The Perpetual Motion Machine

Posted By Amyinseattle on June 14, 2011

Since it’s been a while since i really worked Nutty, i made a point to video as much as i could.  Also, i was really looking forward to working her.  I know it might sound odd, but i missed working her.  It’s a bit Zen-ish for me.  Anyway, we used some heavyish sheep and started putting together the pieces of a take pen.

Starting out

So in this first video, we can see that she’s a bit unsure about getting in the pen. It’s a confidence thing that will pass. Before anyone asks, no i’m not dragging her or choking her by her collar. I’m not even gripping it. Just slid a finger underneath it to help guide her. Now, what i *should* have been doing was having her stop on the 3rd pole (back left) instead of between the two poles. But whatever. For the first while i used her to put them out of the pen and then used her to put them away. The last few seconds are interesting as at first she can’t deal with the pressure, then after releasing the pressure comes back in towards the sheep and finds success in moving them. Which is a nice little win.

Here, i’m using my body to push her out on the outrun and bring the sheep back. More importantly, we’re not doing ring around the handler in the take pen as i’m backing up to the right place to get the idea of her sheep going into the pen correctly. And she’s not coming into the pen to do it.

We’re starting to put things together here. The sheep come out rather smoothly, and we start the process of moving along the fence.
And finally, sheep come out, move around and put them away.

you’ll notice there is a lot of me lieing her down and Liieee and all that. the last video where we had a discussion about not crowding the sheep didn’t record properly. But after that we were fine and repeated this a few different times changing direction and such.

Superfun!

Outtakes:

When Nutty just had to poop…

But they’re supposed to be in there! (the joys of a smart dog)

Really need to be smarter than the stock to do this….

Category: Dog Things, Molly | 3 Comments »
Tags: Australian Shepherd, Pen Work, rateing, Sheep, Video

Posted By Amyinseattle on May 2, 2011

A lady that i see often at trial as the most wonderful red dog that she named Tuna (chicken of the sea) as she was a stockbred dog who was afraid of stock. I heart this dog as she is just so personable, and even more so as she did turn on to stock… around age 5.

Molly has had a similar problem with cows. She has been tied out back near the cattle pens with me for the last few years and was set loose with cows good to start on over this past summer. But Molly, being 35lbs just politely let her self out of the pen and went back to the car. TYVM.

At the last April trial, i went so far as to try to use her on leash to move the cattle down the isle and out to their overnight field. Which she did begrudgingly.

This year at the April Trial seemed different. As early as Saturday afternoon she was carefully watching each cow that wandered in the holding pen and was equally intent as i moved cows in and out of their sorted pens for trial runs. When I was handling calves alone, I asked her to stand (tied up) to give her the feeling of putting just enough pressure on the calves to move them. Being calves heading back to their safe pen, they moved every time with or without her standing, but i could see her confidence build.

At the end of the first trial day, i cut her loose from her tether so she could potty and such. As she pottied i started the slow process of moving the calves from holding pens to roundpen for final release into the field as a group. Before i even had a chance to start unloading the first pen into the isle, there was Molly – Poof! Ears up and confident, ready to help.

I attached the 18″ trial leash (which at her size only allows her to get about 1 step ahead of me) and together we moved very tired slow calves out of pens and down the alley to the round pen. On the second to last pen, a calf had a moment of bravery and turned on us instead of going out slow and smooth. I immediately dropped the lead as Molly barked once, waited, hit her in between the eyes and then backed off two steps as soon as she turned to go out. “good girl, that’ll do” and after a moment we walked the group down the alley like nothing had happened. In the round pen, i held a pretty tight thumb on Molly. She was up and interested and i wasn’t going to risk a bad habit after doing so well. I had her down/stay where the alley met the RP as i pushed the group off the gate so i could open it. I pushed them off about 7 feet, opened the mangate wide, backed off the gate and told Molly to walk up. Now the calves didn’t start moving until Molly started to get into contact. When some of the calves were pushed out of the way of the gate by the pushier calves behind them, Molly went out and covered them. She didn’t run at them, as i’d feared. She was slow and methodical even in that small space, giving each cow time to get out the little hole. She barked and turned the few cows that were facing the wrong way.

