Boost's First Herding Lesson

SUMMARY: Maybe should be titled "My First Herding Lesson"

Drove to Gilroy (about 45 minutes) with a friend and her 10-month old puppy Dig. Dig has had a couple of previous lessons; friend has had quite a few more with a different dog whom she'd decided doesn't really get the herding thing.

Spent a lot of time talking about what works and what doesn't, what the dogs are thinking and what they're not, what the livestock is thinking and what not, how to communicate, how to establish control, how to know that you're in control, and so on.

Watched friend and Dig work a bit (Dig wants to grab the goats); watched instructor work a young border collie, watched another student work a dog, watched instructor work Boost, watched friend and Dig, watched instructor work his young but excellent Kelpie, then I got to work the Kelpie to give me a feel for what it's like being in the ring with the livestock and not have to worry about the dog. Watched friend and Dig. Tried to watch instructor and Boost again but Boost wanted mommie, so I joined them. More watching. More talking. Worked Boost on my own.

All of that took about 3 hours, I think, and Boost was in the ring for probably no more than 10 minutes each of 3 times and maybe less than that. I got about the same, but not all with her.

OK, details. Boost's first time in the ring, she expressed great interest in the goats. Checked in with me (watching from outside) a couple of times but went right back to it. She circled quite a bit and went back and forth quite a bit but the big issue was wanting to dive in at the goats, so the instructor gave me a running commentary on what he was looking for and what he was doing to avert the behavior.

Second time in, he tried to walk her out to the livestock and she just wouldn't go with him; tried halfheartedly to jump out of the ring to get to me or to my friend. When I came into the ring with the instructor, she was perfectly happy to go back to the livestock.

We had a discussion about how ending a session involves just walking in towards the dog, basically cutting them off from going anywhere except waiting for you, and how threatening or intimidating that really can be to a dog, and maybe that's what concerned her after the end of the first session.

She got better about not diving in at the goats, but slowed way down, almost to a walk. Kept working them, but looked sort of half-hearted to me. We didn't stay in all that long (I think--I was trying to follow his instructions to "stay behind me"--yeah, right!).

When she and I finally went in alone, she seemed calmer but also back to being interested and running again, although not full-out, just comfortably (seemed to me). Went to mostly circling behavior, which isn't desirable in the long run (want them to always keep the livestock between them and you) but instructor said not to worry about it for the moment.

I had to push her back from coming in at the goats only a couple of times, and I had started to figure out how to walk with the goats without tripping over them or getting my coat caught on their horns. So then I practiced getting her to change direction and mostly just tried to keep walking the goats in straight lines back and forth across the small pen without getting them too close to the wall and keeping my eyes on my dog (a lot like agility--the instant you take your eyes of your dog, bad things happen!) and on using the long stick appropriately when needed to push Boost back or give her a little directional help. Another thing where the human needs to be at least as agile and coordinated as the dog, if not more so!

That's basically all it was. Someday I might have enough clue about what's really good herding and what's really bad and what the terminology is and all that. Or maybe not. This turned into a 6-hour trip including commute, lunch, waiting, and the long combined lesson. And not cheap, either.

But I really liked the instructor, I had fun chatting away about dogs and herding and agility on the way there and back, and it was well worth the experience.

Oh--I took my camera but it never came out of the car. The herding instinct test video from a year ago looks a lot like her first session today.

Foxes and Sheepies

SUMMARY: A long drive, Boost is a herding dog, Tika isn't, and there's a fox out there in the field!

I drove to Vacaville this morning with a lonnnnng-time friend; we've been vowing to do more things together and, after our trip to Golden Gate Park (sans dogs) a month or so ago, this was our next adventure, since I knew about one microbraincell more about herding than she did--maybe. At least I got to sleep in until almost 6! Not like 4 a.m. for agility!

Turned out to be a lovely day for a drive--beautiful sunrise with just the remnants of what had been rain clouds overnight.

The lecturer/tester, Deborah Pollard, was the one recommended to me by the testers in Arizona. I liked her style of working with the dogs much more, and she was much better about explaining to all of us naive onlookers about what she was doing, what she was observing, what the dog was doing, what might be some training things to note, and so on. All intriguing and educational. Now I know *two* microbraincells about herding.

