Freeman 101

Julie, you know what? I've had concerns about a lot of the unkindness that I see on these boards , and your comment just confirmed my feelings. In the future I'll take my comments, concerns, and questions elsewhere. Best of luck to all of you. Taryn and Freeman.

The best solution is to clean up the poop as soon as they poop. Practiced behavior becomes stronger behavior; if poop is cleaned up there would be no poop eating.

I 2nd "Really Reliable Recall" DVD. I've used this with all my dogs, and they have fabulous recalls.

Really good information by Ken Ramirez on how to move from primary to secondary reinforcers. I'm going to renew my Tawzer Dog membership so I can watch the entire 3 hour video! BTW, any CPDT's here? Tawzer Dog offers ceu's on many of their videos.

the entire article can be viewed at http://www.clickertraining.com/node/3408

Ah. I love this response by Ken Ramirez on clickertraining.com someone asks: "Is any dog capable of learning different concepts? What needs to be in place before a dog is ready to learn?" Ken responds: "In my opinion, yes, every dog is capable of learning concepts! However, you do have to wait for the right time in a dog's learning. Just as you would not ask a 3-year-old child to learn algebra (a child that age does not have the foundational math skills to learn something so complex), you would not teach young dogs concepts until they have the foundational skills to understand them. If I had to the basic or necessary foundational skills, they would be: Well-versed at clicker training (understand a marker signal) If you keep training fun, and make each step easy to achieve, then you can build your dog up to concept training. Possess a solid behavioral repertoire that mixes basic obedience with exercise behaviors Understand the idea of free shaping Introduced to creative games that teach thinking and problem-solving Understand and appreciate non-food reinforcers Introduced to and able to perform behavior chains Even then, the secrets to the success of any training plan are appropriate approximations and responding to your animal's needs. If you keep training fun, and make each step easy to achieve, then you can build your dog up to concept training"

Alligande, I'm reading the book as well, and I think his training was a bit sloppy. I suspect he wouldn't have gone as far in training with many other dogs. Kathy Sdao's DVD "Improve Your I-Cue- Learn the Science of Signals" gives very precise instructions on how to teach dogs to identify items by name. Ken Ramirez (Sheds Aquarium, Chicago), has done something similar with his little terrier mix. He didn't use treats for training this, but only because this little dog was very motivated by retrieving the objects. I haven't been able to find this video online. Kathy Sdao showed the video clip at her "I-Cue" seminar.

rushdoggie: I had never heard of Denise Fenzi, but after your comment I checked out her website and her Youtube videos. Really good stuff. Thanks for sharing. I really love some of her videos on heeling.

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Also, Silvia Trkman offers her videos on DVD. This is a skill she teaches in foundations, so it would be included on her foundations dvd. As I recall, she starts out having students doing it with just one jump, and then we kept increasing the number of jumps in a row that we were sending to the backside. It was quite challenging!

I learned to teach this from Silvia Trkman's foundations class. I stood near the front/edge of the jump and used my leg and hand to signal going around the jump. I would post a youtube video, but I confess that I have not figured out how to do this on this board. And you're correct. I used to never see these on course, and now it seems there is at least one per course. type in "Silvia Trkman Foundations" in a Youtube search. I'm sure you will find some good youtube videos showing how to teach this.

Sorry, for acronyms. By OCD I was referring to Osteochondritis Dissecans . And by LCP I meant Legg Calve Perthes Disease

But from what I've been observing, the contract is a benefit to the buyer. Several of my friends and I bought puppies around the same time. All of our puppies ended up with issues. My puppy had LCP, another friend's puppy had OCD, and another friend's puppy had OCD, hip dysplasia as well as a lot of other early health problems. This last puppy is a border collie and from working lines. There really wasn't a lot of cost difference in what I paid for my puppy vs what she paid for her's. The outcome of how we were treated was a vast difference. My puppy's breeder refunded me as well as offered me another puppy. I took the refund, and this allowed me to afford his hip surgery. I declined the new puppy, for now, because I wasn't ready to take on 2 puppies while rehabbing one. On the other hand, my friend with the working line border collie has incurred so much cost with her puppy. This is the first time I've ever purchased a dog, and I've learned a lot from it. For one, there are no guarantees when it comes to genetics. I also really appreciated a breeder who was willing to do more than what her contract assured, and it meant a lot to me to be part of a group who cares about his outcome. Sadly, my 'no contract friend' had none of this.

I'm just curious, but why would working line breeders not find it desirable to have contracts for their puppies? Up until my last puppy, I've rescued, so contracts were not an issue. My puppy is not a bc, and he did come with a contract. I'm not sure how enforceable the contract is, but I do think the contract sets the tone for the expectations. I did not purchase him on a breeding contract, so my contract stated that he had to be surgically sterilized within 12 months of signing the contract. It requires that I have both his knees and hips checked by a certain age. The contract guarantees the health of the puppy. The contract also set the tone for the expectations for the puppy's care, safety, and living environment.

