More Progress
Today was day 6 of the feeding manners program. Gunny was a little worse than yesterday but still tons better than he has been. When he was almost done eating, Eric came by and created a distraction which caused Gunny to lapse back into his ears back mode. I spent awhile waiting and when he became distracted, I acted like I was walking out of the pen with the feeder. That got his attention back on the task at hand and he was pretty good for the rest of his meal. Another difference tonight was that I didn't have him stand on his feeding spot, so he didn't have that security blanket either. But all in all, it went pretty well.
I was trying to come up with some strategies to use for when I am leading Gunny and he tries to walk faster than me rather than rating himself. I decided that this might be an area where he is "arguing" with me, so any direct request to slow down again is likely perceived as me arguing back with him. So in the interest of not engaging but being effective I came up with a couple of different ideas.
I decided that there are two different types of scenarios. One is where I am walking him from a comfort zone area towards a non-comfort zone area and/or coming from a non-comfort zone area and walking back towards the comfort zone. The other is walking from one point to another but remaining in his comfort zone area. So maybe he is motivated to get to the destination but it isn't because he is uncomfortable or unconfident with where he is.
So when we are in the first scenario and walking towards a non-comfort zone area and Gunny is walking slow, if I have him just keep going, then I am not acknowledging that he is doing the right thing, plus each step is taking him further out of his comfort zone. So a double negative. And then when I turn around he is motivated to get back to his comfort zone and any request to slow down or stop is probably seen as a bad decision by me because I am impeding him.
The plan that I came up with for this scenario is that when we are walking in his comfort zone area and if he speeds up, then I will walk a tight circle and have him do a much larger circle around me. When the angle is right I will continue walking in my original direction and he will end up behind me again. When we start to go out of his comfort zone, in an effort to reward slow walking I will stop every 5 steps or so (to be increased gradually) to turn and face the comfort zone for awhile. Then we will continue on for another 5 steps or so and repeat.
When we turn around if he is hurrying me, I will cause him to walk the big circle to reposition him behind me or I will walk a half-circle and have him stop and face away from his comfort zone for a bit and then turn and start walking again.
When we are going from one point to another and remaining in his comfort zone I will try using the big circle or kind of jumping ahead myself and resuming my normal pace to create the distance. I need to determine what will work and I would like to have more than one strategy so that he doesn't start anicipating what I am going to do and using it against me.
On the way back to his paddock I tried my "within the comfort zone" technique and just turned a circle making sure to keep him wide so he couldn't cut the corner. It took several circles on the way back to his paddock before he licked his lips but after the first circle he was walking with his nose dragging on the ground. We were able to walk the last straight-away with him staying behind me nicely and even going through the gate he stayed behind me.
After feeding him, I decided to try my theory out with a short walk up and down part of the driveway because it was too cold to do sharing territory. In execution it all worked pretty well except on the way back when he was walking faster than me and gaining on me, when I would start to turn to walk the circle he would slow right down. So I would turn to go straight again. But then within a couple of steps he was gaining on me again, so I would look over my shoulder and he would slow down. It took about 5 times of me doing this and then we were back by his paddock.
Afterwards, as I was thinking about this I wonder if I should give him one or two chances of slowing down off of a look, but if he goes right back to trying to hurry me then maybe he needs to have the complete consequence in order to decide he doesn't need to do it? I think this is what I will try the next time I do this exercise.
Overall I was please with how it turned out. We were both very calm the whole time and when we got back into his paddock he licked and yawned a bunch and seemed pretty content.
I was trying to come up with some strategies to use for when I am leading Gunny and he tries to walk faster than me rather than rating himself. I decided that this might be an area where he is "arguing" with me, so any direct request to slow down again is likely perceived as me arguing back with him. So in the interest of not engaging but being effective I came up with a couple of different ideas.
I decided that there are two different types of scenarios. One is where I am walking him from a comfort zone area towards a non-comfort zone area and/or coming from a non-comfort zone area and walking back towards the comfort zone. The other is walking from one point to another but remaining in his comfort zone area. So maybe he is motivated to get to the destination but it isn't because he is uncomfortable or unconfident with where he is.
So when we are in the first scenario and walking towards a non-comfort zone area and Gunny is walking slow, if I have him just keep going, then I am not acknowledging that he is doing the right thing, plus each step is taking him further out of his comfort zone. So a double negative. And then when I turn around he is motivated to get back to his comfort zone and any request to slow down or stop is probably seen as a bad decision by me because I am impeding him.
The plan that I came up with for this scenario is that when we are walking in his comfort zone area and if he speeds up, then I will walk a tight circle and have him do a much larger circle around me. When the angle is right I will continue walking in my original direction and he will end up behind me again. When we start to go out of his comfort zone, in an effort to reward slow walking I will stop every 5 steps or so (to be increased gradually) to turn and face the comfort zone for awhile. Then we will continue on for another 5 steps or so and repeat.
When we turn around if he is hurrying me, I will cause him to walk the big circle to reposition him behind me or I will walk a half-circle and have him stop and face away from his comfort zone for a bit and then turn and start walking again.
When we are going from one point to another and remaining in his comfort zone I will try using the big circle or kind of jumping ahead myself and resuming my normal pace to create the distance. I need to determine what will work and I would like to have more than one strategy so that he doesn't start anicipating what I am going to do and using it against me.
On the way back to his paddock I tried my "within the comfort zone" technique and just turned a circle making sure to keep him wide so he couldn't cut the corner. It took several circles on the way back to his paddock before he licked his lips but after the first circle he was walking with his nose dragging on the ground. We were able to walk the last straight-away with him staying behind me nicely and even going through the gate he stayed behind me.
After feeding him, I decided to try my theory out with a short walk up and down part of the driveway because it was too cold to do sharing territory. In execution it all worked pretty well except on the way back when he was walking faster than me and gaining on me, when I would start to turn to walk the circle he would slow right down. So I would turn to go straight again. But then within a couple of steps he was gaining on me again, so I would look over my shoulder and he would slow down. It took about 5 times of me doing this and then we were back by his paddock.
Afterwards, as I was thinking about this I wonder if I should give him one or two chances of slowing down off of a look, but if he goes right back to trying to hurry me then maybe he needs to have the complete consequence in order to decide he doesn't need to do it? I think this is what I will try the next time I do this exercise.
Overall I was please with how it turned out. We were both very calm the whole time and when we got back into his paddock he licked and yawned a bunch and seemed pretty content.
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