Not a lot happened today … BUT I got some husbandry done: clipping (“Claws!”) Chai’s nails on the right back paw. No problem for my superstar!
Day 42 – May 19, 2023
Husbandry
+ “Claws!” on the left back paw. + “Brush!” (with a break between the two husbandry procedures)
UNAM adventures
Game, Chai and I went to UNAM, saw and met strangers, practiced recalls, got paid for check-ins and hung out with fellow Border Collies!
Because it rained, the space around the big UNAM flag had turned into a pool and we played in the water and going up and down the stairs until a security person kicked us out.
Fun with fellow Border Collies at Las Islas!
Inside spaces
I took Chai by herself (solo adventures are SO important in my book!) up and down the scary elevator (still carrying her in and out). Then I put her into the puppy and we walked through the Walmart corridor and to the bank.
Day 43 – May 20, 2023
Parque Hundido
Chai and I went to Parque Hundido – which was quite busy since it was Saturday! She played with a Chihuahua (making me very happy; I want her to interact with dogs of all sizes!) and we hung out at the playground so she could observe kids running, playing and climbing.
Parque Hundido, located in Colonia Extremadura Insurgentes.
The bestest girl waiting for my order of pambazos at a Parque Hundido food stand.
Playing briefly with a Chihuahua, a whistle recall at the right moment and a sweeping view of the playground:
More playground time: watch and learn! (I had her on a leash and walked her around the playground and then we just watched from a distance. I only unleashed her to play with the Chi.)
Playground time! Getting used to kids running, screaming, laughing, playing, riding bikes …
Pizza outing
Chai and I then went to have pizza for lunch with a group of people I know. She did great inside the pizza place, mostly resting near my chair and chewing on a rawhide! I’m not much of a restaurant person – but if it involves socializing my puppy, count me in!
Pizza, rawhide and the art of doing nothing.
Further errands
I also took her to a bakery and a pharmacy and then had her wait in the car crate while I looked at an apartment. (And important exercise: I don’t want her to ONLY be in the car crate when I’m in the car myself!)
She did great on all her adventures today! Go Chai!
Tuesdays are market days at Diagonal San Antonio! We used this opportunity to walk through as the vendors were just setting up shop in the morning.
A week later, the Tuesday after, we went back to this same market. You’ll see the remarkable difference in Chai’s confidence!
We also did – as we do most days – a little (or a lot of) shaping, drove a slightly longer (about 2 minutes while yesterday was about 1 minute) loop on an empty stomach (success! No throwing up or pooping!), spent some time in the car crate, and hung out at home with Game.
Today Chai went to Parque las Américas and saw lots of people and dogs, heard new sounds, walked on different park surfaces and smelled new smells. Before we got there, we had this little encounter:
We then walked all the way to the park on our own four paws and saw and met, among others:
A person who followed my instructions about how to invite Chai to approach: not from above, but from below, being still and letting the dog take the first steps. I decided, after seeing Chai shy away from hands reaching for her a little more than I’d like to in the last two days, that I will make a point of having her meet people “the right way” every day. There is, of course, no one right way – you’ll have to look at the dog in front of you to find out what works for them. In Chai’s case, I opted for asking people to stand still and hold out their flat hand, palm facing up. If and only if Chai approaches, sniffs the hand and looks comfortable, I will then give the person a few pieces of kibble to hold in their other hand and feed them, one after the other, from their flat hand without touching Chai and holding the hand low enough so all four paws stay on the floor.
I would NOT start with food without having Chai opt in and approach voluntarily first, and if she was shyer than she is, I would not use food here at all. Food can backfire extremely easily if used as a lure to get an uncomfortable dog closer to a stimulus they are unsure about: they’ll take the treat and then realize they are WAY TOO CLOSE! With Chai’s level of people curiosity, it is really just the head reaching she has feelings about. And because she is cute, people will reach for her head. I am countering these experiences by means of providing positive ones in the way I described above. My instructions are simple and easy to follow, and they work well for Chai. In the case of my very first helper (random stranger from Costa Rica I met in the street), we chatted long enough that they actually ended up making friends with Chai and being able to scratch her chin:
We also saw a bakery bike!
