Working with another dog
I was rather nervous for a few days prior to this momentous event. I asked an accredited positive reinforcement trainer to work with us with her dog. Once we got to our spot, I pretty much just did what came next without being particularly nervous. That’s pretty usual for me. I was less “tunnel vision” than I have been in the past, which was good.
We took Amika out on the long line and harness after I spoke to the trainer. Let her have a sniff and stretch her legs. Put her back in the car (blanket was over the box, of course) and set up the mat. I also grabbed my treat pouch that had lots of extra nice goodies. We went through that and two auxilary pouches of natures’ gift kibble (yummy stuff, but not quite as good as sprat and hotdog).
We set up under a tree and the trainer came over and we had the greeting thing. Dion liked the way she tossed treats at Amika to distract and calm her. We chatted for a bit, refined our plan, and she went off to get her dog. Amika was anxious when she left, but did OK once she was at distance. She didn’t seem to really take the other dog in until she was much closer.
Her reactions were similar to what she has had, but less intense because the other dog left as soon as she started. I rewarded LAT, eye contact and look away plus did some open bar/ close bar. We did 3 things with sniff / drink breaks in between:
- Other dog approached from different angles. Trainer put down a “hat” (traffic cone) at this reaction point and retreated.
- Other dog walked from cone to cone (perimeter) and came in towards us at each cone. I was supposed to put my hand up to stop her progress but didn’t do that great. The idea was to get the other dog to go while Amika was acting calm. Not so good on this one, but at the same time, Amika wasn’t going berserk and was able to lie down and offer behaviour after each reaction.
- The trainer put a head halter on Amika (yet another style, she has two already) and walked her. Got her to heel pretty well, despite that she was hot and full of adrenaline. Walked her in circle fashion closer to the other dog. Got MUCH closer in this way. No treats used, just come with me and keep the lead short, turn away if any reaction begins to happen.
I think it was a productive session. One of the biggies, says the trainer, is that Amika is a pushy subordinate who feels she has to be in charge because the people don’t know what the heck they are doing. Those are not the trainer’s words, though! So rules are good and I need to be more observant of when she is pushing the line. That is, when she is mugging me, ignoring me etc.
Our other homework is to start doing mini-walks again. As soon as she shows signs of anxiety, turn around and come home. This is even if we only get to the mailbox. In addition to trying the head halter we have been loaned (a Canny Collar) I will work on getting heel position to “on cue” stage. This is because I really don’t like the idea of just using the aversive of the collar.
The next step is to get Amika into the same setup with different dogs. There is another accredited trainer who has a property nearby where she has offered just that. The suggestion was, when I mentioned new places increasing anxiety, to go up to explore the property briefly and go home without a training session or seeing the other dogs to start. Once she is relaxed about the new place, then do a training session with the new dogs.
Musing: tracking is a known, enjoyable and focused activity. If new places are set up as tracking practice, perhaps that will make me seem more “in charge”. Must try this at our spot, the old spot at whiteman and a new one at whiteman first. See how that goes. It’ll be a bit of hassle, what with going to lay the track and coming home again for it to age, but may very well be worth it.
Another thing Dion suggests is have people greetings in our back yard, rather than letting Amika yell at them in the crate. His thought is that at least she can run off the excitement and we avoid the crate tantrum. My thought is she needs to be under control and calming herself when greeting them. A good compromise may be to put her outside while the guests are arriving. Once they know the rules and she has run around outside with excitement, I can go ask her for calm behaviour and put her on lead if she wants to greet them.
Anyway, LOTS of stuff to think about.
