Pebbles' First Day

Today was Pebbles' first full day with us at the College of Wooster. She's perfect in every way! For the past 6 months she's been training at a prison with the inmates, so she knows quite a bit already. She is pretty well potty trained, she has learned to sit, lay down, high five, handshake, walk on a leash, and is very polite. However, there's always room for improvement, so we're working on perfecting all of these commands, and most importantly, getting her socialized. As a service dog, she will be exposed to all different types of people, sounds, and places, so we want to get her used to as many different situations as possible. It is our hope to be able to take her to class, to Lowry cafeteria, around town, and into stores and restaurants without her getting distracted from her "work" in these surroundings. From her breed (bloodhound/lab mix), she will most likely be a Search and Rescue dog, or an autism dog, but this is all based on how she does in her testing at the end of her training with us. We knew from the start that she would be an energetic little one, but us five are certainly up for the challenge!
So here's what we've been up to so far: We all slept in the living room with her last night, just so she wouldn't feel too alone on her first night, and she slept all through the night without making a sound. In the early afternoon, I took her out for a walk around campus to get her acquainted to the area. We had a few issues passing small children and people with their hoods up, but otherwise Pebbles did an excellent job of heeling and walking nicely around campus. We then went in to the Lowry Student Center where Pebbles was greeted and by many passing students. She did a very good job of staying calm and letting everyone pet her and play with her, and she really enjoyed all of the love. Bringing Pebbles to Lowry was also a great way to start informing students about her and 4 Paws and educating them about what we were doing. Later in the evening she took a stroll through the library, meeting new people and continuing to amaze us with her behavior.
We've still got a ways to go with the work that we hope to accomplish, but so far we feel that it is going quite well, and we couldn't be more excited about the months to come :)

Here is a short video of her training so far.

-TCHRM