Rhymes With Sit

In obedience class last week I learned that there are two types of sits -- the tuck sit and the rock sit -- and I taught Jedi the wrong one for competitive obedience. Oh sit.

The tuck sit is where a dog plants his front feet and tucks his butt up underneath himself. This is the sit of choice as the dog stays in heel position when going from a stand to a sit.

With the rock sit a dog plants his rear feet and leans back into the sit. The longer the dog, the farther he falls from heel position. A nice, long German shepherd like Jedi can easily be off by 4 to 6 inches. How does this happen? By teaching your puppy to site by letting him with a piece of food held over his nose. (Sound familiar?) So now six months and sixty pounds later I'm trying fix this. Grrrr. Wish I'd known this earlier.

To fix this I'm trying to kiss Jedi into a sit while practically holding him up by his collar so he tucks his butt underneath. Did I mention that he's nearly 80 pounds? My trainer swears he'll get it before my arm breaks. We're trying to make the tuck sit second nature -- a muscle memory kind of thing. However, I feel like it's a "blind leading the blind" scenario. I don't know which one of us is more confused. -- K