nxpress62 Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 We just (3 weeks ago) got a very sweet bc, Keira, from a shelter. We don't know anything about her life before us, but she has been pretty easy to housebreak, and seems very healthy (after getting her over a short case of kennel cough). The problem is; I have owned several bc mixes over the course of my life, and I never took the herding instinct thing very seriously, and now, appparently I have adopted one with a pretty serious drive. The first issue was with our other dog, a 18 lb. minpin male, Turner, who she would stare at all day long, and stalk around the house or the back yard. This has basically worked itself out, the two are now pretty used to each other and play constantly until Turner hides on one of our laps. The other issue is the porch cats (2), who come in to the basement when the weather gets cold. Keira wakes every morning and loves to help us 'herd' the cats out of the basement and to the porch, where, when the work is done she becomes a great and 'normal' dog around the house. The problem is in the evenings, when it gets cold enough the cats come in and live in the basement. Keira will not leave the basement door alone, she doesn't claw or scratch at it, but stares at it, apparently willing to do it forever if we don't find some way to get her out of her mindset. I've been looking over the boards, and there is almost too much information to sort through. What is the right way to get her into a more 'normal' mindset when she is in a herding trance, or are we suppose to just let her obsess at the door (Im guessing the answer is no..) She has no interest in toys (this is a bummer, but we're working on it..) and treats aren't doing it either. She gets walked daily, and plays with the other dog, I know she needs a lot of exercise, but we feel she's still doing better with us than she was at the shelter.. Other than that she's a pretty calm, only slightly crazy, sweet and lovely dog.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carlasl Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 I am sure there will be lot of responses similar to this, but the first thing you need to do is keep her separate from the cats and under no circumstance let her chase the cats, which is what she is doing, border collies herd sheep if they are trained, everything else is just prey drive and more likely a wish to "get" the cats. As far as the obsessing over the basement door, once she realizes that chasing cats is not allowed, and obsessively staring at the door is not allowed she should stop. I would distract her with something she likes to do, a game of fetch, or a trick training session. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WyoBC Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 Welcome! And thank you for adopting her. The best thing to do is to keep her busy when she starts to zone out. Find something that she likes more than staring at the door. Playing will come. How old is she? Maybe she has never played befor or never had toys? That's the way mine was. Good luck a hope to see more of you guys. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
desertranger Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 Border collies need something ot do or they'll just make it up. Like herding cats. Staring at the dor is called "eye" and too much eye can be considered OCD behavior which is fairly commonplace in BCs. Carlasl has the right answer for a start but you also have to find something else. A ball, chewies, bubbles, squeakies, tug toys. Bear in mind that a BC can also change their OCD to something else. I also recommed teaching tricks to keep their minds busy. Welcome to the forum. Now you can reflect on, "What would possess me to get a dog smarter than I am?" Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nxpress62 Posted December 7, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 Hah! Thanks for the responses. We are working on toys, but she just doesn't get them (she will grab the little dog's toys to get his attention, but I don't think that counts..) Our vet thinks she is less than 2 years old. She loves car rides and went on her first hike with us today, loved it, but she's not well leash trained enough to really run free, pretty weak on recall right now... With no cats or other dogs around (like hanging out at my garage) she is completely relaxed, just hangs out and lays around. Anyway, we're definately not the best teachers, but we're working on it, and she is very receptive to training. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mariji Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 Learning to play comes with time. I have managed to teach racing greyhounds that have never even seen a toy to play within a week. It may just start with no toys and chasing you or you chasing them, smacking them (softly) around and getting them to play back. Then move it onto toys. She sounds pretty motion sensitive so a ball or something that rolls or makes noise would probably be a good start. What she is doing is her showing obsessive qualities borders can develop and that is not because of you but most likely her lack of stimulation at some point in her life. As for being good trainers just do some research it took me till my girl was 10 months old to learn about training mechanics and how dogs learn and how we can teach them. Although it can be hard to reinforce a dog that wont take treats or play with toys so just start with that. If she likes her dinner train with that! Try researching a