New park discovery!

Kirby here-

Well it is a chilly sunny Sunday afternoon here in beautiful Western Michigan and mom and I decided it was time to check out another park. This one too isn't far from our house. Here is a pic of part of it:

There are quite a few lakes in the area and in this park you get to walk around the whole lake! There are paved paths and places to sit and places to smell...it's wonderful:

Check out this walkway below, it actually divides the lake!:On this walkway I passed three dogs! Mom was a little nervous because there wasn't much wiggle room and I got a little snarly, but mom was impressed that I didn't totally go ballistic, apparently I'm becoming more confident in myself! Yeah me! Here is a pic of me on the walkway, I wouldn't look at the camera for mom (hee hee):

You also had to be on the lookout for squirrels as there are tons of trees! There were also ducks. right after mom took the picture below one flew up behind us out of the little creek! If I was able to jump super high I could have caught it!

As you can see, it was an awesome afternoon. Filled with great sights and smells.

So what did you do on your Sunday afternoon? Woof! Kirby

Saturday Blog Hop!

Kirby here-

Well I went to the groomer's this morning, why mom thinks she must do this to me on our Saturdays I will never understand, but she does. Well it totally wears me out and now I found out that shortly I will be visited by some little people, my mom's neices and nephews. I am so excited, but I must rest to re-energize! So since I have found the perfect sun puddle I am going to take a snooze...until I hear the pitter patter of little feet!
While I am sun snoozing feel free to check out these cool bloggers!





-Woof!
Kirby

Wordless Wednesday

-Kirby's Mom

Catch the bird Kirby!!!

Kirby's mom here-

Well Friday nights are usually hectic, I come home, walk the Kirbs eat fast and off to Rally class we go. But, God obviously thought we needed a little more excitement in our lives. When I came in I went into the kitchen and bent down to play with Kirby, all of a sudden there was a ton of noise in my laundry room, which is right off my kitchen. It literally sounded like the ceiling came down! I carefully opened the folding doors and the only thing that had fallen off the shelf was a bottle of cleaner, I looked up and the ceiling looked fine. All of sudden, a bird was flying right past my head! I slammed the doors shut, yelling some obscenities, and got on the phone to call my dad!

Thank God for Dads!! My dad came over and got the stupid bird to fly out of the laundry room, hit the kitchen window and knock himself silly long enough for my dad to throw a towel over him. He promptly brought him outside and the stupid bird flew off! Apparently, my dryer vent tube worked it's way off of the dryer and the bird came in.

So where were Kirby and I? In the safety of my bedroom, peeking out the door! Kirby whined the whole time, I'm sure he wanted to be out there helping my dad. So today while Kirby, my dad and I are fixing my dryer, enjoy the blogs below!

PS: We had our third rally class last night. It is going suprisingly well. Kirby is doing okay around the other dogs (we are still working on the halti collar-I don't plan on using it in rally until Kirbs is comfortable with it), he only snarled a little bit and that was at some new dogs. He does some of the commands very well. He actually wanted to play at class last night and wagged his tail a few times (YEAH!!!!) he is beginning to feel comfortable!

A picture of the almost bird hunter:

We will miss you Scooter...

Kirby's mom here-

Yesterday Kirby and I lost a wonderful friend. My sister's dog Scooter died. Scooter has been in Kirby's blog before, maybe you remember seeing her picture:

Scooter was a rescue from St. Louis Senior Dog Rescue. Scooter's owner had died and she ended up in the shelter. She was adopted and then returned to the shelter and then St. Louis Senior dog rescue took her. My sister adopted her when she had moved from Michigan to St. Louis for a job and decided she needed a friend. Scooter was 7 years old when my sister adopted her, way past the puppy stage, yet not too old to go for a run! When my sister moved back up to Michigan and Scooter became a part of all of our lives. Scooter's favorite thing to do was to hunt for rabbits...anyone with a beagle will understand that! Scooter was a wonderful friend to my sister and then to my nephew who later joined the family. Scooter was the first dog Kirby met, that he liked! Scooter was also kindred spirits with Max (see post below), as they were only about a year apart. Those two loved lounging around together, sometimes even in the same bed!

