Distraction recall, iteration 6L1: 1/2.0/3.C: 6th training plan adaptation, 1st location (L1), levels 1 (holding on to long line), 2.0 (back tie) and 3 (off leash) with distraction C (liver; difficult).
We’re ready to face down our nemesis – the most difficult food distraction – or so I hope! First things first though: our next session will be an easy taco recall, no distractions. We need to keep that response sharp and fun! And then … we’ll gamify!
Tacos and Border Collies, the game
Then, I will play with liver in 3 locations. I made a game board (thank you, Canva) to hopefully not skip any steps. From experience, I know that if I accidentally skip a step, Chai will outsmart me! Here’s our board: all of the steps below and we will have reached our distraction recall goal.
This is how we (plan to) beat our nemesis – the most difficult food distraction! The little Border Collie and I will hike and swim from island to island until we reach the treasure chest: it contains off-leash privileges out in the streets of Mexico City! Because hiking and swimming is hard on the body and mind, Chai needs to recharge with an easy taco recall after each distraction she masters!
October 11, 2023: rising to the first challenge on our the path!
Yesterday, we did an easy taco recall at Dead Poultry Park. Today, we went to location #1 for our third and most difficult distraction – liver – and had a successful recall on a long line!! Go Chai!!
On the path to recall success!
October 14, 2023: back tie success!
After another easy taco recall the other day, Game nailed her back tie recall in location #1/3 today! Go puppy!!!
October 16, 2023: off leash SUCCESS!
Yesterday, we went to Chapultepec and I brought my last taco de birria … unfortunately, I forgot all about it because I was there with friends. So instead of getting an easy taco recall out and about, Chai got an even easier one back home in the living room.
And today, we finally did it: our first off-leash recall success away from the most difficult distraction – liver – in our first of three real-world locations!
Go Chai, master of swimming across oceans! Tomorrow, you’ll get to recharge again:
The title of this iteration is 6L3: 1/2.0/3.B: 6th training plan adaptation, 3rd location (L3), levels 1 (holding on to long line), 2.0 (back tie) and 3 (off leash) with distraction B (kibble). Slow and steady wins the race!
The day before yesterday, Chai had an easy taco recall at the Urban Enrichment Jungle. Today, we are back to the first distraction session in our third location: Kiba’s Park!
October 5, 2023: first session in location 3
We’ll start out with holding the long line in my hands. I’ve got a taco de canasta con chicharrón ready and will release Chai to the intermediate distraction (kibble) by dropping the long line after a successful recall. Let’s see how things go today!
Success!
Our next recall will be an easy taco one, followed by one with the distraction in the exact same location at Kiba’s Park … and a backtie! Slowly and steadily, we are getting closer to our highest value distraction!
October 7, 2023: back-tie success!
After yesterday’s easy taco recall at Toy Play Plaza (no video), today, it was time for the back-tie distraction recall! Chai knew this was a set-up but she didn’t know exactly where it was:
You can’t see the back tie – but it stayed loose! Go puppy!
I should do the easy taco recall tomorrow in the same space since there will be no empty target session this time! And then … off leash!
October 9, 2023: intermediate distraction off leash in location 3/3 – success!!!
Chai got an easy taco recall at the Dead Poultry Park yesterday, and today, I picked up 3 freshly made tacos de canasta de chicharrón and we tackled our last stop in the intermediate distraction recall stage: off leash, unprotected intermediate distraction (kibble), location 3 with the first taco. She did it!!! Another easy taco recall next, and then we’ll be ready to start with – drumroll – DIFFICULT distractions!
I’m naming this post iteration 5.1/3 because we are still on our 5th attempt at distraction recalls and will now be working on levels 1 (long line, no barrier) and 3 (unprotected distraction, off leash dog) with the easiest new food distraction (A).
The plan …
… is vague for now. The first time I work without a container again – with something lower value than kibble this time – I will go back to a long line. When I get a long line success, I will try off leash right away in the same location. Whatever happens, I will then head back to headquarters and decide how to continue.
August 25, 2023
Dead Poultry Park
Since Chai has outsmarted me at the unprotected-distraction stage several times, I’m going to take it r e a l l y slowly this time! I started with her lowest value food (that I have found so far): dried fish treats. I went back to Chai on a long line and scattered the treats under her favorite scavenging draws: trash cans.
