Clicker Training for Dogs

Herding Clinic Report

O.C. Herding Clinic by Helix Fairweather

Day #3 - Sunday

I'm exhausted!

This morning Lana again stressed how important it is for a dog to be able to eat, play, and do obedience, whatever in the presence of sheep. This seems to be the cornerstone of her training. She also went on to describe what 'that'll do' should really mean to the dog. It should not be the end of the fun, but a cue that means really, really good stuff is a'coming. The dog should leap with joy to hear 'that'll do'. She trains this with puppies from the time she gets them. To be able to call your dog off stock and have it NOT view it as punishment means a lot. One way that she does this is with lots of 'that'll do', dog turns from stock; R+ is the release to go back and work again. And then sometimes, the R+ is the Frisbee, a hamburger, a game of chase-mom. But "that'll do' means something cool.

Lana also ends a session with a simulated job done. She'll end with the sheep against a fence, as if that were the job that had to be done. She'll be against the fence with the sheep, she'll turn and walk right out through them, taking the dog with her and walk off the course or out of the arena. There is no 'but, but, but mom, the sheep are moving'. Who cares? The job was to take them to the fence; we took them to the fence, now we're done. This, too, is built-in early on. Here's a quote I wrote down: "Every herding dog should be able to turn his back on the stock and interact with the owner."

I truly appreciate Lana's grasp of the foundation skills, those needed to be imprinted early on, so that, when the 'real thing' comes they are all in place to draw from. She is a strong believer in dry work (training the cues without sheep), but as I said before you have to be a thinking trainer and transition those to sheep with a plan.

This morning we did some classroom work, using little drawings on handouts, as to what constitutes an outrun, lift and fetch, what can go wrong, where exactly the handler needs to be, how/when the dog needs to be cued/blocked. Then we saw the intermediate dogs demonstrate correct outruns. This gave Lana the opportunity to tell us, again, exactly what we had just summarized on paper - right there as the real thing was happening. We all got so we could tell the handler just what she was supposed to do and when, and we got so we could recognize when real herding was taking place.

Each dog, in turn, then worked outruns to his current level of ability. IOW, we got to see the stages of training to get to this point (wall work as described yesterday). Many of the dogs that yesterday worked on self-control were able to circle, change direction and work the beginnings of an outrun. What I truly appreciate is that Lana let the handlers work things out for themselves and then gave them help if they couldn't get the timing right (or if they just could not follow the plan). Always, always, always was the insistence on reinforcing the dog by setting up the logical path for him to succeed.

I took the seminar as I was really curious to see what Lana does with clicker training - actually more importantly operant conditioning - and herding. I was very curious to see how she works with OC and an instinctive behavior. I wanted to see how she breaks things down for humans to understand, then for humans to work with the dog. Mostly I was very curious. I don't particularly want to do herding at this moment. If I were able to have my own sheep and practice in peace and quiet by myself, I might some day do it just for learning more about dogs and OC.

If Lana comes back to OR to do another seminar, I would attend as a participant WITH MAGGIE. I can't think of any higher compliment to give a trainer than to say I'd trust her with Maggie. Maggie is very soft; strongly flight driven and can tolerate no corrections whatsoever. Watching Lana discriminate as to exactly what each dog needed to succeed, I know that, if I say Maggie cannot tolerate anything extreme, she'll listen, she'll respect that, more importantly, she'll see that for herself - and Maggie will have every opportunity to work sheep at her own pace.

There was an Aussie there who had had traditional herding lessons, been over-corrected and now would not go near sheep again. Lana let that dog do anything she wanted out there. If she wanted to chase sheep, she chased sheep. Each time that dog did anything, she ran back to her owner expecting to be corrected. It took several sessions, but today she could herd the sheep without expecting to be corrected. She could make choices, she was reinforced for them and she regained her confidence. I'd like to see that happen for Maggie.

It was a truly interesting and educational 2 1/2 days. I'd highly recommend that those of you interested in learning how OC and herding go together invite Lana to come do a seminar. I'd highly recommend that you attend even if herding is not your 'thing'. There's a lot to be learned about dogs and behavior and OC and instinct.