The fine art of being objective. Aus. kelpie etc.

Let’s face it, the dog world is huge! While adding new acquaintances ( believe me, had to google that spelling 😉 on facebook I get more and more pleased, and a bit surprised, of how many people are passionately engaged in dog training and competing in different sports. On the other hand it still worries me about how many that can’t be objective when it comes to their dogs or to its breed. You know how you say ”speak ill about me but never my dog” ? That kind of thing. Of course it is a positive thing aswell, it sure is better then continuesly down talk the dog when it really has a lot to do with training.

Take Australian kelpie ( one of my breeds ) for example. The breeders in Sweden are really involved and have a lot of experience and it’s sure to say they do a fantastic work. I think it is very important to keep your feet on the ground and be able to deal with criticism and questioning about the breed. And of course that goes for probably all breeds. Instead of trying to make people believe that Aus kelpie ( not WK ) for instance can compete with border collie when it comes to herding, tell people that you sure can use them in practical herding work but that it’s a different type of herder and that you probably have a lot more work ahead of you because you have to build and reinforce behaviours that sits more deep than within a border collie, where you have a lot of herding behaviours from the start without doing anything. And let’s face it, we are few that use our Australian kelpie for herding in this country. If you have sheep of your own, you most likely will buy a BC, even though the kelpie can be very good at it and are probably more stable mentally. I think we have to remember that people are lazy, we don’t really want to work our asses of to get a good herder, hence you buy a border collie.

Now the Australian kelpie has proven to be a very good allround worker with a lot of high placements in competing field work, agility and obedience. These are all sports where you have to put work into to get as good as you can. Of course there is more likely that certain qualities physically in the dog will benefit different sports. A dog that is composed in a special way might have an advantage in, say agility, like people are more built for certain sports. But there still has to do a LOT with training. This is also the big difference when it comes to thinking breeding in my world. Herding qualities is heritage, winning an obedience contest is not. Obedience is something we teach the dog, and the better teacher you are, the better the dog will be. Herding skills can of course be reinforced and there is a lot of training in this sport to, but that has more to do with how we want the dog to move the sheep etc. Basic skills like good natural handling sheep, motivation to move sheep, natural balancing. These are all things that is within the dog and that we can’t look away from but that is also basic natural ingredients for making that obedience star because it has to do with inner motivation. And here is where the breeders have a lot of responsibility. You can’t say to people that an Aus kelpie in general has as much natural herding instinct as BC for exemple, because that is simply not true. Sure, there is individuals with more than others but it’s not really representative. That fact is also proven by the other fact, that Sweden now sadly enough have separated the breed into two, Working kelpie that is bred on herding skills, and the Australian kelpie, which is not. And how could you still say that the Aus kelpie is a herding dog if you don’t pay attention to the herding skills?

Now I will probably never have a better dog than Mr F. He is THE dog with so many strong sides. He’s fantastic with the sheep even though we have a lot of training in front of us. He wants to work but he can relax when expected of him. He’s socially very skilled and has an inner peace. Of course I will take cred for this aswell because of our way of training him and handling him. A calm house with love gives calm loving dogs. As simple as that. BUT, I have a lot of work to do in the herding area, and I have to do it because we think it’s fun. We could probably get a merit but how high would he be able to go?

My point is, love the breed you’re breeding, but be realistic. Sure I’m not encouraging to be negative about the dogs, they ARE fantastic, as herders aswell. All I’m saying is, if you want to keep the herding skills and be able to compete in field, obedience or agility, you should take good care of the natural instincts and not just say they are great herders and then focus on the above merits only…

”There is no bad weather”

One of the things I love with being a dog owner is how much I get to be outdoors. I probably seems like a cliche but in my world it’s the difference between me being healthy, happy and having a peace of mind or me being a drag being around. Ever since I was little I needed to move, it was the one thing that could make me sleep really good at night. I really believe you get both mentally and physically ill by not spending a lot of time outside of your house. Dogs will probably, hopefully forever be a big part of my life, and they will keep me active for as long as I live in any weather.

Out like a dog?

This is a topic I’ve been wanting to write about for some time now, but I really needed to get clear on what my standpoint is. And now I know where I stand based on my own unscientifical research.

Topic: Homeless dogs, how should we doglovers adress this growing problem?

In many parts of the world puppies are sold through pet stores that often gets the puppies from so called ”puppy mills” ( Breeders that produce a lot of dogs for money basically )

Now in Sweden, which is the country I have to use as my reference since I live here, we don’t sell puppies in pet stores. We sell birds, fish, small rodents, but not cats and dogs. Cats and dogs are bought from a breeder, or at least from a person who happened to have a litter of kittens or puppies at home.

When someone gets tired of a dog in this country ( or allergic, or don’t have enough time, or split up etc etc ) that person puts out an ad telling people he or she want to sell his or her family dog. Or return the dog to its breeder. I should say this is how it works in 99% of the cases. Of course there is people who probably do otherwise but it rarely happens is my opinion. In a lot of cases dogs are re-homed, in some cases put to sleep and in a few cases they end up in a place where you can leave dogs where you’re on a vacation. ( until a new owner is found )

Unlike a lot of countries Sweden doesn’t have shelters. Simply because we don’t have stray dogs living in the streets. An HERE’s where the big difference shows I think. In countries where they DO have shelters they also have stray dogs living in the streets.