Tika was the first dog up and really wanted to have nothing to do with it. She wanted to come back to Mom. She'd periodically dive in at the sheep, barking,and then lunge away to try to come back to Mom. Eventually Deborah had me come out in the pen with her, so then Tika reverted to moving away with her back to us and sniffing. D. asked me whether I intended to do herding with Tika, and I said not (especially now that I've seen 2 tests with her where she's not evidenced the moves), and she said that's probably good--Tika could probably learn to do herding, but "her heart's not in it," which I'd now agree with. Written evaluation includes "Nice dog but not for herding. Too much fear/prey drive." Here's a short clip of the first 2 minutes of Tika's session.

(I'll have to figure this out...  the old video format won't work, this workaround might or might not work, and Blogger apparently doesn't allow you to point to videos on your own site; you either have to upload it to YouTube--which I *can* do but I already have it neatly stored on my own site!--or to blogger, which takes up a lot of storage, which I'm already paying for and videos would be too much. Bah.  - ELF   Sept 9, 2019)







Boost, once again, did well. Her strong propensity to stay on her right lead (circle clockwise) really shows why she had no trouble making weave entries when bending to the right but always ran past them when bearing left: She really doesn't like being on her left lead! This gives me something to really be on the lookout for in agility--are there other patterns or situations where that weakness becomes apparent and manifests itself? And I could do some exercises with her just circling jumps on her left lead. Intriguing!





After I got home, I was standing in the kitchen telling my renter about the experience, half gazing out the window at the huge expanse of field (surrounded by suburban housing tracts) that will one day be a park, and noticed an odd-looking cat way out in the golden grass. "Is that a big cat," I asked, "or is it a fox?" "It's a fox!" he said, and we both ran for our binoculars.

Sure enough, there seems to be a fox living in those 300 acres. Wonder what'll happen to him (and, presumably, his friends and relatives) when they finally start building the park?

Assorted Notes from Nationals Final Thoughts

SUMMARY: More assorted notes and thoughts.

"Free" handouts at check-in: T-shirt (nice, with 20th-anniversary info on back). Some sort of wallet or card holder thingie with the USDAA logo--I guess I'll donate that to my club's raffle. A round white plastic thingie with the USDAA logo, not sure what it's supposed to be, maybe a zipper pull? The usual nice keepsake pin. And--that's it.

Some final thoughts and memories:

