The Leave It Command Worked! Whew!

[Leslie and Halas]

Our team had to cancel our flyball weekend, so I've been trying to do extra things with Halas this weekend to try to make up for it.  We went to the Peoria Doodle Romp yesterday, and I took him hiking/swimming this morning.  We have a nice area of trails that run along a creek, and that's where we went this morning.  Halas had a blast running through the water, but there weren't any spots deep enough to swim.  So he just ran through the water, ran on the banks, ran in the water, ran on the banks, etc.  I had him on his 20-ft lead, and he was running along the bank when he stopped to sniff a stick.  I caught up with him and realized that the stick had a head.  So, yes, he was sniffing a snake.  He was sniffing the back half of the snake, but the snake had his head raised.  I have no idea what kind of snake it was. Probably just some kind of water snake, but I felt that sniffing it was a bad idea.  I couldn't make a leash correction, because Halas was on the 20-ft lead, and I was only a few feet away at this point.  So I said, "Halas. Leave it!"  And he did!  I was kind of surprised.  Leave it works in the field behind our house when he's sniffing poop or something, but I didn't figure it would work against something as interesting as a snake.  So he hopped over it and walked away.  I looked back, and the snake slowly made it's way into the water.  I decided that we were pretty tired at that point, so we left the creek and focused on the trail.

[Suzann, Rosey & Bandit]

OMD -  good boy Halas!!

[Coco Chanel and Cheryl]

Good boy Halas!! That is the best command!! I use it with Coco all the time!! She now won't pick up anything off the floor without permission!!! You can drop food and she doesn't go for it!!

[Jennifer,Chloe & Myla]

Good boy!!!!

[Nancy, Ned, Clancy, and Charlie]

Good for Halas! And you too.

[Camilla and Darwin]

Good boy Halas, that took a lot of will power dood!

[Jodi and Stella]

A great command that could be a life saver! Awesome!

[Allyson, Peri & Taquito]

Good boy Halas!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Leslie and Halas]

What's funny is that I don't always remember to use it.  At my mom's last week, I let him outside, and he took off after a bunny.  It was a big bunny, and it was having trouble getting through the fence.  So instead of trying to tell Halas to leave it, I was shouting, "Run, bunny, run!"  Like he needed some encouragement to run faster.  The bunnies hang out in her yard all the time, so I'll have to try leave it against a moving object when it happens again.

I'm not a fan of snakes, either.  If I had been walking on the bank and come right up to it, I probably would have freaked out.  I was far enough away from it that I didn't freak.

[Adina P]

Good boy Halas!  It's not the command though, it's YOUR work with that command that made the difference =)

[Linda and Murphy]

GREAT job Halas!!!

Way to make your Mom proud.