{"id":3478,"date":"2013-10-30T06:39:32","date_gmt":"2013-10-30T14:39:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/?p=3478"},"modified":"2014-02-26T13:31:22","modified_gmt":"2014-02-26T21:31:22","slug":"can-you-hear-me-now","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/2013\/10\/30\/can-you-hear-me-now\/","title":{"rendered":"“Can you hear me now?”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Gear\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Students are always asking why doesn\u2019t my dog listen to me? It all starts \u201cup close and personal\u201d.<\/p>\n

In order for a dog to work\u00a0with\u00a0you \u2026 you have to be in his mind. He can\u2019t hear what you are saying if he\u2019s not listening. So, how do we go about teaching a dog to listen to us better \u2014 \u201ccommunication and trust\u201d.<\/p>\n

When first starting a pup if your\u00a0guidance\u00a0gives him better control of his sheep (which is everything his instincts are compelling\u00a0him to do) he will learn to rely on and trust that guidance. If everything you do\/say makes him lose his sheep that trust will quickly be eroded. With young dogs the last thing you want is a conflict between what you are making him do and what his instincts\u00a0are driving him to do. A \u201cwell bred\u201d dog will do everything he can to listen to instincts before you. Which is great because this is what we use to mold him into the working dog he will become.<\/p>\n

You don\u2019t want to force his attention on you \u2026 his attention should be with the sheep. However, this doesn\u2019t mean you have nothing to say about HOW the sheep are to be treated. He needs to know that they are YOUR sheep and you are allowing him to work them. So, he works the sheep and you work him \u2013 by controlling the sheep. You are working on his mind so you become an indispensable\u00a0part of his wondrous\u00a0experience called \u201csheep work\u201d.<\/p>\n

In the beginning\u00a0you are developing his awareness that you can help him. The more he connects sheep work to you \u2013 the more he listens and trusts you \u2013 the more control you will have when you start increasing his distance from you. A dog at 800 yards DOES have a choice to listen or not.<\/p>\n

If you insist on total control by doing nothing but giving orders until he \u201cgives up\u201d you are not building communication \u2026 because no actual communication took place. You might have a dog that obeys \u2013 but If all you are teaching is how to make random moves (flank\/lie down, walk-up, etc) without the sheep reacting to HIS movements \u2026 then you are not using \u201cinstinct building blocks\u201d \u00a0that are logical to the dog.<\/p>\n

That of course doesn\u2019t mean he won\u2019t make mistakes only that when mistakes are made \u2013 he will get a correction that allows him to work his sheep more effectively. Try to remember this is about WORKING sheep not making a dog move left\/right. Working sheep is learned (more by you than the dog \u2026 since he at least has instinct to go on :@) by making mistakes then realizing your actions have repercussions and learning from these mistakes (actually \u2013 doesn\u2019t that summarize life :@).<\/p>\n

Eventually training has to go against his\u00a0instincts (i.e. off balance flanks, stopping when sheep are running away, etc.) BUT hopefully by that time you will have built that \u201cworking relationship\u201d that he trusts you enough to go to the next level.<\/p>\n

A lot of novices tend NOT to watch the sheep\u2019s reactions. Sheep are not inanimate objects for dogs to \u201cplay\u201d with. They will learn \u201ctricks of the trade\u201d \u2013 and depending on your dog these can be good \u201ctricks\u201d or not. If your dog buzzes them with every flank \u2013 they learn to go sideways (trying to avoid the \u201cbuzz\u201d). If your dog never takes pressure off \u2013 they will never learn to settle when worked. If your dog doesn\u2019t put enough pressure on and then too much \u2013 they will learn to not move until chased. The \u201clist\u201d goes on \u2026 all the while your dog is learning all these wrong approaches to working sheep \u201cup close\u201d \u2013 he can\u2019t wait to get some distance from you so he can become more proficient at them.<\/p>\n

I know it\u2019s not easy for a novice to combine the two at the same time \u2026 but if you want correct dog work \u2026 it\u2019s a the only way. You communicate to the dog the correct way to work sheep and the dog communicates to the sheep that they will be treated with respect if they move.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Students are always asking why doesn\u2019t my dog listen to me? It all starts \u201cup close and personal\u201d. In order […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3479,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[89],"tags":[19,72,83,33,88,60],"class_list":["post-3478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured_post","tag-border-collie-pedigree","tag-border-collies","tag-candy-kennedy-training-border-collies","tag-herding","tag-sheepwork","tag-young-dogs-in-training"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3478"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3480,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3478\/revisions\/3480"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.abcollie.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}