• Slim pickings at check-in (see photo):I realize that my entry fees pay for this stuff, but they couldn't find any vendors who wanted to donate or sponsor or even co-sponser check-in goodies? This is the World Championships, fer pete's sake. But maybe I'm spoiled; we don't usually give any check-in goodies at Bay Team trials any more. Hmmm, I wonder what they got in Norway at the other World Championships?
• Vendors: OK, I'll admit that I mostly avoided the vendors this year to help my budget. But I always shop at Clean Run, and they weren't there. Neither was the vendor of the heavy-duty carts to whom I referred some people. Neither was the guy with the PVC dog beds for which I need replacement mats. In fact--the whole vendor area seemed extremely sparse. Are vendors not selling anything here and they've given up? Or did Westworld kill 'em (like Twin Creeks stupidly mostly did to Bay Team vendors)? Or did USDAA? That's always been one thing worth attending the nationals for--the shopping opportunities you don't get elsewhere. But not so much this year. Pity. One less reason to go.
• Organization: Seemed to me that things went much more smoothly overall this year than in some past years. There were plenty of course maps, unlike in previous years. I still like the large computer displays with results, but they weren't showing all results (e.g., team standings), and although the binders were good for keeping the results organized, it was hard to stay up to date with 600 people all trying to read one page at a time of 30 pages of results. Overall, communication seemed to be better, things seemed to start on time, and I didn't see any major glitches with anything. A reason TO go.
• Herding: For the second year, I took Boost for a 10-minute herding instinct test with three cooperative goats. Again, she seemed to do very well. But what do I know? The lady recommended a trainer in Vacaville (if someone in Arizona knows about someone in Vacaville, that speaks well), although I have no interest in driving 2 hours each way and paying a ton of $ to stand around while my dog gets all the fun. Still, my teammate noted that the border collie group with which she's associated is hosting an instinct test with real sheepies PLUS introductory lecture this weekend from the very lady recommended. In Vacaville. So I signed both dogs up; might as well give Tika one more go at it, since she flunked last year. It is scary signing the disclaimer about paying for damaged or destroyed livestock, but I think Tika's too much of a wuss and would be easily deterred if she seemed inclined to grab.
• That lost purple riot tug After last year, when I lost two purple riot tugs and found only one, I was VERY careful with mine this year. But, lo, it vanished anyway. This year I got lucky; I checked lost and found one last time before leaving, and there it was. Whew! (I've put labels on 'em, but with all the dog activity, they don't stay.)
• Getting whistled off: I thought that everyone was leaving the course after they Eed because they wanted to. Much to my surprise, when Tika Eed halfway through the Grand Prix quarterfinal and I kept going, the judge insisted that I leave. Someone told me later that, yes, that was in the rules somewhere (buried in 12 pages of fine print in the premium or elsewhere). Can you imagine driving 12 hours, paying $900 overall for your week at Scottsdale, and not being allowed to finish your run? At least we had 6 classes over the 5 days, not just one. And I realize that the days would've been much longer if they weren't whistling people off. But, jeez... it just doesn't seem right. (I finished the course anyway, saying "oh, sorry," or something like that, since I need to keep Tika moving or we'd be standing in the middle of the ring with her mouth attached permanently to my shoes.)
• Reserved seating in the bleachers: Every year the premium says (I'm going to have to brush up on my fine-print memorization) that you're not supposed to reserve seating in the bleachers. Every year, people do it. So we do, too, because otherwise latecomers find no seats, or none near friends and teammates. The "out" is that it says that if the personal belongings are "unattended for any length of time" they can be cleared. So we counted how many people we had, amassed most of us at the bleachers with seat-saving towels, and arranged a schedule whereby we all took turns sitting in the bleachers attending our seats. Which is more than most people did--there were plenty of unattended belongings. There were things going on in the ring all day, and with more than one of us there, we had people to talk to, so it wasn't bad duty, and this still allowed folks to get meals, attend to their dogs, run their final runs, and so on, without getting shut out of the seating. It's not a perfect system. But I love sitting with all my friends and sharing information about the people who are running (or not). A big reason to go!
• Attendance at the big events: I said "find no seats," but this year the bleachers never filled for any of the final events. This is the first year that I haven't noticed it being standing-room-only, at least for the Steeplechase and Grand Prix finals. Are people getting jaded? Funny. Maybe it IS time for them to move to a different part of the country so people again appreciate the opportunity to watch.
• I can't say often enough how much I enjoyed watching all the final events. The full-crowd participation adds a lot, too; everyone is rooting for everyone to do well. I love it. And it provides inspiration for what to work on for next year to enable YOU YOURSELF to appear in the finals, you're SURE of it.
• OK, I think that's almost all I have to say about this year. See you next year, with BOTH dogs! I'm SURE of it!

What We're Learning

Thurs--Day 1 a.m.: Stairs are interesting. When we first arrived home, I put Boost on her leash and walked her into the house. The first thing we encountered was the five steps leading up from the bottom floor to the kitchen. She stopped dead. With a little urging, tentatively put one foot onto the first step. Very cautiously pulled herself up. Very cautiously scaled the remaining steps. Her breeder lives in a slab-foundation one-story house, so I'm not sure whether she had ever encountered steps before. On the way out to the back yard, there were the five steps going down from the deck. Down is a whole different thing, but she negotiated them cautiously. By the end of the day, she was blasting up and down the stairs as if she'd been doing them every day her whole life.

Day 1 p.m.: Tunnels are fun. While walking on her leash to go potty, Boost stuck her head into one of the C-shaped tunnels, ears perked, and then trotted in to the middle. I leaned down and peered into the other end, where I could see her just peeking around the corner at me. Like a toddler playing hide and seek, she pulled back and *raced* back out the way she had come.

