Working through the new exercises

I had a couple of lessons with Cathy earlier this week. Taz has been responding really well to the exercises Cathy is showing me, so I want to see where it goes. We spent more time with the circles, making sure Taz stayed well off the sheep. He is very, very sensitive to Cathy's training stick with its little flag, so I tried to use it very judiciously. It did work to reinforce that he should be maintaining the same distance, rather than spiraling in as he often does with these kinds of circle exercises, but it came at a cost—he started looking at the sheep in the other pens and a couple of times he even went to the gates where the gates adjoining those pens were. He could always be called back very easily, with just a "shhh," but Taz is a little wiggy about that kind of pressure, so I really want to be careful here. Cathy encouraged me to add two commands to Taz's repertoire—"out," as in "come out," or move out while flanking on the come bye side, and "keep," or move out on the away side. Basically a command for a wide sweeping flank. Since I generally want all of Taz's flanks to be wider and more sweeping than they usually are, and I have always striven (strived? strove?) to communicate that to him, I don't know how successful I'll be teaching him these new commands. Then again, maybe if I reteach the flanks wider with new words, we'll get wider flanks overall anyway. Definitely worth a shot. We also spent a lot of time mixing things up with the circles: flank left for half a circle, stop, walk up, get back, flank right for five steps, stop, flank left for ten steps, walk up, etc. No real pattern, just aiming for more flexibility, more tuning in for instruction from me, less anticipating what he should do on his own, a snappier stop. He looked pretty good, though it was hard on him. He was fried after some time, and then done for the day (well, done for the lesson, I guess—I mean, even after he rested for fifteen or twenty minutes, when we went out again he was not as responsive as he had been earlier).

We also did more driving. He is very responsive when driving in general (at least compared to outwork), but he does get a little sticky if the sheep are moving ahead and he is feeling pressure from a draw. I admit to getting a little frustrated with Taz when he does this (after the resurfacing hesitation issue, I seem to have no patience for any stickiness, especially as this kind of stickiness is not the result of a lack of confidence, as his hesitation on his outrun is). Instead of repeating commands in an increasingly annoyed tone of voice, I am trying to interrupt his laser focus with a neutral sound. This worked pretty well. We also worked a little on increasing his speed on the drive (this is a first; if Taz needs to change his pace while driving, he usually needs slowing down, but again I'm game to try to put different speeds on his driving). I know these are all tools he should have at some point anyway; may as well teach them now. Generally, though, his pace was nice, and he frequently (correctly) stopped himself when he felt he was putting too much pressure on the sheep.

Things were a little different with Craig. On Monday, I asked Cathy to watch me drive a bit with Craig in her big arena. She thought the biggest problem we were having was not that he doesn't listen/respond to me, though that needed work, but that his flanks were often big sweeping movements, rather than occasional smaller ones. This happened especially when he wouldn't take a command at first; instead, he waits until the pressure builds and then explodes. She thought working with Craig the way we were working with Taz would really help me handle him better because he needed to become a little more flexible with regard to taking the commands I give him. She thought she could help by using a few techniques to help him understand that I should be more in the picture with him.

So, back in the tiny arena we went. We did the get back exercise, and he was able to give ground, though not nearly to the extent that Taz had. He also was able to flank without coming in, when we were working in the corner. This was not so easy when we went on to circles in the middle of the arena—he was tight and didn't want to get back. I accepted a widened flank, but Craig was still pretty tense. He responds to pressure very differently from Taz. Taz will get tentative; Craig gets more pushy and busty. When he was tight, he didn't respond to a simple pivot of the stick forward the way Taz did, so I often resorted to trying to get in his space a little. This goes against everything I learned with Derek, and it often turned into me chasing him. So naturally it wasn't very effective. Cathy suggested I work on stopping him and starting over when he gets too tight, and that was maybe a little more effective. Not very, though. Cathy thought it would be a process, but she feels it is necessary, or at least would be tremendously beneficial, to work through this, so Craig will be a bit more responsive to me. Again, I'm willing to try for now, as long as it doesn't become too much of a battle, and I'll see where it goes.