Walking near dogs.

Tanka and I walked out into the big wide world today. I did a good job of leading him IMHO. We went the "dog way" today.

Tanka is a bit spooky about dogs. I knew the dogs on the corner to the left are behind fencing. I also knew the next dogs on the right are chained up.

As soon as a dog barked, Tanka was head up and stopped. I let him look towards the noise. Then I asked him to walk forwards.

He did get just a bit jumpy with the first dogs.

With the second dogs, he started getting on top of me. I insisted that he stay out of my space.

We stopped several times facing the danger. We made it all the way to the end of the block. Tanka did get kind of hyper vigilante a few times. I insisted that he stay off the top of me. "Give me some space buddy."

On the way back I asked him to yield the fore and the hind a couple of times. I also let him sniff and touch some mail boxes.

When we got much of the way back, a pitbull ran out from their home and that was scary for Tanka. He spooked a little. The fence was holding him, then another pitbull showed up and Tanka spooked again. I insisted that Tanka stay off me and turned him to look at the threat.

I asked him to move on and we did pretty good. Then, another surprise, a man came out from behind a shed to get his dog.

Tanka spooked a little again. I stood and talked to the man and thanked him for always keeping his dogs locked up. He has seen Wiseguy and me on the road in our cart:)

I told him the new horse was Tanka. He says "That horse is doing so good standing here looking relaxed right now. And I can see that horse is really into you." Made me smile.

Tanka and I took off again towards home and one of the dogs followed along the fence and Tanka had one more little spook.

I thought I handled the whole thing well and I didn't look jumpy. Kind of proud of that. We stopped near the neighbors dogs on the corner. Tanka reached out to gently nip my coat "No, bad horse". Backed him up a few steps. I think he was saying "Don't stand near those dogs."

At the corner a couple of cars went by and Tanka was not worried about the cars. Totally nice.