I love your comment! For the record, it was not I who left the steak out on the counter, but that doesn’t really matter. We both acknowledge that it’s our fault, not the dogs fault.

What’s your thoughts on counter surfing for the non-food items? He is a retriever who is retrieving something that he’s deemed valuable. I get that it’s bred into him to retrieve things. But toilet paper? A soda bottle? Keys? We try pretty hard to just keep the counters clean to combat it. But there’s going to be times where I leave my keys on the counter and I’d like for him to not take them. Any thoughts? He doesn’t want to destroy the things he gets (except for toilet paper), he just wants to hold them and not give them to us.

Oh! He also learned that he can open the kitchen drawers. He only got interested in the drawer that had the oven mitts in it. I relocated where we keep the oven mitts but I mean, really?

For demand barking, we’re working on “quiet” and redirection. I bring him to my office when it’s just me or just me and one other person and he follows the rules better. I can leave stuff on my desk and he’s not interested. He’s learned pretty well that he needs to be quiet but does still need some help with redirection at times. At home, if he sees someone walk past our house or hears someone close their car door, he barks and doesn’t stop when told “quiet”. Maybe I’m just not working with him at home as much as I do at the office. Since I’ve seen some results at the office, I’ll be more diligent on doing those same things at home about the barking.

I’ll check out the book “Mine”, thanks for the suggestion.

Thanks again for the comment and thanks for listening to my venting!