Tag: recall training

Week 20 digest (August 13-19, 2023)

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August 13, 2023

Activity level: calm

We started our day off with 45 minutes at Fresa Parque. It’s nice how quiet it is at 7:30 on Sunday! Then our friend Dina joined the party and Chai and her got to run lots together.

Chai is now contently sleeping on the couch. This was a perfect start for the day! Game and her also found a bunch of stuff to scavenge on, including a bag of mysterious salsa.

Home alone

Game and I went trigger hunting, ran errands and park-officed for two hours while Chai stayed home. Really glad I made time for leaving her home alone – I need to make sure I keep up with Chai staying back and Game heading out with me as Chai is pretty much able to do as much as any adult dog, but still at an age where repetition is crucial for her to not develop FOMO.

Park-officing at Parque Morelos!

Now that we’re back, Chai is chewing on the Nylabonbe I got her yesterday. Based on her chew choices, I suspected she would like the hard rubber. And I was right! She is the first dog I’ve ever had who is into Nylabones! She looks blissed out chewing on it on the couch while Game couldn’t care less.

Solo adventure

In the late afternoon, Chai and I went out for about 20 minutes. We walked to the Toy Play Plaza on her back clip harness. I let her run around for a few minutes and, since there seemed to be a Squirrel Party going on, used her formal recall cue “Schnee,” marked with “Birds!” and ran with Chai to point out a squirrel. She had a blast! It was an easy recall with a big “IT’S A SQUIRREL!” reinforcer.

I then quickly set up for distraction recalls at the barrier stage with liver in container #1, location #2, reinforcing both with liver from my hand and the liver from the container. 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.

We walked back home in collar mode, making it between 5 and 20 steps between treats (20 only once: calm days are hard! That’s why we’ll make sure to keep at them!) Collar mode walking treats is how the Border Collie earns her keep on calm days that don’t have a lot of shaping in them!

House training …

August 14, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We spent 30 minutes at Fresa Parque. Chai played with the black whippety dog and a few others. When she plays with this dog, it becomes really clear that she isn’t the fastest Border Collie on the block! That little black one runs circles around her! She’s not slow and her movement pattern looks great, but she isn’t the fastest Border Collie I’ve seen. 4-months old Maki is already as fast as Chai. (You won’t see little Maki in pics and videos anymore because she moved back to the farm she was born on yesterday. She had made it clear that she NEEDED to have herding in her life. Viri and Esteban listened to her needs. It was a good and brave decision – a hard one, but the best decision for all of them. I am sorry, Esteban and Viri. It takes strength to do what’s best for our dogs, and you did!)

After today’s stint at the park, neither one of my dogs was “played out.” So they continued wrestling on the couch while I worked. Now, after playing and shaping, they are both soundly asleep!

Shaping!

We played two-toy fetch with two 10-peso coins and then shaped one object in another with both a clicker and a coin in the water bowl. Chai ROCKED it! You go girl! I love how toy skills and shaping are coming together to make this trick happen!

Solo adventure

We walked to the Dead Poultry Park. While Chai ran around chasing ardillas, I stealthily set up container #1 in its third location, with liver in it, for our barrier recall. I didn’t record this time because I didn’t have my phone with me. Unlike most previous reps, Chai and I had to stroll past the distraction area multiple times before she noticed it. As I suspected, the tripod is a cue to look for and then recall from a distraction! Going forwards, each container will have at least one rep I don’t film – just to be sure Chai generalizes the behavior when there isn’t a tripod. In any case: she was being a superstar!

She also found puke in the tall grass and ate a lot of it. We’ll see what her stomach thinks of that. She then played for quite a quite a while with a 10-months old German Shepherd, an adult mix and a Boxer. She mistook a Chihuahua for a squirrel – but only for a moment. Clearly, we need more Chihuahuas in our life! If you’re in Mexico City and have one who’d like to befriend a Border Collie, reach out to me!

On the way home, we walked in collar mode between 5 and 30 steps (we managed 30 several times – Chai was tired and a superstar about walking next to me)!

Back home …

I decided against shaping today: it means I won’t video, which means I’ll save myself video editing time. I am slowly but certainly getting sick of editing, but am still committed to this project of documenting every day in Chai’s training life. And there are SO many videos I still need to catch up on editing from the last couple months! Every new one adds to the pile. I am now at a point where most days, I edit more than I add or manage to break even. Slowly but certainly, the backlog is shrinking!

Instead of shaping, Chai rested back home, wrestled with Game and then ate the last remaining pieces of the Nylabone I had gotten her yesterday. (No, it is – supposedly – not edible, but according to Chai most delicious.)

Home alone

Chai stayed home alone when Game and I walked to a pet supply store to pick up a few things – among them a Nylabone-replacement for Chai. It’s an off-brand chew, but Chai approves – and so far, it seems a lot sturdier than the original Nylabone!

Hours later, that toy has been played with and chewed on and is still intact!

Another reinforcer test

I also did a reinforcer test today. A few days ago, Chai found a pile of irresistible fish treats at the park – so I got fish treats (at a RIDICULOUS prize). I thought they might make another single-protein option if Chai’s stomach agreed with them. After all, she seemed CRA-ZY about the ones she scavenged. Well, pitted against dried beef liver (which we already established is the same value as cooked chicken), the fish clearly lost!

I wonder what the fish treats at the park had that the ones I got don’t have. They looked the same and I got them at a store close to the park to maximize our chances that they actually were the same brand. Maybe the ones she found just sat in a puddle of lukewarm rainwater for a while and went deliciously bad while the ones I got were still boringly safe for consumption?

House training

Just gotta keep it up two more days and I’ll get the next brownie!

August 15, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We started the day with 45 minutes of being dogs at Fresa Parque where Chai got to play with a park friend.

Game did NOT beat up a Whippet who didn’t see her and accidentally crashed into her at full speed. She was going to and I immediately interrupted her. I don’t think she would have stopped before having told the Whippet that this behavior was inacceptable in the past. I have Pat Stuart to thank for this! Thank you!

Left: Chai and two of her park friends. Right: Game being a good girl who stays out of the commotion.

Home alone

Both dogs stayed home for a little under two hours while I worked with Scarlett and Panucho, a Golden who is taking his first steps towards being a social butterfly (rather than a grumbly grouch). He did fantastic and so did our helper Pau!

Panucho: breaking hearts with extreme cuteness since 2021!

Solo adventure

Chai and I walked to Kiba’s Park. I let her run and sniff and did a barrier recall with container #2 in location #1, reinforcing with liver from my hand and from the container. Like yesterday, I casually placed my distraction and then came across it; no tripods giving its presence away. Chai was being a superstar!