Day 1 p.m.: Tika is fun to chase. Tika is being very good about the puppy. Not immediately friends, still cautiously accepting, but not hostile. Boost likes nothing so much as to chase Tika around the yard as Tika flushes out all possible offending wildlife from nearby fences and trees. So I let Boost loose (with leash dragging) while I played with Tika and her toy and did a little agility. At one point, Tika blasted through one of the tunnels, and Boost blasted through right behind her.

Day 2 a.m.: Jake is an unpleasant experience. Tika abruptly decided she was done playing and raced into the house, Boost hot on her heels. I followed, thinking it was OK--but no. As I reached the kitchen door, I could see that Tika had completely vanished and Boost was racing straight towards Jake who had remained cicumspectly in the front hall. Jake landed on her, snarling, and she started shrieking like she was dying. I hauled Jake off by the scruff of his neck; he just doesn't seem to get it about letting up on a puppy who cries uncle. While I told him off, Boost fled back out the door to the deck, wailing and shrieking as though the entire universe had abandoned her. I went out and held her and comforted her (usually I don't like to "comfort" my dogs--let them figure out what the world is about and they're less likely to be neurotic about it, IMHO, but this seemed like a special case). Eventually she stopped crying, but she really nestled miserably into my arms and lap. I found absolutely no sign of damage.

After that, she became quite concerned about Tika, too. Every time Tika turned in her direction, she ran and hid behind me. It's 24 hours later as I write this, with lots and lots of Tika interaction, and she's only now getting over being worried about Tika. (Although it didn't take her much time at all to get over *chasing* Tika.)

Day 2 a.m.: Herding is in my genes. The baby Border Collie does the Eye, the half-crouch, the circling of Tika as Tika gets ready to run because I have a toy in my hands. When she's not running full out to catch up with Tika, she's doing the herding moves on her. Wow. Tika definitely has Aussie herding behavior, which is the heeling thing rather than the heading thing. She loves to chase Jake and slam against his sides; she poises with rapt anticipation to catch his every dodge and move as he runs. I thought that the heeling herding move was going to cost me a dog Wednesday night. We were up at the Woodside horsepark, in an area where dogs can run loose. Someone came up the hill behind the cars with a large (draft-looking) horse, and I didn't see them until they came around the vehicles, right in front of Tika. Tika ignored my frantic call and went right in behind the horse and started barking and dashing at his heels. One of my agility friends lost an agility dog to a solid equine kick in the head, and I saw my agility life flash before my eyes before I got Tika away from her. Thank the gods that it was a mellow, experienced horse more interested in going to a new pasture than in any boring barking dog. Jeez.

Day 2: Ready...get it! One of the motivational things that many of us do with our dogs is restrain them (e.g., holding collar or hands around neck) while we do something to get the dog excited in front of them, then realease them. We often use "Readyyyyyyyy..." as a cue word that itself will become an exciting thing. Boost definitely has toy drive. I'd hold her collar, toss a toy across the floor, say "Readyyyy... get it!" and release her, and she'd fly across the room to get the toy. I don't think we'll have any problems with toy motivation with this dog.

Day 2 and 3: There are many scary things in this world but they mostly turn out to be OK. If you throw a toy against the kitchen door, and the puppy crashes into the door because it's not very coordinated yet, the door makes a loud booming sound about which one must then be very cautious the next few times the toy is thrown. If you throw a toy against the baby gate, and the baby gate isn't as securely fastened as you thought it was, the baby gate crashes to the ground with quite a clatter as the puppy bumps it. (No comforting here; just moving calmly to the gate and carrying on the "Wow, that was interesting, huh? What was that? What it a big noise?" conversation. Sometimes when it's dark outside, another puppy that you don't know suddenly appears in the sliding glass door and if you bark a scared/warning bark at it, the other dogs leap to their feet and join in the warning to the perceived threat. The puppy seems to go away when mom opens the sliding door. Same puppy appears sometimes behind the mirrored closet door in mom's bedroom. Fortunately, following mom (safely behind her legs) over to the door and looking carefully around it seems to make it go away.