… and several dogs …
We met another person who also ended up touching Chai on the side of her head – not something I encouraged, but she was okay.
We walked past an outdoors assembly of some kind and saw a person on a skateboard with a dog, a kid in a stroller and more dogs:
And the Chai and I rested in a (comparatively) quiet corner of the park and she posed serenely for a bit before we made our way back home.
How much is too much?
… you may be wondering. Didn’t Chrissi just get this puppy, who had been confined to her house and yard and a crate from 8 weeks to 3.5 months of age, literally three days ago?
Indeed, I did. And indeed, this would be too much for MANY Border Collie puppies with this (lack of) experience. It would have been too much for Hadley right after T got him and it would have been too much for Mick (and would still be too much for Mick today. Mick is a farm dog who wants exactly three things in life: sheep, a person to work sheep with, and zero other people). Hadley today, as an adult, would likely be okay in this environment – he’d just pull all over the place trying to sniff things, I suspect.
Is it too much for Chai? Am I flooding the poor puppy? No – at least I wouldn’t say that I am. But in order for this term to have any meaning at all, I need to first define it. “Flooding” is one of these buzzwords everyone uses slightly differently.
I just looked at the glossary of my 4 go-to behavior books, and it isn’t in any of them. That surprises me – but maybe it shouldn’t. Maybe flooding is a term trainers borrowed from human psychology, or maybe it is simply a layperson’s word. Next stop: Google.
Bingo! I got lucky at the APA Dictionary of Psychology, which sounds like a decent source. Plus it matches my own definition of the term and the way I’ve been using it, which is reinforcing.
So – no, I have in fact not flooded Chai. She is not an anxious dog – just a curious one who lacks experience. I have not exposed her to a maximum-anxiety-producing situation or stimulus. (I would have on day 2 when I was just trying to get a feel for where we were in terms of exploratory behavior, fearfulness and resilience. Based on what I saw on day 2, I made choices for day 3, and based on what I saw on days 2 and 3, I made choices for day 4.
Because Chai is not an anxious puppy and her sensitive socialization window is rapidly closing, I want a lot of exposure to what is going to be normal in her world if she becomes a Mexico City dog. If she doesn’t become a Mexico City dog but finds a home somewhere else, all the experiences she is currently having won’t hurt either. For example if she goes on to be a sports dog, these experiences might help her learn how to focus on what matters (“gate”) in busy trial environments.
This is the full description to go with this week’s free-ranging dog video! If you’ve already read the first part on my Youtube video description, continue reading at the heading “Barkiness, extinction and correction.”
If you are only just starting to read here, start from the beginning, below the video!
Lots and lots of things to observe in this week’s video!
A little escape artist
In the beginning of the clip, right before I started filming, the white puppy squeezed through the iron rods of the fence/gate I’m pointing out at 00:22. It’s a little hard to see, but the square openings between the iron rods of this gate are JUST big enough for this puppy to squeeze out with a bit of effort. They won’t be able to keep doing this for long – soon, their head and shoulders will be too big to fit through, and they’ll stay confined unless the gate is open.
I know this puppy because I used to see them in the center of town, and they used to participate in Veronica’s community dog feedings. (See https://youtu.be/WNF5DDNnkBE ). I’ve seen this puppy in the center less lately, and I’ve never seen them behind the gate on the outskirts that they just came out of. This leads me to suspect that the community puppy has become an owned village dog – the people who live behind that gate likely took this puppy out of the community dog population. However, since the puppy is familiar with the center, they are escaping when something tempting happens outside the fence – such as Game and I walking past!
The escaping will likely stop as soon as the puppy doesn’t fit through the gate anymore (unless this house tends to have its gate open; if so, the puppy may be roaming the center even though they get fed at their new home – or they may not, depending on how big of a homerange they end up choosing. They will get fed at home, so home range size will not be determined by food availability, but by their genetic propensity to roam). Some owned dogs are not confined by fences and won’t even leave their patio – they just don’t have the need for a larger home range. Others will wander quite far … just because they can, and they like to.
