Bitches in Brace

Since I was a complete slug this morning, laying in bed with my book and a cold bottle of tea, the dogs were rampy as hell by around noon. My lazing about had abruptly come to an end; whether I willed it or no.

The sky was blue and the sun was shining so I decided to take all three of my bitches for a walk. Once my dogs figure out the concept of loose-leash walking, or LLW, I start taking them on walks with other dogs. All of my dogs are now very used to the way we do things and each knows her place.

Mill'E-Max is the designated guider. She wears the harness, halti and leash and walks on the left. She takes this very seriously and on these walks she does a fantastic job at staying focused and finding the best path which will accommodate all of us. Laveau and Bristol wear a brace. It is a V-shaped piece of equipment with an O-ring at the bottom of the V. Nylon straps make up the sides of the V and each end terminates in a bolt snap which attaches to the rings of Bristol's and Laveau's collars. I attach a leash to the bottom O-ring. Using a brace, I can walk two dogs with one leash.

We took a ten or so block walk around the streets in our neighborhood. Spring has truly arrived and here in the swamp, this means that things are growing rapidly and that vines, shrubs and trees are already crowding the sidewalk. Mill'E-Max did a great job of picking the best way for us all, and when I needed to go right, Laveau would pull slightly ahead of her LLW position, and exert a small amount of tension on the leash so I could feel which way to go. Bristol walked between Laveau and Me. The only issue I encountered was Laveau's need to sniff everything because she wasn't guiding. She seems to have two modes; working, no sniffing, and not working, sniff everything. This issue will need to be addressed, because it is neither safe nor necessary for her to sniff everything. It's not safe because she could easily eat something off the ground and since I can't hear; I can't tell the difference between nose down to sniff, or nose down to eat. I'll be doing a lot of clicking and treating for head up, llw, face forward.

Bristol was pretty tired when we finally made it home. She used to be able to go for miles and miles, but for a thirteen-year-old dog, I'd say ten blocks is pretty good. I think these walks are good for her; she's experiencing some muscle weakness in her hind end, and the more we can do to strengthen those muscles the better she'll be.
Once we got home, Laveau tried to take a swim in her water dish. This resulted in water all over my hall, all over Laveau and an almost-empty water dish. Once I cleaned up the floor, and cleaned the dish (because who really wants to drink out of a dish which has been used for a foot bath) it was cold water for the dogs and cold tea for me!


I have an insane jones for nachos so once I cool down and Laveau gets a chance to rest, we're off to the mini-mart for nacho fixings.


Happy Saturday!