method called shaping. It is absolutely fantastic for training borders who are very clever and quite capable of thinking for themselves. shaping is when you let the dog respond to you. You wait for an appropriate response and reward this. At first it may take a while as the dog has never had to think like that before in regards to training but once they work it out you can teach the dog absolutely anything. This link is a vid of me "shaping" my puppy to go through a tunnel. It will kind of explain things a bit more. She has no idea what i want her to do, so i take very small steps i.e. just looking at the tunnel first, then taking a step towards it etc. Your girl sounds just adorable and well done on you for adopting, i didn't have the guts to take on a shelter collie at the time i was looking for my first dog as i just didn't think i would be able to help collies that had been mentally abused for so long. It is possible it just takes time. Well done and good luck in the future. There is another video on my youtube channel of Echo up to 15 weeks that might give you some inspiration, or i'd like to hope it would. You may even want to try agility if she is so driven she would most likely be just fantastic at it with you there to help her. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
juliepoudrier Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 I think that instead of letting her "herd" the cats to the porch in the morning, you should teach her that cats are completely off limits and not ever to be bothered by the dog. Because you've allowed her to mess with the cats, she now obsesses over them, which is why she stares at the basement door. From now on, do not let her work the cats in any way. Distract her or remove her from the area when the cats go from basement to porch. Don't let her sit in front of the basement and stare. You've got an obsessive behavior started and it will take consistency (you can't *ever* let her sit in front of the basement door and stare--inconsistency with this will kill all your attempt to break the habit) to correct it. By taking the cats off her list of things she's allowed to "do" you will start to redirect her attention. As long as she thinks the cats are something she's allowed to work, she will continue to obsess over them. So start by teaching her that the cats are not hers to deal with. J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejano Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 We just (3 weeks ago) got a very sweet bc, Keira, from a shelter. We don't know anything about her life before us, but she has been pretty easy to housebreak, and seems very healthy (after getting her over a short case of kennel cough). The problem is; I have owned several bc mixes over the course of my life, and I never took the herding instinct thing very seriously, and now, appparently I have adopted one with a pretty serious drive. The first issue was with our other dog, a 18 lb. minpin male, Turner, who she would stare at all day long, and stalk around the house or the back yard. This has basically worked itself out, the two are now pretty used to each other and play constantly until Turner hides on one of our laps. The other issue is the porch cats (2), who come in to the basement when the weather gets cold. Keira wakes every morning and loves to help us 'herd' the cats out of the basement and to the porch, where, when the work is done she becomes a great and 'normal' dog around the house. The problem is in the evenings, when it gets cold enough the cats come in and live in the basement. Keira will not leave the basement door alone, she doesn't claw or scratch at it, but stares at it, apparently willing to do it forever if we don't find some way to get her out of her mindset. I've been looking over the boards, and there is almost too much information to sort through. What is the right way to get her into a more 'normal' mindset when she is in a herding trance, or are we suppose to just let her obsess at the door (Im guessing the answer is no..) She has no interest in toys (this is a bummer, but we're working on it..) and treats aren't doing it either. She gets walked daily, and plays with the other dog, I know she needs a lot of exercise, but we feel she's still doing better with us than she was at the shelter.. Other than that she's a pretty calm, only slightly crazy, sweet and lovely dog.. There's something about those min pins -- Robin was in puppy class with one and found the little critter quite enticing. He did learn to leave it alone though and your Keira will learn to coexist with the cats with a little control. A four letter word -- Ball. Or any other toys and tricks that you can use to exercise her body and mind. Sometimes one thing will get her really excited, but if you've only had her for a short time, she's still trying to get comfortable and figure out the rules. It will help if you be very clear about the rules (i.e. no cats, no sleeping on furniture...whatever behavior you expect. She'll learn very quickly to do any number of things. Our Ladybug was four years old when we adopted her and she came pre-programmed...knew everything - we just had to ask her what she knew so now that Keira's feeling better, you could try basic obedience commands to see how much she's been taught. Pictures? Liz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carson Crazies Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 Staring at the dor is called "eye" and too much eye can be considered OCD behavior which is fairly commonplace in BCs. I'm sorry, but