The rake

[bcnewe2]

What works better for him is setting up situations where he REALLY has to be wider to do the job (can't get away with cutting corners) and hoping that he figures it out -- usually he does.

 

I was working with Kathy Knox at a clinic and she kept repeating the phrase "use the sheep to teach the dog". I think that's what Melainie's saying and it's working great for us. Sometimes it take me a while to figure out how to set up a situation that we need but if I'm observent they present themselves pretty often, I just need my brain to be there ready to take advantage at the moment it happens.

 

It's hard for me to not try and make things happen. Sometimes I don't see I'm forcing things but the dogs sure do.

 

I've seen the rake used for other breeds where the feeling is lacking in the dog so the rake is pushing the dog into the right spot, guess they're hoping the dog will feel the "right" thing.

 

Kristen

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

I was working with Kathy Knox at a clinic and she kept repeating the phrase "use the sheep to teach the dog"

 

Yes, that's exactly it! An older version of this is, good sheep make good dogs (and good dogs make good sheep).

 

One thing I will say about rakes specifically is that they tend to be a cultural marker in the sense that the trainers who tend to use them tend to train for venues other than practical stock work with Border Collies specifically, or ISDS-style trials.

 

This is true, and reminds me of something I wanted to mention here. A subpoint of this fact is that of course there are plenty of decent trainers who happen to wield (weild?) rakes, not to mention the fact that there are plenty of other pusher-outer tools that we just haven't siezed (seized?) on here, to use as shorthand for this kind of training. The rattle paddle, the flag, the ten-foot PVC pipe.

 

AND, there's plenty of decent trainers who use such things in more stock-oriented training. I've seen all but the rake, used simply to get the dog's attention when all else failed, and attention immediately rewarded with regaining the sheep - an "invitation to be right." Edit: You can tell the difference easily - these trainers walk around with the tool in a neutral position when not issuing a correction.

 

Trainers find their own comfort zones, and that changes as trainers mature and get more tools in their mental toolbox. I do have to say though that I find trainers with the most in their mental toolboxes tend to have less to do with gardening tools. Just my very novice observation.

[Sue R]

Rebecca - Wield and seize. Wield and seize what, I don't know, but wield and seize. The more I stare at these words, the weirder (wierder? weirder.) they look. Hmmm, I think I need more sleep. Hope you are feeling better.

 

As for tools, I think a lot of what is accomplished with or without them, is due to the skill and timing of the handler/trainer. Elvin Kopp says that it's not so important what method you use (within reasonable limits) but whether or not it gives you the results you desire and require(my clumsy and, I hope, not misleading paraphrase).

 

I've been impressed by the results that several handlers get with their dogs, and they use wildly varying ways of achieving those results. Different strokes for different folks, maybe? Also, different approaches for different dogs, perhaps?

[Bill Fosher]

I've been impressed by the results that several handlers get with their dogs, and they use wildly varying ways of achieving those results. Different strokes for different folks, maybe? Also, different approaches for different dogs, perhaps?

 

Different approaches for different dogs, to be sure. But sometimes I wonder, like in the Youtube video that was linked from this site a few days ago, if dogs work because of their training or in spite of it.

 

I've seen the rake used for other breeds where the feeling is lacking in the dog so the rake is pushing the dog into the right spot, guess they're hoping the dog will feel the "right" thing.

 

I guess this is what I was trying to convey. If the dog has so little feel for the sheep that it must be pushed into the "right" spot, then what's the point?

[Pipedream Farm]

I guess my question is not how to help the dog learn proper distance, but what has happened that a rake is "necessary?" Is it just a short cut?

I have found that the added reach of _______ allows me to make a better timed correction (for diving in) on the other side of knee knockers than if I attempted to make my way through knee knockers to make the correction myself. So, yes it's a short-cut.......through the sheep.

 

Mark

[bcnewe2]

If the dog has so little feel for the sheep that it must be pushed into the "right" spot, then what's the point?

 

I bet if you asked the people with those dogs they'd be able to tell you what their point is.