Behavioral changes likely caused by becoming an owned dog
The white puppy here is already displaying behaviors they didn’t use to display: they are being quite brave and behaving like a homed puppy: barking at Game (who they have met and ignored in the past), trying play-biting at me (for example at 03:11/12, when they grab a belt that’s dangling down from my treat bag). This puppy is behaving like a confident and playful Western household puppy when they meet a new person, not like a community puppy. Community puppies know to stay in their lane. Western household puppies know they can get away with a lot more towards the people in their lives! This puppy has (I suspect) been homed for a week or so, and had lots of interactions with people – interactions like the one they are trying on me right now. In the time they were still a community dog, they wouldn’t have had these interactions with people and therefore not displayed the behavior of jumping and grabbing at human clothes because these behaviors would have been punished. In a homed puppy, they are often reinforced: there may be toy play, or at the very least laughter and attention when the puppy tries something like this. Both of these are reinforcing.
Barkiness, extinction and correction
The barkiness is also new. The puppy barks to get Game’s attention – they want to play and interact. Game is not in the mood, and she is handling this really well: she basically pretends the puppy doesn’t exist. She doesn’t correct the puppy (she would correct an adult dog much sooner for barking her ear off).
There are two potential consequences:
If barking is a learned attention-getting behavior for this puppy (it may be; I’ve never seen this puppy bark when they were still a community dog), the absence of reinforcement (attention by Game) will lead to extinction: the barking at Game will disappear, either in the course of the current interaction, or in the course of the next one. It is entirely possible that the puppy has learned that barking gets attention from other dogs and/or humans in the week that they have been homed, simply by their barking being followed by attention.
If barking is intrinsically reinforcing to this puppy (that is to say barking itself releases feel-good hormones or neurotransmitters in the puppy’s brain, independent of external consequences), ignoring the barking will not make the barking go away because the barking is not maintained by external attention, but by internal states of feeling positive emotions. Shelties tend to be in this categorie: they’ll often LOVE to bark, and you can ignore them all you want – this is not going to change anything!
Only at the very end of the clip, at 10:22, does Game correct the puppy for barking at her. She’s patient with puppies, but her patience has limits. This is a very appropriate and soft correction – just right for this puppy who immediately understands her and backs off. Dogs who spent their sensitive socialization period as community dogs or owned free-roaming puppies tend to have excellent dog/dog social skills, and this is exactly what you see here: the puppy reads Game well. No need to escalate the reprimand.
Barrier frustration and the fascinating fence effect
Two interesting things happen (or, rather, one interesting thing happens, and another one interestingly doesn’t happen) earlier in the video. Between about 02:00 and 00:05:50, we are walking through a corridor of confined dogs: first two Mals, two Boxers and two Great Danes (only one of them seems to be outside today) on the left and a German Shepherd on the right, and then a small barky dog behind the hedge fence on the left.
All these dogs are barking and fence-running, but neither Game nor the puppy are giving them attention. Game doesn’t because I’ve taught her not to. The puppy doesn’t because they’ve grown up being a community dog, and community dogs generally learn fast to ignore the dogs who are yelling at them from behind fences: they learn that actual interaction is impossible, and they do not share the frustration of the respective dog behind the fence because they are free to do what they want.
The dogs behind the fences are not free to interact or do what they want. Fences (leashes can also have this effect) have a high potential of causing barrier frustration because they make it impossible for the dogs to interact like dogs normally would. Fence barking usually goes out of hand quickly because the dogs behind the fences are being reinforced for barking.
This is negative reinforcement: the dogs (or people) walking past outside the fence will eventually go away. The superstition a chronic fence-barker is likely to develop is that it is their barking that made them go away. If the initial barking was frustration-driven, the disappearance of the frustrating stimulus on the outside of the fence will be experienced as a relief. So they will continue barking. Even if the initial barking was attention seeking, attention seeking is highly likely to turn into frustration because they can’t go up to the other dog. If the initial barking is fear-driven (it is not in any of the dogs in the video), it will also be reinforced by having the fear-inducing stimulus on the outside of the fence eventually go away (simply because the stimulus outside the fence will move on with their life, and keep walking).
The puppy already knows that no real interaction is possible with fence barkers. So they don’t respond to the barky dogs, but keep pestering Game instead. Game is outside the fence. Interaction with Game is possible! Smart puppy!