We saw Nicole, a kid who is crazy about dogs, knows all the dogs at the park and LOVES Border Collies. Chai has learned to stay just out of their reach since Nicole likes calling and picking up “their dog friends.” Chai has figured out how to dodge that bullet by now, doing casual drive-by-s but staying just out of Nicole’s reach. It soon started raining … time to head home after a shorter-than-expected adventure. Chai wasn’t done running yet and needed a high rate of leash-walking reinforcement.

Shaping

Over the course of the day, we had 3 four-in sessions and I did one session practicing my timing and mechanics without a dog. We’re down to (struggling with) my smallest bowl already! I’m proud of my girl.

House training

One more check mark tomorrow!

August 16, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We spent half an hour at Fresa Parque. Chai had lots of fun playing with Doodle puppy Pipa and her friend Dina. Game got brushed and had fun greeting Dina and two of her human friends. We’re now at a point where Chai gets really excited to see Dina while Game gets really excited to see Dina’s human Daniel, who may already be regretting that he told me Game was welcome to Malinois-hug him anytime.

Chai also found a most delicious dead squirrel (nice and smelly after probably having been dead for a few days) and had some of it before I threw it out. We’ll see what her stomach thinks of that input tomorrow!

Home alone

Both dogs stayed home alone while I ran errands.

Noon and beyond

Around noon, the three of us walked to the Toy Play Plaza. Game and Chai had a blast trying to run up vertical palm trees after squirrels while I worked. We then did barrier recall with liver in container #2 in its second location. 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 formal recall. I had planned to walk some more before encountering it, but this worked too. It was lovely to see the recall work just as well in Game’s presence! (Usually, I only take Chai for her recall set-ups.)

After 1.5 hours of chasing squirrels, getting treats for checking in while I was working and (Chai) practicing a recall and playing briefly with a mix, the girls are back home and sleeping peacefully on the couch. The highlight of this outing, I am sure, was finding and sharing a pile of what looked like gooey tortilla chips with some sort of salsa.

Shaping

We did three sessions of 4 in with only the smalles bowl (blue, bowl #6). Chai is doing great and much more confident than only a few days ago!

Reinforcer test

We ended the day with another reinforcer test. Since Chai had so clearly preferred the liver over the fish treats, I wanted to know whether fish was even better than kibble. I used a blanket this time to give the fish better visibility in case camouflage had been their disadvantage in the last session. If the other day was any indication, these fish need every bit of help they can get!

Believe it or not – kibble is better than fancy fish treats!

House training

We DID it! Anther week – another brownie!!

August 17, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We started with 30 minutes at Fresa Parque – we had half an hour before it started raining. Since it was already drizzling, not a lot was going on this morning but we walked for 30 minutes and greeted a few dogs.

Shaping

We had three sessions of 4 in with the smallest bowl (#6). So much fun!

Solo adventure

TW: dead animals. If you don’t want to read about them, skip to the next heading (Home alone).

Chai and I walked around for two hours and she got off-leash time at the Dead Poultry Park where we practiced barrier recalls, did easy “Schnee” (her formal recall) recall games and a “Schnee” recall reinforced by “Birds” (squirrel chase marker). She very much knows what the marker cue “Birds” means by now and gets just as excited as Game does!

Chai also found another dead critter (not a chicken this time) – she’s getting annoyingly good at finding smelly carcasses. Of course, she enjoyed some of it before we agreed on leaving it behind. (I’d let her eat the entire thing if it wasn’t for her stomach issues.) Whatever this carcass was, it wasn’t a squirrel like the other day because it was BIG, but already decomposed to an unrecognizable degree. What is the deal with this park anyways? Is this where everyone goes to die?

On the way back home, we walked in collar mode with 5-30 steps between treats. (30 only once but she did well today in general!)

Home alone

Chai and Game stayed home alone in the morning when I ran errands and got my hard-earned brownie for yesterday’s weekly streak (it was delicious!).

House training

The brownie I earned for the weekly streak I completed last night!

New week – new streak!

August 18, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

The three of us spent 40 minutes at Fresa Parque – then we left because Chai had found some delicious spot to insist on licking for-e-ver, which meant she was done playing with her park friends. Other people get fancy licky mats – I just take my dogs to the park. Game is a pretty foodie dog, but Chai is another level of food motivated – probably my dog foodiest one so far. I’m not complaining! Not only does she not tire of working for kibble, she also gets super excited about low-budget frozen Kongs (filled with soaked and squished kibble).

Home alone

Chai and Game stayed home alone for 3.5 hours while I went to a no-dogs social thing.

Shaping

We did four 4-in sessions with the smallest bowl …

Rainy park times

… and then Game and Chai spent 40 minutes walking to and running around Fresa Parque in the light rain and waited for me outside a store. Walking on her back-clip harness on the way out was hard for Chai today! (Game was off leash and ahead of us.)

A little more training

I didn’t record it to avoid “having to” edit the video, but I LOVE how well Chai did! Fold-back downs on a verbal cue – no lure! I’ll record the next session.

House training

Two days into the next weekly streak, and it wasn’t a tie! Yay!

August 19, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

The dogs and I spent 45 minutes at Fancy Park I for our morning outing. It was a fun change for them, included play in the fountain and hide and seek.

Playing in one of the fountains! Chai was intrigued by the moving pillar of water!

Note to self: if going to Fancy Park I on the weekend, go early and parking will be easy!

Being in an area with bars and restaurants on a Saturday morning meant there was A LOT of food everywhere. I was daring greatly and recalled Chai away from two tiny yogurt containers with her formal recall cue (after pup-pup-pup failed). She came running and I sent her right back. Go puppy!

Photo proof of the first time I used “Schnee” in the real world away from food Chai had found, fed a handful of kibble and sent her back to finish her prize! So proud of you, puppy!

This, unfortunately, made me overly confident. I tried a second time with a food container while she was already eating. Chai did not respond. Ooops. Error on my side. I “helped” her let go of it, repeated my formal recall and then sent her back to eat more of it twice. She also found a mount of cream cheese with a tiny bit of bagel around it and thought it was the best thing ever. I did not try any recalls or leave its there but leashed her and walked her away after letting her lick a third of it. It was A LOT of cream cheese and I don’t think her stomach would have supported all of it. That said, I am going to get cream cheese and try using it as my highest value reward!

Scavenging and life quality (an opinion)

By now, I am less stressed about letting Chai go back to small amounts of food after a recall (or just letting her have small amounts of found food in the first place.) Small amounts seem to have become okay with her stomach. Judging by my observations over the last couple weeks, Chai’s highly sensitive puppy stomach has slowly, but steadily grown stronger and does now tolerate of a much wider range of food! A huge relief because I see scavenging as SUCH a species-typical dog behavior and want my dogs to have it in their lives.

