Facebook page.
I have taken to walking him in the very early morning ('cuz my prior 5am waking time wasn't masochistic enough...) as I wanted to get back into a better workout/exercise habit for myself, anyway. I know that despite all best intentions, if I try to do my own workout toward the end of the day, it just isn't going to happen. So that leaves the morning. (Moko gets lots of off-leash run/romp time at the farm every afternoon and an evening leash-walk, but I'm not into serious workout by then.)
We've been getting up between 4-4:30 a.m. walking (with occasional jogging/sprints for short distances to mix it up,) to the village green, and then Moko gets to practice sit/down stays and burpees tethered to the rail of the bandstand while I use the steps/benches and rail for pushups, stepups, crunches, pullups, lunges, and other silliness, (but no one else is awake to see how ridiculous I look,) and then we walk back home. It's been great and the added bonus is that with the morning exercise Mokume is soooo much more chill and lays at my feet happily chewing on a bone or approved toy while I'm prepping breakfasts, lunchboxes, etc. Where before, he'd either have to go right back in his crate after his morning potty, or I'd be multitasking between morning school-prep duties and constantly intercepting him with "Off!" "Leave-it!" "No!" as he tries to counter-surf or abscond with someone's boot, hat, child-toy, etc...
Yesterday, as I was finishing my workout, Moko suddenly leaped to a high-alert posture and let out a concerned whine/growl mixture. I looked where his attention was fixed (it is still dark, mind you,) and noted a man with two medium-large dogs by the poop-baggy station by the entrance to the green and so calmly told him "Thank you for telling me, Moko. I see them. We can go, it's okay." As I was coming down the steps, I was alarmed to note the two dogs come bounding toward us, off-leash.
I called out to the gentleman that my dog is fear-aggressive and please call your dogs!
I'm pleased to say that it could have gone so much worse, Moko, who normally would have been frothing and raging at the end of the lead and biting air, leash, and me, handled it so much better than I imagined! He did some leaping and whine/growling, but not his normal biting frenzy, even though the two dogs stopped at JUST barely outside of nose-to-nose distance, checked out Moko's body language and ran back to their man who was arriving with multiple apologies and clipping them back on their leads. Moko was agitated but way better than he's been in the past, and was even able to hear and respond to a "Sit" command while I briefly chitchatted with the man from a distance of maybe 2 yards.
We're a long way from being bombproof in his dog reactivity, but that was just such a huge step forward compared to where he's been that I wanted to kiss him! (I waited 'till we were home so didn't get a tooth knocked out by an upwardly-mobile, rock-hard DS skull!
)
