Obedience Games with Callen

Callen is now 8 1/2 months old. I haven’t started any “formal” obedience with her. Instead we are playing lots of games which are building a foundation for the skills she will need for the formal obedience exercises. I really like this way of starting my puppies as then I don’t get caught up in the ‘big picture’ (the finished exercise), and I also have no expectations of right and wrong. How can there be a right or wrong way to play?

Callen came with a hard-wired retrieve to hand which I absolutely love. All my dogs must return the toy to my hand when we are out playing tennis ball fetch or the game doesn’t go on. This includes the grand-dogs, Riley and Emma, when they come to visit. I do not like a dog who comes close and then tosses the ball in my direction and I don’t play their game. If I don’t pick it up, they figure out pretty quickly that they have to put it in my hand. Generally this takes about 5-10 minutes to teach, but does take a ‘refresher course’ the next few times we play. But Callen didn’t need to learn this so I am very lucky.

Callen has been playing with the plastic dumbbell, doing pick up games and fun retrieves since she was about four months old. There are days she is just so ‘into’ these games and others, for no apparent reason, that she acts like the dumbbell is going to eat her. On those days, I help her thru her phobia, but I don’t let her get away with refusing to pick it up or play with me. Playing with me is not a choice, or it is, but on my terms and my terms are that I will continue to get in her face and push her and tweak her butt until she begins to interact with me. She does this to Trey and Beckett so I figure turn-around is fair play. It generally doesn’t take long for her to begin playing with me and the dumbbell. But I don’t force her to take the dumbbell or pinch her ear for not taking it. At this point we are still playing. It’s just a game.

Last week I introduced her to a metal utility article. Callen thought she had died and gone to heaven since when she was a tiny puppy I had given her an aluminum canning  jar ring as a toy so that she would get used to the taste of metal. It was her favorite toy – really. She used it as a teething ring and I finally had to throw it away when she chewed it into two pieces! So other than adjusting to the weight of the triple bar article, she had no problems picking it up and carrying it around.

I also found a single bar article (looks like a dumbbell) that she also enjoys playing with. I leave that one on the floor for her to pick up and play with. She regularly brings it to me for a game of toss. I truly think that if we could use a metal dumbbell in Open that she’d have no trouble with it like she is having with the plastic dumbbell. Unfortunately the regulations state that the dumbbell must be made of wood or plastic. Ah well.

We are also playing target games, which have also morphed into rear-end awareness games. Target games help her learn to go away from me which will help her learn go-outs and directed retrieves for Utility. The rear-end games teach her that she has a butt and that she can and is in control of where it is for heeling. Celeste Meade has videos on YouTube on how to teach it.

Callen just started the rear end games. I started her on a Frisbee on the ground like Denise Fenzi showed on her blog, but Callen doesn’t seem to “get” that her feet are supposed to stay on it.

Callen will hold one foot on the Frisbee while standing

Callen wants to 'sit' when both feet are on the Frisbee

So I put her up on the step-stool (a game we’ve been playing for quite a while) and am now asking her to pivot around that without taking her front feet off the stool. She is better going counterclockwise than clockwise, which isn’t unusual as dogs are “left-handed” or “right-handed” just like people. Beckett is left-handed and Trey and Callen are right-handed (this might explain why Trey’s away flanks are better than her go-bye flanks in herding!).

This game is easy!

And this morning I introduced a glove to hold and she took and held it almost immediately! This is for the directed retrieve in Utility.

Introduction to glove and her 1st hold!

I am going to start scent discrimination training with both Callen and Trey. No, Trey is not going into the Utility ring, but I figure the more dogs I teach, the better trainer I become, and Trey will not be an easy one to teach this concept to!

Playing games as a beginning to the concepts of the formal obedience exercises really helps to reduce the stress on me and the dog and helps me to remember to keep it fun!