After reflecting on this some more, I’ve decided that I’ll even take the occasional diarrhea day. I don’t want to create a dog who lives in fear that I’ll take away a treasure they find. I want a strong recall that works away from any kind of food source anyways and am working up to it in our distraction sessions – but I’ll only ever use it when absolutely necessary. When Chai finds the next delicious food container like she did this morning, I won’t call her away from it (for now – we’ll get there after more distraction recall practice) but celebrate the find with her. And I’ll send Game (if available) to help finish the job so Chai only gets to inhale 50% of whatever she finds.

Life quality (being able to show species-typical behaviors such as scavenging) matters more to me than diarrhea-free dogs. I put scavenging in the life quality category because I suspect that’s what the dogs would tell me if they could weigh in. My readers may see this differently and that’s totally okay. Like in most things life, there is no one right way of being out in the world with our dogs. You do you and I do me!

Allowing scavenging is of course not a recall cop-out: the way I see it, strong recalls also go into the life quality category. The stronger their recall, the more freedom I can safely give my dogs. I absolutely want a recall I can rely on even under the most challenging food circumstances, and because of who Chai is, I’m positive we’ll get there – probably not in a straight line, but we will. From what I’ve seen so far, I suspect that food will stay her biggest recall challenge, but food is a controllable distraction and she’s a trainable Border Collie who doesn’t guard resources. With that kind of dog, food is the best biggest recall challenge you could possibly have! (This is not true for all dogs. Add resource guarding or low biddability to the mix and things look different for sure.) Chai isn’t the most biddable Border Collie I have worked with by far, but that’s part of what makes her so much fun for me. It’s not only her Border-Collie-ness, but also her quirks and the ways in which she challenges me that make her a great fit for me.

Shaping

I was going to continue with 4 in and the smallest container, but Chai said she wanted a break from this exercise. So we stopped. I’ll give it a week and then continue where we left off.

We worked on positions instead!

Afternoon adventure

I took both dogs to Fresa Parque when the rain died down. Chai got to play with Pipa (the Golden Doodle puppy) and Lola (Pipa’s older Old English Sheepdog sister). I usually chat with Pipa’s human, so this was fun. Their friend was here too and they invited Chai to play monkey in the middle together with Lola and her baseball.

Monkey in the middle with Lola and her human!

Chai didn’t have a solo adventure today, but she’ll have a big one tomorrow! And then I’ll have to take Game on a longer solo adventure of her own – probably a bike trip – next week to make sure Chai gets some longer home-alone time without Game. It’s an important skill to maintain! It’s also important to me that Game gets her fair share of solo adventures herself. I’m too busy to do it every single day these days, but two or three times a week are usually possible.

Home alone

Both dogs stayed home alone when I quickly went to the grocery store.

House training

Today’s pee outing was unsuccessful – but fascinating! Game didn’t pee because, I suspect, she didn’t have to and it was thundering. I cued Chai to “potty” in a spot Game often goes, and she immediately squatted but didn’t pee. I have captured squatting, but not peeing! Her cue to squat is, “Potty,” her prompt to mark is Game’s fresh pee on the ground and her cue to empty her bladder is having to go when not distracted from the bodily sensation by the environment. FASCINATING! I have exclusively rewarded after the potty cue when I saw at least a few drops (marking). And YET, squatting is what Chai has learned as the meaning of the cue! Dogs are SO fascinating!

Chai’s formal recall, iteration 5.2: the barrier level(s) – higher value distraction (liver) in 3 containers and different locations

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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 Play Plaza

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.

Container 1, location 3: liver

August 14, 2023: Dead-Poultry Park1

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.

  1. 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. ↩︎

Chai’s formal recall, iteration 5.2: the barrier level(s) – kibble container #3 (wire mouse trap)

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If I’m not mistaken, my reinforcer for the kibble recalls is liver in all the videos below (same value as chicken).

Container 3, location 1

I started on a long line. She reoriented as soon as she spotted the container – so I took a break to loop around the park and then set up in a different part of the park off leash!


Well done, puppy!

Container 3, location 2

Two days later at our toy play plaza. You go girl!

Container 3, location 3

Yet another park for our third location!

Session 1

In real time, I had the impression that Chai’s response was below baseline speed (even though it looks good on the video). To be on the safe side, I took a break and then did another session in a different part of the same park. (Note that my new Chai-tailored recall strategy is not like my distraction protocol: I get to take a break right away and then try in a different location.)

Session 2

After a 10 or 15 minute break; different location in the same park.

In the video above, Chai definitely turned on a dime! Achievement unlocked!

Chaiary – week 16 digest: July 17-22, 2023

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July 17, 2023

Activity level: average

Mostly bullet points today!

Activities

+ 45 minutes at the park: running and playing with other dogs and a single-rep success recall off distraction #3 (kibble) behind the closed plastic container barrier. Woohooo!

+ Shaping “Earn it!” with 3/4 of Chai’s daily food ration.

+ After our impulse control shaping session, Chai needed some Game-wrangling time to let out all of that pent up need to move and DO rather than hold back. I totally get it!

+ Then Game and I went out for three hours to bike around and meet a friend for coffee …

Enjoying a chew at the café and guarding “my” Ecobici (Mexico City bikesharing bike) outside a store on the way home.

… Chai got another round of “earn it” – and we made it to food on the floor! This was followed by the necessary roughhousing with Game. Impulse control means all that pent-up DO-DO-DO needs to come out! I have never seen as clear an example of this as I’m seeing in Chai.

+ Chai and I walked back to Fresa Parque and repeated the next formal recall step I had come up with … with fascinating results. This girl is challenging me and I love it!

In terms of good news, she left a green paleta when asked to “Leave it!” and the same splash of dog poop she was tempted to eat twice. Then, however, she found something else that smelled like a mixture of human poop and rotten animal and managed to eat quite a bit of it before I got her away. Tomorrow will tell if whatever disgustingly smelly something she had the pleasure of enjoying today agreed with her stomach.

Home alone

Chai stayed home alone for 3 hours while Game and I went on bike rides and a coffee outing, and again for Game’s evening walk.

House training

How can this be right? I just had a brownie! Where does the time go?

July 18, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

Chai spent 20 minutes running around Fresa Parque with dog friends and Game practiced staying calm and eating treats surrounded by the morning craze. I had been planning on repeating the barrier step at the park (kibble in closed container) and, after a break, kibble in the open container just to see where we were at. But since I hadn’t had my coffee yet … I forgot both my tripod AND the container. No recall training this morning. We’ll go back and try again later!

