I was watching over a friend’s house this weekend. I was really excited to do it because they have a massive fenced in yard and said that I was welcome to bring Ricochet over. This was going to be the perfect opportunity to work on recall, to practice listening outside, and to get in a really good game of fetch. Nothing could go wrong.
Now fast forward to the part where everything went wrong. I release Ricochet into the yard and he is so excited by the amount of room for activities that he begins darting around the yard, running in circles, and mostly just being a maniac. This is no issue, I’ll just give him a couple of minutes to explore the environment before we get to work. I wait a bit before grabbing my secret weapon…his FAVORITE squeaky ball. I call his name. Nothing. I squeak the ball. Nothing. I wait until he is accidentally maybe kind of running in my direction and throw the ball. He looks over excitedly…and then proceeds with his planned activities (which, clearly, do no include listening to me).
I let it go. He’ll tire out. I realized I should have grabbed the training leash from the car so that he didn’t have quite so much freedom. I’m not going to worry about it. Today can just be for fun and free play and then, tomorrow, I’ll put him on the leash so that we have more structure. This is what I told myself. This is what I believed. I was happy with this decision. I was happy until that dang rabbit came into the yard.
It seemed to happen in slow motion. Mr Rabbit decided to pick this moment to pop out of the prairie. Ricochet’s ears perked up, he hunkered down, and started staring like only a collie-ish dog can. Oh no. “RIC LEAVE IT!” “RIC, COME BACK!” Ric did not leave it and he did not come back. What he did do is dart off faster than a bat out of hell and chase after that rabbit. The rabbit was fast and smart (well, smartish. He could have just stayed in the prairie). Mr. Rabbit ran across the yard and straight under the fence. Safe.
Nope, Not safe. Ricochet chooses this moment to show me his special talent. The dog JUMPED OVER the 4 ft fence! I ran to get around to the second part of the yard (the yard is divided with multiple fences, I should still be okay). Sure enough, he clears the second fence with even greater ease. He is now loose in the neighborhood, running after a rabbit.
Luckily, Mr. Rabbit went into a bush which slowed Ricochet down enough for me to catch up with him and put his leash on. No harm. The rabbit was safe minus a tuft of hair, and Ricochet was now leashed and heading back to the yard (where he would stay on his leash for.ev.er.).
The whole experience just got to me. My heart was racing and I felt panicky. Waffles was hit by a car because he got overly excited and ran to greet a dog. Ricochet could have just suffered the same fate. It was in this moment that I decided to get truly serious about training. I need to teach this dog to listen and not be so impulsive. Training is about to get real.
The Heralding Hound 