After breakfast, and everyone has eaten – people and dogs – Bud, Zinnia, and Fate gather around me, wherever I am, and look at me longingly. It is treat time.

I believe in treats as a training and calming tool. l use a special, highly digestible, and small rolled rawhide, the dogs can’t choke on it, it crunches and dissolves quickly in their stomachs.

I give one of these – sometimes a small marrow bone from the supermarket – once in the morning, and once at night. I make the dogs answer to the names, look me in the eyes, and be still for a while – no lunging or grabbing or fighting.

Fate is the troublemaker here, if she can grab the treat from the others, she will try, she tries to intimidate Bud. I make her go into her crate or the other room.

Zinnia would happily give her treat to any other dog, she often does. She has a very generous soul.

I love this dog line-up, a bit of everything.