Session profile: Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese followed by eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: long line Immediate response on a loose long line: NO
Round 1
Round 2
I did this one right after the previous session, but approached from the other side this time. Immediate recall success because Chai knows I have Philadelphia (if I had to guess why!)
Round 2 profile: Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese followed by eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: long line Immediate response on a loose long line: YES
Round 3
Same location; right after session 2; approaching from the original direction again.
Round 3 profile:
Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese followed by eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: – Immediate off leash response: YES
It is fascinating to me that in the third session – the video above – Chai doesn’t even want the fish anymore. In only three recall rounds, I have turned fish from something she’d try and blow off my recall for even though she was on a long line into the most boring treat in the world that she has very little interest in.
I don’t want to jinx it, but if I were cautiously optimistic, I would say: found food (including fish) trumps anything except for cream cheese. I would love to be right about this one – it would solve all my recall “problems”! But I know I need to be careful. Chai’s recall is a flighty animal and needs to be approached with great caution! I know that today’s success is, at least in part, because – as Tracy (Tracy, in case you’re reading this: I love this metaphor you’ve used for Huck!) would say – I have used the earlier two sessions as scaffolding for the third (successful) one. And as I would say (to Tracy or any other student): a successful off-leash recall only bumps you up to the next level once you’ve succeed after a break, un-scuffolded!
I’ll think about this some more but I believe what I’ll do is try this same set-up in a different location and see if I get a recall on a loose long line on the first try. I won’t make the mistake of going directly to off leash in a new location!
August 26, 2023
Fresa Parque
Chai knew this was a set up. That said, she did GREAT in both sessions. Already doing better than yesterday by keeping the leash loose in the very first rep. I did the second one pretty much right after – using it as scaffolding as Tracy would say.
In both sessions (because Chai knows it’s a set-up), she offers eye contact while we’re still far from the distraction. I keep heading that way anyways to make it a little harder. If I wasn’t filming and trying to be clearly visible on screen, I might have marked the check-ins with a recall cue right away.
Round 1 profile:
Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese followed by eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: long line Immediate response on loose line: YES
No break – round 2, off leash, same location:
Round 2 profile:
Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese followed by eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: – Immediate response: YES
Notes for the next session:
For my next session, I’d like to have a helper set up the fish distraction, come across it as a true surprise for Chai on a long line and see if I still get the success I’m after. If this works, I’ll take a break and try the next session after – again with a helper – off leash.
August 27, 2023
Location 3: Kiba’s Park
My friend had to take his mom to the hospital right before we got a chance to do a set-up (no worries – all is well with his mom). I managed to sneakily set up anyways. This time, there is no way Chai knows there is a distraction set-up …
Session profile:
Distraction: dried fish Reinforcer: cream cheese and eating the distraction Distraction safe-keeping: long line (accidentally) dragging Immediate success: YES!
The first rep in the video above shows that Chai didn’t realize this was a distraction recall: I called pretty early, Chai responded and then headed off in some other direction rather than going towards the fish or sticking with me.
I wanted a distraction recall that wouldn’t feel like a set up and where she actually knew there was a distraction! So I didn’t point the fish out to Chai, but looped back around and let her get really close this time. This time, she clearly knew there was a distraction (but hopefully not that it was a set-up)! She responded beautifully and then went back to eating the fish with much more gusto than in the previous sessions – maybe precisely because she thought she had found street food rather than a distraction I had placed? Who knows.
While this session went really well (as in: Chai did really well), I did not stick to my training plan: I was going to hold on to the long line, but in both these reps, I let go of it and just let her drag it. Which really doesn’t help anyone because Chai is too far ahead by the time I call. The long line isn’t long enough for me to step on it if I needed to. Its weight may still have helped create an on-leash feeling, but the session I ended up having today was not the one I planned on having. Note to self: ALWAYS read your session notes right before you train!
