One of the segments on the BBC show The Secret Life of Dogs that generated several interesting comments was the segment that showed "Betsy," (not her real name, you gotta love that some dogs now have 'nom de plumes') retrieving an object after being shown just a photograph of it. Wow. That truly is amazing. It got me to thinking about the trouble I had a year or so ago when I tried to teach Willie to discriminate between toys based on a name. For over a year he'd been told to "Go get your toy," and he'd pick out whatever toy he liked best that was nearby. When I tried to teach him to touch or pick up a toy based on a different word ("ball" or "rope"), he became hopelessly confused. He became so stressed over the entire operation that I dropped it and went on to teach him other things. My Read More
Willie Searches For and Rescues His Toy!
As many of you know, Will has a bad shoulder and he can't play fetch or flying disc without problems. If I just work him on sheep and take him on long walks we can keep it under control, but the "short stopping" associated with fetching aggravates whatever is wrong with his shoulder. (I haven't discounted surgery completely, but we are still in the 'gather information' mode.) That means that most of his exercise is working sheep, which works great when I'm home and feel like scrambling up the hill. But when I'm gone? You can't just have anyone go work your dog on sheep, that would be a disaster, so it is important to find ways to keep Willie exercised when I travel. Here are 2 videos of the game I've talked about in earlier posts. It's really not that new, just another version of the Read More
The Wolf in the Parlor
True confession: I haven't finished the book The Wolf in the Parlor. I might not, at least not in the near future. Here's why: As I said in my last post, the author's thesis is that "people and dogs, around 12,000 years ago, linked their evolutionary paths together and evolved socially and physically to take on supportive roles. He argues, according to the reviews, that humans lost some of our brain power because dogs took over those functions, and dogs lost some of theirs because we became their protectors and nurturers." It seems downright churlish of me to stop reading before I read for myself the full extent of his argument, but what I've read in the first 60 pages has put me off a bit. I mentioned earlier that the thesis itself sounded a bit simplistic, but I love speculation and Read More
Lassie Self Handicaps with Willie
Here's a video of Self Handicapping that I took 3 years ago, when Will was a young pup and Lassie was the stronger of the two. It's a lovely illustration of appropriate dog play, showing how the stronger dog self handicaps to avoid overwhelming the weaker player. Lassie, even now, is capable of pulling with a great deal of strength, but in this video she clearly damps down both the power of her pull and intensity used when she shakes her head. She moves more slowly and with less power than she would when playing with me. There's another piece to this video that I just love: when Lassie decides she is done playing she gives Willie a very clear signal that play time is over. (Not long after she looks at me when I say "Jim! Turn the TV down" in the background!). She gives a second (more Read More
Dog Play DVD Available!
Wheeeee, the new 1/2 day seminar on play that I did in California a few weeks ago is out now on DVD, thanks to lots of hard work by Alta at Tawzer Videos. You can learn more about Dog Play on my website, but here's the summary: The seminar focused on three aspects of canine play: 1) The Natural History of Play: What IS play after all? Who plays and Why? (Those questions turn out to be much more complicated than you might think and have all kinds of interesting implications for us and our dogs!) 2) Play Between Dogs: What do we know about the development of play in dogs? The seminar includes new research out of Barbara Smut's lab in Michigan about the development of play in dogs and what is "natural" and what is not. It also includes an in-depth discussion, with lots of videos, about Read More