Haley Harding

 Hello again! It is week five and I am failing miserably. I have not stayed on track with my action plan at all and I am honestly pretty frustrated. Coco has decided now not to listen at all and that she is going to play with the sheep dog and not learn anymore. I finally cracked down on her last night though and she actually listened to me. I really hope that it is ok that I am not really following my action plan, and if not, oh well such is life. It did help that our sheep dog (Tank) was with us last night right next to the sheep so Coco was so much more calm.  This is a picture of Coco and our new kitten when we were in the barn. I guess it's not necessarily relevant to this blog but I thought it was cute and that I should share this picture.   This is me and Coco last night trying to get her close to the sheep. I couldn't really get a better picture because she was pretty scared and wouldn't leave my side, but progress is progress! I am trying really hard to get ...

 Hello again! I'm sure you are tired of hearing about my dog by now, but just a few more and then I will be done. These past week we did not have a blog so this blog is the first one in two weeks. I actually got a lot done with Coco in that time. I was about ready to give up because she wasn't making progress at all, but then she really surprised me. I took her along for a few rides in the pickup with me just to try and see if she still gets car sick, and she actually went on the whole ride without getting sick, which is pretty exiting. Now she thinks it's a great idea to run to the pickup whenever we drive anywhere with it. On Sunday though I was kind of disappointed that she did end up getting car sick when we were hauling bales, but on the bright side I was able to open the door fast enough so she didn't throw up in the pickup. I am glad that we made some good progress with that though.   This is me an Coco riding in the pickup together going to shut gates and run pa...

 This week was actually a lot better than last week. I started bringing Coco into the pig pen with me and now she is not afraid of the pig anymore. I still would like our progress to be a little better, but I'll take what I can get. She is also really timid around equipment, so I decided to take a break from the animals and try to get her used to loading up in the pickup. She has been in there before, but she always gets nervous and pukes so I wanted to slowly build up her confidence. This weekend I told her to load up in the the drivers seat expecting her to jump to the passenger side, but she just stayed on the floor so I had to drive with her at my feet. I actually think this helped a lot because she wasn't nearly as scared and was willing to get back in the next time I had her load up.  This is Coco sitting the the drivers seat with me just looking out the window as happy as can be.  I am really hoping to move forward this week and have her get used to herding the she...

      This week was a little more challenging with training Coco. I chose to start introducing her to smaller animals to ensure her confidence in herding. She did not respond well at all. She came with me to the barn where the animals were at, but she was so scared she wouldn't approach them. She did however stay by my side while we were inside the barn. I think I'll have to repeat this weeks plan so she can gain some confidence. I was happy that she stayed right next to the fence while the sheep were sniffing her, so that makes me feel a little better and lets me know she has potential to overcome her fear.      To start her training for next week, I'll start taking her down to the barn with me more in order to just get her used to all the animals. I also found an interesting product on Amazon that is supposed to help run off energy and help practice herding for dogs. It's called a herding ball which is technically meant for blue  healers, but I think...