Now to me, that speaks a lot for itself. What would happen if Sweden suddenly started to kick dogs to the curb instead of making the effort of re-homing them? It would probably be the basis for shelters to suddenly pop up with the argument that ”someone has to save the stray dogs and rehome them”

Here is my question: What happens in countries where they try to save all left out dogs ( there sure seems to be a lot ) Well the streets is filled with homeless dogs, that believe it or not will breed, spread diseases ( quite bad diseases really ) and threat people ( dog gangs in parts of Balkan attacking people on the beach for ex, I’ve heard teenagers from Balkan countries being very fearful of dogs  ) Do we really want cute rabies infested muts roaming the streets? Of course we don’t, stupid question perhaps. But then again, how do we solve this problem?

Some people say that shelters is the best way to go, that people should adopt dogs from these places rather then buying from a pet store. A new friend of mine made that point, that if people in her country continued to buy puppies from stores then the breeders will never stop and the streets will fill up even more. Good point, but! And here’s a but…

On the other hand, as long as the shelters coninues to take in homeless dogs, the more stray dogs there will be because of the fact that people will continue to find it easy just to get tired of the dog and kick it to the curb. Because ”the shelter will re-home the dog” See my point of view here?

This is my humble question: How come we don’t put dogs to sleep that has become street dogs, potentially dangerous to their environment? Now I now some people are probably getting upset but please hear me out.

These dogs are in my world no longer pets.  These dogs have become wild animals, chasing people from their territories, breeding without control and spreading diseases. Do we really think we can change grown up dogs that’s been living the hard street life filled with fights, food chasing and rock throwing kids?

I have an example with a german shepherd male, taken from the streets in Dubai, followed a swedish couple back home. This dog was seven years old, and had lived in sweden for two. That dog had really scary behaviours that I personally have never seen, threatening in ways that make my hair curl.

Is the way to deal with street dogs to take them in? Or are we just solving the surface of the problem? Or do I dare go as far as to say shelters are contributing to the problem? What do you think?

Unaware dog training?

Here’s an idea. To get a really reliable down-stay in the obedience training, you know like the ones you get when the dog is begging for food at the table?, bring a laptop to dog training and do something else ( surf ) while the dog is lying in a down-stay. That way you reward really inconsistent time-wise, and the endurance is getting stronger. I call it unaware-training. 😉 Thoughts?

I think a lot of our dog training is getting pretty bad because of the fact that we’re to aware that we’re training the dog. Sounds weird? Well, think about it. Where do you have the best indurance in behaviours in the every-day-life? Dog with a stick-or tennisballmania can probably tell you. Sometimes the ball or stick gets thrown, sometimes not, and sometimes it takes a couple of ”please” s until something happens ( putting the stick in front of your feet ) That is building strong strong behaviours, the inconsistency of the reinforcer and we’re doing it all without being ”in the game”. Because when we’re IN the game, maybe we have a tendency to reward consistent, teaching the dogs time-lines for how long a sit-stay, down-stay etc should last?

What if we could use tools to get there, to train the dog efficently ( right things ) without thinking too much about it. Since we’re all already doing it in our every-day-reality it should’nt be that hard to transfer it to the training field? Begging for A LONG TIME  in a sit-stay, a down-stay or with whining, barking, annoying the hell out of us, we already know why. We just have to put it where it belongs….

Valpfotning och sociala funderingar

I onsdags hade jag premiär på att plåta valp. Kom faktiskt på att det saknades valpbilder i portfolion och när goa Jenny Marek ville ställa upp med sin Fido tackade jag såklart inte nej. När jag fotar hund måste jag vara helt fri från förväntningar, hundarna är så himla olika varandra att det inte går att förutsätta att de kommer agera ( eller inte agera för den delen ) på ett visst sätt. Det gäller istället att vara superflexibel och snabb med att ändra settingen utefter hur hunden funkar och reagerar. När Fido spatserade upp på vår garageuppfart var det då inte direkt någon blyg valp jag eller våra hundar mötte. Något avvaktande, som valpar ändå ska vara enligt mig, men morsk. Bosse klarar nuförtiden av att nos-mot-nos-hälsa, tom på valpar, utan att få psykbryt och vråla i ansiktet på dem. Äldre gör visare 😉 Men han bryr sig heller inte särskilt om andra hundar längre. Ett tokbusryck kunde han dock bjuda på dagen till ära. 🙂

