I have Bouvier Des Flandres dogs. This is a breed noted for herding and guard dog abilities. It is a breed which is also fun loving and loves to be around its owner(s). It is a breed which is alert and intelligent. It is not a subservient breed and does seem to get bored with repetitive actions which would be found in obedience trials.
Rita finally passed leg C of the CD trials and was the most difficult Bouvier I have ever had in the obedience ring.
Rita can move extremely fast when she wishes to chase after anything but in the obedience ring, once she knows there is no longer a leash attached to her collar or choke chain, she returns to being a terrible lagger.
So here is how we managed to pass:-
Understanding that dogs work with positive and/or negative reinforcement, I tried to make the exercise more fun for Rita. I tried to make it a game; I tried treats for close and fast heels. But when Rita sensed the treats were not forthcoming, she reverted to lagging and I could sense she was bored.
Then I tried a prong collar but Rita realized when the leash was not attached, she could do as she pleased again.
And as the off leash exercise was 45 points out of the total of 200, we had to pass and do well in the off leash exercise.
There are little tricks a handler can try in the ring to get a lagging dog to catch up. Beware, however, that these little tricks can cost the handler points but it is better to lose a few points than to fail the exercise.
A lagging dog might come in to a better heel with the handler calling the dog’s name, slapping his/her thigh for attention.
Touching the dog, or attempting to pull the dog by the collar will cost substantial points and so should not be done in an off leash heel exercise.
Another helpful tip, might be when you start the off leash heel exercise to alert the dog by saying heel before you step off as opposed to your starting to heel and then hoping the dog will follow.
Try not to look back at the dog, or accommodate your speed to the dog’s speed, and try always to do brisk heeling. You are not allowed to praise the dog during an exercise.
I had seen a few dogs and trainers using e-collars. One of these was Adrian Ward of BGI (a link is on my site) who is a Schutzhound trainer and some of the dogs he trained were on my class doing the CD title and these dogs all did good off leash heeling. So I spent an evening on the B’dos. Dog Training Club’s class with Linda Pearson using an e-collar on Rita.
When Rita lagged, she got a zap, and I had a very thin leash on her which was hanging so as to appear she was free, and I pulled her in close to me after the zap. Whenever she fell behind, she got a zap and after a few minutes, she realized that if she did not want the zap, she had better stay close to me. Rita learnt in one session to heel close to me.
To prevent her from being collar wise which I saw happen to another dog in the trials, I borrowed an e-collar (which was not working for some reason) from one of the other participants on the course and put the collar on her sometimes. So that she did not associate the collar at a training session with being zapped. And I did no heel work with her outside of the training grounds so she did not get the opportunity to do poor off leash heeling again and get away with it.
After only one session, although a working e-collar was placed on Rita on the training grounds for a second session, Rita was heeling and doing the about turns, left and right turns at a fast speed and was a different dog in the obedience ring.
So to people saying an e-collar should never be used, I don’t agree. It is a correction tool and I believe dogs need to be corrected from time to time. I think it should be used by experienced people and the dog should only get a zap when absolutely necessary and only at the exact time when it is exhibiting the behavior which needs to be changed.
There are a lot of factors in play when training for obedience. For instance, breeds like Golden Retrievers love to please and do well in obedience. Breeds like Border Collies excel in agility and obedience as they love to have “work” to do.
Dogs which come from kennels and are let out might regard the obedience exercises as fun. In contrast to dogs like Rita who are never kenneled and have their freedom and might therefore find the repetitive exercises very boring.
And for temperament, Rita was the ringleader of the litter of puppies she came from. She would march her litter mates down to the mango trees and break of a stem of young mangoes and everyone would chase her. And she would also be the last to get back inside the puppies’ enclosure and was the first to get out of the litter box and wander around.
So Rita is a very independent dog which has made her training more challenging. Unlike some parts the world, e-collars are not illegal in Barbados and I would recommend them being used for lagging dogs once the e-collars are used by experienced trainers.
Of course, I would always recommend using motivational methods such as praise, and rewards first on a lagging dog.
Here’s a video showing what a Novice trial looks like. In Barbados, the area is not fenced in. There is a ring which has ropes (and some dogs doing an off leash exercise do decide when they have had enough and exit the ring by going under the ropes 🙂 )
Tags: Dog training in Barbados