Next, we did some paw target shaping with new objects. I want to improve Chai’s precision targeting!

Noon

Around noon, we headed back to Fresa Parque in harness mode. My plan was to walk home in collar mode and spend the time there practicing the recalls we didn’t get to this morning. And that’s precisely what we did after be-a-dog-time.

After rep #5, I gave Chai time to run and be social with the noon crowd. Her intensity was ratcheted all the way up: these recall games take a lot out of her puppy brain! And all that concentration leads to pent-up “Whaaaaa!” that is best released in playing with other dogs! I took a video from beginning to end of the play session. You can see HOW intensely she plays at first – this is a way for her to release the pressure that concentration and impulse control build up! – and how her social needs saturate within a few minutes and she’s then able to move on to sniffing and exploring. Meeting your young dog’s social needs on a regular basis is a big deal!

I’d usually feed check-ins, but I was out of treats. While running out of treats can be annoying, it is also convenient: anytime I run out of treats, I will substitute personal play as a reward. Running out of treats about once a week ensures that we keep personal play as an outdoorsy reinforcer as well and don’t become solely dependent on tangible reinforcers.

On the way home, Chai got to wait outside the bakery and at a corner store while I went inside. Good girl!

Afternoon

After a fun-and-easy recall from the bathroom into the shaping space (checking recall 8/101 off Silvia‘s modified list!), we worked some more on single-paw targets with easy objects (balance pod, lid of a pot, turned over metal bowl), putting the cue back on and switching both the position of the objects and my position in relation to Chai (turning my back, standing on one foot, feet and hands on the floor and looking at Chai through my straddled legs etc).

The upside-down metal bowl works great – I want to find something stable that is equally tall but less wide (to ensure she only gets one paw on) and then start reducing hight and size from there! Maybe styrofoam will do the trick … I could slowly shave it down and tape it to the floor for stability …

Home alone

Chai stayed home alone for Game’s two short rain-break walks.

Husbandry

+ “Brush!”

House training

(1) New recall rule: I’ve done quite a few into the shaping space and it’s time to mix it up again! I’ll make sure the last two fun-and-easy ones are outdoors! Maybe one for toys and one for food?

July 19, 2023

Activity level: low

Woohooo! Getting this week’s low-activity day out of the way!

Recalls and collar mode in the AM

After a brief morning walk work, Chai and I went to the park to repeat our same distraction recall in the same space, aiming for a single-rep success. Unfortunately – this being Mexico where public spaces are shared and used and alive! – there was a dance class happening in our usual spot with the piano mural.

I decided to go for it anyways, having Chai wait in her usual spot and simply setting the distraction up in the other direction. Would I suggest this to a student? No. I would tell them to go home and try again later But with my own dogs, I experiment more – and that’s what I did here. I was curious if Chai would recall away from the tapedd plastic container if it was in a different spot.

Pre and post distraction recall, we did a short loop through the quiet (except for the dance class) park. There were no dogs to play with and I’m thinking of keeping today low key. I threw in one fun and easy “Schnee” recall when Chai was already about to turn my way, reinforcing it with “chase” and 3 ball tosses. Her ball game was a bit lacksadaiysical today in terms of returning the balls, but it was a lovely recall and a fun “chase” reinforcer! Recall 9/10 for Silvia – check!

We then walked home on a collar (5-35 steps between treats). I upped the rate of reinforcement to every 5th step when passing a single dog and a group of dogs. Chai did SO well today! I used to feed a lot more when passing dogs, and now she’s just rocking it!

Home alone

Chai stayed home with Game for 5 hours while I co-worked with a friend, and then again alone by herself during Game’s brief pre-rain walk.

“Cape ONNNNN!”

For the first time, I announced the service dog vest (cape) and put it on, fed the unimpressed Chai a few treats that required her to move around and then “Cape OFFFF”ed her again. Tomorrow, we’ll go to the airport for the first time. She will probably not wear the cape – it’s still new to her – but if someone asks, I want to be able to put it on without her freaking out!

“Frog” progress

I used the remainders of Chai’s meal for the day for two frog sessions. For the second one, I did not fold the pillow! This is a great calm day activity, and my (randomly discovered) trick of feeding with Chai’s head off the couch is helping her to not try and crawl towards me: there is nowhere to crawl when your front end is at the edge of A couch!

House training

Woohooo! I’ve got a 3-week/21 day-streak!

July 20, 2023

Activity level: average

Morning fun and formal recall success

Chai nailed her single-rep success recall with our latest barrier strategy – a closed container I will open for her after recalling for chicken. Go Chai!!! Then she got to run around with several dogs she knows at that park, found a mud puddle to lie down in and is now – after half an hour of training and off leash fun – peacefully asleep on the couch.

Rough-housing – and a break at the exact right moment

After resting up, Chai and Game enjoyed some fun roughhousing around the apartment. Timing was perfect – the people in the apartment below us were also being loud, so I didn’t worry about them being bothered by the dog nails screeching on my floor (their ceiling). After roughousing, I scooped up Chai to put her in the bathroom for a break … and when I came in just minutes later for my own bathroom break, she had already peed in the shower. Yay for great timing! May the housetraining streak continue!

Even juvenile dogs who are already learning where to do their business may forget when they are all wrapped up in playing – until they can’t hold it anymore and pee on the spot. Supervision still matters (even more so with Chai who hasn’t learned to pee outside as a young puppy, but really with any young dog.)

Home alone

Chai stayed home alone while Game and I went for a brief late morning/C-gets-a-brownie walk. The person working the place that sells the brownies already knows me and invited me to come in WITH my dog(s) the next time: they had seen that I asked them to wait outside every time and let me know they are welcome. People are lovely!

Chai had another brief home-alone stay on Game’s evening loop.

Husbandry

Chai got brushed – she’ll look good at her first day at the airport!

“Cape onnnn!”

We practiced putting on, walking with and taking off the service dog vest one more time, just in case. (I didn’t end up using it at the airport.)

Airport adventures

Getting ready: when going to a place that your dog may consider indoors as well as outdoors – be sure to bring cleaning supplies just in case! (We didn’t need them. Tip: if you get Nature’s Miracle, do NOT get the “melon burst” scented version I accidentally bought. It smells disgusting.)

Left: be prepared – don’t forget your cleaning supplies! Right: airport parking garage. Ready to adventure!

We went for a socialization trip to the airport, saw LOTS of people, heard suitcases roll on different surfaces, rode the airport elevator and I carried Chai up and down an escalator. She also got smacked in the head with a “Caution-wet floor” sign by a cleaning person in the bathroom who didn’t see Chai and just bounced back. She took it all in stride. Go Chai!!