Flip, som ju är helt fantastisk med andra hundar, valpar inget undantag, tyckte att den här var lite söt men mest ful. 😉 Flip skulle istället ha stenkoll på allt som hände kring tomten och hade inte riktigt tid med herr 9 veckors, som försökte få igång brunråttan några gånger utan att lyckas. Jag upplever att det verkligen gör skillnad när hundarna får klara av såna där sociala grejer själva, positiva erfarenheter bygger ju och språket blir bra. Flip kan träffa hundar både i koppel och lös, nog tack vare hans goda erfarenheter och träning i språk. Med Bosse gjorde vi tyvärr många fel i socialisering med andra hundar, delvis pga att vi hela tiden skulle ta ansvar för allt, han behövde inte klara nåt själv, allra minst att hälsa på andra hundar. ( Ni vet, de behöver inte hälsa på allt och alla hette det då ) Problemet blev väl att det blev väldigt svart eller vitt, han hälsade på för få istället. Det plus några dåliga erfarenheter av hundar som jagat herr B, plus kort stubin skapade inte de bästa förutsättningar för en pappis i sociala sammanhang. Dock finns det ingen ingen hund jag hellre vill ha som valpuppfostrare, för snacka hund, det kan Bosse. Han vill mest inte bli tilltalad själv. 😉

Här grejar Flip med nåt, han tycker hellre valpen ska lära sig viktiga saker än att flamsa runt. Det är tex viktigt att gräva upp rötter att äta. 🙂 Fint att studera äldre hundar i samspel med små.

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Nystart och blodigt öra.

Tjo!

På jobbet, tidigare idag, fick jag äntligen det där goa suget som jag saknat länge för att blogga! Det är fullt ös i vår värld, både sambons och min egen och vår gemensamma. Arbete styr mycket av vår vardag och det är nog tur att vi båda verkligen älskar att jobba, annars hade det säkert blivit outhärdligt att vara ifrån varandra såpass mycket som vi ändå är. Jag jobbar fortfarande kvar som fritidsledare 50% och bygger samtidigt upp min verksamhet med hundfoton på canvas. Det är verkligen skönt att kunna putta in egna pengar i företaget och slippa skyhöga lån men samtidigt känns det som jag sitter på två stolar, jag behöver kunna fokusera fullt ut på fotandet. Nåväl, den tiden kommer…

Förutom att jobba stoppar jag in en del pluggande. Just nu läser jag två heldistansutbildningar via HLK i Jönköping ( högskolan för kommunikation och lärande ) En 7,5 p digital bildbehandling och en 7,5 foto eller visuell kommunikation, som den heter. Det som är så bra med dessa kurser är just att de verkligen är 100% på distans. Allt, även examination sker över nätet. Är du nyfiken på deras utbildningar kika in här: http://hj.se/hlk.html

Hur får hundarna sitt mitt i allt detta kanske man undrar? Faktum är att de får all tid, träning och motion de kan tänkas behöva därför att: matte behöver pauser i arbete framför dator och detta sker alltid i form av promenader, löpturer ( inte på ett tag nu hrrrm ) hundträning som måste testas för fotning eller ren näsjympa, såsom upplet.

När det kommer till hundträning upplever jag att jag utvecklats mycket det sista året, inte minst genom att ha så många olika kundhundar i studion. Om det arbetet och bilder kommer det komma mer om . Just nu känns det som sagt gott att äntligen fått dragit den där sega tummen ur. 😉 En fräsch nystart helt enkelt, och om man ska citera Smala Sussie så ”känns det rätt gött faktiskt!”

Amen det där blodiga örat då? Jo, kan berätta på vilket sätt jag lyckades frisera Bosse idag innan han skulle till grannarna för passning. ( Är gräsänka denna helgen då sambon är i Danmark och behöver då passning när jag jobbar kväll på bortaplan ) Skulle precis gå med hundarna när jag precis såg den där vita, tufsiga saken som låg och dåsade uppe på soffryggen. ”Sådär FÅR han bara inte se ut när jag lämnar honom” var min snabba tanke varpå jag, på tok för stressat, slet tag i min utredningsborste och rafsade över papillonen. I lite sömnigt chocktillstånd lät han mig härja när jag till mitt förtret insåg vilka fnoddar han hade bakom öronen. Översättning av fnoddar, som för övrigt är en väninnas och min beteckning för just detta. FNODD=tova som är som en filtkaka och som inte går att borsta ur utan måste klippas bort. Anyway, han hade fnoddar, jag hade sax och lite för bråttom. Flera fnoddar rök fint tills jag klippte i det jag trodde var en tova, men som visade sig vara Mr B´s örsnibb. ( Har hundar örsnibbar förresten? ) ”Klipp” sa jag, ”Ouiii!” sa han, ”OJ” sa jag och sa förlåt. Han blödde såklart all over sin vita päls, varpå jag ( inte direkt mindre stressad ) tog den blodiga pappisen och hystade in honom i duschen där han fick spolas av bryskt. Alldeles blöt, blodig och enormt förnärmad var han inte svårövertalad då vi skulle gå bort till våra mjuka goa grannar. ( Där blir man inte klippt i eller nersprutad med kallt vatten var hans åsikt ) Dagens lärdom fick alltså bli: Försök inte frisera en sömnig papillon i farten.

Fridens liljor.

/I