Questions & telling about second lesson with Tess

[Keegan's Mom]

Tess had her second lesson last night. I decided to do some major obedience training in between. She did really well and was interested in the sheep almost right away. However, she does cirlces around Keegan while playing - counterclockwise...well this carried over to sheep. I try to stop her when she is doing it during play because it seems obessive. We tried to get to go the other way, but didn't work yet. We didn't work long - her attention span is still not all that great for she is only 8 months old.

 

Keegan did great - or so I thought. We may be moving to a bigger field next lesson. I just wish I could pick up better how to manuevre!!!!

 

My hubby will go next time I take both dogs - so about another month. I will try to get some good pictures then.

 

I have two questions now...I've heard people talk about the sheepdog list. Where do I go to read these discussions?

 

Also, my trainer was saying that there is currently a discussion there about playing with your working dogs. How do you all feel about playing and training for work? Do you feel that playing with your sheepdogs makes them less of a sheepdog or less keen on the sheep?

 

I'm trying to train Tess at home for things that might carry over to the sheep training. For instance - she has a decent recall without distractions. However, any distraction, even if small, is a huge distraction to Tess. So I've been using her favorite ball in the backyard and calling her to me. This hasn't worked so far so I thought of attaching a long leash...let her play with the ball then call her to me. If she doesn't come then I will tug on the long leash. Are there other ways that people have found to train this successfully on an easily excitable pup (but what pup isn't?)? I'm doing this method in hopes that when she is around sheep which is very exciting that I can call her off easily.

 

Thanks!!

[Smokjbc]

Hi-

I believe you can use this link to subsribe to Sheepdog-L:

 

http://www.sheepdog.com/sheepdogl.html

 

As far as playing- I have only one dog that is ball obsessive, but she has never left stock to find a ball or stick, even when under pressure. She's not a very good sheepdog though (too obsessive and does not cooperate well), so she is probably not the best indicator. I did not let any of my other dogs become as obsessive about fetching, mostly because of the annoyance factor, although I do have two dogs that will fetch and the pup I have now wants to fetch too. I never throw an offered ball anymore unless I initiated the play. I also don't fetch with more than one dog around as I have had some pretty bad fights erupt over that (involving the obsessive dog and the dog that works the fetcher ). My younger dogs will fetch when I initiate it but never offer to do it, they may go months and not pick up a ball. Nellie can "fly" when she fetches- gets over 5 feet off the ground, but when you are done, she's done.

 

I guess I believe playing depends on the dog- I don't think excessive, obsessive type play is good for any dog. Some dogs (my Nellie is one) are hyper/keyed up dogs, and I do see that if we do too much "silliness" she gets to crowding her sheep and reacting instead of thinking while working. Others, like my Jane, are not keyed up and are very serious, and probably could play ball every day and not have their work affected too much. Jane would rather show everyone she has the ball than to bring it back anyways...

 

I definitely will never let a dog work another dog fetching again. I think it develops bad habits and is a bad fight/injury waiting to happen. I learned the hard way when one dog punctured the eye of my good old cow dog- she didn't lose the eye but I don't think she sees too well out of it because of the scarring and I had to end her working career when, after the injury, she got herself kicked really hard. She was a dog that always took care of herself well (brave, but smart about it), so suspect she didn't see it coming.

[juliepoudrier]

Rachel,

If the link Jaime supplied doesn't work, just go to yahoogroups.com and search for Sheepdog-L. Follow the instructions on yahoogroups to join.

 

All of my dogs fetch and play. I've never had my trial/work dogs distracted by balls or anything else when working, even in pressure situations.

 

Like Jaime, I have do not like the idea of group fetch unless there is an object for each dog to fetch and the dogs understand when to wait and when it's their turn.

 

I think a lot depends on the dog, but I don't agree with the blanket statement that working dogs shouldn't be played with. As someone noted on Sheepdog-L "a little play is good for the soul of both man and beast." The caveat is that the human needs to regulate the play and not let it become the be all and end all for the dog.

 

J.

[Keegan's Mom]

Thanks for the link for the sheepdog forum. I'm all signed up now and trying to catch up on reading.