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Dogsey Junior
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01-02-2013, 01:11 AM
Originally Posted by Wysiwyg View Post
Me? Oh, I'm not surprised at all, in fact i expect disagreement! Of course.

However, you tend to say that an ecollar is not always used "correctly" or "properly" or that it can be "misused". Whereas my point is that I don't believe there is a "proper" way to use them, because no-one can agree, and everyone thinks their way is best if they use them - hence my comments.
Originally Posted by Wysiwyg View Post


N.B. I inadvertently split "Wys's quote. I made several failed attempts to fix it and was reduced to just increasing space between the parts of her quote and the parts of my response. Sorry, hope y'all can decipher it.

And I do believe that there is a correct way to use the collar, hence the disagreement; there is absolutely nothing wrong with disagreeing. What I find curious is, despite all the shrapnel thrown my way, I have been very forthcoming in describing how I use the collar; yet most (not all, but most) of the folks here who advocate for purely positive methods are eager to tell me how happy they are with their method, and how wonderfully trained their their dogs are, but very few seem willing to share the how of their method. Just what am I supposed to conclude from that?

As I indicated earlier, I have watched trainers over here who tout them selves as users of positive methods work, and could only conclude that either the method is not as advertised, or the trainers are misapplying the method. I find that people here, including trainers, often glom on the the latest and greatest training ideas and rush to use them without actually understanding the first thing about behavior and learning. There is a huge difference between reading/learning about a method, and actually understanding how to apply it to your own individual animal.

I have worked with many people who have read a "how to" training book, or several, and come to me because their training efforts have failed miserably. These folks are and angry and frustrated, because they have come to think that either they or the dog is too dumb to learn, or the dog is being stubborn or deliberately giving them the gears. I have to explain to them that books like they have read assume the reader is a perfect trainer with a perfect dog, and lead one to believe that training will be a straight-line progression. The author cannot possibly cover all the problems that can occur and how to deal with them, learning styles of individual dogs (and owners; visual learners often have difficulty "getting it" via the written word), etc., without winding up with a tome that has to be transported via wheelbarrow. I advise them that they would do better if they read a good book on behavior and learning to undestanding the "why" of a training method, because "how" is not enough.

The really frustrating thing is, many folks who actually have read up on behavior still don't get it, because they can't understand the concept of thinking dog, They have engaged in the anthropomorphism of animals for so long that it is really hard for them to get a different mindset.




Sorry if I've not seen the explanation - I did read you believe wearing the shock collar makes it easier for the dog and for you but what I am asking is, how can you defend using a shock collar in the name of sport?

After all, you are out to enjoy yourself, perhaps win something - nothing more. What is important to you that you "need" to use the shock collar on your dogs in this situation?

Does it boil down to believing that shock collars can save a dog's life? As that is the usual "reason" users tend to give.
Wys
x

[



No intention to "defend", just to impart information. Enjoy myself? Trust me, there is very little enjoyment to be had in getting up at 4am to drive thru a blinding snowstorm just so you can sit in a miserable smelly, mucky swamp all morning and half freeze to death. The dogs, on the other hand, leave no doubt that they enjoy it immensely. Winning? If that was my goal, I certainly wouldn't have chosen a breed that everyone around here, including judges, had such a low opinion of. Most of the stuff I did was supposed to be non-competitive anyway, except for conformation shows. I ''won" every time I was out with my dogs.

And saving a dogs life is certainly high on my list of reasons to use the collar.
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Firstlight
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01-02-2013, 02:21 AM
Originally Posted by Brierley View Post
The thing that really struck me was not so much the disagreements on how best to use them, but the insistence that everyone else was using it wrongly and in a cruel/abusive way. If users themselves can't agree on what is and isn't abusive, it's a pretty safe bet that those who are against physical aversives will universally agree that the things are just plain wrong and abusive no matter how they are used.

I can pretty much guarantee that anyone posting about pet keeping on an animal rights board would be pretty lucky have any kind of civil discourse. I can also pretty much guarantee that if an animal rights activist came on to this site and started a thread saying it's cruel to own dogs would also be pretty lucky to maintain any civil discourse for any length of time.

