Issue #1

Winter Walks At Wisley Common

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We have to go back to the beginning of 2025, as this is when my journey with Reuben began. It actually began in December 2024, but that's a minor detail. Assuming you've read my 'About' page which talks about 'Borrow My Doggy', Reuben's human parents, Arno and Mithy, etc, I want to get into my journey with Reuben during the winter months.

One of our favourite locations to walk is Wisley Common. I started taking Reuben here after I'd visited myself on a few occasions. It's a mixture of heathland and woodland that's situated next to Wisley Royal Horticultural Gardens, north of the A3 and west of the M25. Despite the traffic, it's a lovely place to walk, with quite a few different pathways that all interlink with each other.

We also walk next to Wisley Lake, which is south of the A3, offering woodland, a lake and also heathland. Most of our winter walks involve a mixture of sniffing sessions, throwing/chasing a tennis ball (and not giving it back for the human to throw until one is ready), retrieving sticks from watery pond-like spaces and large puddles.

I started allowing Reuben to sniff some fresh training truffles I'd bought, to familiarise him with their scent. These are autumn truffle pieces, that cannot be sold to commercial caterers, and work very well for training dogs. Immediately after sniffing, I'd click the clicker, and give Reuben a food treat. It didn't take long before Reuben had acclimatised to the scent of fresh truffles.

After 2 weeks or so, I began hiding small pieces of loose truffle underneath leaves or under some loose soil. I had to be quick about this, so I'd throw the ball for Reuben and quickly bury a truffle piece. The problem with this technique is that Reuben decided to start eating the truffle pieces! I watched my training truffle pieces rapidly decreasing, and realised I needed a different strategy. A little research bought up some small glass jars with metal screw tops, as used by hotels to put their breakfast jams and marmalades in. They're perfect, needing a few carefully placed nail holes in the lids to allow the truffle scent out.

This is the way I continue to train Reuben, and as you'll find out in the next instalment, I found a cheaper way to create a truffle scent. I'll also talk about some of the welly boots I bought, and what a difference they made!

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See you next week!