She has made me look at things differently - flooding of our basement this past winter was laughed about when I found her sticking her snout in the water and blowing bubbles; her natural curiosity has reminded me that life is to be explored; she greets each day with a fresh outlook and makes me realize that life is just that, a gift each day.
I enjoy taking her for long walks around our home especially areas that have access to water. Being a Lab she is drawn to water (even puddles). However, her reluctance to go beyond the shallow water has been something I have vowed she would overcome. Today was the day!
Patrick and I started out small - taking her to a local stream that had all depths along it's path. She was fine with walking in the water but if her paws could not touch the bottom she'd turn back to shallow safe sections. We started by coaxing her out little by little with one of her dog biscuits. Sometimes she'd reach for them and other times she'd just panic and turn back.
I think her panic was caused by an early incident last winter. Early December on a warmish day (well for December) I took her down to Liberty Reservoir. After an almost 2 mile hike I knew she would need some water. Finally found an area where she could get a drink. She walked in the shallow part for awhile but no amount of stick throwing or "go get it Dani" was going to get her out to deeper water. Then all of a sudden she took off light a bolt - started running around on the ground and play growling. She then just ran towards the shore and jumped in. However, where she jumped in was much deeper than where she had originally been playing. The look of panic on her face was due to not only the depth (and lack of ground beneath her paws) but also the shock of the colder water.
Recently we've been benefiting from the drought this summer. The water is, in some places, a good 30 yards below it's normal water mark. So what was the deeper part of water is now dry land. We are able to walk along the shoreline as if we were at the beach. Many of the areas have had nice shallow areas for her to play in. The dog biscuit tossing into water bit has gotten her to go out up to her belly but no further.
Recently Patrick has made it his goal to get her to swim in the deep part....more importantly like doing it. The other day he found a nice area where it was shallow and gradually got deeper. Hooking her leash on he was able to coax/pull her out and get her to swim a little.
I tried to get her to go out the following day by throwing one of her favorite fetch toys in the water. I started out shallow and worked my way further out. Unfortunately I threw it a bit too far and the old panic set in (although she did swim for a second before it dawned on her). Her toyed floated in Liberty Reservoir taunting us. Nothing I could do would get her back out there to fetch it. Great, $8.99 down the drain. Happy ending! Next day we went back and it was still floating in the same spot. Luckily a kind young guy was fishing and when asked "hooked" her toy and reeled it in.
Today Patrick once again reinforced his work with her. She actually swam quite a bit. First on the leash and then free of the leash. She loved fetching her once "lost" toy and bringing it back to shore. At one point Patrick came out and she even swam without him in the water with her. My once "big soppy girl" (as Jon calls her) has finally found her inner Lab and learned that the deeper water can be just as much fun as the shallow end.
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