E-collars in the UK = explosive arguments. There's a strong movement to have them banned and some of the UK have already done so.

No matter the topic, I'm of the opinion that civil discussion is better than personal attack and although I'll argue strongly for what I believe, I would hope I'm always civil, but I'm getting on a bit so have learned over the years that you get a point across far more effectively when being polite
I guess I'm dense, because I am not seeing the connection between a disagreement over use of a tool causing a universal agreement that use of the tool is wrong and it should never be used. Suppose a trainer who uses the collar is listening to two reward-based trainers have a disagreement over how food should be used; should the collar user conclude from that disagreement that food should not be used at all?

Re: ARE's: OK, I used a bad example; I was talking about discourse between sane people. And I would caution y'all to view efforts to ban anything with reference to animals with a jaundiced eye. Some of these groups over have adopted the "foot in the door" approach to achieving their goal, and it is also becoming more difficult to determine the players without a scorecard.

And I am in total agreement with your opinion civil discussion, as hope I am demonstrating on this thread.
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manydogz
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01-02-2013, 02:47 AM
Having seen e-collars in use several times I could only come to the conclusion that they are inhumane and I would never use one. I have bred and trained several kinds of dogs for over 40 years and have somehow managed to do so without the use of corporal punishment or a shock collar. They should be banned in the US as they are in some countries.
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Firstlight
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01-02-2013, 03:22 AM
Originally Posted by spot View Post
I've not read the whole thread so please forgive me if you have already responded firstlight - but how would you train any of the dogs in the senarios you have give if an shock collar was not available to you.

As you may be aware they are banned in many parts of the world so, as a trainer, how would you go about dealing with the problems you talk of without an ecollar?
Excellent question Spot, thank you. I hope you will find time to read my longer posts, because there is much information in them that is relevant to your question.

I do train without them, and did for many years before I ever got the first one. The collar doesn't come into play until after the proofing stage of training (teaching and conditioning stages are all positive and reward-based), which involves traditional corrections. And I have already gotten the message - about a gazillion times over - that use of physical aversives makes me a blood relative of Attilla the Hun, so you don't have to feel obliged to waste time expressing that opinion, if you do indeed hold that opinion, if you don't feel the need to

If I did not have the collar available I would seek out another way of training which would work for me and my dogs, and would definitely not involve punishment. I would certainly investigate the method so many of your countrymen tell me they have enjoyed so much success with. That actually was the goal I had in starting this thread (the title of which has been amended by the mods), but I have found it very difficult to encourage most posters to share information re: how they use their method with me.
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Firstlight
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01-02-2013, 04:30 AM
Originally Posted by Brierley View Post
Here we will have to disagree. Your dog received a command, albeit and environmental one, and ignored it. That command is now irrelevant to what happened subsequently as you did not shock for disobeying that command, you shocked to reinforce the next command you gave - the whistle.

The only relevance as to whether the shock or the whistle aided the second command is whether or not the shock was actually for your dog's sake or yours (ie it made you feel you were leaving your dog with less options). The default/emergency 'down' never failed with my collie without a physical aversive to reinforce it. Maybe I was lucky, maybe it was that a natural action for the dog was so well conditioned on command that he never thought to disobey it, much the same as I never think not to put on a seatbelt when I get in a car.

Zap again?
I don't know what you mean by an environmental command; the dog was trained, very carefully mind you, that not only does the whistle mean sit, but so does the flush; whistle=sit, and flush=sit. Again, I did not have the option of repeating the flush (and it wasn't necessary that I do so), so I used the whistle, which the dog had been trained to understand as having the same meaning as the flush.

I think part of the problem here is that you are not giving the dogs enough credit. The last dog I taught sit to flush to was the male I currently have. He was still in the teaching/conditioning stages (read no physical aversives of any kind being employed) of the whistle version of sit to flush, when he began, voluntarily and consistently, to sit in response to the flush only. He made the intuitive leap from the cue of the whistle meaning sit, to the cue of the flush meaning the same thing. The result was that I was able to push the training along much faster that I might have done.