Pet dogs (I am using “pet dog” to refer to a dog who is not free, and who is likely to be walked on leash) do not usually know this, and would join the fence-barking/fence-running if given an opportunity.
Game has learned that fence barkers are a cue for her to pay attention to me, because I will often pay for attention in these circumstances. You’ll hear me praise her (when I speak German, this is always praise for Game), and you’ll see me give her a treat at one point (02:49). Game also knows the meaning of fences. If a dog is yelling at her from behind a fence, she will ignore them. If these adult dogs were barking and coming at her without there being a fence, she would not ignore them. I’ve built this behavior by both preventing her from fence running with other dogs, being barked at from behind a fence being followed up with treat scatters, and marking and reinforcing attention when in the proximity of a fence barker/fence runner. At this point, Game would be able to walk past these dogs in a relaxed fashion even if I didn’t reinforce her. I still do though when I have treats on me (i.e. intermittently). Her off-leash relaxation in the face of fence-runners/barkers is important to me.
The adult black dog
At 08:46, an adult black dog comes into view on the little wall to the left of the sidewalk. You’ll see that this dog’s body is stiff – for example when you pause the video at 09:34. This dog and Game have run into each other several times, and the black one is always stiff. This wall is within the black dog’s home range and within Game’s core area. Game doesn’t care about the black dog, and the black dog … well, the black dog never really seems to trust or approve of Game. Maybe this will change if we stay for a few more months, or maybe the black one will always disapprove of Game. Some personalities simply don’t match, just like with people. As long as no one escalates a personality mismatch, there’s no issue: live and let live.
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Ready to go from cat watching right to kibble scatters?
Video 1
First session – and Game is being a superstar! Go Game!!!
Notes:
Door status: glass door closed.
Let’s repeat this with the door open!
Video 2 – door open
Notes:
Door status: glass door open
I LOVE that Game looked at the cat and then at me (that’s what I mark)! There is a moment of looking back catwards before the last treat though. We’re going to repeat this again; I want to see her succeed without looking back at the cat before the treat magnet or last scatter treat.
The hope is that at this point, the cat’s arousal level is only moderately high – ready to be met with a high value scatter!
Video 1
This was hard! Game had to go back to watching (at 00:05) and couldn’t finish the first scatter right away, even though she responded to the treats cue at baseline speed. She went back to eating quickly – but I want that first scatter to be eaten without interruptions before I proceed to kibble scatters. So we got some excellent new information here, and I conclude: we’ll stay at this level until I get a no-latency response, and Game finishes the entire scatter without interruptions before following my treat magnet to the bedroom.
Notes:
Door status: glass door and screen door open.
Two scatters because Game didn’t finish the first one without interruption (at 00:05 in this video, she briefly looks at the cat).
Video 2
Several sessions down the line, Game is rocking it!
Notes:
Door status: glass door closed
I want to repeat this with the door open and see the same response before moving on – but in any case, REALLY happy with this one! I could have marked looking at me at 00:01/02 right away rather than waiting for Game to look at the cat again, since looking at me was cued by seeing the cat.
Video 3: high value scatter, door open, Game rocks it!
Notes:
Door status: glass door open
Upwards and onwards – we’ll try kibble scatters next!
Same stair case – but kibble rather than high value treats!
In the video below, Game and I are having a long conversation about the cat (it’s the red cat and it starts out on the chair to the left of the umbrella). I aim for 5 treats from hand in a row before going to the kibble scatter, and have to start counting over again multiple times because Game needs to collect more information about the cat and its whereabouts before being able to give me 5 reps of eye contact in a row. That’s totally fine: she can earn the same treat in two ways: by looking at the cat, or by looking at me.
Notes:
Door status: glass door closed
I will stay at this step for a few more cats until it is easier for Game to offer 5 reps of eye contact sooner. I will also want to see this on an open-glass-door occasion before removing the kibble-from-hand step from my staircase.
Also, here you go, another (and I promise this will be the last) round of – wheee! – self-promoting, which I dislike – feel free to stop reading here!
Registration is still open for the December term at FDSA, and I’m teaching Finding Five.
