Am I wrong for doing this...

jess2416

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#1
Anyhoo, am I wrong for encouraging Chloe to go after squirrels ??

This is what happens...

Every day, we have our play/train time and we are out for at least an hour at the minimum, lots of times its more like 2 or more hours...

Anyhoo... we go outside, play our little game of fetch for awhile, and we I see she is starting to get bored, we start with our refreshing of Sit, Down, Stay, Come Here, and so on and so forth, after a little of that, I will say to her, "Chloe, Where's the squirrels?" now keep in mind, that most of the time I don't know if any are around or not..

But if I ask her that, she will run to the trees that they normally hang out in, and look up into the branches to see if they are there, and if they aren't, she will continue on with what she was doing, either sniffing around or bringing me the toy to throw..

Now if they ARE there and she happens to see them, she will do her bark and dance and be done with it... and after about 5 minutes she will continue whatever she was doing before she spotted them..

Just so you understand, I don't ask her where are the squirrels every time I spot one.. sometimes I do it for the hell of it when none are around, and sometimes she surprises me and happens to spot one even though I haven't seen it...

I have noticed however, that ever since I started asking her to look for them, she isn't as frantic with her bark and incessant whining after them as she used to be..

Anyhoo, I was just wanting to get some opinions..

For the record, this only happens with squirrels... I can say, "Where is the, : doggy, kittie, birdie" and she will completely ignore me and give me a pissy look and continue on about her business..

ETA: no squirrels are harmed they all have plenty of trees to escape in, and Chloe can only reach one, but they have learned that, so they avoid that one :)
 

sparks19

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#6
I don't see a problem with it.

I mean Belle and Beezer go nuts for squirrels... Belle's instinct tells her to tree it and bark like crazy and Beezer being a sighthound wants to give chase. Belle chases too but she's not really agile lol.

I let them have their fun with the squirrels... they are DOGS it's what they do. As long as she isn't posing a threat to anyone (and obviously she isn't) I see nothing wrong with it.

I don't think I could take away that joy from my two lol.
 

Baxter'smybaby

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#7
I know Baxter loves to chase a squirrel--but I don't always let him just so he knows that sometimes it is not ok--I want him to respond when I tell him to 'leave it". He doesn't have too much opportunity to chase squirrels, but he loves it!
 

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