Notes for the next sessions:
I feel ready to give this a try off leash and without scaffolding. I will do the next session at Kiba’s park again, where Chai has already succeeded with the long line dragging, but probably in a different spot of the park. f Chai gives me the response I’m hoping for – a single-rep off-leash success – I will then go for a single-rep off-leash fish recall success in two more locations before making the distractions more difficult:
I very much dislike advertising, but I’ve got a freeby with no strings attached, so I’m letting you know! I’d love for someone who hasn’t taken an FDSA class yet or currently can’t afford one to get it! It doesn’t matter where in the world you are, and you don’t need to be Facebook friends with me to participate. (The only reason I’m putting this on Facebook is that I want it to be in one spot and it’s easiest there.) It’s a public post and everyone, FB friend or not, should be able to comment to play here.
I’m calling this post iteration 5.2 because it is (still) the fifth stab at distraction recalls and we keep playing at level 2 (barriers).
The plan
After consultandolo con la almohada for a few days, I decided that my next step was going to be a high-value distraction in a container rather than a lower value one without a barrier. I came to the concusion that repeating 3 different parks with 3 different containers, each holding a high-value distraction Chai would gain access to with my help, would best prepare her for taking another stab at off-leash distractions. Below are the next steps: 3 locations per container (not always the same 3), resulting in a total of 9 challenges at level 2 (off leash dog, distraction C – difficult – behind a barrier):
The reinforcer would be the same value as distraction (liver) from my hand, followed a release to the distraction itself which I would then open for Chai who values distractions more than treats from my hand. The reason I treat from my hand rather than using just the distraction as a reward in this scenario is that treating from my hand teaches the dog to come all the way back rather than predicting an immediate release – and in an emergency situation, that’s what I need.
Container 1, location 1: liver
August 12, 2023
As always, I use a tongue click when Chai turns towards me – and as almost always, in the video below, my microphone isn’t picking it up. The treat from my hand is a piece of liver – same as the distraction in the container she then gets to eat. I love how she doesn’t treat the container as a food toy anymore but waits for me to open it for her! She knows the drill!
Kiba’s Park:
Container 1, location 2: liver
August 13, 2023
Toy PlayPlaza
Today, Chai started towards the container while still chewing on the treat from my hand. She already knows she’ll get the distraction, and she is waiting for me to open her containers! I love it! I’ve been hiding my camera behind trees or bushes so it doesn’t become too much of a set-up cue. However, I suspect Chai still knows when things are set-ups. She’s just too damn smart to trick.
I didn’t film this one and am happy about this session for two reasons: one, Chai didn’t come across my stealthily set-up liver container right away. We had to stroll past it several times until I called her, almost nose on container, and got a beautiful response. This tells me that the tripod is a cue to look for a distraction and recall. Going forwards, every container will have at least one session I don’t record. The other thing I’m excited about is that I finally made it to an environment I haven’t done any distraction recalls in so far. I love mixing things up to help generalization!
Container 2, location 1: liver
August 15, 2023: Kiba’s Park
We mastered container 2 in its first location! I handled things the same way I did yesterday with container 1 at the Dead-Poultry Park: rather than filming, I set up the distraction stealthily and casually came across it. No tripods, no big production that may have given away that we were training. Chai nailed it and got both liver from my hand and from container 2! I’ll try and record the next recall again.
Container 2, location 2: liver
August 16, 2023: Toy Play Plaza
I tried setting up as casually as possible: first the tripod, then walk away, then walk past it, then place container #2 while Chai wasn’t watching. Of course she turned and saw it, moved towards it … and did a beautiful “Schnee” recall. I had planned to loop another loop before encountering it, but this worked too. It was lovely to see the recall work just as well in Game’s presence.
Container 2, location 3: liver
August 17, 2023: Dead-Poultry Park
After running around and working on other things for half an hour, we did …
Container 3, location 1: liver
… on the other side of the Dead-Poultry Park:
Container 3, location 2: liver
August 20, 2023: Chapultepec
The video below shows two sessions. In the first one, you’ll see Chai coming from a different direction than I do: left of screen. This is the first time in a while she didn’t give me a single-rep success on the first try! You’ll also notice that in both sessions (the second one was half an hour later and successful), Chai noses the container more than she has in the past. This is new as well. Part of it may be that we’re out here with a dog friend and Chai may be a little overstimulated and therefore more impulsive. OR yesterday’s “Schnee” recall failure at Fancy Park I (a recall that wasn’t part of my training set-ups) may play a role! I already know this puppy learns FAST and exactly what you teach her – which isn’t always what you want her to learn!
