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Tuesday, February 10 2015

LIVING WITH THE PACK

By Raewyn Saville on Tuesday, February 10 2015, 22:34 - Club Corner: Personal Stories

I have decided this year (2015) to start a daily blog about living with my four dogs. I suspect that not too many people live in a house with four cross bred dogs and share most of their property with their pets.

My oldest dog is Becki Boo who is a Foxi Huntaway cross. She only recently became the oldest dog as I had to put my 15 and a half year old Staffie cross to sleep with cancer, So Booey as she is fondly known, isn't that comfortable in her role as Matriarch. Midge the Staffie on the other hand was very comfortable in her leadership role and bossed everyone about, all the other animals and humans included. So we have Booey who of late has become a little rotund. She is ten years old and has decided that working for a living chasing bunnies and doing agility is really not for her and sleeping takes priority. This means that the food supply needs to be cut down accordingly. When she gets too hungry she jumps the fence into the farmyard and pigs out on chicken and duck food, the odd baby rabbit that is as yet too slow to get away and absolutely any revolting mess she can swallow. She has achieve FD with the Flygility Association, purely by longeivity of association I think. She has never liked Fly as it means she has to run alone. If ever people are bemoaning that their dog will never achieve a title, I use Booey as an example. After 10 years she has 48 points and is in grave danger of ending up in Advanced class and getting FDX as well. I enter her in competitions so that other people get a chance to win points. Sometimes her work in teams and pairs elevates her opportunities but it is almost a risk to put her in pairs anymore as she has taken to running half way and quitting and coming back. On the other hand over the years Boo has excelled in Agility. When she was remeasured and ended up being a mini not a medium dog it lifted her game. Then with the split of heights occurring at Ribbon Shows she managed to win herself through to Intermediate. She has had very little training. She has a left hand only weave, doesn't like to loop off and do things on her own and generally needs me to hold her paw and babysit her around a course. She seldom hits hurdles in fact I don't know that she ever has hit even one and stays on the contacts pretty well so she is a bit of a doddle to run.

Many years ago I used to belong to the Kennel Club and go to Agility Champ Shows, and I did modestly well with my mini Rosie a collie corgi mix from the SPCA, she achieved ADX, and Midge the abovementioned Staffie pig dog. With Rosie's demise and the Staffie doing a cruciate, I sort of put Champs on the back burner. But lately I have been training people to learn Agility and they all want to step up and compete at Champs level having experienced the Ribbon thing. So we have all joined up and they are eagerly awaiting their first Show, Probably Rerewhakaaitu as run inMay? March? can't remember by the Rotorua Dog Obedience Club. Now that they insist I join up I have to look at who I am going to run at these fancy Champs. Ten year old Booey comes to mind. So the weight has got to go. Over the last week she has become much more lively with a reduction in opportunity to stuff herself and a general cutback in the food available from the family fridge, so it might be possible to get her out there working. She has a good chance of getting around an AD course in the time allowed so thats a possibility. Becki Boo might be the oldest Starter Course dog in NZ but she is still fit and uninjured and very happy out of a course. A bit more urgency with the speed would help, maybe the waistline trimming will help with that as well. Her NALA work over the years has been steady and she has won top Agility Dog for Dog Sports Rotorua once or twice. So before she becomes too geriatric we will see how her year goes as a competitor - what a laugh.......

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Tuesday, September 25 2012

I am Master

By Raewyn Saville on Tuesday, September 25 2012, 14:38 - Dog Handling

You are my dog...

I thought after writing last night that I seldom explain why I like standing on a rope and holding my dog down, and it may seem a little silly to some people. I call it Passive Dominance. I don't want to do this when my dog errs, makes a mistake or transgresses, I want to train my dog to give me submission at all times.

Submission at all times is the requirement of the Alpha pack leader. All the rest of the pack must always be submissive, not just when the chips are down. Nobody else in the pack makes decisions about which way the pack will run, or who will eat first second and third. The pack leader has that sorted just by virtue of being the Alpha Dog who leads the pack.

