Hi everyone,

You could probably say that I have not been the most active member
here so far. Have barely had any time at all to do any reading about
clicker training, but the little that I have read leads me to believe
that this might help Gracie to gain the confidence she is lacking at
the moment. My main motivation to join was to help my friend who
adopted Rambo the Chi. (Very appropriate name) He is not quite 2
years old.

I will be "dog sitting" Rambo for about 10 days starting on Wed.
afternoon. When Rambo first came to his new home he was very
aggressive, and with traditional obedience training he is coming more
under control. And he seems to really like me now too, which sure
helps. He spent about 2 1/2 hours with me yesterday, his first time
away from his new home. At first he was totally stressed. Did not sit
still for a second. Running all over the house, back to the door over
and over again (up onto the kitchen table a trillion times!) pooped
in the living room. All this took place in the first 45 minutes. He
kept jumping at one of the counters also, which I found odd until I
realized that his mom had put the leash there. I let him have the
leash which I assume had her smell on it, and he sat right nown by
the kitchen door with his bowl of water and went into waiting mode
but still panting and stuff. So I took him for a walk around the
neighborhood hoping this would get some of the nervous energy taken
care of, which it did. When we were out for a walk he growled at the
two people that we met on the way, but when we got back home he was
way more calm and came to me for belly rubs, which totally surprised
me. At one point he decided that he should try to sit on my lap at
the same time as Gracie, and she wanted no part of sharing my lap. I
was careful to make her the first to get attention etc. Good thing he
is crate trained and will sleep in his crate at night. He is a greedy
little guy with the food too so I will feed them separately just to
be on the safe side. Any other suggestions, without the clicker at
this point? Gracie is quite shy with people, but I suspect that when
it comes to protecting her territory from another little do she will
stand her ground. Overall Gracie and Rambo seemed to get along ok,
although I am not sure how it will be when Gracie sees that Oops!
That guy is not going home tonight. Also, I am really not used to the
hyper kind of dog at all as Josephine was not hyper and Gracie is not
either. This upcoming visit might just help me to loose the weight
that I would like to!

Thanks, and have a wonderful day!

Beth