The only thing that didn’t go as well as it could have: Chai threw up in the car on the way to the airport. She happily got in again after our adventure though. No fallout from car sickness so far. Fingers crossed it stays this way!

After getting home, Chai joined Game’s sniff loop to empty out the puppy so she could hang out in the living room without accidents. Just now, a bit after 6PM, both dogs got to go on a short pre-rain loop – and we got an empty puppy again!

4 in (“Four!”)

We went from bowl #2 down to bowl #3! This is HARD and Chai is being a superstar!

Frog

I tried two frog sessions with the tired evening puppy: one with the (unfolded) pillow and then one without a pillow. She couldn’t do it without the pillow so we went back to the pillow for session #2. Short and sweet, praising gently and releasing with “okay.” Me putting the pillow on the couch is becoming a cue – Chai goes right into frog position! Feeding off the edge of the couch keeps her from crawling forwards!

House training

New week – time to start a new streak!

It looks like I might really get that massage …! Only 6 more days!

July 21, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We spent half an hour at the park. Game got to sniff and chill and Chai played with her dog friends and worked on positions in between. She did great!

Home alone

+ Chai stayed home alone for Game’s noon loop.

+ Both dogs stayed home for a little over 3 hours while I ran errands at a no-dogs-allowed place, and again briefly when I picked up dinner.

Shaping

+ We repeated yesterday’s session from bowl #2 to #3 (no video). Next time, we’ll start with #3 right away!

+ We worked on single-paw precision targeting.

Husbandry

I trimmed Chai’s ear fur back a little: another no-big-deal (for Chai anyways) grooming procedure preceded by an announcement.

Frog

We worked on the frog behavior again. Silvia agreed with my plan of taking out the pillow and filling the pillow case with smaller and smaller things. First, I tried just a hoodie but that was too hard. A hoodie, a t-shirt and shorts did the trick though! We’re already downsizing from the pillow in the pillow case and it’s looking good!

The evening

The dogs did some gentle roughhousing, the three of us had snuggles on the couch, went on an evening pee loop together (yay for empty puppies) and had fun with informal toy play in the apartment (with both dogs at the same time and the always-out toys). We’ve been building gentle fun with tugging between the dogs and me, and Game has been a great teacher for Chai. (No video.)

House training

Wheee! I keep winning at my game! House training, including the version of it I am doing, is mostly a matter of consistency and vigilance: I know when it’s safe to let the puppy into the living room and when it isn’t, and she does already pick up some slack for me, like the other day when she herself went to the bathroom (the door is always open) to pee and poop while I was distracted and let her in the living room too long.

After week #4 (which may or may not be in only 5 days), I’ll up the ante on myself and try to get more and more outdoors pees. I still have to make up the rules of the new game, but I think I might do something along the lines of “green check mark any day she pees outside more often than in the bathroom” to start with.

We’ll also have to take a closer look at pooping again once I’ve streaked through week 4: Chai hasn’t pooped outdoors in a while, just in the shower. I’ll have to go back to massaging her belly and spending more hours working from a park office rather than from home: after the pee games, I’ll come up with a poop game! (These games are for me, of course, not for Chai: they motivate me to set her up for house training success every day. I hope to get her as house trained as she is capable of becoming, which, due to her unknown past, may or may not be fully housetrained.)

One of Chai’s favorite spots because she can reach the toilet paper from there if I forget to put it out of reach – and toilet paper is FUN!

July 22, 2023

Activity level: average

The AM

We started out with a round of paw-target shaping, just like yesterday.

Chai and I then walked to another neighborhood in harness mode to meet Alan and Kiba. We started off with my new recall plan for Border Collie stares/recalls: shaping. I’d wait her out at the end of her leash and then release her as soon as she gave me a weight shift or any sign of reorientation. This was easier said than done, as you’ll see if you follow the link in this paragraph.

I’ll be helping Alan with Kiba next week so I may be able to repeat the set-up. What I want to change next time: call her the moment she gives me a check in rather than immediately releasing. Feed and release! This may be clearer to Chai – and it brings us closer to the actual goal, which is a recall anyways!

We then just hung out and Chai and Kiba got to socialize with Ivan’s Border Collies and their dog sitters. Nicole had fun throwing Kiba’s squeaky ball for Chai, and Chai found a non-intimidating way of interacting with Nicole, a kid who is at the park a lot and wants to hug all the dogs!

On the way back – harness mode again because I was out of treats – Chai waited for me outside a store. Good girl! Waiting is no problem, even when Game is not with her! She trusts I will be back for her.

More shaping

After coming home, I worked on the frog twice for a handful of treats each. Silvia’s feedback on my last video (see above):

“Left leg looks great here – but right seems a bit harder (going out 2nd, leaning to the left when she does so), so I would stay on this height for a bit to get her totally relaxed with the right leg as well before fading the support further.”

Silvia Trkman

For now, we are staying with the hoodie, t-shirt and shorts in the pillow case!

After a little break, we went back to single-paw target shaping in 4 brief sessions. It is coming along nicely!

Home alone

Chai stayed home alone during Game’s potty walk at noon and Game and Chai stayed home alone when I met folks for a picnic at a no-dogs allowed (sniff) section of Chapultepec.

… and MORE shaping!

After getting back home, we did a 4-in session, starting right away with bowl #3! Chai did well!

An evening loop …

The three of us went on an evening loop during a rain break. Unfortunately, it didn’t result in empty puppies … so Chai went to bed (aka to into the bathroom) a little earlier than usual. No living room time for puppies who still need to pee! I want my weekly brownie!

This evening walk came with a startle for Chai: right in front of us, someone at the wall to our left tossed a rolled-up sweater to someone standing at a car to our right. The person catching the sweater was wearing an (according to Chai) creepy and unusual yellow dress. Chai growled for a second before I interrupted her with a scatter cue, tossing the treats ahead and away from the people, and then we quickly moved on. (I know, Chai! You never know what articles of clothing the big city will throw at you next!)

House training

Woohooo! Almost halfway through the week!

Distraction recall round 4 – chuting back to a closed container, or: Chai’s formal recall: the barrier levelS (plastic kibble container #1)!

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Enter: a new reinforcement strategy

After returning to our headquarters to strategize, I decided to start over with the last successful step: a closed plastic container taped shut. I also changed my reinforcement strategy: not only would Chai get a handful of chicken – I’d also open the kibble container for her after the “okay” release. She has taught me that she needs both reinforcers for me to be successful: knowing that she can reach a distraction, even if it is lower value than what I have, trumps coming back to me unless she also gets that distraction. So we’ll try for a compromise: what, little Border Collie, if I reinforce you from my hand AND give you access to the distraction after?

