Nina and her new life....

Roughly about a year ago now a couple walked into training classes, with them they had a medium sized black lab cross called Nina. She was wearing a harness and halti and with them they had brought a muzzle. They told me that they had been to another class and was told there was nothing they could do to help them.

Nina started off letting everyone know she was around, she lunged and pulled and carried on as Helen called her as the "Asbo dog". This continued for a few weeks until we all got to know Nina. Seeing her reaction reducing over the weeks was amazing. However Nina's real turn around came when my pet dog Shadow became her friend. We free run them together for a couple of weeks then introduced my other dog Tyler, Nina was needing to know that not all dogs where going to get her and that if she asked for space from them she would get it.

This went on for another few weeks and bit by bit we introduced other dogs, all of them got on well, but the important thing in this is that both Helen and Dave learnt that she wasn't as bad as she was making out, she had just learnt that by creating the way she did she got what she wanted. (Which was to be taken away from the other dogs). However being off lead gave Nina the freedom and the choice to express herself the way dogs need too.

Regards Helen

P.S the photo on our facebook page is Nina with her friends!

Mr Trix and his journey so far....

I bought Mr Trix in November 2011, he was fearful of people, hands and being touched. Although he came across as wanting attention and demanded it, when you actually wanted to touch him his first line of defense was intimidation.

He would not stand whilst a rider got on, he would bite at every opportunity, he would lash out with his back leg whilst fitting rugs, he would scoul and pull faces at everyone in close proximity.

First thing was to introduce him to riding with no pressure, so out came my western saddle and off we went, everywhere, Trix will hack any where. So we did, he is noble and brave whilst hacking, not much scares him, he did stop a couple of times and refuse to walk so i took the pressure off him and asked him to stand and take in the environment and the stimulus that was worrying him.

2 months of hacking and ground work later, he no longer walks off whilst mounting, he no longer bites, he no onger kicks out with his leg. He is changing all the time, he has required patience and understanding, rehabilitation is a timely process. He has been checked out by my physio Becky Walker of Yorkshire Animal Physiotherapy. He had a few tight areas on his back but mainly in his shoulders.

We have started schooling, he has been rushed and pushed faster so he does not know slow, although this is coming again in fairly quick time, he is learning to hold himself without rushing and will in time be able to offer me slow and steady from the beginning. This is a great way to strengthen back and hind quaters.

Our progress is moving quicker than I ever thought, he is trying new tricks all the time to test me and my strenghth as a handler (emotionally not physically). He will try and intimidate me to test weather i have weakened, but the positive move is that others can now go in with him and he will not fire at them or make a move in a negative way.

T Touch is helping with the process and of course lots of mints and attention in a positive way!

Thank you for reading I will post more updates in due course. Many thanks Helen