Ah, well wouldn't you know but I go out to the barn this morning and get the squeaky toy and ...... It won't squeak! I can't imagine what happened to the squeakers in it overnight but there was nothing but a hissing air sound. ???? I was so disappointed!!!! Louie was really in the mood to play. I tossed the toy and he eagerly went after it. He grabbed it, gave it a good squeeze between his teeth, it made the hissing air noise and he dropped that toy like it was a hot coal!! He jumped back a little way and gave that toy the totally suspicious mule look. You know the one when they tilt their head a bit sideways and one ear is hard forward (Makeing sure the path straight ahead is clear if the need arises to get out of Dodge)and one ear is flat sideways towards the suspicious object forming a perfect L on their head. So, desensitization to hissing air sounds ensued. After a while he finally decided he would pick up the toy again. But it was so funny watching him trying to figure out how to pick it up in a way that would not make the sound. He was tying to carefully pick it up from each end, then just barely taking the smallest pinch between his teeth that he could and still be able to hold onto it. He did fetch for me but his enthusiasm was a bit dampened by his suspicion of the hissing air sound of the toy.
I then worked with Marie. Gads but she is not easy to work with. Though, truthfully she is likely the better teacher as she keeps me thinking on ways to inspire her to try and understand what I am asking. This morning was not a good session, or so I thought at the time. Our later session would dispel my discouragement. So far Marie would only target the toy if it was dropped directly in front of her so she doesn't have to move her feet to reach it. And if she doesn't actually touch the toy and I request that she try again before giving her a treat she just stands and stares at me and has absolutely refused to try again and will eventually just walk away. I tried to wait her out this morning. We were in a confined ares so she could not just walk away. But, she wore me down finally as she simply would not try again unless I picked up the toy and we just started all over again. THEN, this afternoon Marie did great! She made her first step of progress in a long time. She was targeting great and going back for another try perfectly. She was touching and even playing with the toy a little, enough so she was rolling it and then would have to take a few steps to touch it the next time. I was proud of my old girl this afternoon.
It was raining hard this afternoon so I just worked with Louie in the barn. He did very well. The first few times he picked up the toy he tried to do it carefully to avoid causing the hissing air noise but then he gave up and quite worrying about it. We only had 20' of space to work in but I'd throw the toy to one end of the space and walk to the other end and he was fetching and bringing the toy to me very well. We may get a good video in 5 days after all!!
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