On Sunday it was more of the same, but i used her as a partner and not as an attachment to me. I opened a gate to an empty pen to give Molly a visual barrier until i called her into the isle. I then went into a full pen and got everyone up. As they started to enter the isle i called Molly to Get Through (a get through the bars command) and Walk Up. Three cows and a Molly went down the isle together calmly, but in constant motion. At the end of the isle, i at first downed her and then called her back. However as this process got to the third pen, i just started calling her back with no down. She understood the job. After all the pens were empty we went into the round pen, Molly took here Away command and pushed the calves off the gate and held them while i opened the man gate. I walked back to the middle of the roundpen, sent her off the calves and around the RP to balance the gate and any cows that somehow missed the gate was turned and sent back to try again. She was so efficient and graceful. Outside of the initial Away, Comebye and that’ll do… the only noise was the quiet plod of hooves and occasion rattle of heavy panels on heavy calves.

Now it’s important to say that i’d never do this with a dog other than Molly. A dog and a person and three calves is not the safest place and that could have gone south fast. In addition, these are all hollow tube type panels with sufficient gaps at all levels that she could escape and save herself. I had a feeling we’d be ok as where other dogs that have been back near the pens had to be kept a ways off the pens. Molly was never that dog. Had she been i wouldn’t have had in the isles let alone the pens.

But i was so proud of her.

Category: Molly | 1 Comment »
Tags: Australian Shepherd, Cattle, Pen Work

Posted By Amyinseattle on March 21, 2011

I took some time this weekend to shake the dust off myself and The Machine.  It’s funny, we always talk about how to ease back into to work after a long break and such.  Where i know the information in my mind, i went to send her and immediately moved forward from where we’d left off.  This doesn’t happen every time, but more often than not and it’s part of what makes her fun.

This weekend was Day One of take pen training.  I had thought that doing the barbel work would have been super helpful, but I was finding that the information wasn’t transferring as i’d hoped.  My initial try was just standing at the pengate and walking her in on command.  Which wasn’t working for a variety of reasons.  The first being that she’s not done a take pen before so she’d run in the Away direction along the fenceline not in the pen…  The second being that the heavy Barba-deer we were working haven’t been worked in a good long while and they weren’t interested in starting today.  Molly has never dealt with sheep that do the Fight portion of fight or flight, so this was all new to her.

After a little try and failure, i set her up at the mouth of the pen and walked in with her by the collar. Not rough, but with two fingers helping move along the pen’s fence line toward the sheep at something that resembles the speed desired.  Then a sit at the hinge of the pen, which can later morph into a pause – like running contacts in agility. This all moved along nicely for a while. She’d push them out and then stop, i’d change positions from her left side to her right and then send her out on a Come Bye to fetch the sheep and bring them back to the pen and stop her before she entered the pen.  Her stop at the mouth of the pen after fetching became a bit dramatic after a while as a few times she stopped so fast she slid on her bum and then selfcorrected and scootched backwards so not *in* the pen.

On one little trip around the take pen, i went slower and with that tipped our hand in a way to the sheep.  Understand that alot of Molly’s power is in her speed and motion.  She’s still figuring out how to use her eye and her teeth.  We’ve skipped the idea of her using her voice. It just isn’t who she is.  When the sheep started to realize that she wasn’t as powerful when she slowed down and there wasn’t anything to fill that void they began to slow down.  By the next go around, the black sheep turned and went head down and hoof digging in the same way you’d see a bull in a rodeo – challenging the dog.   There are two ways to deal with this.  The first is to be the handler, reach out thunk it on the nose and keep on moving.  The other is to be the ‘assistant’ and encourage the dog to thunk it on the nose and keep moving.  I chose the second as Molly isn’t young or grippy, nor does she seem to desire take a sheep down by the nose. It’s good for her confidence.  The next quick thought was how to name this or to name this.  We use Take Hold in tug and i didn’t want to risk her exhibiting her tug behavior on a sheep.  So out of my mouth came “psppsppsppp get her, nutty” and she knew exactly what i wanted.  With a finger still on the collar she put her power in the back legs and her nose almost to the ground underneath the sheeps nose and snapped twice.  True to a heavy sheep, the black sheep just turned gave a flank and moved slowly out of the pen.  “that’ll do… walk up” and Molly was back with me and moving them out of the pen.  The last walk in i didn’t hold on to her at all.  Just had to step into her a little to remind her to stop before leaving the pen.

Overall she did great work.  I did take video, but then realized that it was centered on the wrong part of the pen.   However we’ll get another video soon. There is still alot of work to do.

Category: Molly | 1 Comment »
Tags: Australian Shepherd, Commands, Pen Work, Sheep

Posted By Ron on March 18, 2011

Category: Spokane Stockdogs | No Comments »
Tags: Border Collie