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Posted By A & B Animal Care on 22/04/2020

Newsletter Edition One

 


Newsletter

                                                          Pre lockdown                           Post Lockdown

Welcome to Edition One of the A & B Animal Care Newsletter! As we are unable to see you and your pets at this time, we thought we could use the large amount of time we now have to write to you instead! The newsletter is aimed to be light hearted and fun and hopefully gives you all a break from this whole situation as well.


 

What have we been up to? As most of you know A & B HQ has moved! We are only across the other side of Pocklington, but luckily, we managed to get in before we were put into lockdown, so the house has taken up a decent amount of this last week, getting sorted. Abby has also taught a couple of online classes and one-to-ones. The plan is to make the classes a regular Saturday morning feature and include basic behaviours, tricks, skills and lots of fun. For more info, contact Abby. Abby has also been doing some videos starring Jasper, which are on her new YouTube channel (A & B Dog Training) and many of them are on our training Facebook page.

Nicki has managed to pick up some more online English teaching lessons, which she usually does when not walking or visiting your lovely pets. This is keeping her pretty busy too. We are all very grateful for the daily exercise though as we are very much missing our walks! Luckily Pocklington has a large number of lovely walks very close by. We share some of these in the article below.

 

Let us know what you have been doing. Are you working from home now? Key workers? Or similar to us and unable to work? What are you doing to keep yourselves and your pets entertained?

 

Daily Exercise Route Ideas

I’ll start them from West Green as that is a fairly central point, but please adjust to your home.

 

1. Cemetery and Airfield. Approx 4 ½ miles.

From West Green head into Pocklington. Walk right down Cemetery Lane and at the very end follow it around to the right into the cemetery itself. In the top field, the footpath out is in the far-left corner and takes you across Amos Drive, along a grass footpath, past a green area and onto the fields. Dogs with good recall are OK off here and there is a lovely clear stream to follow if they are water babies! The proper path follows the right-hand side of the fields, by the stream. Many wander all around the edge of the fields here but shouldn’t really. Follow the stream all the way to a kissing gate and use gloves/ sanitiser as you open the gate. Recommend back on lead here. Cross the paddock (sometimes horses but not the last couple of days) and through the next gate taking the same precautions. Cross the yard, staying by the side of the house on your left and through the gate (precautions used of course). You are right along the A1079 for a very short while here. You can either cross the A1079 for a longer walk along the canal and back (OK off leads) or bear right down Canal Lane back towards Pocklington. At the end of Canal Lane, you can shorten the walk by turning right down West Green and back to the green itself, or turn left here then right just past Wilberforce house onto the airfield.  No gliders at this time so fine off leads again. Follow the edge of the airfield, then bear right along the well-worn path along the field edge until you reach Barmby Road and back on lead. Stay to the right of Barmby Road and level with the traffic island, take the snicket on your right. Brief off lead if wish, back on for car park and turn right on West Green to return to the green itself.

 

2. Golf Course

(Approx 5 ½ miles)

From West Green walk straight up through the town centre, up Union Street and along London Street until you reach Target Lane. Take this on your left, straight across Dennison Road and up the chalk track. OK off lead here if safe to do so. You can go either way at the top, I tend to go clockwise so will describe the route as such but up to you! Continue straight ahead alongside the water plant, through the kissing gate (usually ajar so easy to go through without touching), admire the view across Pocklington and through the next kissing gate (using gloves/ sanitiser) into the wood. Stay on the track straight ahead, people do head left here but that isn’t the proper footpath. Follow around the edge of the wood and onto the edge of the golf course. Course is shut at the moment so fine to stay off leads. Path stays along the edge of the wood, to the left of the fairway. At the end of the wood you can continue straight to follow the drive down the hill and onto The Mile and return to Pocklington. This is a slightly shorter route.

I follow the edge of the golf course to the right, all the way until you reach the holiday lodges. Join the gravel path, then the tarmac drive and bear left along the tarmac drive just after the bins towards the clubhouse. May need to be on lead for this bit, but everything shut so unlikely to be cars around. Take a diagonal across the car park to the far left and follow the drive away from the car park, alongside the first fairway. Half way down the drive, you can follow the public footpath to your right, which takes you straight across the course and will save you about ½ mile. Otherwise carry on until almost the end of the drive, then head right at the signpost before the stone wall and gently downhill. Continue through and along the woodland area, following the edge of the course, then head into Spring Wood as you start to climb. Clear path through the wood to the very top where you re-join the shortened route and head left along the 4th fairway. Stay along fence line to top of Chapel Hill. At the junction of footpaths, head right to the top of the chalk track and return the way you set out.

Training Games:

This can be done with any animal as well, not just dogs!

All my training uses marker words or clickers to let your dog know when they’ve got it right. I have a tutorial about marker words/ clickers on my Facebook Training page (A & B Dog Training) and YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIA3PavoGssqsk7jEU30xjg?view_as=subscriber)

Skill level is easy with harder progressions:

Touch – Teach your dog to touch your hand with their nose (or paw). This can then be progressed to touching a post-it note, then they can learn to shut doors, cupboards and fridges or switch lights on & off!

Method – start with treat/ bit of food held between your fingers and your hand flat and open, palm towards you dog. When they sniff your hand for the food, mark & reward with the food. After a few reps of this, remove the food lure, offer the empty hand and mark & reward from your other hand/ pocket/ food bowl when they touch the hand.

After a few reps of this, start to say your cue word as they touch your hand. I use ‘touch’ but it can be anything; ‘nose’, ‘hand’, ‘tap’ etc.

Then, start to move your hand & say ‘touch’ as you offer it in different positions. Mark & reward when they find the hand & touch it. If they are getting a bit stuck here or not getting it, do a few more stationary touches then try again. Offer the other hand as well. This may be enough for today for a beginner dog.

To progress, stick a post it note on your hand and ask for ‘touch’. When they have done that a few times, stick it to another part of your body, e.g. your shin, thigh, hip, foot, partner’s bottom!

Beware of putting it above their head height as this will get them to jump up to it. If jumping is not an issue for you and they are simply doing it on cue, this is fine. If they are jumpers and you are working on redirecting this behaviour, I wouldn’t encourage jumping at you at this stage!

Reward when they target that note in different positions. If they aren’t getting it, go back to more reps of note on hand. Can do a few now before reward but mark every one so they know it’s correct.

Next put post it note around house so they find it & touch. Then on open cupboard doors, open internal & external doors etc. Eventually you will be able to remove the note and simply indicate what you wish them to touch.

If you have enjoyed this, check out the other videos mentioned above or contact Abby to do a one-to-one or join an online class.

 

Jasper doing ‘touch’:

  

Send your ‘touch’ pictures in!

 

That is about it for this edition of our newsletter. Please send in your photos, walks and what you have been up to as we miss seeing all your animals!

 

Look out for the next edition dropping into your inbox soon.


 

 

 

 

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