Tuesday, November 29, 2016

A FURTHER WESTWARD MIGRATION OF THE PUFFIN

It was November 3, 2016 and Puffin and I had just completed our
last trip--our last flight together. She was much more calm in
her customary place, under the seat in front of me, than she had
been on her first flight west. Since then, we have flown
together many times, but this would be our final journey
together.

I was flying to SeaTac to attend the Washington Council of the
Blind annual convention. Puffin, though she did not know it, was
flying to her new home. She is now enjoying her retirement with
my nephew and his wife and their Jack Russell mix. Puffin now has
a half-acre of fenced yard where she loves spending much time
weather permitting. My nephew's wife does not work outside their
home and does not drive, so she is there to be door-person for
all the dogs. During the week, my nephew's son stays with them
to be closer to his work. With him come his two dogs; a Border Collie and a Pomeranian puppy about 3-4 months old. There is a
fifth Puffin-size dog, a mix who also has access to the property.
All get along well.

After two convention days, I spent one night and the following day
with my nephew and his wife teaching them about Puffin. I had
them do the obedience routine with her. I worked with them on
the "come" command using treats to enforce the likelihood that
she will obey this when needed. I showed them how I have been
caring for her nails--using a grinder to keep nails short and
Musher's Secret to keep pads healthy. I brought copies of all
her vet records for her new vet. She also had a familiar bed
waiting for her that they had taken home after their visit with
us in September. In short, I did all I knew to make this a
smooth transition for all concerned and to tell Puffin she was
now to see this change as her new home.

They visited us over Thanksgiving and Puffin, though happy to
greet us, was clearly their dog now. She has always loved my
nephew and the feelings have been mutual.

Some may ask "Why do dogs retire?" In her case, at 6 years and 9
months, it is earlier than one might hope. Honestly, she has had
some work-related issues throughout her career and some potential
medical issues. She does have fears and this was obvious, even
in class, when she showed extreme fear of vacuums. We worked
with treats to overcome or lessen this. At home it was fear of
the sounds at the hairdresser. We worked there with food daily
for a few weeks to help her overcome this fear. She was jumped
by a dog (no blood) early in our time together and eventually she
started lunging at other dogs--especially loose dogs. We worked
with positive training methods to overcome this. We discovered
that she also has kidney insufficiency although her blood work is
within normal range for kidney function at this time. Most
recently, she has started slowing down in her work and
hesitating. Sometimes we were only sauntering along. Early on,
she was very eager to walk fast.

Her house behavior has been excellent throughout our time
together. Her puppy-raising family certainly did very well with
this. She has remained a wonderful dog and a joy to be around.
Now my nephew is reaping the benefit of her early training. It
made the difficult job of giving her to a new home a bit less
difficult to know that she was already somewhat familiar there
because of previous visits. It has been clear that she favors my
nephew. All this, plus the fact that I still can keep track of
her makes the grieving process much less difficult for me. It
was my option to choose the date of her retirement to give me a
chance to prepare mentally and emotionally for my new partner.

In just a few short days, I will be flying to Portland to train
with my seventh dog. I have chosen to stay closer to home this
time. I received my first two dogs from Guide Dogs for the Blind
(GDB) California campus and will now be training for two weeks at
their Boring, Oregon facility. The clicker training experience I
received at Seeing Eye and on my own has made me want to learn
more about this. I decided to see how the GDB greater emphasis
on positive training methods using clicker and food rewards is
working. Let me say that Seeing Eye puppy raisers and trainers
have provided excellent dogs. Both schools are high quality
schools and the decision to change was not an easy one.

My hope is to blog my training experience again as time permits.
Check here on December 5 or later to learn about my new partner.
I hope to upload pictures as well. Training is a rigorous
experience and with two students to one trainer rather than 3-4
students, word is that we are much more actively involved
throughout the day with less down time while we wait for team
members to work with the trainer. I am not sure how well
blogging will work without having benefit of a computer--only my
BrailleNote.

2 comments:

  1. Thank you so much Joleen for preparing the blog about Puffin. I am sure she will be very happy in her new home. Let us know what is going on when time permits. Holly

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  2. Safe travels to Portland. Looking forward to hearing more on your new partner.

    ReplyDelete