Making the most of weekend walks.

Hello and welcome to our very first post! I am so excited to be starting this online adventure and hopefully connecting with other crazy dog people.

Koa and I usually go hiking once or twice a week, but in general, we try to do most of our hiking on weekdays, when the trails are emptier, and we get a better sense of being in nature, but being the high energy girl that she is, Koa still needs a lot of exercise and stimulation each day. Plus, we recently applied for the Karen Pryor Academy's professional dog trainer certification program, which means Koa has to be able to focus while she's surrounded by other dogs, and since she is easily excited and distracted, we have a lot of work to do to get her ready. Here are a few ways we make the most out of a Saturday afternoon stroll:

For a long walk combined with training, I like to keep a few different treats on hand. The Instinct mixers are a great standby when I already have Koa's focus. The Merrick freeze dried lamb lung has a stronger smell and grabs her attention a little better, but the Good Lovin' freeze dried chicken hearts are stinky, greasy, and absolutely irresistible to my gross dog, and help me get her attention when there's a lot going on. Koa also wears a Kurgo backpack, which I load up with a small water bottle on each side, to give her an extra work out. She also gets to drink the water she carries, and on hotter days, I'll freeze the bottles so they'll help keep her cool as we walk or hike!

Working on Loose Leash Walking

As we walk, I reward her for staying by my side and walking at the same pace as me. I don't mind if she wanders to the side a bit to sniff, but if she pulls ahead, I turn around and walk in the opposite direction until I have her attention. Then I turn back the way we were going, and if she keeps pace with me, she is rewarded. When we first started working on this, it would take us a lot longer to get where we were going, because we were constantly stopping, walking backwards, and turning back around, but she's made a lot of progress and now I am introducing her to the Heel command. I'll write more on teaching your dog to Loose Leash Walk and Heel, but for now, here is a short clip of us working on our leash manners:

The world is our agility course!

Another way we make the most of our walks is by taking advantage of low ledges, stairs, etc, to practice Koa's jumping up and jumping off skills, as well as improve her balance a bit. Since she is not very confident about jumping and balancing, especially while wearing her pack, I keep our jumps pretty low, so there's no risk of her injuring herself. But it's a great way to make the walk more fun and give her a little more exertion. Combining physical exercise with mental stimulation is the perfect mixture for burning energy!

Distractions galore!

Our destination for this walk was Library Park in Old Town Monrovia, which has a nice bustle on weekend afternoons. Koa and I found a nice shady spot in the park and worked on some of our basic commands in the presence of other dogs, kids playing soccer, people on bikes, etc. You can tell from this video that she is very interested in what's going on around her, but still did a good job bringing her focus back to me for some training. With practice, she will get better and better at ignoring the commotion!



That's it for this post — in the future we will share more training tips and videos, information about fun hikes to take with your pooch, and even some doggie DIY projects. Feel free to comment with any questions or post ideas you may have.

Thanks for stopping by!

Tressa & Koa