The Leader does not go around growling and whacking his subjects over the head or rounding them up to make them behave, he or she just leads by example and practically ignores the goings on further down the chain of command. If there are two younger siblings scrapping within the pack, the pack leader casually looks over at them and probably lifts his lip in distain and the scrapping is halted. So in order that dogs will behave themselves and want to please you as the Master then you have to take some leaf's out of the book of the wild dogs that have been studied and examined.

For example. I am the Master so I will eat my dinner first and then I will put down the scraps for my dog/s and if they choose to fight over them, then I will look in their direction and frown and they will stop or someone will crawl away and submit to the others. However, my experience is that if I put down a big tray with goodies on it they all pitch in and help themselves, I do notice that my youngest dog who is now 11 months, and used to pinch everyone's food when she was younger, has obviously been given the message by the older dogs and is now waiting her turn at the food tray. The rest of the dogs have decided she is old enough to wait in her place now. When she was a puppy it was okay for her to get extras, but now it's not. There has not been any drama about this, it is something they have all worked out for themselves.

Example 2. I am the Master so I will decide when we are going out for a pack walk and hunt. All the dogs wait for me to make this decision. Again the youngest dog had been going off and hunting on her own, but has now decided she will wait for the rest of us and for me to call the shots. Again I don't know quite why she has decided this, but the problem has been solved. Maybe she got a fright on her own out hunting, maybe the dogs from next door chased her back through the fence when she went after one of 'their' rabbits. Whatever, she now enjoys the group walks and sticks with us and hunts with the other dogs, although occasionally she thinks she knows best and we all have to wait while she checks it out. All my dogs wait for me to let them know they can go after something. We have young roosters from the farmyard coming in around the house and the dogs let them do it, but if I say,' Chan get that bird out', he doesn't need another nod and he's off and the rooster flies over the fence. 'Good dog'. So I call the shots on the chase. We only have to see a hawk circling low over our house paddock and shout 'Hawk' to the dogs and they are out there barking and looking at the sky and frightening the living daylights out of the low flier, the Hawks learn too and don't come down too low - but there is always the odd new Hawk who doesn't know the rules. We have observed Hawks trying to pick up our young ducks sleeping in the sun, so this is a a worthy piece of work on the part of the dogs.

So I find it pretty easy to be the Master of my dogs. I keep off their case if they are playing together, I do their training for Agility on a one on one basis and they just love it. I don't get involved in the group games - I just let them do their own thing. They mostly sleep together and I never hear a bad word, although Becki-boo is a bit dominant about her sleeping space and sometimes snarls to keep others away, and they do, they have felt her nips before and they get out of her face. I play with them as individuals and they love that too. I hardly ever have to growl or snarl, just occasionally when they get a bit over enthusiastic at the gate when friends, dogs and/or people arrive. They become a bit overstimulated and need to be called to heel, but after that they are fine.

So why, you will ask, do some people have such great problems calming, training, and generally making their dogs into good citizens and happy home dwellers. Two things really. A lack of good training and a lack of any form of work for the dogs. If you can take care of these two things and give your dog adequate exercise and food, then everything will be just as it should be.

But I only want to own one dog, you say, I just want a companion, you say, fine, then recognise that your dog will adjust to this situation but it may be a bit wonky around other dogs for the whole of its life and it may be a little neurotic in general. I heartily recommend two dogs from one litter, or a family such as mine that just seems to add to itself about every four years and waxes and wanes from two to four dogs at any one time. I am casual about it, I simply love dogdom, and they come and they go. I break my heart when a favourite dies but I know that there are dozens more out there just waiting to make me into their Master as well. I have a little nation here and I am the boss, the queen, the leader. Am I a control freak, well probably, it's a tough job, but someone has to do it.

Have confidence, be strong, kia kaha, and enjoy the fun that life with other creatures affords you.

Raewyn Saville 25 September 2012

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Friday, September 14 2012

Old Dogs, new tricks

By Raewyn Saville on Friday, September 14 2012, 13:51 - Dog Handling

What happens when it turns to custard.