A closed plastic container!

July 18, 2023

Another barrier attempt at distraction #3 at the park! The reinforcer: a handful of chicken (rather than a single piece), “okay” release, and I am opening the plastic box for Chai to eat the kibble distraction as well: look how powerful your person is! That opposable thumb thing is quite amazing!

5-rep session:

In the session above, I set Chai (or rather myself) up for success in all the ways I could: we haven’t done any impulse control work today and she has already had some time running around to get out the cabin fever. I also made sure she acclimated to the space I was going to train in before setting up.

When acclimating, Chai met two toddlers (human kids her age who were fascinated watching her). Nice experience! They just watched each other; no direct contact, which is perfect.

Then our first session with the closed see-through container taped shut took, as you just saw, FIVE reps until we got a success! Good timing: after rep #5, I was both out of kibble and chicken.

This is fascinating to me! Chai clearly learned yesterday that in this situation, she can blow through her recall because she’ll get the kibble – and this set us me back in the sense that she now also tries going for a closed container that she used to succeesfully recall away from in the past!

With the adjusted reinforcement ritual, I hope Chai will learn that she’ll get everything (chicken AND kibble) if she comes back, but will not get chicken if she doesn’t. With the closed container, she still got the chicken after trying to open the closed container in vain. Once I use freely accessible kibble, if she doesn’t come back before reaching the kibble, she won’t get the chicken (but still get the kibble if she blows through my recall). We’ll have to see how good the pragmatic little Border Collie’s mental accounting skills are!

Tomorrow morning, we’ll try for a single-rep success at this same location, repeating today’s set-up and reinforcement ritual!

July 19, 2023: will we get a single-rep success after a night’s break?

We changed the direction of the recall … away from the piano mural rather than towards it … because the piano mural stage had a dance class going on. Now if you were a student of mine, I’d tell you to just wait and try for your single-rep success some other time. But I am me and with my own dogs, I LOVE to experiment. Since I knew Chai wouldn’t be able to help herself to the distraction without my help, I decided to give things a try with this slightly different location. I had no idea if she’d succeed the first time – but I wanted to find out! It took her two reps:

Would she have been able to do it in a single rep if we had kept the environment exactly the same (not changed recall directions because of the dance class)? Maybe! Maybe not. There’s no way of knowing! One thing, however, I know for sure: tomorrow we’ll go for that single-rep success again!

July 20, 2023: single rep success with the closed container!

Woohoo! Now just to decide how to proceed from here … I don’t expect the previous strategy of the open container to work – at least not yet. We need another, more different dragon plan! Time to take a break and strategize, little Border Collie …!

Chai’s distraction recall training, round 3.2: starting over at the barrier level!

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I’ve decided to chute back down to distraction B (a bag that used to have food in it) at the barrier level (level 2) in the house and build back up from there. I’ll skip distraction A (empty plate) and work with only B (bag that used to have food in it) and C (kibble) instead. I’m calling this recall round 3.2 because it’s the 3rd “new attempt” and I’m starting at level 2 (the barrier/helper stage). The drawing board I went back to after this session says:

I’d worry about all things off leash and barrier free after working through this new barrier plan. I excluded the empty plate – wasn’t it beneath Chai already? Let’s find out!

July 15, 2023: single rep success at the barrier level (level 2) in the house!

Paper bag (intermediate distracton) in plastic container

Kibble (difficult distraction) in plastic container

For now, at round 3 of our distraction adventures, I’ve decided to let Chai check out the barrier, but not provide her with access. For now.

July 16, 2023: the roof, the roof, the roof has distractions …

In the two videos below you’ll see me move towards the distraction to celebrate with Chai rather than away from it (as I recommend you do when working on recalls with your own dog). The reason I move towards the distractions is that I want our reward celebrations to be on camera, and that’s the only way to make that happen since we’re coming around a corner.

Chai does a lovely job with distraction B, the paper bag in the plastic container (barrier):

The next session, we’ll move on to distraction C: kibble in the plastic container! Being good students of my recall protocol, we took a break of personal play and relaxation on the roof before setting up the next challenge:

Chai was being a superstar again! Go puppy! (Once more, my smart student is setting me up for an extinction burst in the future. She knows how reinforcing recall success is for me …!)1

Level 2 (barrier) at the park!

Riding my wave of success, headed back outside in the late afternoon for real-world recalls at the barrier level:

This wasn’t a single-rep success session: I quickly tethered Chai after getting distance with my treat tosses, returned to the camera to reposition the kibble box and then returned to Chai to release her for the second rep of what would end up being the 2-rep session from the video above. We then took a break for some park fun … and had a new session about 15 minutes later:

Single-rep success! And on that note, we called it a successful day! Only distraction C at the park is left, and we’ll test out of the barrier stage again (third time’s a charm?)

July 17, 2023: third time IS a charm this time! Single-rep success on kibble in the plastic box at the park!

I’ve taped the container to make sure Chai can’t get to it, and upped my first reinforcer to an entire handful of chicken.

Single-rep success! We tested out of the barrier level! Go puppieeee!

I’ve completed the barrier plan I made. Now it’s time to go back to our headquarters and figure out how to proceed … our goal, after all, is still off-leash recalls away from unprotected distractions. And I know that Chai is a powerful strategist – as am I! (Insert suspensful music!)

  1. Just joking, of course. She is a dog, not a cunning human! ↩︎

CHAI’S DISTRACTION RECALL TRAINING – going rouge again! ROUND 2.3: level 3 (off leash), unprotected kibble at the park … followed by a (genius, I know) helper-fading training plan!

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(Still) July 1, 2023

Well, well, well. No, I have still not printed my distraction tracker. No, I do not practice what I preach and keep my 3 environments the same at all 3 levels (level 1: long line; level 2: barrier/helper; level 3: off leash). I was aware of the latter but thought Chai could do it anyways. I was NOT aware of skipping yet another 6 steps, which is both wild and wildly amusing.

Future me chiming in from bird eye’s view:

Check marks are for the achievements Chai has unlocked, strike-through text for the steps I am skipping and the green arrow for what I’m trying on July 1st’s first park session below:

I’m about to skip 6 steps!

July 1, 2023 – off leash unprotected kibble distraction at the first park we already failed at.

Our most difficult distraction, and I just go for it! Watch me crash and burn entertain you and Chai, smart and pragmatic as always, enjoy her pre-recall kibble snack! Who knows where my brain cells are off to. Well, I know where they are off to but seriously – I’d expect to be able to keep all things recall straight anyways! Instead, I’m being hilarious these days. (Nobody’s perfect, dog trainers are just as human as everyone else etc. – I’m sharing this because some students are intimidated by professional trainers when really, there’s no reason to. If your trainer only shows you perfect sessions, that’s not because they only have perfect sessions but because they only show you those. I promise! Our humanness never goes away, no matter how long we’ve been in the field. We all have days where other things are at the forefront of our minds – no matter how much we love our dogs and their training! Personally, I think that’s a good thing. It keeps us humble and it makes for good laughs! So here you go!)

