Bad Bitch

I think, or I thought that I was doing a pretty good job with Bette. She's been getting better at walking on the leash. Her toilet habits have improved. She almost always hits the puppy pads, all four that I put down every day. Lately however, she has been challenging other dogs when we go out for our walks. This gets Chandler all riled up and I usually end up having to drag them both away from the offending pups. It doesn't matter how large the dog, Bette wants a piece of them. Then last night she snapped at Mark. This isn't the first time this has happened. I told Mark that he can't surprise a sleeping dog. Gently wake her up, stroke her a couple of times, and then move her or pick her up. I actually think Bette is trying out for alpha dog here in our house. She has even been bossing Chandler around lately.

Yesterday Bette went to the beauty parlor. She got a nice new hairdo, a bath, and she came out smelling like a rose. What surprised me was when the groomer, Bianca, came out and scolded me.
    "You know she bites don't you?"
    "Well yes, she's been snapping at Mark and nipping at me lately. I just thought that was a puppy thing."
    "See these scratches up and down both my arms?" The nice lady asked me. "That's from her. So miss Bette and I had a conversation."
True, I had noticed how obedient Bette was acting around her. Especially when she quietly backed a few inches away from Bianca and sat facing her.
    "How'd you do that?" I asked.
It turns out that not only is Bianca a groomer, she trains dogs. I just figured Bette was so small, why bother going through all the training I put Chandler through? The fact is small dogs need more training. They are just little bitches that will take advantage of you if you don't train them early. So right then and there Bianca gave me a quick lesson on teaching Bette who is the actual alpha dog in the house, and how to get her to stop biting. It was amazing to see it work almost immediately. So now I have Chandler trained, Bette is well on her way to being trained, and one day I hope to have Mark trained.