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A Useful Correction


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My goal in training is to focus on what I want and training my dog accordingly. Kolt is ridiculoulsy biddable and corrections have been mostly limited to a calm "no" and an occassional "knock it off". I tell him what I want and he does it,

 

Last night at SAR training he worked his problem beautifully, located his victim, went in and started to bark alert and then got distracted by where the previous dog had urinated a foot away from the victim and started sniffing the ground.

 

I took the leash in my hand and threw it at the ground near his nose. Which startled him. He ran back about 20 ft and stared at me with a confused look on his face. I stood there for a minute and then told him to "get to work" I could see the wheels in his head turning. "I just got corrected near the vicitm. Am I supposed to go back there? Am I supposed to ignore him? And I supposed to ignore the pee spot on the ground?"

 

He chose to go back to the victim from a different angle, avoiding the pee spot. He gave a couple of tenative barks and was well rewarded with a frisbee game for his efforts.

 

This is what I want in a correction. I want it to be appropriate to the dog and situation. I want the dog to have enough background and information to make the right choice afterwards so they learn from it. After this, I will absolutely set up similar distractions in training so he has practice in confidently working past it. But in the spur of the moment, I want my dog to be able to take negative information from me and use it to make a good choice.

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I think a milder correction (if you can come up with something that works at a distance) would have worked better. I had a gsd and used strong corrections for some misbehaviours, but she never looked 'confused' or had trouble getting back to work afterwords. My gauge for a 'useful correction' (great term btw) is the how the dog reacts to it, attitude. For her, it was to quickly refocus on the handler with more enthusiasm than before-- a quick, yeah, I get it, I shouldn't do that, followed by a yay, let's go!, back into the training game/motivation. If/when I use a correction, that's my goal. End the undesired behaviour--and back to a happy task.

Your dog being hesitant about going back to the person and into avoidance would be an over-correction. Not a criticism, I really admire what you're doing and you're way beyond anything I would ever attempt with a dog in terms of training, just an observation about the out-come. Training in theory is easy, getting it right in the real world is endlessly complicated, something I am struggling with.

I'm still trying to figure out what a 'useful correction' would be for Sonic, as he will fold if I don't give him a hot-dog piece at the right time and yet, sooner or later, I want him playing off-leash in coyote country...

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Dear Trainers,

The slightly too severe correction is preferable to the too weak (uninformative) correction but yes, it's possible to correct too severely. When my June was 18 months, tryng to push her out inbye on an away flank, I tossed my whippy stick at her feet. Stick took an odd bounce and struck her - no physical harm but extremely startling. June promptly started running too wide on the away side which is much harder to fix.

 

Fortunately, these dogs, involved in working with us, are forgiving and will bounce back. It takes persistent, inappropriate poorly timed to corrections to make a Border Collie say, "Ah, the hell with it!".

 

Donald McCaig

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Dear Trainers,

The slightly too severe correction is preferable to the too weak (uninformative) correction but yes, it's possible to correct too severely. When my June was 18 months, tryng to push her out inbye on an away flank, I tossed my whippy stick at her feet. Stick took and odd bounce and struck her - no physical harm but extremely startling. June promptly started running too wide on the away side which is much harder to fix.

 

Fortunately, these dogs, involved in working with us, are forgiving and will bounce back. It takes persistent, inappropriate poorly timed to corrections to make a Border Collie say, "Ah, the hell with it!".

 

Donald McCaig

Agreed. Getting it right is the 'art of training'. Dogs with high drive will bounce back fast, weaker nerved dogs need more caution (I think I have the latter, but he's not a working dog)

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Agreed with Mr. McCaig. For a correction to be fair, the dog needs to understand why it's being corrected and understand the correct behaviour. Corrections, if used, should be enough to impact future behaviour (if they don't, you're just nagging your dog). Good luck with your future searches!

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Training in theory is easy, getting it right in the real world is endlessly complicated, something I am struggling with.

 

Ain't that the truth!!!

 

It's funny because reading over what I wrote with a different "lens" makes me come to much the same conclusion you did in some ways. And honestly, if Kenzi reacted to something like that then it would have been waaay too hard. But Kolt?

 

But in the moment it felt right and effective. Partly because it meshed with his personality and partly because his response - while not what I want to see with many dogs - is pretty normal for him. He gets startled, thinks about it and changes his approach and gets back to work, usually stronger than before. But it takes a minute if he's figuring it out. If working directly with me, he would have bounced right back into things but I left him hanging for a minute last night. When startled he's kind of a "drama queen" with excellent recovery. Which is quite different from my other three Border Collies.

 

Another piece of the puzzle in my situation - young hormonal male brain (it was in check nicely but has returned in an annoying way the last week or so. It may end up getting him neutered if it's not in check soon...). He's been annoying Kenzi with his over excited sniffing all week and while something milder has worked in the house, I wasn't sure that it would at a distance. I do think his temporary hormone brain freeze was part of his response.

 

Kind of my long explanation of why I think this was useful for him. I think he'll take it and learn quite well. But he had to think about it first.

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Ain't that the truth!!!

 

It's funny because reading over what I wrote with a different "lens" makes me come to much the same conclusion you did in some ways. And honestly, if Kenzi reacted to something like that then it would have been waaay too hard. But Kolt?

 

But in the moment it felt right and effective. Partly because it meshed with his personality and partly because his response - while not what I want to see with many dogs - is pretty normal for him. He gets startled, thinks about it and changes his approach and gets back to work, usually stronger than before. But it takes a minute if he's figuring it out. If working directly with me, he would have bounced right back into things but I left him hanging for a minute last night. When startled he's kind of a "drama queen" with excellent recovery. Which is quite different from my other three Border Collies.

 

Another piece of the puzzle in my situation - young hormonal male brain (it was in check nicely but has returned in an annoying way the last week or so. It may end up getting him neutered if it's not in check soon...). He's been annoying Kenzi with his over excited sniffing all week and while something milder has worked in the house, I wasn't sure that it would at a distance. I do think his temporary hormone brain freeze was part of his response.

 

Kind of my long explanation of why I think this was useful for him. I think he'll take it and learn quite well. But he had to think about it first.

Thanks for the "fill in". Context is everything. It's fascinating to read about how individual our dogs are, and part of getting it right is getting to know them.
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When my settled males got stupid again, it was usually because the neighbor with intact bitches had one in season. You may find that to be Kolt's issue.

I've wondered about that. But I live in the middle of a 200 acre farm. And the close neighbors are 1/2 mile away. Still possible of course. I'm kind of wondering in in heat coyotes might have a similar effect...

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