Day 2 and 3: Crates are your friend. I've been too tired to think clearly about crate training in an energetic and positive way. Just pick her up and put her in and reach in and praise her. She's accepting but it's not something she'd do on her own. I *finally* found my notes from Susan Garrett's lecture last year at Power Paws Camp on crate training. The idea behind most training is to try to get the dog to make choices and reward them for the correct choices--of course it's good if you can limit the availablility of wrong choices so that they can succeed.

So I plopped Boost down in front of the open door of the small crate and waited for her to go in, holding her on a very short leash. She was having nothing of it. After a couple of minutes, I limited her choices more: Supported her in a standing position facing the crate, just a few inches in front of it. She couldn't sit because she'd get caught halfway down and readjusted; certainly couldn't go left or right; tried to go *over* the crate but mom got wise to that, too. Couldn't lean on mom or get onto her lap, either. Might have taken 5 minutes before she decided to try going forward into the crate, at which point she received lavish praise and dog goodies. Door closes.

Now--to associate the sound of the door opening with a treat (a pleasant feeling) *without* the dog surging forward. So, open the door and toss a treat into the back of the crate, then close the door. Repeat several times. So now, when the door is opened, the puppy's first thought is *not* to rush forward, but to wait and see what happens. So you can treat & praise the dog for staying there, and close the door. Repeat several times.

Decided that the goal would be for the puppy to sit when I open the door and not move forward out of the crate. If the puppy lies down, I can toss a treat into the back again to get her to get up. If the puppy stands up, I just have to wait for her to sit, pop open the door, treat and praise.

I decided to try to use the release word "Break" for Boost; "OK" has been a problem for me all along with Remington and Jake (you don't realize how often you say "OK!" when you don't mean it as a release for the dogs).

So, after she has stayed in the crate a few times, I can leave the door open and then say "Break!" At this point, she likes being in the crate so much that I have to pat my knees and encourage her to come out.

OK, it's not even 24 hours since I started this. The puppy goes into the crate when I open the door and put her in front of it. She stays in the crate when I open the door. She waits until I say "Break!" and then comes out. Crud. Another too-smart dog.

Day 2 and 3: Sit for your supper. It's so easy to get a dog to sit when she's focused on the bowl of food in your hand and you move it over her head. Then, as you move it down, praising, if she stands up, you just repeat the maneuver. Then "break!" when the bowl is on the ground and it's OK for her to get it. This puppy is only 3 months old and is learning all this stuff instantly! Well--OK, we're just scratching the surface of these things, but what a joy.

Day 3: Lie down while mom fills the dog bowls. This is fairly easy because I kneel on the deck to scoop food from the bin into the bowls. I put a kibble in my fist, show it to the dog just enough so she can smell it and lick it but can't take it. Put my hand on the ground. As soon as she lies down to get at it (which she does eventually), she gets the treat. I quickly scoop some dog food. Repeat the actions; she goes down much more quikcly the second time. I scoop more; she stands. The third time, she drops almost immediately and stays there (with me feeding her a kibble every several seconds as reward).

All days: I have no excuse. This dog learns everything so quickly when it is presented to her properly. Bad behavior won't be blameable on anything but my incompetence as a trainer. Sheesh.

Day 3: Fleas and baths. Boost has been biting enthusiastically from time to time since I got her home. Yup, I finally saw a flea this morning. She got a bath--which she needed anyway because she was quite dusty from her previous life--and about which she was not tremendously happy. Other dogs got their doses of FrontLine. I've been switching the dog bedding back and forth to try to get all the dogs accustomed to each others' scents more, so I had to wash all the bedding--this probably also means they've been sharing Boost's fleas. Tomorrow I can put some Advantage on the baby, too. We should be fine.

Day 3: Vets: You seen one adventure, you've seen 'em all. Boost was most mellow on her first trip ever to the vet. Vet said her heart rate was completely calm, not at all elevated. She just lounged on the table during the exam. I fed her a few treats here and there, but she hardly needed them. I hope she stays like this. Tika, on the other hand, is so overwrought when we go to the vet that she couldn't care less whether I have a treat in my hand. If she ever has to stay overnight at the hospital, she might have to be sedated. Terrible. The vet tried to torture her alive several times, e.g., by taking her temperature, giving her a couple of shots, and other appalling human behaviors.