사라 브루스키 - 여름을 최대한 활용하기

And I was like, let me just look and see what Sarah has coming up. You've got kind of a lot on the schedule right now. I did jam pack it, which is silly because summer is like my favorite time in the world. I live in Minnesota and summer is so brief. And so for some reason, I jam packed June with a lot of things. You really did. So we've got all sorts of things that dogs and people want to do in the summer, right? Playing disc, dock diving, paddle boarding, and traveling. So is that kind of the list of what you and your dogs get up to this time of year? Yeah, I was just looking at that without finishing reading the paragraph. And yep, that's literally my days every single day. We might actually get to a dock every day. But we were swimming earlier today. We played agility. We had our class for agility. And then we went and swam dogs. We'll probably play disc later tonight when it cools down a little bit. Paddle boarding. Yep. Packing up the paddle board because we're going up north this weekend. And so we'll be out there paddle boarding and traveling up north. And so, yeah, in a nutshell, that has happened all today and then tomorrow. Those things. Sounds like a heck of a way to spend the summer. Yeah, it's so funny because, you know, up here in Minnesota, we have like maybe three months. I'm joking. We have a little longer than that of good weather. Not much. And so it's hard to like stay task orientated in our other sports that we could be doing in the wintertime, right? So I have agility, nose work, and obedience that I do as well. And scent hurdle racing, we just started a club here in Minnesota. And it's so hard to be motivated to do those things because I'm like, but I could just be swimming dogs or I could just be throwing fersweeds to my dogs and doing all those things that are just so much fun for us. And so, yeah, it's hard to stay task orientated. I mean, I think we all struggle with that. And, you know, just a little harder in the summer. That's all. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So I think whether because of summer vacation, right, or trialing, our audience is probably more likely to bring their dog along when they travel than like the average pet owner. Since I know you have a young dog who kind of inspired the topic of the webinar you have coming up, what do you think traveling with a young dog can help teach them and what skills do you kind of like to have on board? Oh, my God. There's so many things that our young dogs learn from traveling.

And I try really, really hard to schedule a road trip, even if it's just like a couple hours here, there, whatever, with my young dogs when I have them. If I get a puppy and I don't have a road trip on the schedule, I will volunteer to transport for a rescue or do something where I have to drive, go visit a friend out of state, something like that, just so that I can get those road trips in. Because I think they're so important for our dogs and socialization and building up confidence. And even still, when I have puppy campers, so I do board and transfer performance dogs under six months old, if I have a trip scheduled, that's always a selling point for that. Because, you know, people want their dogs exposed to road trips, exposed to those long traveling times and having to potty in new places and all that stuff. And it's so cool to be able to take your puppy and teach those things right away so it becomes a bit of a normal thing for them. So the big things that I think puppies learn going on those adventures, road trips, extended stays and stuff like that. One is the big one is potting in a new place. Like it can be so overwhelming to potty on the side of the road when there's cars driving by if your puppy suddenly has an emergency potty. But it's such an important skill as well or going to, you know, a fast food place and having potty there when it smells like cooking burgers outside and kids are running around crazy. Like what a great skill to have and being able to put that potty cue or potty on cue and be able to, you know, ask your dog to go potty. That way when you are trialing in the future, you're like, you know, I know you haven't pooped today. So I need you to go potty. They already have that skill set and they understand that when you ask them to go potty that they should go potty then rather than in the agility ring or somewhere where you don't want them to. The other thing is they just learn to settle and relax in the car. So a lot of times with our dogs and our young dogs especially, the only times they go in the car are to go to fun things, right? So we load up to go to obedience class. We load up to go to the park. We load up to go hiking or paddle boarding or whatever it is or go see their friends or whatever. And they just start to learn that car means fun things. And so you get very vocal, very excited dogs in the car and that can be really difficult. And so if you take the time to kind of teach them, hey, you know, the car could mean nothing. We're just going in the car and it's going to be hours before you get out. I'm sorry. It sucks.

