Veronica in a long black skirt and a zebra top with rhinestones. Hestia walking in heel next to Veronica, jumping up to meet Veronica’s hand with a treat in it.
(Video below.) For years now, I’ve been wondering how on earth Hestia will ever learn how to heel. I thought maybe it was just too difficult to teach her (though she does heel in the ring well).
Since the heeling buddies group has started, we’ve gotten video almost every day and I’ve been doing training every day with heel work as per my new year resolutions.
Turns out that when I actually practice heel with her instead of dragging her around by the leash, she learns quite fast! It’s only been 9 days and she is doing great!
I am especially proud of our video from yesterday where we did a serpentine through a bunch of Hestia’s human friends. And today’s video is very good, too.
So the conclusion is if you think your dog can’t learn or isn’t getting something, work for just 1-5 minutes a day every day on it, before it gets old. This really had jumpstarted Hestia’s heel! Slow is fast! A few minutes at a time has really started sinking into her head. And I no longer think she lacks intelligence. I was the one not keeping up with the training!
The video shows us walking down our street working on heel while using the long line, then stopping to work on stationary heel positions. What you don’t see is a man loading his van with all kinds of equipment to our right, and a neighbor’s dog who likes to bark at Hestia coming out of their house. Hestia didn’t pay her any mind, so the neighbor’s dog didn’t bark! Plusses for both of us!
Those 9 days have made all the difference!! Keep going, Team Morris, we are totally cheering you on! 😀
Thank you!