Last night, we took Clover for her first of several training sessions at a local kennel, and for the first few minutes, I was honestly thinking, “Dang, we’ve got a fairly well-trained dog already.” The trainer took each dog for a short walk to see if any sort of training collar would be necessary, and Clover just walked along as if she’d been perfectly trained for years. When the trainer stopped short to talk to us, Clover stopped and sat down.

“She’s good to go,” said Sandy, our trainer.

And then it happened: a long pause for the dogs when Sandy was going over this and that about the training course, about basic dog care, about the basics of training collars. Clover gradually slide herself under the small set of bleachers we were sitting on and then didn’t want to come out.

To say she didn’t want to come out is the ultimate understatement because she became wildly panicked. She began jumping and bucking, jerking and pulling. Sandy was taken aback; I was a bit surprised; everyone’s eyebrows went up just a bit.

We worked with her and coaxed her out, pulled her out, isolated her, reintroduced her — no real change.

“She needs a day of training here if you’re willing,” Sandy suggested.

So this morning, I dropped off the dog at 7:05 and picked her back up at 4:30.

Sandy’s report: at first it was more of the same. More panic, more pulling — she even pulled out of the collar and the choke-chain placed behind it to prevent escape in just such a situation. But with some persistence and patience, Sandy got her calmed down and trained so that by the end of the day, she could lead Clover into any room with any number of dogs with little to no stress on Clover’s part.

The upshot — she was so impressed with how much growth Clover showed that she’s going to be the kennel’s Trainee of the Week next week. And more importantly, she showed perfect behavior during our evening walk.