For me, the joy and accomplishment of training dogs does not come from expensive books and videos or gurus on television, it is both internal and spiritual, it comes from within, it requires love, patience, confidence and faith. It means giving dogs a chance to fail and to succeed. It depends on who they are, who we are, where we live, what we want. No two dogs are alike, no two people are alike, training is as individualistic as fingerprints, and understanding that is the key to having the dog I want and need.
Fate has been with us for a week-and-a-half, and she is only 11 weeks old, she is not yet ready for too many high expectations. Yet she has surpassed all of our expectations, and our training ideas and practices are beginning to bear fruit, beyond what we thought possible at this point. This means that she came to us as a remarkable dog, healthy, spirited, intelligent, the product of good and thoughtful breeding. Karen Thompson often says it is 50 breeding, 50 per cent people. She did her part, we are doing ours.
We are doing well with Fate. We are thinking about training, adjusting it, doing it together and doing it very well. Fate has an almost 100 per cent recall now, she comes when called, sits when asked (mostly) and is learning how to stay. She has not damaged or destroyed anything that is not hers, she adores Red and learns from him. She is way too young to look for perfection, she is a puppy still, and needs to be understood in that way. But she is quite bright and eager to learn, border collies are like that.
This morning, a joyous experience, and training is joyous, for the people and the dog when it works and is done out of thoughtfulness, patience and individual experience. I saw that when we took Fate out for a mile-long walk on a road near us, we took her off the leash. She walked alongside Maria much of the way. Two or three times, she veered off to smell or eat some revolting thing. We kept walking, permitted her to look up startled, and rush to join us, when she was rewarded with love, hugs, excitement and a treat or two.
Most of the time, she walked by Maria’s knee, just where she should be and Maria praised her accordingly, and with good timing. It is easy to confuse dogs when you praise them for something too early or too late.
It is hard for Maria to walk away from Fate and trust her to come along. Will she run off? Encounter an animal? Fall into a hole? Get tangled up in barbed wire? Get spooked by something unexpected? But it’s important. Fortunately, we live in a place where people can walk their dogs off leash, on trails and in the woods. It is a wonderful experience.
Letting her explore and fall behind – when the circumstances are safe – is giving her a chance to fail – the distances are small, and I know this dog well by now, she will not run off. It also gives her a chance to succeed. You will not, of course, find this in any dog training book. They are as phobic and risk averse as our anxious world. After a minute or so, Fate looks up and gets nervous – border collies are always herding in one way or another – she comes running, is rewarded and reinforced. We have been working on this in bits all week, starting small, expanding the distances.
Beef jerky bits are the trainer’s friend. Training must be fun, for the dog, for the human. It must be clear. After a few minutes, Fate loses focus, we stop training. In those few minutes, she is learning to calm down, come when called, sit when asked, stay when required. These are the basic tools – along with “lie down” – for obedience and calming. Fate is a wonderful dog, she is also a handful, she can be a monster (and is escorted to her crate right away when she is.
She is never alone or unsupervised in the house, so there are no surprises, no bad habits developing.
She needs for us to show her how to be in our world, in this world. She will not be a herding dog, but she is loving her life. Hanging out with Red, running back and forth along the fence, chasing balls and frisbees, sitting with Maria all day as she works in her studio, walking in the woods, chewing her wide range of chew-things in the house at night. She is fitting into our lives, her existence of full of love and activity, this is what border collies need and love. She loves looking at the sheep as well, but has shown no great need to go out and be with them. She seems to see this is Red’s thing, she has her own things.
Maria loves her, she loves Maria back. And how could any animal not love Maria? Training is fraught for Maria sometimes, she is afraid of messing up her Fate, but that has not happened, and will not happened. Fate is great dog. Training her well is a responsibility, a joy and a sacred obligation. It was a wonderful walk.