We miss you very much Scooter, but know that you are now no longer in pain and running around with Max, chasing bunnies.

Forever in our hearts....

Kirby's mom

Remembering Max

Kirby here-

Well tomorrow will mark the day that Max, my mom's first dog, died. I thought I would share a little bit about Max with you. My mom and her sister (my Aunt Lori) found Max on their birthday at the Kent County Animal Shelter. He was listed as a purebred Lhasa Apso (can you believe that!). Max was approximately 1 year old then. He was found as a stray with another lhasa that was very old and had to be put down because she was very ill. When mom saw Max, he was covered in mats. The mats on the bottom of his paws were probably one inch thick and his tail was matted to his back leg so he could hardly wag it. But boy was he excited to see my mom and her sister. He bounced out of the cage into their arms and gave them kisses! Mom had Max for 14 years! Mom called Max her "diamond in the ruff!" So many people looked past him because he was such a mess and wouldn't even consider him. Mom uses Max's story and mine to tell people not to overlook shelter dogs, some may be in rough shape, some may have had rough lives, but under that rough exterior is a dog that wants nothing more than love and to love. Mom and me wanted to share some pics of Angel Max. Enjoy...

Angel Max, forever in our hearts...

Kirby and his Mom

Our first rally class!

Kirby's mom here-


Friday night Kirby and I had our first rally class. It actually went pretty well, considering that Kirby is dog reactive. I got there a little bit early in hopes of talking to the instructor, Sharon. She gave me some pointers on how to handle Kirby with the other dogs, the important thing for me was that she was okay with Kirby being dog reactive. She has had them in her class before and probably wants to help the dogs as much as their owners. So what did she tell me?


First, Kirby and I have to work on the "watch" command. (This is where I say "watch" and Kirby is to look at my face, not whatever else has caught his eye.) Not only will this help with other dogs, but will also help with rally and Kirby paying attention to me. I worked with Kirby on this while in class, he did pretty good, but we have quite a ways to go with it. At one point I couldn't even get his attention. He was watching dogs, not snarling at them, just INTENTLY watching and was just ignoring my command to "watch" me.


Second, was my body position with Kirby. I have read about this. She said leaders dont' lean over their dog. She said you can bend over a little bit to give him a treat, but when you are saying "watch" she said you are standing up, not leaning over. Also, to praise him like a crazy lady before giving him the treat (I added the crazy lady part), because I won't have treats on me everytime.


Sharon said I may want to consider using a Halti head collar on Kirby. She had a lady in a class that did this with her cocker spaniel who was dog reactive and had wonderful results. She said it will come in handy when you need to redirect his eyes to look at you. I did some reading on it, and felt comfortable with getting one. So I was at an adoption event yesterday at a pet store and I picked one up. Has anyone used one? If you have any suggestions I would appreciate it.


By the end of the class, Sharon said Kirby was doing really good. I was able to talk to another lady whose dog was also dog reactive. She was only 3-4 feet away with her dog and Kirby just sat by my side while we talked (AWESOME!). Her dog was also just content to sit there too.


Her class is pretty interesting. She has course that is set up every class in one part of the center and the other part has new commands that you can learn. You get to go through the course with her at least 3 times and she walks you through the new commands. Then you are on your own to practice them. When you are on the course, it is only you and your dog and her. She gives excellent pointers on how to get the dogs to do the commands. I think it's going to be a good class for Kirby. We practice at our own pace, and sometimes I just make him sit or down and we practice the "watch" command. We also go through all his "tricks" while we are there. Sharon gave me that idea, she said doing this will help him to realize that he is safe there. All the dogs ignore his snarling, so he's not getting launched at or anything and all the dogs are on leashes, so he doesn't have to worry about getting attacked again. I'm hoping that this will help to build his confidence up (mine too)!


What's interesting is that I am learning what all the signs mean (there are tons of them!) and Kirby is trying to figure out what I want him to do. Yes, we are building our relationship, I can't wait to see how we are as a team by the end of fall!


So here is a picture of the new rally student:

Again, if you have any suggestions with Halti collars (good and bad) I would appreciate hearing them.

Enjoying Kirby,

Kirby's mom

PS: Harbor Humane Society had 104 dog and cat adoptions in February! WOO HOO!!!