Mon May 15 14:31:19 PDT 2006

Glindy's Furminator

I've been working with Glindy to get her more comfortable with her Furminator. Glindy sheds a lot, so I need to get her to tolerate longer sessions with a shedding tool so that we can strip out all that loose hair before going out in public.

Glindy has traditionally avoiding grooming like it was a punishment of some sort. So, I needed to modify her associations a bit, so that she'd look forward to grooming instead of running off to her crate every time I showed up with a brush.

What I've been doing for the past week or so is clicking and treating for grooming. I started out with one reward per brush stroke, but am now up to 4-6 strokes per treat. My goal is to eventually get her to sit still for a full five minutes while I groom her uninterrupted, but we're nowhere close to that yet.

Still, thanks to her newly-changed associations, I can usually get at the worst of her loose fur now. Progress comes from little steps like this.

Posted by Todd A. Jacobs | Permalink