We had an enjoyable walk at Radford park, the dogs love going through the woods. Scenting the ball and generally having fun. We got to the other side of the park near the duck pond when Stanley took his opportunity in scarpering, to pinch the duck bread. At the same time Melvin went “scrumping”. As I had a customers dog with me I decided the best thing to do was to get my remaining three dogs to sit stay at the top of the hill, keep the customers dog with me and fetch Stanley. Utterly no point in recalling him when he is eating (stealing more like). Thank goodness for all my hardwork as the dogs “stay” is solid. I returned with a very norty Stanley to see the three (Molly, Archie and Charlie) where I had left them. Now all I needed to do was get Melvin – he had now finished eating his apples and was coming back to the pack. Some sense of order must resume so I got them to sit at the top of the hill. I tend to point at their bottoms while whispering “sit” at them. They know to sit in a line too!! I walked down the hill and along the track. I turned around to look at them. I waited a few minutes, before recalling them. I wish I had my camera as I could have filmed them charging towards me! Yay good doggies!
When I got home I put Molly, Charlie and Archie indoors and decided I needed to do a little work with the two youngsters. I put Melvin and Stanley to the test as their eating habits are getting them into trouble. I put them on our back path (which has lots of bird tables for them to steal food from) and got them into a sit stay. (I am now learning this is called a long duration sit!) I walked back to the front of the house, I am out of sight and called them. *nothing*, so I called again. Still expecting them to come charging around the corner, I called a littler louder, again nothing happened. So I went back to the norty pups. I have to confess it was running through my mind that they were likely to be eating from the bird tables BUT to my delight I discovered they were exactley as I had left them! Whast good dogs. I felt very proud they hadnt moved a muscle, given I had been out of sight for at least 3 or 4 minutes and the very high motivation for the bird tables…they had done really well not to have legged it up the path! They had cute looks on their faces as they were wondering where I had got to! I think it is fair to say the sit/stay is very steady in my dogs.
