Monday 26th February 2007

I spent the whole weekend working on the sit command with Molly. She has been relatively slow in getting the hang of this but after a lot of gentle persuasion over the 2 days of the weekend we are making great progress. On Saturday I gave her two ten minute sessions in the morning with an hours rest in between. Walking her on the lead around the garden and every few paces commanding her to sit and gently putting her in position. She was still reluctant to sit after this. In the afternoon I took her to a stubble field that has a some grass growing through it now for a run about. Mainly to get her used to different environments. I brought the reteiving dummy with me and gave her 4 retreives in the longish grass/stubble. This was a great exercise cause eventhough I only threw the dummy about 10 yards she had to search for it. She is much better now at coming straight back to me. On the 3rd retreive she went past me and lay down but I walked backwards away from her calling her to me and came in straight away. The last retreived she did perfectly.
On the walk back to the car I had her on the lead and decided to use the opportunity to do more sit exercises. I told her to sit and put her in position and then walked on after lots of praise. The next time I commanded her to sit she DID! I gave her loads and loads of praise and walked on again and gave the command again. Same result. I left it at that and went home.
On Sunday I put her on the lead and walked round the garden again to continue on the sit. She is now sitting well while on the lead. Any hesitation and a slight jerk on the lead has her on her bum. I am going to give her lots of practice at this over the coming week to perfect it. Tonight I am going to try her with the lead trailing on the ground. Gradually working up this week to have her sitting 100% while off the lead. Thats the plan anyway. I am in no hurry though so if she is not ready then so be it.