My Labrador took Norocarp for years. She also had severe osteoarthritis. Norocarp is much more affordable than Rimadyl. My Pyr Shep took Tramadol for more than a month post surgery and he had no issues with it.

"What kind of dog likes carrots" my standard poodle loved raw carrots. He was my only dog who loved raw veggies. How cheap was that? I'm currently a volunteer for Pups 4 Parole, and we are so limited for treats. We mostly use the dogs daily kibble for training, with a few extra treats throughout the week. When we do have treats we have to come up with things that don't need refrigeration. I often use some of the soft packaged dog foods as treats. For our next session I'm thinking about asking if the offenders can cook or dehydrate treats, so I would appreciate any ideas for homemade, affordable treats that don't require refrigeration. For the poster who stated they were dehydrating sweet potatoes. Are you doing this with a dehydrating machine, or are you doing this in an oven? Can you tell I'm not much of a cook?

Diana. That link was interesting, and although I agree with it, I wonder how valid this sort of testing is. The value of a reward is really specific to the individual being rewarded. They compared treats vs petting and praise. It seems obvious to me that treats are usually more valuable than praise and petting since we tend to praise and pet so freely. However, I would not have strong recalls if I depended on treats with my own dogs. My own dogs prefers toys, play, and anything involving movement. But imagine testing toys vs food? I don't see how there could be reliable results because this is really individual preferences (just like me preferring dark chocolate over milk chocolate, red wine vs white wine, etc. etc). For recall training I use tugging, and ball tossing, but one of their favorite recall games is "ready, set, go!" I call them to me,they come, and then I say 'ready set, go, go, go!" and they take off running. It's even more fun for when I do it with both dogs at the same time and they take of running together chasing each other. (such funny, silly boys!) I would like to read the specifics of how this was done: what breeds, what treats, how they were trained, etc, etc. Or did I miss some key details?

Shetlander, You should try this comparing your Lhasa, Sheltie, and bc! That would be a cool comparison. When I find the time I think I will try this comparing my bc vs pyr shep, BUT, I'm not going to try it with 1000 items. I think coming up with and naming this number of items would be the biggest challenge. and then coming up with toys that would last long enough to complete the testing!

Never mind, I see it on their website. Championship 12, 14, 16, 18, 22, and 26. Performance 8, 12, 16, and 20. I'll put my bc in performance. He measures 21.25, and at 9 y/o I'm not going to attempt the 26" jump height.

Airbear, that's good to know. Is this for Performance or Championship? USDAA advised me that they are adding 20" jump height to Performance, but I wasn't aware of the 18" option. I think Zip, my little guy, could do the 18 inches. I remeasured him this weekend, and he is still barely under 16", so I "think" we are going to make the 16 " championship jump height. He's 16 months, and I don't anticipate any more growth. This will be our first time in USDAA. I've always competed in AKC, and some ASCA, due to limited USDAA trials. Fortunately, recently USDAA trials are becoming more common. I only trial one day per month, so being able to run multiple times per day will be to our advantage (at least I'm hoping it will be! I may find that this old body can't run that many times in one day, or memorize back-2-back courses!)

I'm currently reading the book "Chaser", and the book has made me think a lot about Border collies, breeding, and intelligence. Chaser is the border collie who can identify over 1000 objects by name. There have been several other dogs who can also do this (Ricco and Betsy come to mind). So far all documented dogs have been border collies. Chaser's owner intentionally purchased from working lines. I'm not sure what you mean by AKC border collies, but do you mean conformation bred?

Additional note: I also asked my puppy's breeder why I tend to see more female Pyr Sheps in agility, and she did state it was because of size. She stated she sees no difference in working abilities of males vs females. The USDAA and International Jump Heights are very challenging, and it could be very challenging when you have a dog that is "barely over height" having to compete against much larger dogs.

I asked this question a few years ago, and almost everyone agreed sex doesn't matter. I currently have 2 males. I have noticed that a lot of serious agility competitors do run females, but I wonder if this has to do with jump heights, since females tend to be smaller. My male border collie measures 21.25 inches and would have to jump 26 inches (USDAA) if I had him in Championship. I have a male Pyrenean Shepherd who I have not yet had officially measured, but he appears to be right under 16 inches. If he's over this he will have to jump 22 inches, which I don't feel would be ideal for him.

G. Festerling. Collars are not part of my training when teaching heel, recalls, or downs. I start puppies off by capturing downs and then adding the name to the behavior, so this doesn't require the use of any sort of collar. I think this hands off training has allowed me to easily add distance to downs, and to teach down in motion. Recalls, again, collar not required. I begin "Come" indoors, so a collar is not a necessary part of this. Once I take it outdoors I may then add a collar and long line, but I did not do this with the 2 dogs I currently have, and they both have stellar off leash recalls. I also don't think a collar is required to teach heeling. It's very possible to start heel training off leash (without the use of a collar). Im not adverse to the use of buckle collars in training, but for me personally, I don't want the manipulation of the collar to become part of the dog's cue to respond to the behavior.