Generally, according to my recall protocoI, I would have a second go right after the first one and only take a break after getting a success. I didn’t do that in this case because Chai was very excited and my friend was waiting and keeping their dog from joining the fun. Taking a break felt like it was more likely to set Chai up for success – and my patient friend as well.
I can’t wait to find out how our NEXT mouse trap session will go: when Chai isn’t over-stimulated, will she succeed right away in our third location? Will she be as nosy as she was at Chapultepec? Stay tuned!
Container 3, location 3: liver
August 24, 2023: Kiba’s Park
Achievement unlocked at the first try! Party for the puppy!
… which brings us to the last check mark! We’ve made it through all 9 container challenges:
What’s next for Chai?
I do not want to go right to unprotected distractions. I’ve been there, done that and failed at it before. I’m thinking I’ll do liver (or maybe chicken to mix it up) behind a real-world barrier (fence) in three locations. Reward with something even higher value (cream cheese)? And then do unprotected low value distractions (dried fish?) in the real world and, once again, reward with something REALLY high value (cream cheese)? Maybe even go back to the long line stage before trying off leash? I’ll have to think about that one some more before taking the next step, becaus there is one thing I know for sure:
We will have to approach Chai’s off-leash distraction recall beast carefully. This dog is lightening fast when it comes to learning what is accessible to her and when! Stay tuned (well, if you’re into this kind of stuff. If you’ve read this far, I suspect you are!) The paragraph above is just my first thoughts; i.e. it’s musings, not a training plan and subject to radical change.
Named in honor of the impressive number of dead roosters or chickens in various states of decay – but always rotten enough that I couldn’t tell whether they were roosters or chickens and giving off a deliciously disgusting smell – that Chai has found and rolled in in this particular park. ↩︎
After succeeding at the barrier level, I came up with a plan of how to – potentially – set myself up for off-leash recall success. By now, I know that Chai is either a pragmatic dog or is going through a pragmatic phase (she’s a juvenile pup – a different dog every day!)
Either way, I don’t want to wait for her to be older to continue training my formal recall. I’m very much enjoying our strategy game here: Chai’s goal is to get to the distraction as fast as possible, and mine is to convince her that it’s worth her while to come back to me as soon as I call. We are playing a game in which the two of us have different goals. My way of getting closer to my goal is to set up the game board in such a way that it maximizes the probability that I’ll get a recall. Chai’s way of getting closer to her goal is to try and see through my game board set-ups (OR train me to up my reinforcers!)
I’m having fun with this, so I’ll continue. If you were a student of mine, I might ask you to take a training break and revisit the challenge when your dog is a little older. That would be to make things easier for you in case it was a phase rather than your dog’s personality.
In any case, I decided, since Chai has “won” when I presented her with unprotected food distractions in the past, to break down the big step from protected to unprotected distractions by using an in-between step: opening the barrier she has already succeeded at, but leaving that same barrier there in order to remind her of how well things used to go for her when she recalled away from said barrier. After recalling her away from an open barrier (in my case the open plastic box), I’d then recall her from the same distraction without a barrier present.
Note that at this point, I am not following my recall protocol anymore, and quite consciously so: I’m just experimenting with my own dog and I am also curious what I can get away with and how Chai will respond to different set-ups. Having eliminated the empty plate at our last stage, I’ll also eliminate distraction B (the bag that used to have food in it) at this new stage I’m inventing for Chai:
While I’m breaking down the step from closed to open container, I’m no longer splitting down environments. I want to find out if we can take this additional step (open kibble container) as a short-cut to off-leash food success (kibble without barrier in the real world).Note that experiments like this, where I don’t know what the outcome will be, are something I LOVE doing with my own dogs but wouldn’t ask a student to do. My students get tried and true protocols – it wouldn’t feel fair otherwise.
(Still) July 17, 2023: our first park experiment with the open box!
We play at our usual spot, but it’s unusually busy – and a number of the people out here are eating. So we have people weirdness and distracting food smells, which leads to a slower recall response and to a hesitant approach of the kibble box once I release Chai. Since I want to see a response at baseline speed (as fast as if there was no distraction) and the usual joyful approach of the distraction itself after my “okay” release, I’ll repeat this same set-up before checking the box off the list above. She did very well though and recalled despite all the distractions!