But that's going to be life right now. The road trip is a really good way to kind of teach that lesson. And of course, I do a little bit of that or a lot of that beforehand. But it's a really good skill for them to have. And then just the confidence of like moving into new environments, not being a big deal and not asking them to work constantly. So I know a lot of working dog people take their dogs out of the car, work, work, work, work, work, put them right back in the car. Well, when you're traveling with your dog, they get a lot more opportunities just to walk around, stretch their legs, take in the environment and kind of slow down and process things. That I think a lot of times talking more like the protection supports that we tend to lack on with our dogs is really giving them that opportunity rather than focusing on drive building and all that stuff all the time. Other than that, you know, sleeping in new places, that's a huge thing. So even if you don't travel very often with your dogs and you don't foresee them sleeping in a new place, you never know if they're going to have to have an overnight emergency vet stay or something along those lines. And so if they're more comfortable sleeping in new places, that's going to make that whole experience a lot easier for them as well. Or if you have to go out of town and they have to stay at a friend's house or a boarding facility, it's going to be easier for them to do that as well. So lots of skills that they can learn from going on a road trip, even a boring one. Anything you kind of want them to know before you go? Yeah, if I can. So I have a whole list in the webinar about pre-travel training and things that you really want to focus on teaching. So the big ones are potting in new places. So if I know I'm going to be taking a puppy on a road trip, and maybe I don't have a lot of time to go different places and have them learn to potty in new places, I'll just pick different places around the house, like outside. So the front left side of the yard, the front right side of the yard, this really awkward spot right by the sidewalk, you know, that sort of thing. And have them learn to potty in different spots around my yard so they can learn that it's okay to potty and not just in their usual spot. And then I have a huge list, but one of my favorite things to do with dogs on road trips is, I know, don't come after me, but to use a flexi lead. Like flexis on road trips are everything, I'm telling you. Like they are the best thing in the world.

But they come with a little bit of a warning disclaimer because me, if you're like me, I drop things a lot. And so often I'll drop the flexi itself and it comes like clattering after your dog and can really, really freak them out. So if I know I'm going to be bringing a young dog or a dog on a road trip, they learn to be desensitized to that flexi dragging behind them. Because 100% I will drop it at some point and I want them to know that that means to come to me and I will save them from the scary flexi coming after them. So that's just a little bit of a unique skill that I definitely teach my dogs. But most people probably wouldn't think of that. Right, right. And I'm, you know, I'm sure people kind of understand the usefulness even if they don't love them. Yeah, I know. I know. There's a whole lot of things to say about flexis. But trust me, if you like travel with your dogs a lot, like you will understand the love of flexis. They're amazing. So anything surprising or that folks like don't consider that you would include on your packing list when your dogs are coming along? Um, yeah, there was I did come up with a cool PDF, PDF packing list. So things to bring with you and your dog. I'm trying to think if there's anything really cool or unique on there. I talk a bit about the emergency tube. So one of the things you'll see nowadays is a PVC tube with kind of screw on ends. It says emergency contact information or whatever on the tube. And inside of that, you can put all sorts of different things like your vet info, an emergency contact information, any medications that your dog might need, any special behavior type things that they should be watching out for. That way, if you do get an accident, all of that information is right there. You put it right on the front of your crate and it's easy access for anybody that's there to assist you. And so that's a really big one for me is making sure that you have all that information, easy access. Yes. Let's see, because I know kind of personally that it's such a big topic. How do you handle things like ensuring your car or your vehicle actually stays cool enough? And what do you kind of do with your dog if you want to, you know, go sit down indoors at an actual restaurant to feed yourself? Yeah, absolutely. So that is one of the big things is like you have to eat when you're on the road and you have a van full of dogs like I do. And you really want to make sure your dogs are safe and you don't want to just hope that it'll stay cool enough. That's one of the things is, yeah, it looks like overcast, you know, but the sun can come out quick.

