One of the things I'm doing right now is grading papers from my UW students on the "Biology and Philosophy" of one of five topics. They could choose to write their papers on one of the following: Eating Farmed vs. Wild-caught Salmon, Should Apes Have Rights?, Game Farms, Dolphins in Entertainment, and relevant to the blog, Breeding Regulations in Domestic Dogs. They were charged with first writing a paper objectively describing both "sides" of the issue and then writing a paper that relates one of the philosophies we've studied to the issue and their own beliefs. Grading their papers is daunting (there are 150 of them; thankfully I have a wonderful Teaching Assistant who shares the job) but also fascinating. Each year I learn a tremendous amount that is often relevant to both my personal Read More
Willie’s Exercises & Honoring Your Dog
This video tape of me and Willie doing his exercises reminds me how important it is to "honor your dog." (I think that is originally Kathy Sdao's phrase, and I just love it.) The video shows us doing two exercises, "Flex" and "Paw," both designed to strengthen his shoulders before the surgery. We first began doing one set of 10 reps each with very short durations, about 2 seconds max, and have worked our way up to 10 seconds duration for the first set and 5-6 seconds for the second set. But the therapist warned me to watch for signs that we were pushing it too far, and those showed up recently, which we caught on video. Watch the video first, then I'll tell you more about it. It's a little under three minutes. We cut out about 30 seconds just to keep it short, I'll describe more about Read More
The Food-All-Over-the-Floor “Method”
I mentioned earlier that Willie has re-injured his shoulder. He's going in for a consult with my "sport medicine vet" on Wednesday, but meanwhile I am playing the not-always-so-fun game of keeping him quiet and not stressing his shoulder. Our two most challenging times are when he is waiting for his dinner and when he is greeting someone he loves. Otherwise it's not too difficult. Leash walks outside? Trivial. Around the house? Harder, but very doable, (though not so good for my getting things done, but I sure have caught up on a lot of television lately!) I lie down on the living floor and rub Willie's belly for several hours every evening (when we would normally be playing with toys in the house, after our walk or sheep work outside.) Otherwise he's chomping on food out of a hollow toy Read More
Trisha Joins the 21st Century (and Facebook!)
Yup, I finally did it. I'd love to hear from you on my Facebook page; it all feels very new and strange. Does it sound like I've been in a cave for five years? Ah well, I'm catching up slowly. I'm still feeling my way through this, so bear with me. Sigh. So far, it's sort of fun. I'm keeping this short today, it's been a busy, busy week, with, among lots else, new lectures to prepare on animal cognition for the UW class, work on the "rescue" booklet, a speech at the Middleton Library and lots of planning for seminars to come. MEANWHILE, back on the farm: Still cold and snow/ice covered, Willie still lame on his left front. We'll be at the vet specialist next week for sure, and I'm beginning to brace myself for the very real possibility of surgery. I'll keep you posted. Here's Read More
Positives of Negatives & Negatives of Positives
Thanks to all who have commented so far in answer to the questions "Are you a 100 % positive trainer?" and "Would you sign a pledge to only use positive reinforcement and never use punishment?" I appreciate the thoughtful discussion that the questions have generated. I'll jump in now, with the caveat that this topic deserves an all day seminar (at least) and I can't begin to say all I'd like to in one post. I'll start however, by summarizing some of my thoughts on the issue. Let me start by saying that I consider myself to be an overwhelmingly "positive" trainer. I would imagine that those who have seen me work would agree that I am a kind and gentle trainer, and primarily use positive reinforcement when working with dogs. That said, I'd never sign a pledge saying I'll only "use Read More
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