I have an acquaintance who has had a lot of dogs and does Agility and has done Obedience as a Sport over many many years. I have enormous respect for her as she is a consistently good performer who actually deserves to achieve more but probably has always lacked another trainer in her age group with similar aspirations. It is very hard to see the error of your own ways and we need to coach and encourage each other, without being too critical and be able to celebrate successes and moan about bad judgements we have made.

So recently when one of her dogs ran after another dog and caused a fight with this unknown dog, in a public place, I was concerned for her and her dog, and I was concerned that it was not the first time that this dog had behaved in this fashion.

When I train dogs, I train for zero aggression. That has to be the aim. To have a dog that is laid back and relaxed and ready to work without being distracted by anything or anydog or anyone. For some people and some dogs this is just normal and always works and then sometimes they will get a dog who does things differently, and they don't counteract and things go wrong.

I think this problem falls in to that category. When your dog goes off and attacks another dog for no apparent reason, it does leave you feeling somewhat bothered and worried and you probably don't see the forest for the trees. In other words you are too emotionally close to this issue to fix it on your own.

One of the things I am strong on is leashing in public places. The dog cannot get it wrong if it is on a leash. It is called avoidance, that is you are taking the opportunity away from the dog to run off and misbehave. I like to keep a new dog or puppy in training on leash in a public place about ten months. That means from the time that I get the dog whether it is 8 weeks or 8 months or 8 years old, it is going to spend a bunch of time attached to me. All the time I have this dog on leash I am watching what it is doing, is it interested in chasing trucks, cycles, runners, other dogs, horses, what are this dog's vices likely to be. Then I can deal with those vices right then and there on the lead. As time passes about 9 months after I have owned the dog I will, if it is safe and I am sure, drop the lead and let the dog have a snuffle along with the other dogs. Initially this is only for three or four minutes and then it slowly gets longer.

If the dog tries to run off or behaves in a dangerous fashion I catch up with it by standing on the leash or training rope and we are back under control. If I didn't have that piece of rope or leash trailing behind the dog, I would have to try and grab the dog, who would move further on and I could end up in real trouble. I come across huge numbers of dogs who will not come and cannot be caught and this grabbing thing is often the beginning of the problem.

So if my dog is going really well and is running loose in safe places and showing no aggression to anything then the leash would come off and I would assume that all would be well. However, what if it goes wrong and suddenly my dog chases something and creates trouble what would I do. The rope would go on again. By now my dog will have had a lot of my 'control' and 'obedience' lessons so I have some distractions of my own that I can put in place.

When I arrive at my walking place I would leave the dog on the leash or rope, I would do some heel work, I would reward my dog with treat food, I would do some stays and recalls and treat, probably for about five minutes, then I would drop the lead and let my dog go off on its own. After five minutes I would call dog to a sit, feed a treat and then send it away to do its own thing again. Then a bit later I would call it back, pick up the rope and do some on lead heel work, I would use the rope to do a little tug tug cue to remind the dog it is under control. If I saw the same distraction that caused the problem previously, I would call the dog in and do heel work and keep hold of the rope until the problem had passed or we had passed the problem or my dog showed no interest in the troublesome distraction.

I think people know all this stuff, they just panic and don't put it in place when trouble happens. The leash rope is the best friend of both dog and handler in this modern world, and I will not be persuaded that a dog necessarily needs to be free to bolt from one end of the park to the other on its own in order to be properly exercised. If I can't see my dog, I do not know whether he attacked the other dog or the other dog attacked him. I also do not know whether he has his nose in a baited rodent trap or has just smashed the eggs of a sitting water bird. This is not good enough for me. I want my dog to be a good citizen in my community and control either with or without a leash is absolutely imperative.

I am mentoring my friend through her retraining period and best of all, she has decided that she does need to train this dog away from it's aggressive streak and that is just great. Another great opportunity to get to know the dog better and save it from further embarrassing moments. Maybe even save a life.

Raewyn Saville 14 -9-12

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