a rock star. It really a depends on how class starts for him. If he looses it, he is done for the rest of the class. The rest of the class was working on walking. He can't get out and walk with everyone else because he is too excited. We had him partially screened, but the motion sets him off. I ended up having to take him out of the room.

Asking him to go from where he is to where I want him, which is to not be so reactive to other dogs, is a huge jump for him. After talking with the trainers, who are my heroes by the way, I think we are going to try to break this down into two separate issues: noise sensitivity ( specifically barking) and movement. This the help of a CD with dog noises on it, I can easily working on desensitizing him to the barking dogs. I hoping this will just leave the movement, which is a common Border Collie issue. Individually I think each issue is manageable. Together this is quite the challenge.

As I write this, I have the barking CD playing. It is on volume 10, which is very low for my player in the study. Kasey is baby gated out of the room because this room is the safe place for the cats. He sometimes barks because he can hear it. It is so quiet that when the heat goes on (because it is 18 degrees here today!), neither he nor I can hear it. Holly is ignoring the entire thing completely.