No. of outruns in a training session

[Maja]

I actually posted the video to show how fast she is going in relation to the original question what the healthy number of outruns is . If I walk towards the sheep they will come to me regardless of where the dog is, and it's something I have to fight with very hard with in order for a serious disaster not to overtake us. Hence, the longer outruns, instead of short, comfortable ones.

 

You are right, Bonnie does not reach 12:00. On very short outruns she used to overshoot. I do not make an attempt to slow her down in the video because she slows on her own in both cases (the command stand is for slowing down, not necessarily for stopping). I cannot make her stop, it would be a very bad idea, because it just about guarantees a very messy lift, because the sheep are a stubborn bunch, and lying Bonnie down takes away power from her.

 

Today Bonnie did a lie down on her own, and then she was unable to move them nohow. It was terrible. She never had that problem before, and then the second time, she did something utterly ridiculous and counterproductive (she went on away almost to the point of balance, and just before the sheep, she switched to comebye ending up between me and the sheep). In the end, I managed to send her out as wide as I could, then I ran to the sheep to make them lift in time, so that it had a semblance of a normal outrun and not a crazy thing she did earlier. So the last time was not too bad. But this was a terrible set back, and now I will need time to recover from completely mentally freaking out, and go out there calm and together, and see how I can shorten the outruns without causiong other problems. You see, she is cutting in, in my opinion, because the sheep would start going towards mee too early in the beginning, and hence I lengthened the outruns.

 

Unfortunately, I won't have a video because it was too foggy.

 

Maja

[Donald McCaig]

Dear Sheepdoggers,

 

I enjoy training discussions but like Mr. Andy, I'd rather not argue. Words are fixed; every training session is fluid - one captures the lessons one can.

 

He writes: "Within reason, the best reward you can give your sheepdog (for good work) is to allow it to continue working sheep."

 

Agreed: but I ask novices to quit when they succeed with a new task because many/most novices will promptly make a fresh mistake and instead of leaving the dog remembering a new task accomplished they muddle the message with the mistake. Fulsome praise works nearly as well as letting them have the sheep and isn't as risky.

 

and

 

"The more you allow your dog to work on its instinct alone, the more difficult it can be to change a particular behaviour. Therefore, if the dog has done a great outrun you should tell it (as it’s outrunning) . . .,"

 

Sentence one: agreed. That's one big reason we "Down" at the top of an outrun - we are asking the dog to submit.

 

Sentence two: Praise is tricky - an essay in itself. I've never known a trainer who praised a dog during a successful outrun though I suppose experienced handlers could do so with some dogs at some stages of their training. Novices are likely to be ignored at best or baffle the dogs at worst and novices don't recover well from failure. But the notion of maintaining contact with praise (and whistle tone can be praise) rather than abandoning and resuming contact (standard procedure) interests me. Of course, teaching the redirect does much the same thing - the dog who understands the redirect has some part of his outrunning brain ready to accept the command thusly retaining handler contact but what about the dog who does flawless outruns from the start (Yes, there are some.) He's also likely the hardest to stop at the top. Hmmmm. Thanks.

 

 

"At our sheepdog training classes at least ninety percent of dogs work better in one direction or the other and we regularly see dogs which are so “handed” it’s extremely difficult to get them to go around the sheep at all on their worst side, yet they’ll flank freely the other way. This also drastically affects the dog’s confidence. Dogs are always more likely to grip when working on their worst side . . ."

 

Disagree. Most, if not all the dogs I've trained and helped train were stronger on one side than another. As the training proceeds, the problem disappears: a right handed dog does learn to take the opposite flank. If it were a persistent problem, we'd hear open handlers say: "Oh, I can't run the double lift. My dog won't go out that side."

 

and

 

"I can never understand people who worry that their dog will go out too wide, just as I cannot understand a handler silently watching their dog when it’s going too wide. I put a command on it by quietly and calmly calling the dog in, using a combination of ‘that’ll do” and “come in Kay” (or whatever name of dog) until the dog has learned the command. Border collies are extremely intelligent, and by calling them in and out in this way, they’ll soon learn the distance you like them to work at. If you can steer your dog this way, it’s invaluable when sending it back for sheep it can’t see."

 

I think our disagreement is due to different working/trialing circumstances. Dogs can run too wide genetically or as a result of too much stress in early training. I am told and believe that too wide running young dogs run wider as they age.

