Milestones Should Always Be Celebrated

Most important things first: congratulations to Maizey for she completed Level 1 in the Training Levels. She has been very close but because of her knee could not work on Come we have not been able to finish. But in just the last two weeks that she has been cleared for normal activity we brushed up her recall skills and she passed tonight beautifully. And thus her Level one is complete!

 "HaHa mom look at me laughing cause you made me wear a ribbon! You're so silly mom!"

After that talking to I gave myself in the last post I went back to her levels tracker journal and reviewed what she would need to do to pass a few other tests. Turns out she was ready for a couple. Sit and down. and very close on several others. So we will be updating you on that as it comes around.

She did take her L2 sit test and of course there was no problem. A+ for sitting. 

"See mom? I can even sit on the couch while wearing a ribbon and waiting patiently for you to take my picture!. . .But seriously could you hurry it up a little?"

So that you have an idea of what Passing Level 1 actually means I have put a brief summary below. Hopefully it will help you feel like this is something that is reachable for all of your dogs and their people no matter what kind of limitations of time or energy there is to be dealt with.

Level One Skills:(as copied from Sue Ailsbys Training Levels Book)

COME

The dog must play the Come Game between the handler and a friend or stranger standing 20’ apart. An actual cue to come is desirable but not necessary.

DOWN

The dog must Down from a Sit or Stand with no more than two cues - hand and voice, voice and body language, two voice cues, etc. It is not necessary for the dog to stay in the Down position, simply to lie down.

SIT

The dog must Sit from standing position on one cue only (may be a voice OR a hand cue, but not both, and no extra body language from the handler). The handler may use the dog’s name to get her attention before starting.

TARGET
The dog must deliberately Touch the handler’s hand with her nose on only one voice cue. The hand in position is, naturally, a second, allowable cue. 

ZEN

The dog must stay away from a treat in the handler’s hand for 5 seconds. There can be only one voice cue, which will be given before the hand is presented. 


It's really not that hard and I suspect many of your four legged friends out there already know much of this. But if you give it a few minutes a day you will see so much improvement and find holes in their reliability that you didn't know were there. And best of all when you get done with level one you can show how stunningly awesome your friends are by making them pose for a celebratory picture:

Meeka says, "Hey where's my ribbon? I'm the better girl anyways!"