It’s a class about …
finding five minutes to train your animal (of any species) every day – you are welcome to continue with a previous training project we started together in a different class, or try something new. This class has been taken by dogs, cats, birds, and a Bactrian camel. This time, we’ll be having … wait for it … a horse at Gold for the first time!
Time management and self care.
Improving your relationship with your animal.
Playing ridiculous games (because life does not have to be serious all the time).
Retreating to a virtual island in case you need a break from this holiday-infested month or the looming new year. What gets shared on the island stays on the island.
I’m also trying a different kind of “just in case you’re in the mood for it” background fun every time I run this class. This term, we’ll be having a book club.
Come, join! (Finances and time allowing, that is – if they do not, no worries whatsoever. The class will come around again, and you’ll be just as welcome in the future as you’d be today. No need for FOMO. Please put yourself first!)
Here’s our updated staircase! Still 5 steps – but kibble instead of high-value treats:
Today, I am going for 5 subsequent reps of eye contact (rather than cat looks) before doing the scatter. Yesterday, I only did three – from now on, it’ll be five! I have to start over a few times. However, note that looking at the cat is being just as click-and-reinforceable as looking at me. I just don’t want to do a scatter when Game needs to go back and forth between the two (since for Game and I, scatters are ideally eaten without needing to look up).
Sorry to be out of the camera for most of the eye contact reps. The video is cut short, but the last two seconds of relaxation are right after getting to the bedroom and closing the door.
Notes about this video:
Door status: glass and screen door open.
Number of eye contacts pre scatter-for-eye-contact: 5
I will keep going down the staircase once and then giving Game a break. She is doing really well with this.
I will measure progress by looking what she can do with a cat at average distance – the distance the cat was at baseline, which is where most cats show up. I will not count closer cats (like the one in part 5) or cats that are further away (like the one under the white table in part 2). Baseline distance is here is anywhere in the area I circled, and includes cats sitting on one of these two chairs:
Steps of progress from baseline with a single cat at baseline distance
Skip tugging, and go from cat watching directly to tosses high value treats.
Skip tugging, and go from cat watching directly tosses with kibble.
Go from cat watching right to food from hand high value treats.
Go from cat watching right to food from hand with kibble.
Go from cat watching right to a high-value treat scatter.
Go from cat watching right to a kibble scatter.
In addition, I may add some Give Me A Break CU game sprinkles anytime I toss treats, and it seems like a good idea. Will explain why it felt like I good idea in the commentary going along with my video.
It would be neat to start with a closed glass door, go to a closed screen door and then to the door open – but this may not be possible because the door is already going to be in a certain position (which will be different throughout the day) when uncontrollable cats are being spotted by Game, so I’ll make my life easier and not going to factor this in.
I may not be able to get all of the above on video – note to self: prioritize training – but I’ll video what I can and share. I suspect that by the time I get to #7, I’ll be moving out of this AirBnB – so that’s where we’ll stop. It seems a realistic goal for the time I’ll be here. Whether I get there, don’t get there, or get further than that – we’ll be having fun, and there are going to be treats. “The sun is chirping, the birds are shining, the water’s wet. Life is good, sweetheart. Life is good.” (Bonus points if you randomly happen to know where this quote is from without googling. It just popped into my head – and life is good.)
No video today – but here’s a pic of one of the cats (who would be further than baseline distance):
PS: Note that there are cats several times a day. I just don’t record most of them – my external harddrive is dying (sniff), editing takes too long, and I want to keep this fun for myself.
This cat is closer than the baseline cat. It’s not always visible, but Game knows it is nearby, and is tempted to go back and figure out exactly where it is. I think today’s video is fairly self-explanatory since I’m chatting about what’s going on throughout. If it isn’t – ask away in the comments.
I’m keeping this video short – cut out a long part of our tug play and the end, but: I could easily guide Game into the bedroom (which is a small dark room, and that’s the reason we don’t usually hang out there), close the door, and relax with her on the bed for a bit, heading back out into the other room when the cat was gone.
In part 6, I’m going to share how I will try and keep something resembling data on these sessions. Not as clear cut as I’d like, but it’ll have to do, and I think it will work for our purposes. Stay tuned!