What do you think my rogue self did next? Nope, I didn’t go back to practice unprotected distractions in the house and on the roof. Instead, I got my helper to help and stuck with this very same distraction in this very same location:

Off leash kibble recalls at the park with a human helper (level 2 – barrier/helper)

Here are the next few sessions/reps Zane and I did. In the video below, Chai does exactly what I expected her to do: because she got the kibble in the previous session, she tries again:

We repeat the same set-up. I thought Chai would try again – but no: this puppy learns FAST and has already made the connection that Zane’s presence means there is no point in trying to get the kibble right away! Smart and pragmatic is a dangerous (and dangerously fun) combination!

Chai does well when Zane squats near the kibble plate

This gives me an idea about how to proceed: what if I gradually faded my helper rather than going from recalls with a helper right to recalls without one?

Fading my distraction recall helper at the off-leash kibble stage at the park: 1st step

NICE! Next, I’ll ask Zane to squat just a little further from the kibble …

Fading my helper: 2nd step

Superpuppy! Now I’ll ask Zane to stay at the same distance, but stand up rather than squatting. Gradually changing the picture for Chai …

Fading my helper: Zane stands up

Go Chai! Upwards and onwards: let’s ask Zane to move further back still …

Fading my helper: Zane moves further away from the kibble

Most excellent puppy! (See what Chai is doing here? She is building my trust back up at the same rate that I’m fading my helper. “Patience, grasshopper,” she tells herself. “You’ve got this. You’ll be eating out of your human’s hand again in no time!” This puppy has a master plan!)1

Fading the helper: Zane moves back EVEN further!

Unfortunately, Chai running towards the distraction is out of frame … but you can see her response! Go puppy!

Zane moves further back still – and we need to end the session due to an incessantly barking Dachshund

It’s a shame we had to end here – I would have loved to fade Zane all the way off the stage space and then try again without a helper in this location. Alas – not today! Zane was relieved from his helper duties and I, riding the wave of success, kept going in a bark-free spot of the same park against better knowledge.

No helper – empty plate. Same park, different spot.

Zane headed back to the apartment and I went to a different spot in the park, far from the barky Dachshund. My goal was still to work up to unprotected kibble recalls. I rounded up enough brain cells to start over with an empty plate in the new location: I didn’t want to make both criteria harder at once (new location AND no helper who might pick up the plate). Even though Chai had worked hard to re-build my trust, I wasn’t quite there yet … and as it turns out, that was wise:

Have I mentioned this puppy is whip smart? She knew Zane was gone, saw a plate and would have gone for it. A moment after my recall she realized the plate was empty and turned around to come back to me. I repeated the empty-plate recall in this second location one more time:

After this rep, I made the smart decision to end for the day. Back to the drawing board! I need to think about how to outsmart my puppy … And it’s finally dawning on me that I skipped steps! (It’s humbling to be a student of your own recall protocol and realize that you, too, very much need to print it out or become a person who checks things off digitally.)

Chai had shown me that she was not going to recall away from unprotected kibble in the park at this point! Her motto: “If you see something you might be able to eat – eat it!”

Back to the drawing board I go … let’s see what I’ll cook up next!

  1. I know, of course, that dogs don’t have master plans. If you know me, you’ll know that. But in case you just stumbled across my blog and started reading here, I’m pointing out that this is a joke. ↩︎

CHAI’S DISTRACTION RECALL TRAINING – ROUND 2.3: level 3 (off leash) in the house and level 2 (barrier/helper) revisited

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June 30, 2023: I follow the plan! Woohooo!

After having succeeded outdoors, I stuck to the plan this time – hence the title: round 2 (the 2nd stab at distraction recalls) .3 (level 3: off leash) in our first location with our first distraction.

FUTURE ME CHIMING IN HERE FROM A BIRD’S EYE VIEW:

Steps we have already tested out of are indicated by a check mark, past steps I skipped are crossed out and the steps I am tackling in this post have a green arrow in front of them. Future steps have a square:

Off leash recall away from an empty plate in the house

Reinforcer: a piece of cooked chicken from my hand and “okay” release to check out the distraction.

Extracalifragilisticexpialidocious! Upwards and onwards: distraction #2 – the bag. I didn’t have the paper bag anymore and used a plastic bag that used to have pastries in it instead:

Off leash recall away from empty plastic bag in the house

Chai nailed this distraction as well! Go puppy!

According to my notes, I did not trust that Chai would recall away from kibble off leash. I did not take video, but this is what my notes say:

Long line recall away from kibble in the house

I wanted to go back a step due to my faux pas the other day where I skipped a few steps and she got the kibble. My helper was still working and I don’t have a barrier other than him, so I went back to a long line. And indeed: she hit the end two (or was it three?) times before we could end on a success: recall on a loose long line, chicken from my hand and release to eat the kibble.

So we did end on a success … but not at the off leash (level 3) stage.

July 1, 2023: revisiting the barrier/helper level (level 2)

I had my helper back and revisited the barrier stage with Chai off leash and Zane protecting the most difficult distraction – kibble – in the house. She nailed it on her first attempt! (No video.)

Next, we went up to the roof for an off-leash kibble recall with Zane ready to pick up the kibble plate: by now, I had realized I hadn’t done the barrier level for kibble on the roof the last time.

It took two sessions with a break in between: Zane had to lift the kibble plate in the first rep of the first session. In rep #2, Chai nailed it. We took a recall games break and then had another helper session, getting a single-rep success on the roof (no video).

At this point, future me with his bird eye’s view can proudly show you the following table:

Yay – no more skipped steps! But will I remember that I haven’t yet worked on off-leash kibble in the living room? Stay tuned to find out …

Chai’s distraction recall training – round 2.2: starting over with level 2 (barrier) at a different park

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June 29, 2023

Since yesterday, we failed at off-leash recalls, I remembered: oops. I haven’t done barrier recalls in the real world, have I? No, I have not. So that’s what we did today. We went to our favorite toy play Plaza and started over there – with barriers in a difficult location that wasn’t the same one we had just failed in off leash. While we never did the barrier recall with our most difficult distraction that was still missing from our work on the roof of the apartment building, at least that was the only step we skipped: barrier levels at the park is what comes next according to my recall tracker! (There is a reason my recall distraction protocol follows the order it does: I’ve tried different variations with different dogs and found this order to be the most successful for most dogs.)