staring at the door is called "staring at the door". Eye is something dogs use to control the movement of livestock, and having too much of it can manifest in clappiness (and in other ways) on stock. Having eye is not an OCD behavior - it has nothing to do with anything except for stockwork. Just like chasing a cat is not herding (chasing a cat is chasing a cat), staring at a door is not eye. I think it would be fair to say that there's some prey drive involved here - and some obsessing too, and having said that it's possible to break that up. I have a dog who was very much obsessed with two rescue kittens that I kept for a while. He too was bent on staring at the kittens (although he wasn't particularly interested in chasing them he would have been happy to have taken a bit of a bite if he had thought he could get away with it). I had to break him from staring at the door, and then I had to break him from even THINKING about staring at the door. My next step (had I not found them a home) would have been to have broken him from staring at the kittens themselves. A softer dog than Nick might be easier to do this with. Simple redirection at this point may be the key - giving her something incompatible with staring at the door. Correction when she's thinking about staring at the door may work at this point. You're doing well IMO to go on and deal with it NOW, before it becomes a default. Every time she gets to stare at the door she'll want to stare more so definately you're on the right track to simply not allow it - period, end of story. Hah, easier said than done, I know, but you can do it! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nxpress62 Posted December 7, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 I wondered about the prey drive thing, she doesn't try to move the cats, just stares, with a nip if she thinks she can get away with it. We don't purposely let her around the cats because they absolutely do not like the attention. I'm not terribly familiar with herd dog mentality so I wasn't sure. She doesn't seem to know anything (including staying off the counters..) but learns quickly and is very polite. We're assuming her previous owners never really taught her anything. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ejano Posted December 7, 2009 Report Share Posted December 7, 2009 I wondered about the prey drive thing, she doesn't try to move the cats, just stares, with a nip if she thinks she can get away with it. We don't purposely let her around the cats because they absolutely do not like the attention. I'm not terribly familiar with herd dog mentality so I wasn't sure. She doesn't seem to know anything (including staying off the counters..) but learns quickly and is very polite. We're assuming her previous owners never really taught her anything. My other rescue, Scotty came from a very lax home, which explained why his behavior became intolerable for them and they gave him up. He roared into our house put his big paws up on the kitchen counter and his expression was, "What's for dinner?" He was adorable, but one roaring "NO!" fixed it. He was very adaptable. It's fun to get to know a new dog and watch their special personality bloom. Liz Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nxpress62 Posted December 8, 2009 Author Report Share Posted December 8, 2009 Is this stalking, herding, or play? Still figuring out our photo editor, put a couple of shots in the pictures section too. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
juliepoudrier Posted December 8, 2009 Report Share Posted December 8, 2009 Without seeing it in action, I would say stalking. Try to get out of the mindset that you can explain her behavior away as herding. Anything that is obnoxious to you or another animal is bad manners and needs to be corrected. J. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mariji Posted December 8, 2009 Report Share Posted December 8, 2009 She doesn't seem to know anything (including staying off the counters..) but learns quickly and is very polite. We're assuming her previous owners never really taught her anything. Exactly!!! Her previous owners no doubt saw her in a pet shop or bought her from a backyard breeder thinking, she's so cute and fluffy and borders are so smart and beautiful dogs. Sure they are all of those things but they are also very destructive, obsessive, terribly behaved creatures if they do not have directions and limits in their lives. All she will need is some training (it is up to you how far you take it) to learn what is right and wrong (keep in mind she doesn't know what she is doing is wrong) and learn how to behave in a home. From what i have seen when a border is obsessive as in stalking another animal they are not thinking too much about it, they are kind of in a trance. So snap her out of it and ask her to come sit with you. Reward her for not looking at what she is obsessing over. And catch her everytime! if you can. Even if it is just a fly she obsesses over, there is a difference between general interest and obsession. I know a lady with 3 gsp's and a border, the border is terribly obsessive to the point the second he walks in a room at work he starts to stare at the ceiling looking for a bug. If he sees ones he jumps and barks and spins. Just snap her out of it and ask for something other than looking in that direction. It will take a long time, i do not doubt that, but you can eventually get over the worst of it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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