When starting out sometimes you (as in the collective you) don't know what a "good" dog is, or for that matter what sheep feel is. I remember seeing some good dogs when I first started and I knew they were good but I didn't know that the dog I was working with didn't have the "it" factor. I think that falls into the "if only" people. As in, If only my dog had a better handler or trainer he could do that too! How many AKC owners say that? I don't think they're just saying it to sound stupid, they just don't get "it"! I’ll even add that I’m really glad I didn’t have a “good” stock dog to begin with. I was so green a good dog would have killed me or I would have ruined a good dog. The way it went my dog is no worse off now that she doesn’t work stock. I would feel bad had I ruined Mick in learning what I was doing. Heck, if he wasn’t as hard headed as he is I’d of ruined him in the learning process.

 

I'm in it for the long haul so eventually when I knew it was missing in that dog I got a "better" stock dog. The old one is the best couch tater I've ever had and she still warms my couch everyday. Some people don't want a different dog, because either they still don't get "it" or because stock work is on their "hobby" list and not their top priority list. They're only doing it for the dog. They are insulted when they hear that their dog is not as good as the other dog. Kinda like my kid is smarter than your kid. “Better” is so hard to understand in stockdog they think you’re talking about their dog in general so it sounds insulting.

 

I think Bill is wondering why these people keep trying.....cause they can, and cause there will always be trainers out there who will take their money and keep telling them what a good job the dog is doing. They keep coming back with more money. So the cycle continues.

 

I once helped a friend with a not so good dog. She knew it, I'm pretty sure the dog knew it but the lady wanted to do it anyway and had a great time with her dog. Why not? That's not without adding as long as the sheep are being treated with respect and the dog is not miserable. We got to the point where the dog couldn't go any further so she quit. But I don't think it was wrong of her to try.

 

Kristen

[PSmitty]

I bet if you asked the people with those dogs they'd be able to tell you what their point is.

<snip>

I once helped a friend with a not so good dog. She knew it, I'm pretty sure the dog knew it but the lady wanted to do it anyway and had a great time with her dog. Why not? That's not without adding as long as the sheep are being treated with respect and the dog is not miserable. We got to the point where the dog couldn't go any further so she quit. But I don't think it was wrong of her to try.

 

Thank you for saying this. That's how I feel about it, and I'm a person who has a not so good dog (I can say this already, since he's a mix, I know he's not going to "have it"). If I can find a trainer willing to work with us, the sheep and dog are treated well, and I'm willing to have hoof prints on my forehead, why not? I'm going into it with my eyes wide open, I know I don't have Wonderdog, and no aspirations of trialing or working on the farm that I don't have. It's all good. (or will be, I hope)

 

Thanks for all the replies about the rake, too. Good stuff!

[Lenajo]

well here you go...I fell of the wagon and used the rake last weekend. It was the least violant way to make a point with some ballistic corgis. It was an instant moving wall that made diving into the sheep pointless - at a level the short dogs understood LOL

[kelpiegirl]

If it will make you all feel better, at a clinic recently, someone was using a rake (newbie) and smacked herself in the face with the handle and gave herself a fat lip. OW.

Julie

[PSmitty]

If it will make you all feel better, at a clinic recently, someone was using a rake (newbie) and smacked herself in the face with the handle and gave herself a fat lip. OW.

Julie

 

Hah! That, there, is *exactly* the reason I don't need a rake.

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

I bet she never repeated THAT mistake again! So, maybe a rake is an effective correction after all - for the handler?

 

Wendy - you "fell off the wagon", and took up a rake? - there's a mixed metaphor in there - or maybe the two actually go together if it's a hay wagon you fell off! A corgi? I think you actually just proved the point we're starting to arrive at here.

[kelpiegirl]

And that was after she went over because she wasn't watching the sheep- they clipped her and she went boom. Poor lady.

Julie

 

I bet she never repeated THAT mistake again! So, maybe a rake is an effective correction after all - for the handler?

 

Wendy - you "fell off the wagon", and took up a rake? - there's a mixed metaphor in there - or maybe the two actually go together if it's a hay wagon you fell off! A corgi? I think you actually just proved the point we're starting to arrive at here.

[Lenajo]

Not really sure how using a rake on a Corgi was proving any point here at all, other than that some dogs need different tools as part of their training. The Corgi(s) in question are quickly proving very useful stockdogs, they just....as many Border Collies out there...particularily needed widening out from their level. I suppose you could have swatted at them from above, or better yet yelled and screamed (that's so effective ), or perhaps you could have kicked them (the owner would have been thrilled I'm sure). All popular methods, but the choice for today for us was the rake.

