I don't think we've done this before which is kind of crazy. Post your puppy photos - or if you rescued your dog you can do the first day you got them. 😍

I'm going to post a new free course shortly that will walk people through engagement. It's what I find most people struggle with - having a dog that actually WANTS to listen. I've also created a new classroom for call recordings as there will be more of them coming. Essentially the classroom is going to change a lot over the next few days so stay tuned!

Yesterday was show day for Amigo, and I was pleased with his performance. Slow halt on the heel free, as I was expecting a left turn so stopped suddenly when the steward said halt. No big deal, stewards are humans, and I shouldn’t have stopped so fast! He works wide, so that was marked, but otherwise a decent round. Oh, and he randomly decided to do a left finish rather than his usual right finish - no idea why! Judge was lovely, and allowed warm up time in the ring. Plus, she gave lots of advice to everyone, especially in the lower classes. I’d be keen to work under her again! Today was pet gundog class for Kairo, and she was much better than last week! Some nice retrieves, although she refused to do any more blinds after the dummy fell down a hole lol. There were loads of crows around, but I was able to break her out of point and regain focus, so that’s a huge win!

If you struggle to keep your dog's engagement in the park - here's a quick hack. Make the entrance point to the park a cue that you're going to begin this game. Do this every day for 7 days. Your dog will anticipate it and start offering you huge engagement from the moment you enter the park. Let me know if you're going to try it below 👇

Our trick trainer set us a Christmas Challenge with 2 main parts - hold/retrieve and send around. For Amigo, I combined the 2 elements into one trick - Decorate the Snowman! His goal was to carry the tinsel and wrap it around the snowman. Kairo performed 2 separate tricks. The hold trick, Reindeer gets the Carrot, involved dressing her as a reindeer and retrieving an actual carrot. The send around was with some singing decorations - no idea what to name this one! She’s easily distracted, so thought this would be a good test of impulse control. Believe it or not, both dogs nailed their tricks first time!