Ollie our Borador dog becoming a therapy dog

Last Friday Ollie was assessed for therapy work with the Canine Friends Pet Therapy, a New Zealand organisation working with pet dogs in rest homes, hospices and in schools and libraries to help children with reading.

Ollie is now 14 months old and an active high energy cross Border Collie/Labrador dog, friendly and interested in people.

He loves to learn and to please, but also has a mind of his own and sometimes to clever for his own good. At the moment Ollie is a teenager and really pushes the boundaries so now and then, like jumping on the cupboard were I keep his closed food box and  pushing the box of the cupboard to try and steal some of his food.

Jennifer, his trainer for the coming 6 weeks thinks Ollie has the right personality to become a therapy dog, but together we have to train and work on his obedience and interaction with people.

This coming Saturday we will start and meet more dogs and owners and see how Ollie reacts.

I have been working on the heel command and also on the recall command for the last few days and Ollie is good with the recall, but the heel work is a different matter.

He likes to pull, especially in the beginning of the walk, so I am following Jennifer's instructions and practice every day with him. Ollie needs to learn to walk well on the lead when we start visiting a resthome, he can't pull me along between the residents, not a good look for a therapy dog!

Ollie and Rachel

I would love to hear from other dog owners who are working with their dog as a therapy dog and exchange ideas and stories. So if you read this post please leave a comment on my blog about your dog. I would love that and reply.

I love the beach, mum!