 

One frequently sees good trial dogs start to run too wide (out of contact with the sheep) near the end (the shed) of a stressful run. When it does, a simple recall brings the dog in but you've lost time. I've only run in the UK a dozen times but had more time than in North America where too often: too many dogs run every trial day, too few handlers retire, being called off for lack of progress is unusual and successful well paced runs have only a few seconds left after the gate closes. At Rural Hill last weekend, after June's nice run, an unusually quick shed and the sheep strolling straight into the pen, I had ten seconds left. If time is no consideration at a trial, and particularly if the farm or ranch gather is big and rough, the wide running dog -perhaps even the too wide running dog - has an advantage.

 

Should the novice be concerned about this? Should the novice worry that his dog is running too wide? Probably not. Probably he should clap hands with glee. Too tight is the norm, the fence runner is rare. I would worry if a young dog started throwing himself off contact and if his wide running MEANT escaping the work.

 

Donald McCaig

[Maja]

I just wanted to make sure that everybody realizes that my last long paragraph in the previous post does not have anything to do with the advice given to me.

 

The exchange is very interesting.

Maja

[lookback]

Sentence one: agreed. That's one big reason we "Down" at the top of an outrun - we are asking the dog to submit.

I stop a dog at the end of its outrun because I want it to lift the sheep without unsettling them. If the dog's going really steadily at this stage (and is at the point of balance) I stay silent - or I may praise it quietly (as long as this isn't going to make the dog speed up again).

 

But the notion of maintaining contact with praise (and whistle tone can be praise) rather than abandoning and resuming contact (standard procedure) interests me.

Try it - it works. Talk to your dog.

 

what about the dog who does flawless outruns from the start (Yes, there are some.) He's also likely the hardest to stop at the top. Hmmmm. Thanks.

What makes you say that, Donald? Why should it be harder to stop? It's not my experience.

 

Most, if not all the dogs I've trained and helped train were stronger on one side than another. As the training proceeds, the problem disappears: a right handed dog does learn to take the opposite flank. If it were a persistent problem, we'd hear open handlers say: "Oh, I can't run the double lift. My dog won't go out that side.

The problem goes away because you work on it - making the dog go the way it doesn't want to, and widening it out. Of course open handlers don't have one sided dogs - they train them to be balanced. Are you suggesting a dog that won't go (for instance) clockwise AT ALL - will correct itself?

(With all these dogs training themselves, I'll soon be out of work!) :-)

 

Too tight is the norm, the fence runner is rare. I would worry if a young dog started throwing himself off contact and if his wide running MEANT escaping the work

Totally agree - but we're talking about two different things here. I'm saying that if you're encouraging your dog to go out wide and it starts to go out too far, it's dead easy to call it back in as you go. Repeat the process over and over during training and the dog will get the idea.

 

You're talking about a dog that's finding excuses not to work

[lookback]

If I walk towards the sheep they will come to me regardless of where the dog is,

Maja,

Are you saying that if the dog brings the sheep to you and then you walk away from the sheep with the dog by your side, the sheep will follow you to the dog?

Or if the dog brings the sheep to you and you stop the dog 30 meters away, then walk to the dog, the sheep will follow you to the dog?

[Maja]

Maja,

Are you saying that if the dog brings the sheep to you and then you walk away from the sheep with the dog by your side, the sheep will follow you to the dog?

Or if the dog brings the sheep to you and you stop the dog 30 meters away, then walk to the dog, the sheep will follow you to the dog?

No, I am not saying that, and if they did that I would be worried. I am referring to the outrun situation. Sometimes, Bonnie has not reached 3/9 o'clock, and they start towards me. Sometimes they start off when she is at 3/9 o clock. So if I send Bonnie on an outrun and at any point I am closer to the sheep that she is (or even not sufficiently farther than she) they will start towards me.

 

Maja

[Donald McCaig]

Dear Wouldbe Sheepdoggers,

 

 

Andy wrote (in part) about too wide running dogs:

 

 

" I'm saying that if you're encouraging your dog to go out wide and it starts to go out too far, it's dead easy to call it back in as you go. Repeat the process over and over during training and the dog will get the idea.

 

You're talking about a dog that's finding excuses not to work"

 

 

As I said, too wide running is rare. If it happens occasionally in training, Andy's right: it's easy to correct. Since we value wide runners and breed to them it's unsurprising we get lines that throw dogs that run too wide, impractically wide by any standard. I've also seen dogs that run too wide because they've been overstressed in training and open dogs overfaced at trials that run too wide. Genetic too wides are hard to cure but easy to exaggerate; overstressed dogs - who have " found a reason not to work" can probably be retrained, the older open dog that starts running too wide at the end of a big trial must be handled around.