Canine Performance Scores Database

If you are an obedience and/or rally person this new website database (http://dogshowscores.herokuapp.com/) is a fantastic place to visit and re-live memories of dogs and trials past. The gal who compiled all of this spent a ton of time on it and has much more patience than I!

She collected the information for the database from the AKC website and it has the results from both Rally and Obedience going back to 2000. It’s really a fine site. I found all three of my obedience dogs on the site with their scores and placements. And if I click on the show name, I can then see all the information for that show – judges and all competitors. It’s cool.

The only drawback is that it only shows qualifying scores, not the shows where your dog may have NQd since AKC doesn’t show those dogs on their site. (I know this because Trey took 6 tries to get her CDX but it only shows her three qualifying shows.)

But it is still a neat place to visit memories.

Happy Trey

Trey was so happy yesterday when I finally headed out to the barn and gathered up a set of ducks. It’s been almost two months since I’ve had the time to get out and train. Grandbabies and holidays certainly take precedence over herding practice and the weather also plays a role at this time of year.

I gathered a set of all hens and released them in the front pasture. Immediately all of our bad habits came into play. Trey was too close causing the ducks to string out and split off. We worked on finding that elusive bubble of pressure where they would move and yet stay flocked. We didn’t find it – yet – but Trey did begin to back off the ducks’ butts.  She was too fast/frantic causing her not to think and process, instead just react. I worked on keeping my voice low and quiet so as not to feed into her reactiveness and she slowed a bit and I could see her start to think.

She was too nice! This one is a hard one to correct. This set of ducks tends to not flock tightly. If one wants to head out on her own, she does. Safety in numbers doesn’t seem to be part of this group’s philosophy as I saw at least three of the five make a break for freedom and the barn. I knew this when I picked them for Trey’s lesson. If I always use my “British” set (so called because they are named Chuck, Harry, Simon, William, & George – figure it out) which is a lovely, tight-flocking, non-confrontational set of ducks that Trey finds easy to herd, then Trey doesn’t learn to think thru problems or handle difficult livestock. I use the British set when I’m introducing a new concept or practicing something difficult. It’s nice to have a set of ducks that doesn’t try to get away or challenge Trey.

And that leads us back to Trey’s last problem of being too nice. Livestock can read dogs as well as dogs can read livestock. Prey animals must be able to read the level of threat from a hunter and boy, these ducks can really read my dogs! Part of Trey’s ‘too close’ problem stems from her ‘too nice’ problem. The ducks know that she’s not going to hurt them and so they ignore her and do what they want. And it’s not just my ducks who can read her. Even strange ducks at a trial can read Trey and know that she won’t hurt them so they can basically ignore her. It appears that she has a lot of eye, but there is no power behind that eye. Beckett can be two fields away and still strike terror into a duck’s heart. She has power. Trey does not. So her too close issues come from having to be close enough to be enough of a threat to the ducks to get them to move. But then they string out and peel off and ignore her because she is no real threat.

So yesterday I encouraged Trey to rough up the duck that was trying to get away. At first she’d just go gather it back in but as I kept encouraging her to “get it!” she did a bit of an air-grip – just opening her mouth near the duck’s neck, never touching feathers. This did not impress the duck. But after repeated encouragement on several different occasions Trey finally started to be . . . well, less nice. Once she even rolled a duck and caused her to squawk in surprise. We had a bit less peeling off and more flocking after that. It will continue to be a problem, especially since there is a fine line between appropriate/necessary ‘roughing up’ and inappropriate/ unnecessary ‘duck bowling’.

This all happened while I was just letting Trey do mini outruns and fetch the ducks to me. Her old issues are still there for me to figure out and deal with, too. She leaves too fast on the outrun; she goes too straight – barely curving out at all (altho on her go-bye side she did widen out when I told her to ‘get out’ but only if I reminded her). And her worst problem is that she doesn’t cover her ducks on a go-bye outrun – she always stops short, allowing them to walk right by her on their way to freedom.

