What a good break

Hey all,

I took a day off after my disastrous "work" with Peepers and the sisal perch. I needed to regroup and work through my issues with pushing too hard and really just being dense.

So today was a busy and really kind of disturbing day for the birds. The cleaner came, and so they were outside with Bungee and Dempsey for part of the day. when the cleaner was almost done, I wanted to move Tiny (our foster pony-sized dog) outside and bring in the little ones. So I did this, and left the birds outside. Peepers blew an absolute hissy fit, and was scared to death of Tiny (who wasn't that interested). So I moved the birds inside, which removed the immediate problem, but still left Peepers a little upset and discombobulated.

A little later, I decided to try training, but since I knew Peepers was having a rough day, I decided to start easy. I did step-ups and recalls with both birds, then took a break. After a bit, we got going again, and this time I pulled out the red perch to do some sends to it. Peepers did very well. He was very distracted, but every time I said "ready" he would focus on the perch, and he went straight to it when I cued him with "go". Every time. It was cool, because he'd be looking around, clearly upset, then when asked would just get right in the groove. It's the kind of thing I really love to see, and gives me a good glimpse of what is possible.

Naturally I haven't done a thing with the dogs. maybe tomorrow...