I see Light!

It is so easy for frustration to take over your mind that you have to work hard to take a deep breathe, take a step back and be okay with it all.

I was concerned that working Cooper so much this week was going to set him back but it appears I was wrong and as the week goes on, the drive in him seems to be increasing! We've been doing little tricks that may or may not be the reason he is doing better. From information we have gathered via web threads online and then our own ideas on how to work our dog, its paying off!

We've had him out at the pond every afternoon and he is really doing great in water. He brings the bird all the way out of the water up to us, he wiggles and prances around us, happy to show us what he's got! In the mornings, I throw the bird around the yard in a more playful manner and progressively every day he is getting better at just picking up the bird and bringing it to me. I've even let Ellie & Russell out while I am doing this because that seemed to help, he has competition for getting the bird and it put more desire in him to keep the bird from Ellie. Ellie is MORE than happy to pick up the bird, it is funny to see my little Aussie try to steal his bird and get angry at him when he gets it away from her. They are not fighting over it, but using the other 2 dogs really seems to be helping.

At home with his bones, when he is super excited to show us his bone, he whines.. Just this morning for the first time, he whined just a tiny bit when he was showing me his duck. THAT was an amazing difference in him because he is finally getting excited about the birds in his mouth. Yesterday we were throwing a water logged bird and on the 4th water retrieve, he swam right to the duck but it was 95% under water and when he got too close, the bird went under. Cooper kept circling and circling the spot where that bird was but I think he was then pushing it further and further under water and it never popped back up! It took a long time to get Cooper out of the water, he was not about to give up on finding that bird and I think he finally got so frustrated that he found a stick in the water and brought that back to me instead... It was not a good way to end the session (we had no other birds to throw for him) but it was great to see him so eager to find that darn bird.

I did talk with the local trainer who is on the same page as us, I liked him very much over the phone and feel he will be a great tool for us to move forward. He wants to get Cooper on some live birds and thinks the adrenaline of a live bird will really jump start his drive and get him to finally have that "click" moment we've been trying for.