I’m titling this post “round 2.2” because I see it as my second stab (the first “2”) at distraction recalls, and I’m starting at level 2 (the barrier level, indicated by the “.2”).

Future me chiming in here from a bird’s eye view:

Steps we have already tested out of are indicated by a check mark, past steps I skipped are crossed out and steps I am tackling in this post have a green arrow in front of them. Future steps yet to be tackled have a square in front of them:

Empty plate behind a barrier at the plaza – success!

My reinforcer, as of yesterday, is a piece of chicken from my hand followed by an “okay” release to check out the distraction.

While Chai would certainly have liked to investigate the plate after my “okay” release, she DID it – a recall success, no doubt! Upwards and onwards: the intermediate distraction!

Paper bag behind a barrier at the plaza

This is more difficult! According to my recall protocol, we want a single-rep success at every distraction step. That means the very first rep of a session needs to be a turn on a dime. If it isn’t, the session continues until the dog is successful. Then, after a break of at least 15 minutes, we do another identical session – aiming for a single-rep success again.

In the video below, you’ll see 2 sessions: Chai isn’t successful on her first attempt. Therefore, our first session has 2 reps (the second rep is a turn on a dime). We then take a 15-minute break of park fun and repeat an identical session, getting a single-rep recall success in our second session! Achievement unlocked

Our most difficult distraction: kibble behind a barrier!

Wooohooo! Even though I had to change barriers and head to a different location in the same park – during our 15-minute between-sessions break, Chai didn’t only play in the fountain but also figure out how to get behind the first barrier – we are getting a single-rep success with distraction 3!

I can’t quite believe how well my puppy is doing and call a second time (going off the rails of my recall protocol, which calls for sessions to be ended as soon as you get a single-rep success) when Chai is looking right at the kibble, trying to get into the playground. She nails this second recall too and I’m convinced: my puppy has tested out of distraction #3 at the barrier level! Go Chai!!

Our reinforcer, by the way, is still chicken from my hand – and a “Get it” piece of chicken in the second rep in the video above – followed by a release to the barrier. I decided to not open the gate to the playground and give Chai direct access to the kibble at this point: look and smell yes, eat no.

Stay tuned to find out what I’ll try next …!

Urban art chase: I’ll run a second scavenger hunt – I just haven’t decided what piece of off-the-beaten-track CDMX art we’ll end with. But I already know I’ll make things more challenging – and potentially more fun – this time around by sending you all over the city!

CHAI’S DISTRACTION RECALL TRAINING – ROUND 1.3: LEVEL 3 (off leash) IN A difficult ENVIRONMENT, aka C goes rogue and skips 10 steps, the world is over, the water is wet and all the pizzazz.

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“Oh, honey. […] The world is over. Who cares how fast you go!”
(Manhunt by Gretchen Felker-Martin)

June 28, 2023: Fresa Parque off leash distraction recalls and skipping 10 steps

I confidently went to Fresa Parque in order to tackle level 3 (off leash) distraction recalls. Yep, you read that right: I haven’t worked on level 3 recalls either in the house or on the roof – Chai’s easy and difficult environments. I haven’t even worked on a protected difficult distraction on the roof yet! Future me made a table showing the 10 steps I am about to skip and the 3 most difficult steps I am about to tackle (check mark: achievement unlocked; strike-through text: skipped; green arrow: about to take a stab at in this post):

This first video shows the easiest distraction – our good old empty plate. Chai was a good sport and recalled away from it. I did two recalls rather than just one because she didn’t look like she knew the plate was even there … and then we danced! (Because what else are you gonna do when Gretchen Felker-Martin informs you that the world is over!)

Empty plate, off leash, park

Paper bag, off leash, park

Next, we tackled distraction #2: the intermediate one, our paper bag. This time, Chai clearly saw it. She beelined towards it and came right back when I called. Good puppy!

As confident as can be, I did the next obvious thing: set up distraction #3. KIBBLE! Our most difficult distraction! For the very first time, a completely unprotected edible distraction – several distractin protocol steps before it was time for a challenge of this magnitude.

Kibble, off leash, park

What do you think happened?

Chai knows this is an edible distraction, and she knows it is unprotected. She does the sensible thing and eats it. What else would one smart, pragmatic Border Collie do?!

Silver lining: you see her hesitate ever-so-slightly when I call. The recall response is almost on auto-pilot, that’s why. Then, her conscious decision to of course eat what is right in front of her wins and she goes for the kibble.

Kibble – second attempt

What would gone-rogue me do next?

I decided it would be a good idea to repeat the distraction – this surely was a one-off error! I’d just call earlier next time and all would be well.

You are seeing me have an extinction burst here: Chai has given me SO much confidence in her distraction recalls that I trust my reinforcer (Chai coming back) is going to happen again. Of course it is!

(Or is it? Let’s find out!)

Kibble – third attempt

The conclusion extinction-burst me draws in the video above is not one I would draw if I was looking at my tracker, away from the park and back at the drawing board. But I was still surfing the wave of extinction and trusted that I’d get a beautiful recall if I only reinforced once before releasing Chai to the kibble. She had simply let me know that found food was better than “Get it” chicken. Who knew I am such an optimist! (I had enough brain cells switched on to realize that ignoring my marker cue (Get it) and going for the distraction instead did not count as success even though Chai responded to the original recall.)

Third time’s a charm? Let’s find out …

Surprise: third time’s NOT a charm. What I believe happened here is that the second repetition reminded Chai that there was unprotected food available – so she went for it again in the third one. Clever Border Collie, outsmarting your human like this after building up his confidence!

One NICE thing the video above shows is that it’s no big deal if your dog gets the distraction. I know that, so I don’t worry about it. Laugh it off if something doesn’t go as planned and go back to the drawing board! It’s a game! We’ll just keep playing.

Tip for my Calling All Dogs students: do what I say, not what I do! Print out your distraction trackers, have them somewhere you can see them, check off squares and, most importantly, have a look at them every time before you do a recall training session! It might have been able to resist my cunning puppy’s master plan if I had followed my own advice!

Urban art clue #7: You should, if you want to, have found the blue fence and know which side of it the art piece is on. You now have two options: either you keep looking on that side until you find the art piece …
or you make finding it a bit easier and scroll down for your last-but-one clue:
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the art piece is at (my) shoulder hight at the outside wall of the building.

Also, I verified something: this piece of urban art has got to be by the same artist as the original one I posted (without the blue spraypaint behind), but it is not, in fact, the same piece. The first picture I shared is very close and on the same building, but has been boarded off. Urban art is ephemeral!