Henna's Journey...: #7 Day of Training with Snoball

Today we were all tired from our dog picnic yesterday. We worked on heeling, sits and downs, and seizure work. We talked with Karen Shirk, founder of 4 Paws, about what to expect when taking our dogs out in public and into the school. She had many humerous stories of her service dogs. Every school has a different policy and some schools work well with service dogs and many don't. In Virginia we are one of the few states that has the "three-unit service dog team" law. This means a team consisting of a trained service dog, a disabled person, and a person who is an adult and who has been trained to handle the service dog. A child should never handle a service dog. I'm waiting to hear if Henna's high school has hired a permanent aid for her. The aid would also take on the dog responsibilities as the handler.

Today Sno started licking Henna's mouth a lot. She also licked her ear a little. She then rubbed up against her and wouldn't stop, laying herself across Henna and her face. I redirected her and 17 minutes later Henna had a seizure. It was a substantial one. Go Snoball!!! She's alerting well!

All 9 dogs in a "down". We walked in and around the dogs and tried to distract them while they were in a down. All did well! The Papillons get nervous around the larger dogs and try to walk as far away from them as they can. As we practice, we are going to try to put more distance between us and our dog. Hopefully they will remain in a down position.