We hung out and explored the park for 15 minutes, and then tried again:
Oh puppy! You are making me laugh! This session was really interesting!
Sometimes, the best way is to end and go back to the drawing board, which is my plan here. Nevertheless, I couldn’t help but wonder on our walk back from the park: WHY did Chai blow through this recall after nailing it the first time? Here’s a few possible explanations I can imagine:
She only recalled the first time because the people were confusing and Chai didn’t realize what she was even recalling from.
She didn’t recall the second time because the first time, she learned that the kibble container was open. in the second session, she KNEW that we were working with an open rather than closed container and went for it. In the first session, she may only have learned that the kibble had been accessible all along after my “okay” release.
She didn’t recall the second time because right before, during our break, I had removed her from eating something that looked and smelled like a mixture of poop and unidentifyable dead animal (Chai has a sensitive stomach; if not, I would let her eat whatever she finds, like Game) – about 3 or 4 times. (I kept releasing her once we were at a distance from the disgusting food source because she wanted to play with her adolescent Doberman friend Sam. However, inevitably, after a little play, she ended up back at the food source and I ended up walking up and removing her again – it was too good for our “Leave it,” which is still under construction, to work.) Maybe this frustrating experience did not set her up for success in the recall session right after.
We’ve worked on impulse control (“Earn it”/Zen bowl/a marker cue for taking food from a bowl) quite a bit today. Maybe after all this impulse control – impulse control is hard for puppies! – she couldn’t help it and HAD to go for the distraction right away.
Or one of countless other possible reasons!
In any case, I’ll need to come up with a game plan! This distraction recall step is tricky – it keeps coming back to bite us in the butt! I might need to gamify this for myself some more …
June 24, 2024 – first things first: happy CDMX pride day!1
… and now on to our regularly scheduled dog training programming!
Level 1 (Chai on a long line), distraction #1 (empty plate – easy), environment #3 (difficult)
In an ideal world, I would have recognized that the long line tightened in the moment or reviewed the video before moving on and noticed it then and there. I’d then have repeated the same recall, taken a break and repeated it again. Single-rep (first rep of a session) success on a long line? Only then would I have moved on to distraction #2. It’s not an ideal world though and I was in a hurry to meet my friends. So we took our break and then soldiered on:
Level 1 (Chai on a long line), distraction #2 (paper bag – intermediate), environment #3 (difficult)
I got lucky! Chai’s long line did not tighten this time! In retrospect, I can’t believe what she let me get away with after tightening the line with the easy distraction! (Also in retrospect, it does make sense because she had already figured out that the long line would stop her, including in this environment, and that she was on a long line.)
We looped around the park for a while to give Chai a break, and then set back up for our most difficult distraction:
Level 1 (Chai on a long line), distraction #2 (paper bag – intermediate), environment #3 (difficult)
The reason I put the kibble on the plate is that otherwise, it wouldn’t have been visible against the ground.
… and believe it or not: the long line actually did stay loose again! Chai is building my confidence! She’s got this! I‘ve got this! We are invincible! (Or are we?)
Urban art clue #5: It sits on a border street between two colonias. The colonia the art piece belongs to has more than one part (as established yesterday). The colonia it borders only has a single part. Also: updated picture! The original piece seems to be gone or have been altered, but we have a new one in its place! Urban art is alive!
I am critical of the commercialization of pride events and aware of the fact that especially trans women are being shown the door – and much, much worse – in Zona Rosa on a regular basis. Trans women are being disappeared and murdered right where Pride is celebrated quite literally all the time. I see the announcements of missing people and murders on my news feed, and there are a lot of them. It was still the first time that I was in CDMX in June and I wanted to see the biggest Pride event I’d ever had a chance to attend (this is the biggest city I’ve been to this time of year). So that’s what I did – this year. Next year, I’ll go to the protest marcha de la Tianguis Disidente instead. Gotta remain true to my values, and pretending that every queer person is treated equally and we’re all one big happy family is most certainly not one of them. This year, I was happy to be in my city though, buy a pride flag to wear as a cape and jump into the rainbowy river of people with my friends. ↩︎
