New Things to Teach the Dog

Rocket and I skipped out regular downtown route and instead went on a nice walk though the historic district, shorter than usual, which was disappointing but a change of scene is nice every once in a while. There was the added bonus of many, many retaining walls.

Tomorrow I'm going to get a wooden spool for Rocket to play with. I'm hoping for a small one, low to the ground maybe? I wonder if having "walls" on either side of him would make him more secure on the spool? Does that matter to dogs? What if I attached training wheels to it would that help with the process? Make it more secure?

I really want to make this work. I thin k it can work and I think Rocket has it in him to learn this new skill. Its more of a why thing. "Why" would a dog want to walk on a barrel? What can I do to make it seem like a dog friendly idea?  I do know that dogs can be taught this action and that there are large dogs that do this, although most of the evidence points to small dogs and barrel riding. I've watched goats ride on barrels so it tells me that long legs do not stand in the way of this achievement.

I think first off I'll need to see if he will roll the smaller spool and then if he will roll the spool at this new, lower height, can I translate that new behavior to driving the roll. Hmmm.

This is a lot of thought for something I may end up not getting anyway, there were a lot of sizes but what if none of them are right?  Some of them were really, really huge that I thought looked really neat but I think one of the really small ones might be the ticket. So I have a lot of choices, that means I can make the wrong one...Or even worse, I do find the right one but it won't fit in my car.