Abusing the System

I'm sure you're getting sick and tired of Jinks' antics taking up so much space on what is supposed to be a "foster" blog. But I find writing about her to be helpful to me, and to put into perspective why I don't have much time for high-demands fosters these days.

I find this quote on the BC boards -a place for people with border collies to come and chat, learn etc- to be quite helpful.

This sums up the teenage stage quite well:
"Some Border Collies will use submissive behavior to manipulate and control us. Others will bark and carry on like they're having a temper tantrum. Still others will use every expression and gesture you have ever found cute to get their own way. Living with a young Border Collie is like living with an intelligent toddler. It requires dedicated time and effort to survive the experience!"

For whatever progress we make, something else springs up. I do feel like I'm surviving and not thriving yet, but surviving we are.

As I'm sure any reader of this blog is aware by now, Jinks is quite people reactive, although she is managed well and if you passed her on the trail you probably wouldn't know since at this point she's been desensitized enough to function in public as long as it's trail like, and fairly wooded and she's moving forward, preferably with Beckett close behind. She has made great strides quickly in the being able to live with her world. The visual of people doesn't send her into a barking tailspin anymore. We're still working on people actually paying her any attention, but luckily when you are on trails, moving and with a pack, it's rare that people actually stop to chat. So most of our walks these days are fairly non-eventful, with only maybe a warning sign or two I can easily distract.

But at times, someone catches us out of the blue or the good management we have gets suddenly slammed to the ground and she becomes a barking, hackled-up tornado. She moves backwards so I'm not afraid of her lashing out at anyone in an aggressive way, but she can definitely look nasty. Besides, I don't want her to be afraid or worried about normal every day occurrences. So of course, any time that this happens, I immediately put her to work, I can long down her from quite a ways, so I put her to work in that, then find a distance threshold in which she will work more commands then that emergency ones. Then we treat closer and closer to the "issue", and eventually if we have the opportunity we get that person to feed her. Since they care enough to get her in face, they are usually pretty good about sticking around until I've got it under control. It helps that when I yell "Down" over the field Beckett and Lemon are suddenly down too. So it at least looks like I might have SOME form of control over my little barking tornado.

Today though, a light-bulb went off in that damn border collie's head. Barking at someone = work. Mum will give me work if I bark at that person. God forbid I have a walk with just a chucker, some lazy commands in order to throw the ball and am able to be at least a little on the lazy carefree side. Even with three hours of daycare under her to wear off her edges, when we passed a few people no problem and then we passed a man with a very nice dog. Jinks says hi to the dog, she sniffs the man briefly and leaves. No signs of stress on her part -I'm pretty good at reading her as I read her with every person and will reward recall at any minor sign of stress with someone-. As he turns his back -didn't say anything to either of us- she decides to start barking at him. But this barking is different. This barking is demanding, working brained dog, a manipulator at her best. This is not my fearful, people reactive dog. OH NO, this is a dog who knows exactly what she's doing and for what reason she's doing it.

Learning to abuse the system. What a teenager. Down right exasperating she is. Making an issue out of thin air just so I will put her to work. Too smart for her own good.

Of course it can't be as easy as desensitization to people, agility, working for her food by hand, it's gotta be trying to outsmart mum many, many times along the way. I don't know whether to feel glad that she's obviously in her right mind enough to think about such a thing with a MAN present, or if I need to go pull my hair out. Bah!

So, Jinks abused the system. So mum abused the system.

What can I do? I can't recall her, I can't just ignore her -it's such a self-reinforcing behaviour that I just can't-, I can't lie her down since that's what she wants. I'm all out of positive. The bad behaviour and cheekiness, it's all coming from wanting me to be positive with her.

Girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do.

I've always got the smaller ball chucker on the trails and I've got pretty good aim, so instead of putting her into a down/to work, I take a well aimed toss at her cute little whirling backside. (Oh you should have seen the before and after face). Barking and tornadoing she was oh so pleased with herself -she holds her body so much different if she's actually cautious/nervous/reactive), "Mum is going to work me" she thinks as the guy just continues on his way without a care in the world.

So anyway, aim, fire, SMACK on the rear-end. First she looked to see where the hell it came from, and then, realizing it was from me and the evil glare I was giving her, she smartened her stupid-smart ass into gear and slunk back to Beckett. Oh the look of being outsmarted! I'm sure she had a bit of a pity party since I didn't throw her another ball, I didn't ask her to do anything, I didn't even talk to her, and I certainly didn't let her run like the wind for at least another fifteen to twenty minutes.

And she didn't bark at another person that walk. She was a very well-mannered, if not a bit subdued young dog. She raised her hackles once or twice when someone gave her a lot of intense direct eye contact but got over it as we moved along the trail. Not that I advocate throwing stuff at your dogs or anything, but it definitely smartened her up and didn't seem her "hurt" her. Her ego might be a tad bruised, but that ego of hers is getting bigger by the day so if it shrinks just a tad that's probably not a bad thing.

Like the quote says "Living with a young Border Collie is like living with an intelligent toddler. It requires dedicated time and effort to survive the experience!"

Keeping on surviving. Slight detour from the road of positive reinforcement, promise I will get back on track for tomorrow.