There's all sorts of different things. And so over the years, I've tried a few different things. The Marcel, I've tried the Waggle back when it was the Nimble. So I don't know much about it now. And honestly, I keep coming back to just using a baby monitor with my dogs. And there's a couple of reasons why I like it. And I know it's not a super popular thing, but the reason why I like it is it gives me that video feedback. And if you have one that connects to Wi-Fi as well as to just regular antenna, the Wi-Fi sends alert to your phones for temperature or for noise. So if my dogs are suddenly barking their full heads off and I don't want them barking their full heads off, I can go out there and make sure everything is okay. And obviously, I can see that temperature right there on the baby monitor itself. And so that's my favorite one. And I use it every single day with my dogs. So the only issue with it is you need to have a Wi-Fi hotspot for it. So often you can get that from your cell phone provider and then have that running. And then you have to have some sort of power outlet. So like in my minivan, I have an adapter for the car, the 12-volt car to an actual plug-in. And I just plug mine into that and it works out very well. I like that solution. That's not one I've heard of before. No. Yeah, probably not. You've mentioned a couple of times the multi-dog piece. So since you often travel with not just a dog, but lots of dogs, any tips or tricks for kind of managing multiples while you're on a road trip? Yeah, don't take them all out to potty at one time. You will 100% regret your life choices at that moment. So break it down into pairs. Pairs is always easier. Leashes, if they get tangled, then you come right there. And they always insist on tangling when you're picking up poop or trying to tie the poop bag. And so it's just, you know, just take them out two at a time. If you have four, two groups of two is fantastic. If you have three, you know, two and then one, unless you're feeling very, very gutsy and, you know, your frustration tolerance is very high at that moment. But yeah, take your time. Make sure everybody walks. It's really good for you to get out and stretch your legs anyway if you're traveling. And yeah, that way it's a little bit calming for the dogs. You're not frustrated. You're not trying to make sure everybody potties. And you can keep your eyes on them and make sure that they go and they're not getting into the weird discarded french fries on the side of the road or anything like that as well. The random food that they find, yeah. Great.

Do you want to just share a little more about kind of what you'll cover in the webinar that's coming up next week? Yeah. The pre-training stuff is a big chunk of that webinar. So making sure that you are ready in your dog for the road trip and everything's kind of covered for that. Like I said, the packing list is pretty cool. I do have that. So it's a printout thing that you can take with you. Other than that, there'll be, you know, I'll share which kind of baby monitor I use in my setups and stuff like that too and other ways of keeping your car, your vehicle cool in the summer as well. Awesome. So as I mentioned earlier, that is not the only thing on the schedule. So you also have your disc class and bomb-proof behaviors as classes and then two workshops, one on dock diving and one on paddle boarding, all kind of coming up. Do you want to just kind of quickly talk a little bit about each? Yeah, absolutely. So the disc dog class, it's a – technically it's a handlers choice class, but there is a foundation curriculum that goes along with it. So if you're like, I'm brand new to disc, I have no idea what I'm doing. I don't even know what to ask to work on. That foundation curriculum is really nice to follow along. So I know the gold spots are all sold out in that one, but even for bronze, if you don't know what you're doing, there should be plenty for you to follow along and still be able to be successful as far as that goes. I think we have a pretty good range of students that have signed up for it. Everything from brand new baby disc dog people all the way up to people who are working on building their freestyle routines with their second dogs. So pretty wide range on that. Bottom-proof behavior is definitely one of my favorite classes. It still has gold spots available. So I don't know what's going on this year. Everybody wants to be out playing. They don't want to work on the distractions, whatever it might be. I have no idea. But it is definitely one of my favorite classes. I know it says – it kind of talks about distractions, but I also talk about arousal management in that class. So a lot of people always want to know, like how do they teach their dogs to go from being super crazy, high, excited, all the way down to being calm. And we talk about that arousal mobility in that class because to me arousal is a distraction. And being able to apply the techniques we use in that class to like excitedness when they're working is a really good way to go about it. And then dock diving. It's definitely one of my favorites as well, obviously. Typically in that one we have a huge range of people