[bcnewe2]

I suppose you could have swatted at them from above, or better yet yelled and screamed (that's so effective ), or perhaps you could have kicked them (the owner would have been thrilled I'm sure). All popular methods, but the choice for today for us was the rake.

 

Is that how you would do things if you didn't pick up a rake? I've used a rake before, like someone (maybe you?) stated earlier when the dog needed more than what I had to offer in my physical being for a block, but it wasn't on a BC with any feel and I wouldn't kick a dog to get my sheep point across. I can't imagine needing to kick a dog (not figuratively) off sheep. Where is kicking popular?

 

This sounds sort of snippy, I don't mean it to, just can't figure out where you're coming from. Maybe the confusion I'm having is some of us are talking about working bc's with feel and some of us are talking about working breeds that aren't as natural.

 

I think (pardon me Bill for using you as an example) Bill is asking why bother with training something other than a bc with good stock sence. I offered my opinion on that in a post above. But again, people get all bent out of shape when someone questions why they bother working their not so talented dog on stock and they feel it's a personal attack on their dog. At least for me, I don't take offence with someone saying that dog you got on the couch is not a very good stock dog, even if she is a bc. She wasn't bred for that, and I had no idea what dog was or was not bred for that when I got her. Not her fault and she's not less of a dog, just less of a stock dog and more of a couch warmer, one hell of a former frisbee dog and an all around great dog. She's not offended either, as long as you give her a biscut when she asks!

 

Kristen

[Lenajo]

I've seen a lot of methods, probably more than you care to hear about here, and yes, there are trainers that use the toe of a boot prominently. There are also trainers who use ropes, and rakes, sticks, and some very well known (and successful) ones that teach you to run up the field like you are in Braveheart screaming your lungs out at a dog until he listens on the fetch.

 

And there are also some very, very good BCs that needed way more than a physical block when they started.

 

I am not advocated methods, I am discussing methods.

 

There are more types of dogs than BCs, and some do indeed have a purpose and with training make a perfectly nice stockdog that is exactly what their owner wants. I don't judge the breed or the dog, we just work it to the best of it's capability. If it hits a limit we can't work around, or we don't want to work around, we call it there and life goes on. However a fast moving, driven short legged Corgi who is gathering well in 5 minutes and grouping a dozen sheep nicely is worth the effort of moderate training if the owner has that purpsoe in mind.

 

My point...is that I had ruled out the rake as a tool but I ran into 2 dogs this weekend whom it was the least punitive way to make the point needed.

 

My second point....if you are hanging around waiting for the perfect dog that fades away into a precisely square flank when you step in it's path, and then come on straight and powerful when you ask, the walks out into the training pen with perfectly experienced feel and never comes too tight or too wide....you aren't going to get much training experience. In fact, I'm not sure you aren't going to have a working dog of any breed.

[bcnewe2]

if you are hanging around waiting for the perfect dog that fades away into a precisely square flank when you step in it's path, and then come on straight and powerful when you ask, the walks out into the training pen with perfectly experienced feel and never comes too tight or too wide....you aren't going to get much training experience. In fact, I'm not sure you aren't going to have a working dog of any breed.

 

You just described my second dog Raven. Excpet the power thing. She is my second couch warmer though they both have different couches. I've learned lots from all my dogs, what I want, what I don't want, what I can't stand and what I love in "my" stockdogs.

 

My last time out with Dew my sweet almost 11 month old pup had me picking myself up off the ground with sheep running right on past me (well maybe over me). I yelled a bit but she didn't hear me, she was to concerned with what and where the stock were going. I didn't need a rake except to scrape my butt off the ground. If I had a rake I'm not sure I would have used it properly at that moment anyway. Yelling didn't help much either. But she's doing great and my headache went away the next day! I do consider her my perfect stockdog. At least for right now.....

 

Thanks for explaining yourself a bit more, I get it now. OMT I didn't understand you had ruled out the rake, did this dicussion make or help you rule it out? At least before this weekend?

Kristen

[Rebecca, Irena Farm]

I totally get it about the Corgi, because I feel the same way - if a dog has some potential and the owner is willing and no one's getting hurt, I don't care what the dog looks like or what breed it is. That's the point I'm getting out of all of this - you didn't immediately rush at the Corgi with a rake and drive him back willy nilly from the stock, blocking him from getting there. You gave him a chance to show you what he could give naturally, and then you went from there.

