Do you know Jack?

I have really been making an effort to get Jack out in public.  Now that he walks so much better on leash and knows heel almost perfectly, going out in public isn't as stressful as it used to be!  We have been slowly weaning out the pinch collar and the choke collar and only using his martingale collar.  So far he has been wonderful!  We probably will put one of the harsher collars on him every so often to keep him sharp but he has come so very far in only 3 months!  He walks so nicely on the martingale collar with barely any pulling or trying to cut me off.  I am so very proud of Jack.  Most service dogs have 16 months to learn everything that Jack has learned in 3.  We still have a month or so to go with his training before he goes to Florida for final training.  

Jack at the office being an attentive service dog:

Anyway back to the original purpose of this post, public places!  We went to WalMart for the first time and oh boy was that an adventure.  The closest one to me is super busy and a little smaller than the newer ones.  This means that Jack has to be really focused almost the entire time.  I had a pocket full of treats to keep his focus.  For his first time, I was so very happy with him.  He stayed in a heel, ignored most people, when his attention strayed from me he was easily brought back with either a verbal correction, leash correction or treat distraction and he sat on command.  He also has figured out when I stop to look at something in the aisles to lie down and relax.  That is a big step for Mr. Jack Jack!

Towards the end of our adventure I started using the 'watch me' command to get his attention back on me.  It really worked in the check out line.  I need to start using it more!  

I was only able to get one picture of Jack in WalMart... him sleeping in an aisle.  So good!