I can see it happening but don’t know if I can describe it. Here’s the scenario - the ducks are ‘escaping’ back to the barn on a line about 1:00 or so (if I am at 6:00). I send Trey on a go-bye (because that is the side we are practicing at the time even tho it may not be the ‘right’ way to send her) and she stops her outrun and starts walking in on her lift at about 11:30. Not even close to where she needs to be to cover their escape – in fact, her position pushes the ducks even farther over to 1:30 or 2:00. If I give her a reminder ‘go-bye’ command, she then overflanks by a lot and sometimes doesn’t even stop but continues to circle. She does not do this on her away flank, only the go-bye side which is her weak side anyway. And it’s not only on the outrun/lift. She doesn’t cover her stock at anytime on the go-bye, even driving.

So on her outrun and lift we have three main problems that I am struggling to figure out how to fix – 1) she leaves too fast, 2) she goes too straight (both sides but worse on the go-bye flank), and 3) she doesn’t cover her stock on the go-bye. Any suggestions are welcome. I know Laura gave me some tips on the leaving too fast but darned if my old brain can remember. I’ll have to contact her and get a refresher. (It’s hell to get old!)

Then I worked on Trey’s driving. I have a line of trees that run east/west along the north end of the front pasture. I stood about 15′ out from that line facing north and had Trey work on doing extended figure 8s around the trees in a perpendicular line to where I was facing. This helped Trey work on her cross driving concepts, helped me with my depth perception, and also helped me to learn when to flank her to make the turn around or past a tree. 

It wasn’t pretty but we did get figure 8s around the four trees three times going both directions. At first Trey kept overflanking and trying to fetch them to me, but after a while she figured out what we were doing and listened to my ‘there’ as she flanked just enough to change their direction. I had to work hard to remember my flank commands (I am terrible about that!) and I had to work even harder to keep my voice quiet and low. I get frustrated easily and that comes out in my voice and poor Trey is the one who has to deal with it which she does by getting frantic and reactive.

The best part was that I didn’t resort to lying her down to get the ducks to go where we needed them to go. I didn’t do a ‘bump and drift’. Trey actually slowed down and stayed far enough back so that the ducks moved steadily and in a group. She even stopped on her feet once when I told her to ‘wait’! That’s a first!!

This set of ducks also doesn’t run right to the crate when they see it. Don’t know why they don’t see it as safety like the other ducks do. So we had to work pretty hard to get them to go into the crate. Trey did a fantastic job of staying back far enough and yet covering their escape and it only took us about 3-4 minutes to get all five into the crate. Guess we’re going to have to train them to the crate because a good training session can go bad if mayhem ensues when we are just trying to put the ducks away.

But Trey was a very happy herding dog yesterday and took a good long nap afterwards.

My One Training Rule

“It’s one thing to feel that you are on the right path, but it’s another to think that yours is the only path.” – Paulo Coelho, novelist

Many people have a hard time remembering that their way isn’t the only way, whether it be in dog training, raising kids, cleaning house, driving, etc. I like to have as many tools in my dog training tool belt as possible because I have found that with the four dogs that I have (seriously) trained for competitive sports none of them learned the same way and I had to dig around at some point to find answers to their questions.

Yet time and again I run into people who are having a training issue and yet will not accept outside ideas because “this way has worked for all the other dogs I’ve trained.” So time passes and that person is still beating that same dead horse a year later or has gotten another dog out of frustration with the first. Melinda Wichman called it her ‘sacred cows of training’, meaning her training methods that have worked for her previous (OTCH) dogs. But she put those cows out to pasture and embraced new ideas and thoughts. I’m sure it was difficult for her as is with all things of which we are familiar. I did it with Trey in obedience. No repeating an exercise if she did it right the first time. No repetitions, no drilling, very few corrections. I learned that she had a skewed way of learning and I had to skew my training to match her, not try to make her match my training.

Friend Lois gave me some thoughts after my previous post and I truly appreciate those thoughts and suggestions. I’m going to try some of them out on Callen since my current methods aren’t making much of an impact on the naughty (still a) puppy.

