So when I got there today Bailey was in his crate in the den waiting for me. When I went into the den he jumped up on me and gave me some hello kisses. Then we went straight into the light switch training. Today we did something different. As you may know we have been giving Bailey chicken treats when he actually flips the switch and kibble when he touches his nose to it. We have been doing this because in the past he lost interest in the task because he wasn't getting very many treats and became frustrated and confused. But today he was only given a treat when he actually flipped the switch. He did great and flipped the switch 75% of the time. And he did not show any signs of frustration or disinterest when he wasn't getting treats.
After the light switch I wanted to do a few games of hide and seek. Unfortunately Bailey was not interested. For the first game I went to hide outside of the tennis courts and my aide practiced sit and down commands with Bailey while I hid. She then said "go find Eva" and Bailey took off running excitedly like he usually does. But after looking around the tennis courts for about 10 seconds he stopped and decided he was much more interested in sniffing the concrete than trying to figure out where I was. He eventually casually walked my aide out of the tennis courts to where I was waiting, but it took forever! But when he found me he did happily jump up and give me some kisses. We tried one more game but it was clear that Bailey just wasn't into it today. So I decided to play a different game with him and we worked on fetch. He's slowly getting the concept of chasing, and returning the ball. And to reinforce this behavior he was given chicken treats and a click whenever he brought the ball back to me or my aide. Then it was chill time. Bailey was soooo tired and immediately crashed out within two seconds.
We let Bailey take a good long nap and then did one more light switch session. This time I wanted to see if Bailey would flip the regular switch instead of the bigger one, and he did! His batting average went down a bit but he still flipped it about 50% of the time. After that it was lunch time and Bailey crashed out once again. As soon as we finished lunch it was play time.
Bailey's brother Liam was there today so it was a lively session. At one point Bailey decided that (like many of his buddies) I needed a deer antler to chew on. He picked one up and began carrying it towards me. I thought he would just lie down next to me and enjoy his treat but instead he clumsily jumped up on me and held it to my face before dropping it in my lap. It was as if he was saying "Here Mom I got you one too"! He and his brother were again super cute today.
That is so cute about the deer antler, Eva. My dogs will sometimes try to put the toy in my mouth, like they would their littermates...they try to get me involved in the game. Sounds like maybe Bailey was trying to let you play with his favorite chew toy. :o)
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