Sneak Peek

      Back to proprioception - Rear feet exist!

From Positive Herding 101

Most dogs don't realize that they have rear feet.

This is not a problem until you have a dog making fast turns and quick starts on uneven, muddy, or difficult footing. Having rear feet awareness and control adds a degree of safety in these situations.

Proprioception, sensing body parts in space, has been a hot topic in my Positive Herding Dog Facebook group lately. Most posts have focused on rear feet awareness by having the dog place their front feet on an overturned dish or raised platform and teaching them to move their back feet around in an arc.

I cover this training in my book, Positive Herding 101, but today I would like to pull a story from my book that illustrates how this type of training can be generalized and used to a dog's advantage. Let's jump into Positive Herding 101, Chapter 24 for a closer look.

Jump sideways

Another behavior that spontaneously generalized to herding was rear foot awareness. Proprioception, awareness of body and limbs in space, is great for herding dogs since they will be working in difficult footing at times. I taught Sir to keep his front feet on a small platform and pivot his rear feet around in a circle in both directions. Great puppy training but not terribly useful for herding, or so I thought!

One day I was working Sir on several ewes along a fence. The ewes split and some ran along the fence so I sent Sir to bring them back. Once they were all gathered together I asked Sir in to put pressure on the ewes. I wanted Sir to take responsibility for preventing them from getting away again. As he moved closer the ewes became more nervous and eventually started to split. Sir jumped sideways with all four feet and landed about a foot to his right, exactly on balance to prevent the ewes from splitting.

I was amazed! I had seen many dogs jump sideways with their front feet but I had never seen a dog jump sideways with all four feet. I then realized by jumping sideways Sir was now perfectly positioned to react in either direction. If he had only moved his front feet he would have been at a disadvantage to move the direction he had come from. Too cool!

Later I called my friend who owns Sir’s mother and asked her if jumping sideways ran in the bitch’s line. She replied that she had never seen a dog jump completely sideways when working stock. So again Sir had generalized a behavior because it worked for him, it was inherently reinforcing.

There is more than one way to teach rear feet awareness and the following video briefly walks you through the steps for teaching rear feet awareness using a target mat.

If you found this blog helpful, please tell your friends and spread the herd!

Barb

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