INTRODUCING REUBEN
Reuben was born at the Smart Pup kennel and training facility at Verrierdale on 19th January 2024. Reuben is making great progress through his training modules and has been a delight to train!
Palen Creek Correctional Centre Prison Program information: Over the past 6 years the dog handling team of inmates have been training Smart Pups in basic obedience, task work and tricks from our training modules. Each dog is with two handlers for a five-week rotation. The experience and dedicated time given to our pups ensures a solid grounding in their basic skills. With two training sessions daily as well as living with the handlers, the Smart Pups receive maximum attention. PCCC is a low security prison farm (600 acres), so the dogs get exposure to horses, cattle, farm machinery, the prison gyms, workshops, and admin areas. The compound has long driveways for loose lead walking practice to meet the local wallabies and bird life. The dog handlers are a tight knit team of 6 who work together and support each other's training. They are very honoured to be selected for this program, it is a privilege to work with the dogs. They are very proud of the work they do and love to see the Graduates and hear placement stories. The PCCC program is a win win for all, as our dogs get great training and attention and the handlers learn a skill to take with them on release. They learn teamwork, responsibility, and a chance to give back to community as well as receive much needed affection from their four-legged friends!
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See below for the latest in Reuben's journey:
NOVEMBER 2024
SKILLSET LEARNED: Repetition is in full swing now this month but it won’t end here. This will continue right up until he is placed with his forever family.
Rueben is learning to respond to breathing changes by watching his trainer then when the changes occur, he runs to find someone else for help. Although a work in progress, Rueben is very smart and eager to please so he’s coming along beautifully with this new skill.
NOTEABLE ACHIEVEMNETS AND DEVELOPMENTS: Exciting news! Rueben now has a tentative client match. It’s still early days however so no official introduction has been done as yet.
EXCURSIONS, OUTINGS AND SOCIAL ACTIVITIES: Rueben has been enjoying lots of outings to Noosa River and Gympie duck ponds this past month to work on his dog and bird distraction. It is important for Assistance Dogs to ignore these distractions while working and maintain focus on the person they are assisting at all times.
Other places that were visited this month were The Ginger Factory, where he explored their wonderful Halloween house, the Maroochy RSL Club for their Remembrance Day ceremony. A visit to the very busy renowned Eumundi Markets where he saw some great live singers and performers. The markets proved to be an excellent training ground as its an extremely challenging environment for our Smart Pups in training to visit due to the high volume of people, pet dogs, food smells, loud noises and music. As usual, Rueben took this visit in his stride and did beautifully navigating through the crowds of people and following the ‘leave it’ command around all the distractions that come with a busy market place.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: Thank you for following Reuben's journey to become a Smart Pup, his trainers are very proud of his progress!
OCTOBER 2024
SKILLSET LEARNED: Reuben's trainer is very proud to say that Reuben has begun working on his advanced tasks. He has proven to be very reliable in all public settings thus far. Once Smart Pups can see that he is confident basically anywhere they go, they start to introduce tasks that are more complex. Firstly, starting in low distraction environment at HQ and then build up from there where eventually he will be required to perform his advanced tasks in any and all environments.
This learning takes time and lots and lots of practice and consistency. Can anyone say ‘REPETITION’?!
NOTEABLE ACHIEVEMENTS & DEVELOPMENTS: As SmartPups move through each pups training, they are constantly assessing them for not only their suitability as Assistance Dogs but also looking for their strengths and weaknesses in order to match the right client with the right Smart Pup.
As Reuben moves into complex task training now, they will be able to start to gain insight into his client match, so stay tuned. From there, his complex tasks will move into child specific tasks, meaning that extra tasks can be added to each dogs training regime that are specific to what their special person requires.