I was not at all surprised that he did this, many of the dogs I bred had the ability to make these connections much more quickly than most of others I have worked with. This dog is a "clone" of his maternal great great grandsire, who also demonstrated this ability - in spades. It is a wonderful genetically-based trait, and greatly enhances and expedites training. I can give you other examples of this ability demonstrated by some of my other dogs if you wish, including the bitch in my original post.

Lastly, "zap again" was partially correct. Try again, and here's a hint: I stated that she responded to a low level nick.
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Firstlight
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01-02-2013, 04:32 AM
Originally Posted by JoedeeUK View Post
That's odd you are using their kennel name ?
Nothing odd about it, unless you consider pure coincidence odd.
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Firstlight
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01-02-2013, 05:34 AM
Originally Posted by Jackbox View Post
Depending on the way you look at it, you could say " God pity him"
That would actually be a valid thought during a (thankfully short) period in his life.

I never claimed to be perfect, Jackbox. I was raised by parents who were responsible owners in the sense of taking good care of their dogs, but never gave any thought to formally training them. I began my trek on the training trail back in the dark ages, with very little knowledge of how to train, at a time when most trainers around here would have responded with the thousand yard stare when you mentioned "reward-based training". The only obedience club in the area at the time had a nasty rep, and from what I saw of the results of their methods, (we showed in the same obedience classes), it was well-earned. Field trainers used corrections like shooting a dog with a BB gun for breaking, and worse. The only exposure I had to "positive methods" was a few years into my journey when Volhard came on the scene, and Front and Finish became the magazine du jour. I have already described my (unhappy) experience with trainers who came out of Volhard's program.

This is what I had available as role models to use for teaching me how to train, and this was all I knew.The only saving grace was that I had enough sense/gut feeling to recognize when I was ruining a dog, and quit, and look for a more sensible way to train. I devised a system that worked for me and my dogs, and is flexible enough to be adapted to the needs and problems of individual owners and dogs which make up my clientele.

I am learning all the time, and am always open to hearing about new and better ways to train, which, again, was the impetus for starting this thread. Title change by the mods was, unfortunately, a reflection of what was actually happening on the thread (well, except for the comment about "promoting" a banned method, at least the mod qualified it with "appears to be"), rather than what I had expected would happen. I have no idea of why I am being held responsible for the direction the thread has taken; my only sin was seeking information.
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Malpeki
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01-02-2013, 06:36 AM
Originally Posted by spot View Post
I've not read the whole thread so please forgive me if you have already responded firstlight - but how would you train any of the dogs in the senarios you have give if an shock collar was not available to you.

As you may be aware they are banned in many parts of the world so, as a trainer, how would you go about dealing with the problems you talk of without an ecollar?
WOW! a very good question!

wondering about the answer

...but guess it just will get ignored as well
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Chris
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01-02-2013, 07:47 AM
Originally Posted by Firstlight View Post
Suppose a trainer who uses the collar is listening to two reward-based trainers have a disagreement over how food should be used; should the collar user conclude from that disagreement that food should not be used at all?
Many do and many assume that training without physical aversives means stuffing food down a dog's neck from the moment training begins to the day the dog dies
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Chris
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01-02-2013, 08:03 AM
Originally Posted by Firstlight View Post

I think part of the problem here is that you are not giving the dogs enough credit. The last dog I taught sit to flush to was the male I currently have. He was still in the teaching/conditioning stages (read no physical aversives of any kind being employed) of the whistle version of sit to flush, when he began, voluntarily and consistently, to sit in response to the flush only. He made the intuitive leap from the cue of the whistle meaning sit, to the cue of the flush meaning the same thing. The result was that I was able to push the training along much faster that I might have done.
That's part of training no matter what you are teaching. You taught the dog that whistle means sit. Every time the flush came you gave the command (whistle to sit). Your dog simply anticipated the command (sit to whistle) and, through repetition, paired the new sequence (sit/flush) together so that the flush also became a command.
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