 

When I said that the natural outrunner is often harder to stop at the stop Andy disagreed, saying, It's not his experience.

 

It is my experience. So we must disagree.

 

He is more concerned about a dog's "handedness" than I am. If my student had a dog that absolutely refused one side or another, I'd handle the dog and with presence and body language force it to do the right thing. I'd probably not remember having done so by the end of the session. I suppose there might be a dog somewhere that persists in his/her refusal but I'm yet to meet it.

 

Novices make far too much of problems -like handedness - that disappear during the ordinary course of training. The novice's pressing need is actually seeing the animals they are - most for the first time - among. They must learn to see what their dog is doing and begin to understand his thinking. They must learn to see what the sheep are telling the dog and vice-versa. They must begin to understand proper stockwork. Training any one sheepdog ability: evenhandedness, the down, a square flank, a blind outrun, driving, turning on the proper sheep during the shed is, given the trainer's patience and experience, relatively easy. Teaching the novice sheepdogger to abandon fantastical theories and see his dog is harder.

 

 

 

 

 

Donald McCaig

[juliepoudrier]

Genetic too wides are hard to cure but easy to exaggerate; <snip> the older open dog that starts running too wide at the end of a big trial must be handled around.

I have one of these genetic too wides. I was a complete novice when I started her and so wasn't actually completely cognizant of the problem at first. In time, I figured it out, sought advice, and did what I could to influence her to come in when called in, though largely unsuccessfully (interestingly, when doing chores at home I am usually more successful at pulling her in some, though it's all relative). Instead at trials I choose to send to the side (generally, assuming there's no strong draw to counter that decision) that has a fence closer in to help mitigate the wideness. It used to bother me that people thought I made her wide or taught her to run the fence or some such, but eventually I just resigned myself to a genetically wide dog. The biggest disadvantage is the one Donald noted: running wide eats up time, which is often at a premium at trials here in the US. For me at home, the greatest advantage is that I can send her to gather sheep, visible or not, and know that she will automatically sweep the area and gather *everything* and that I can turn my attention to something else while she is doing so.

 

I am now running two of her offspring in open. As youngsters, both started out going straight up the middle. Knowing their genetic wide-running potential I chose not to widen their outruns in any way. They naturally widened to a normal pear-shaped outrun once we got past the "yeehaw" puppy stage. At their first trials, I was more likely to have to redirect them to widen them (that is, to counter a too-tight outrun). Then when one of them turned 3, he suddenly started kicking out and back when I sent him (just as his mother does, leaving square or wider from my feet) when I was doing *nothing* different in our training, a result, I presume, of his wide-running genetics finally taking over. I *immediately* started working on calling him in at the start of his outrun. I have not been entirely successful, but he's young yet, and so I keep working on it. There is another littermate (owned/run by someone else) that tends to run a bit tighter. But I still think that at times genetics will win out in the training "game," and reforming genetic wideness is one place where I think success could be limited.

 

J.

[lookback]

Donald, when it comes down to it, I don't think we're too far apart . . .

just coming at it from slightly different angles maybe?

 

Interesting debate though - thanks.

Andy

[Donald McCaig]

Dear Andy,

Enjoyed it and may try cautious praising the next strong young dog during his outrun. So this old dog may have learned something. Lets disagree again some time.

 

Donald McCaig

[Maja]

I find this very interesting. Having done some clicker training with my first dog, I have more of a habit of being quiet. in clicker, we had many completely silent sessions. My husband though has a habit of talking to the dog all the time. it used to drive me bonkers during searching, i would just say to the dog "find it" and maybe to-three minutes I'd be completely silent, provided the dog was working. But not he, he would keep talking, and I would say "let her work". Now we have two dogs and no arguments . But I have noticed that herding people talk to their dogs all the time. Verbally or whistling. Even in the finals the communication seemed continuous. So I have learned to talk to the dog more praising it and correcting through commands. On the outrun though, when she is doing well, I usually just hold my breath.

 

Maja

[lookback]

I've won open trials where I needed several redirects and June got in the Gettysburg Semi Finals after three redirects.

Hmmm . . .

Surely this reflects the standard of the other dog/handler combinations and the quality of judging on the day rather than the merits of redirecting a dog on its outrun.