EXCURSIONS, OUTINGS AND SOCIAL ACTIVITIES: Well, they’ve been out and about a lot this month with visits to The Ginger Factory, Noosa Civic shopping centre, a petting zoo, Noosa River to name a few! This was Reuben’s first time seeing young animals like goats, pigs, lambs and chooks. Although he was interested in them, our unflappable boy was non reactive and happy to sit and watch all the children go in and out of the pen to enjoy patting all the cute animals. He was not phased by the children’s shrieks or the intense smells that often these animals exude.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: Thank you for following Reuben's journey to become a Smart Pup, we are all very proud of his progress!
SEPTEMER 2024
CHARACTER OF SMART PUP: Reuben never ceases to amaze the team at Smart Pups with his ultra laid back personality. He is a very calm natured boy who is not wavered by much at all. He’s confident and always eager to please.
SKILLSET LEARNED: Reuben is progressing extremely well with following verbal commands only. This skill takes time and practice and we continue with that daily during training sessions and on outings. He has been working a lot on his calming tasks like laps and overs this month. It is important for Smart Pups to be comfortable in these positions to provide deep pressure and a lovely calming energy for our special clients.
NOTEABLE ACHIEVEMENTS: This month Reuben has learned to a cool new trick. Reuben can now fetch a water bottle when asked and also a mobile phone. SmartPups are now just working on making sure his mouth remains soft while doing so to avoid any damage to the items and to be consistent when asked to perform this task.
EXSCURSIONS, OUTINGS AND SOCIAL ACTIVITIES: The highlight outing this month was a visit to Greenbank Services Club. SmartPups got to experience the Club and facilities and the team were thrilled to meet both Reuben and Marlin. It was a real highlight for both parties.
AUGUST 2024
CHARACTER OF SMART PUP: Reuben never ceases to amaze his trainers with his ultra laid back personality. He is a very calm natured boy who is not wavered by much at all. He’s confident and always eager to please.
SKILLSET LEARNED: Currently Reuben is working towards following all of his commands without the need of hand signals. Responding to voice only, with a large number of commands takes time to perfect and our Reuben is proving to be quite the star!
NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENTS AND DEVELOPMENTS OBSERVED DURING THE MONTH: Reuben had the privilege of meeting one of the very special clients at Smartpups HQ that are currently on their waiting list. From a training perspective, this type of opportunity is always extremely beneficial for both pup and trainer alike to gauge how these young dogs are going to interact with a different variety of children of different ages and needs. Reuben excelled during the visit, providing a calm and relaxed presence which helped to make our clients feel at ease and confident in a new environment.
Well done Reuben!
EXCURSIONS, OUTINGS AND SOCIAL ACTIVITIES: This month Reuben has enjoyed beautiful winter days out at Noosa River, Noosa Leisure Centre (where he had to remain calm around kids soccer class) and surrounds. He's also visited some larger venues like The Ginger Factory, where Reuben got to ride on the infamous Ginger Train and their indoor boat ride and also a trip to Sealife. At Sealife, Reuben made a seal friend named April, she was very intrigued by Reuben and repeatedly swam over to inspect him. It was extremely sweet. We’ve done lots of visits this month to the local IGA’s in support of our Pawgust campaign.
JULY 2024
CHARACTER OF SMART PUP: Reuben is super intelligent yet very laid back. He has a very calming energy, is confident and always wants to succeed.
SKILLSET LEARNED: Whilst Reuben was at prison, he was introduced to his modules 1-4 skillset. This includes all of his commands, specialised tasks such as mobility and autism tasks and his tricks. Reuben is showing great progress in everything he has learnt in the past couple of months.
NOTABLE ACHIEVEMENTS AND DEVELOPMENTS OBSERVED DURING THE MONTH: The amount Reuben has learnt in such a short duration of time at the Prison program his trainer believes is a great accomplishment on his behalf. He is so motivated to learn, and his handlers for the time he was at Prison said they enjoyed working him very much.
EXCURSIONS, OUTINGS AND SOCIAL ACTIVITIES: Since Reuben has returned from Prison, he has been involved in various training outings to locations such as: Noosa River, Aussie World, Kawana Shopping World and Peregian Beach.
Reuben did exceptionally well with his first time at Aussie World, being surrounded by so many roller coasters, sounds, people and other distractions.