 

It's not about the tools, it's about the attitude behind them. By giving the little guy the sheep first and seeing where it went from there, you showed a stock and dog-oriented attitude to training. I mean, sometimes one works on manners before entering the ring, but once contact is made I doubt you break it unless it's for a good reason.

 

Being a mature trainer (which I am not) seems to be about being flexible. For less experienced trainers like me, we have only hammers so every problem looks like a nail. It's really hard to break out of that mindset, but it's even harder if your instructor has the same mindset (not you but all the videos I watched before).

 

The last time Jack was here he had to use a buggy whip to slap the ground for a correction while working Ted in the pen (we had mislaid his stick somewhere and that was all I could find). He used it, but he also mentioned the weakness of the tool in his approach - the correction lasts too long - it goes swiiiissssh - POP instead of just POP on the ground. He also said on the other hand that some people like a long sonically impressive correction, mentioning in particular the famous "white stick toss." It puts me in mind of the Braveheart charge you mentioned. I was taught on the other hand, the stealth method - but I'd do neither now. I'd back up a step, working on the stop, the flank, the drive, making sure the dog was feeling and giving to his sheep right. Three different approaches to the same problem, and I bet if we filled a room with a hundred trainers we'd get a hundred more answers - probably more if they were really good trainers.

 

That's why I even dare to speak up in this conversation - not as someone who has all the answers, but as someone who's made the mistake of training with those "every problem's a nail" trainers. It's really, really easy to get into a training rut if you don't have a good mentor who can jerk you up periodically. That kind of relationship right from the start is what everyone should have, or as many as possible.

 

ETA: For those who might be recoiling at the thought of the whip being used with a then six month old pup, Jack said his response to corrections were "spot on" or he'd never have tried it. Ted's a very game little guy and VERY forgiving, which makes him a perfect pup for me to train, lol.

[Lenajo]

You just described my second dog Raven. Excpet the power thing.

 

and there goes that point: there is pretty nearly always an "except" on a real life non-internet dog.

 

I had ruled out the rake after working with it some with my own dogs. I could get more done with positioning (and good breeding) than the rake can offer me. That led me to rule it out completely....a silly "never, ever, always" mistake that was squashed when somebody had a different kind of dog that they wanted to work with. In their case the rake was very helpful, and the results were what we wanted: a more useful dog on the stock.

 

Everybody needs help sometimes, and if I was around I'd show you how the rake was used and you could decide if it was something that helped you. We've all been knocked about a bit by sheep and dogs, and it does get easier

[Lenajo]

yeah, the Corgi showed me...

 

Not to hijack the conversation but we were having trouble turning the one Corgi on, so we let the "quieter" one in the area as well. Well she went right to work and took him with her and then I had 2 evil corgnevils doing the mirror image thing. They were actually a remarkable natural brace - I'd have them on heavy cows anyday, and I don't think they'd need much training. The rake wasn't to push them out, as it was to make it non productive if they came in to heel hard without reason (a moving shield that appeared and dissapeared LOL). They got it pretty quick, then the rake became a huge demonstration "hand" to teach the owner about how to position get them to give to flanks. (Now that one is hard to explain online.).

 

I think you are a mature trainer, we all all. Lack of maturity in this area congregates on other boards...not here

[border_collie_crazy]

we used a long crook at the clinic I took Happy and Misty too, but it was only for dogs that needed it. like with Happy such a thing was never touched or mentioned, but she was easy right off the bat, never chased the sheep even once, found balance almost immedietly, was doing small outruns and gathers her third time out. Misty however they did have me use the long crook because she kept trying to glue herself to my side, with that they just had me tap the ground with the stick if Misty started coming to my side again as a reminder to get back behind the sheep. cant imagine what the point would be for anything else though lol

[Bill Fosher]

I guess what I was getting at is that I start with a job that needs to be done and look for the dog to do it. I'm not looking for recreation for myself and my dogs. I don't have time for or interest in making "herders" out of Corgis or Australian shepherds or rough collies or Rottweillers or whatever. And I don't fully buy that a rake (etc.) is a good way of fixing a problem with a Border collie. It might mask the problem, but I think it will either come out in other ways, or you'll create new ones.

 

But, hey, what do I know.