Luna loves her food. Of course, she's a lab, right? But she REALLY loves her food. In fact, she gets a little frantic about it. Is someone else eating? What are they eating? How can I get to it? That girl will climb to the top of the food bins looking for a spilled piece of kibble. I've been feeding her in a slow feed bowl (a bowl with a bump in the middle that slows them down a bit) and I've been soaking her food. This helps quite a bit. I suspect someone has been working with her on sitting for her meals because she is quite good at it (nothing more motivating then a bowl of kibble in front of her).
When she eats, I'm going to leave her alone. I might, on occasion, drop a tasty treat in her bowl but I'm not going to put my hand in her bowl or take it away while she's eating. If you had been working hard all day and you were really hungry and you sat down to a meal and someone pulled it away from you, what would you do? I think most people would growl a bit...maybe they would even stab the person in the hand with their fork. For dogs who get a little protective over their food bowl, messing with them while they are eating can cause some anxiety. The last thing you want is a dog who starts to tense up when humans get near their bowl ("Dang, here she comes again, I'll bet she's going to try to take my food again."). Kids are a big no no around the food bowl. Dogs see kids differently then they do adults. They see them more like peers rather than leaders. Even if your dog is excellent around her food bowl with kids around, it's good for kids to learn that rule in general so they don't think it's ok to go up to a strange dog while they are eating.
Because this girl has such a nose for food, we spend a little bit of extra time making sure she is responding well to verbal redirection, recalls, and attention to her people.
We went to a BBQ tonight. Perfect opportunity to see how she's doing in a new setting. As a dog trainer, I commonly hear people say, "But she does this perfect at home." First off, dogs don't generalize well. Because she has learned "down" in one environment, it doesn't mean she knows it in another environment (or on a different surface or when you are sitting down or when your back is turned, etc.). Also, adding new distractions ups the ante. Sometimes you have to back up in your training just a bit. For instance, if she can do a down on a verbal cue at home, in a distracting situation she may need the verbal cue followed up by a physical cue.
Taking her with me to the BBQ also offers us a lot of socialization opportunities. We had a chance to meet a new dog. This is a dog I know well and know him to be good with young dogs and up to date on his vaccines. He's actually a retired service dog and I've known him since he was a puppy. I always want to make sure a puppy has really good experiences when meeting new dogs. A bad experience can stick with them and may lead to fear aggression with other dogs at a later time. But, having zero experiences with other dogs can be just as devastating to her development.
I brought her dinner with me so I had some kibble to work on attention, recalls, and greetings while we were there. It's amazing the amount of training opportunities we can fit into a social event like this. I would much prefer incorporating her training into daily life rather than setting aside time to do training sessions with her. You are much more likely to do the training if it a) doesn't take a lot of time and b) it fits in with your busy schedule.
I'm glad I had her kibble because I could reward her periodically for giving me eye contact. I'll also reward her periodically for eye contact by rubbing her ears and telling her what a good girl she is. I like to spend a lot of time working on attention work with puppies. They can know a whole host of commands and perform them beautifully in a quiet room but, if you can't get your puppy's attention in a distracting situation, none of those commands will help you at all. Some say that they are begging when they come sit in front of you and get rewarded for the eye contact. But this isn't something you do forever. I do this a lot when their young and soon you will find that they are willing to do this without the food rewards.
All our practice with recalls, greetings, and attention tired the girl out. Perfect! Just in time for the humans to have dinner. She got lots and lots of praise for her behavior during the meal. She lay quietly nearby and didn't bother a single person while they were eating. This is impeccable behavior for a any dog, let alone a little puppy. She got an A+ for the evening as her recalls too were stellar and she only tried to jump once during a greeting. Nice job little Luna!
I think Luna is going to need a vacation from her vacation, she is just plain worn out from all this work and play.
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