So this quote is what I need to keep in the forefront of my brain when I am teaching Callen. It’s easy to fall back onto ‘sacred cows’ but letting them out to pasture may be more beneficial than trying to fit the dog to the cow! (I know it’s a poor metaphor.)

Ar-r-g!

Callen has been testing my patience in many areas of her household training. I get so frustrated with her when it seems like I’m repeating and repeating myself. Even if I’m telling one of the other dogs “No” her name comes out connected to it because I’m constantly saying no to her. It’s like a never-ending litany of “no, Callen”, ”stop that Callen”, ”I said STOP Callen”.

I’ve not had such a tough dog before. Maybe it’s more like stubbornness, or wilfulness, or just plain naughty, but Callen is different from any other dog I’ve had before, not just border collies but the Malamute, the Irish setters, the numerous mixed breeds. With all those other dogs I was able to train away a behavior by stopping it with a ‘no’ and a bit of physical correction like a scruff shake or removing the object of temptation or even just moving the dog.

But none of this is making much of an impression on Miss Callen. Oh sure she’ll stop when I say something but will go right back to what she was doing before I interrupted her. Callen is almost 8 months old now and should be past the point of destructive or unwanted behavior. I’m really not expecting too much from her. For instance when she’s lying under my recliner with a multitude of Nylabones and antlers within reach, she really does know she shouldn’t use the chair leg or the recliner’s fabric as a chew toy. Really. She does know better. But she does it anyway.

She also should know that I find teeth on skin objectionable. I started training this when I still had all the puppies here. I used conventional methods like squealing or saying ‘ouch’ whenever teeth touched skin. I removed myself from the game when she used her teeth on me. I scolded and offered her a toy as a mouth guard. I scolded more firmly. Nothing made much of an impression. I am now trying taking her to the ground in an alpha-roll coupled with telling her no. I will NOT tolerate a dog that grabs my hands, my pant legs, my sleeve while playing with me or trying to get me to play with her. Teeth on skin or clothing is unacceptable. I just haven’t found a way to convince Callen of that.

This morning she met the Wrath of 1000 Demons because she revived a gross behavior – poop eating. As a puppy she would poop and then turn around and eat it . . . still warm. Y-U-C-K!!!!! To discourage that I followed her around and told her ‘no’ as I scooped the poop and disposed of it. After a while she quit turning and sniffing it as it dropped out. I thought I had broken the habit. Well apparently frozen poop-cicles are very tasty as she was chowing down on some this morning.  I told her ‘no’. She looked at me and then started nibbling again. I told her ‘no’ again VERY firmly and pushed her nose away from the turd. She picked it up and started to munch. I grabbed her by the scruff (the turd dropped out of her mouth) and then put her on the ground with her nose touching the frozen turd and held her there while summoning 1000 Demons down upon her. I then put her in the house and poop-scooped the yard.

Sigh.

BUT on a high note, yesterday I pulled out the clicker and some treats and decided to restart her heeling training. I’ve been thinking about what and how I want to do this as the little bit of the Choose to Heel protocol I started last fall didn’t seem to make an impression on her (go figure). My problem is remembering to break it down into tiny parts. I tend to expect too big of a chain too soon. So all I introduced yesterday was getting her to follow my hand (with treat) into heel position. She did great! Nice straight sit at just the right distance from my side. She did it with or without the treat as I faded the lure quickly when she showed me she could do it.  I then asked for one step in heel position and a hands-on shaped automatic sit. She was clearly confused by the hands on sitting so I lured her into an at heel sit and quit. I didn’t want to ruin the joy at the successful first part of the session. We did a couple more ‘find heel’ and quit to have a party and some wrestling. (Unfortunately she grabbed my hand with her teeth and I had to correct but it didn’t ruin the game that time.)

I was VERY pleased with her effort and the results. I need to really focus on one tiny part at a time before trying to chain the whole thing too quickly. The fault in that is mine and not Callen’s!