just jumping their dogs in for the first time, introducing them to go off the dock, as well as people that are just trying to get a couple more inches on their big jumps. We talk a lot about toy targeting in that class as well. So a lot of times people are trying to get their dogs to target that toy and get those bigger jumps. We talk about that in that workshop there. And then paddle boarding. That one's fun. I'm like, I just want to be out paddle boarding right now. It is like 95 degrees outside. It's perfect. My paddle board's right there. And that one we talk about introducing them to the paddle board, kind of some things to think about, about, you know, life jackets and different ways to go about that. And then safe places, etiquette around the public waterways and kind of a broad range of different things that we talk about all in relation to paddle boarding and slash kayaking with your dogs. Awesome. So other than just kind of having a ton of different dogs that you can take along for different activities, you kind of mentioned earlier that, you know, you want to do a little bit of this and a little bit of that. How do you kind of think about balancing, training all the different things with your dogs without burning them out or overdoing it, you know, especially when we're talking about like summer heat? Yeah, absolutely. So Pop Rock is a good one to talk about with us right now because her heat tolerance is pretty low. She's only seven months old and she has a thick coat. And I'm trying really hard to pay attention to her enthusiasm and her energy during training sessions because I'm building her drive for toys right now. And so for her, everything's very particular about what I do and when. So if we're going to do something like DISC where her drive for it is pretty modern and we're still working on building it, it's going to be either early in the morning when it's still cool outside or later in the afternoon or it's going to be when she is still wet from doing a swimming activity. So that's the other thing we're working on is teaching her to swim and kind of love the water. And so she went to the river with us today and she was still nice and wet when we got home. So I went out and threw a couple Frisbees for her because she was nice and cool still from her swimming. And so that's a good way to go about it is like thinking about really hard, how hot is my dog and knowing how much that's going to affect their training. At the same time, we do want to build endurance in the heat and that's a whole other topic that would take an hour out of two hours to talk about. Be a good topic though. Yeah, it is.

So when I'm trying to do stuff like that, then I just focus more on let's go for a walk outside, an off-leash walk or a hike or something like that where the dog can regulate how much effort they're putting in when versus me asking for that effort. And so that way, I'm really protecting their enthusiasm for training and kind of building along that way. So I try to do, I try to mix as much water activities in as possible. I always make sure that there's a kiddie pool nearby that I can dunk my dog in or have them go stand in if they need to if I'm doing outdoor stuff. Or if I'm doing something like, hey, I really need to work on start line stays for agility. I can do that while I'm swimming my dogs. So a stay is a stay, especially when that's super exciting. And so I can do a stay for a thrown toy into the water, for example. And that way I'm killing two birds with one stone. Yeah. As long as you have dogs that love water, that works. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Quite well. So any kind of final thoughts or key points you want to leave listeners with? You know, just kind of take advantage of the nice weather and get out there with your dogs because anytime you are interacting with them and whatever it might be, you're still building that relationship in a good way. And that way training is still going to be fun for them. They're going to have a lot of fun for everything. And all of that, other stuff can wait until wintertime when, you know, we're all stuck inside. When the weather isn't quite so tempting. Yeah, exactly. Having just gotten off a week of like nonstop rain here in North Carolina, I'm very excited. The sun's coming back out. So. I'm sure. We definitely need the rain up here. We've been watering pretty constantly right now. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on the podcast there. It's been fun. It always is. Thank you so much again for having me. Absolutely. And thanks to all our listeners for tuning in. We'll be back next week with Michael Shikashio to talk about intra-household dog-dog aggression. If you haven't already, subscribe to the podcast in iTunes or the podcast app of your choice to have our next episode automatically downloaded to your phone as soon as it becomes available. Today's show is brought to you by the Fenzie Dog Sports Academy. Special thanks to Denise Fenzie for supporting this podcast. Music provided royalty-free by bensound.com. The track featured here is called Bud. Audio editing provided by Chris Lang. Thanks again for tuning in. Happy training.