I'm not sure, in your situation, I would leave the dog outside until he made the decision to come in. It almost sounds as if the dog had bad experiences inside at the previous home and outside was the only place he could stay or maybe was forced to stay; anyway you now have to counteract all that.
All the good points have been made by others, now you have to put them all together.
Do not let the dog outside without a long lead (long closthesline or whatever); when you say come reel in the lead and treat and praise. You have to be consistent too; use the same word, treat immediately, etc. Also I don't think I would leave the dog loose outside until this is overcome. If possible I would also take the time to be outside with your dog (still on the lead) and play with him and praising and treating for any good interaction he does.
Also you might want to have a special treat just for the come command and for entering the house. He does not get this treat until he comes and/or he enters the house - but make it something really special that is not given except for this purpose.
Zest's new title
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We had a very productive weekend. There was a 3 day trial and on Friday my lovely little dog would have Q'd in JWW IF I had handled her better.
Saturday's runs were interesting. JWW was first and she was running beautifully until she noticed a basenji-sized gap in the fencing, so she went and watched the Std ring for (what seemed like several dogs) before she came back and finished her run. Believe it or not, she Q'd with that run! AND finished her AXJ title. She had some time faults and I don't know how she didn't go over time with leaving the ring, or why the judge didn't give her a refusal, but we have to respect the judge's decision.
Sunday was also another peculiar day. She got very upset on the STD run. Either by a strange barking noise and/or the electronic timer. She stopped on the DW and stared at the electronic timer, or the squeeky barking area. I'm not sure which was disturbing. Watchers said it was the timer, but that's never been a problem before. So, after that run, we went out to have some quiet time in the car. After a little while I decided we should go back inside and they were running the 16" JWW course. Well, crap. I was not going to ask them to move my dog to the start of the next group b/c I missed my walk through due to my own issues. So, I watch the course. I learn the pattern. When it's close to our turn, I go down. The 3 dogs a head of me are not there so we rush into the ring. We run into the ring and I hear "GO", so we go. At jump 4, I hear the judge bleeting on his whistle. For the life of me, I can't figure out why. Evidently the JWW ring cue is "READY" not the Std ring's "GO". Uhm, oops. So we start again. I've never had to do this with Zest. I'm flustered and I really just want to have a nice run so Z can have a good experience and know boogies don't really live inside the agility ring. So, we run. And we Q. Our first Q in ExB with our first 2 MACH points to boot.
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Okay that is pretty funny! Glad the judge passed her. Hey, perhaps the judge appreciated the intelligence to go check something out then resume business?
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Good going well done
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Good for Zest!
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Okay that is pretty funny! Glad the judge passed her. Hey, perhaps the judge appreciated the intelligence to go check something out then resume business?
Thanks everyone. She had really lovely runs all weekend (except Sunday's Std run) and I'm so very, very proud of her. She went through a fear(?) period on courses towards the beginning of the year, so she's come a long way.
And, DDS, no, agility judges do not appreciate creativity on course. If you don't believe me, ask Jet the trying.
Of course I always thought maybe the judge watching Jet would think "Gosh, that really is a nicer course."
