Rhodesian Ridgeback Training - Hiking and Canoeing Session Example

Welcome back to the Bluegrass. It's a beautiful May day. It's raining but we are having a big time adventure. I got my man No Name and Maxi and back here somewhere. Hey Murphy! Murphy! Say hello! Got a fun little Rhodesian Ridgeback that's here to learn how to be good in an off-leash environment because her owner is playing some kind of fun game called Caney Cross or something like that. Come on Murphy! So you'll notice throughout the video I may have to say Murphy's name a few times because these labs they'll stay with me all the time but Murphy she's off you know she's a Rhodesian Ridgeback so she thinks she needs to go hunt lions and stuff like that. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to use No Name to keep Murphy's attention so that Murphy stays pretty close and hopefully we won't lose her throughout the course of the day and we're going to try to get a little bit of walking in and a little bit of exploring in the woods and we're going to get in the pond and do a little bit of canoeing and maybe some swimming. All right so I'm going to show you guys one of my favorite little paths around the farm and while I'm showing you this path we'll let these dogs play fetch. Everybody will chase No Name around that keeps them all close. Having a mentor dog man it really does make it a lot easier to get out and work on you know off-leash camping and hiking and adventuring stuff but even if you don't have a mentor dog then what really helps is just to you know go out with confidence you know I can tell you 100% for sure after having lots and lots of people come out exploring with me whenever I have somebody nervous out here with me then it's almost guaranteed that the dogs are going to be running for the far tree line you know. But if people come out and present themselves in a calm confident and assertive manner then the dogs just kind of you know tag along and have a good time. Isn't that right Murphy? Like these dogs here like these Ridgebacks they're notoriously hard to take out off the leash and you know have them stay close to you and come back when you call them but we've had really good job really good luck with Murphy. The first few times we took her out we took her with three adult mentor dogs no name leading the pack and this time this is after maybe our 15th or 16th time out we've got one mentor dog and two puppies they're black labs so they're not going to be going too far but we're gradually changing the ratio so that Murphy is kind of one of the dogs that is in a mentoring position and you know they kind of take they kind of like that over the course of time they like to know that they get to be a leader you know kind of a camp counselor you know now she's going off kind of far now. Murphy come! I had to call her and see if she'll come back and if I'm super lucky oh look at this little guy he came oh my gosh look at that fast recall on that Rhodesian Ridgeback dang that's excellent very nice and there's no name. All right so we'll get one more little fetch in here and then we'll head back over to the farm or to the pond and we'll get in the water a little bit and maybe do a bit of canoeing very nice dogs let's try that recall one more time with Murphy Murphy come oh my gosh that is amazing recall for a Ridgeback no name you're such a good mentor all right guys look what we have found Murphy is not just a lion hunter she is also a snapping turtle hunter and I don't know what you guys know about snapping turtles but the truth is and this is real science if a snapping turtle bites you it won't let go until it hears thunder right so I mean it's a rainy day so we might be lucky if this snapping turtle bites one of these puppies hopefully it'll thunder but look at that guy that's a big old snapping turtle and Murphy just found him out here I guess if you can't find a lion to hunt a snapping turtle is the very best next thing back up here to show you Maxie. Maxie took a little fun look at that turtle and said I'm just going to sit over here out of the way I'm not even fooling with that turtle a little bit well what if I reach out here and touch that turtle on the nose you guys think that's a good idea or not nah I better not all right Mr. Turtle we'll leave you alone now so got the easy part done I've got two labs uh in the canoe now comes the hard part we got to get Murphy back up there we have to get Murphy in the canoe now Murphy has been pretty good about getting in the pond and she's been okay about swimming but she's not too fond of being in the canoe because the bottom of the canoe is slippery and of course canoes are unstable come on Murphy oh very nice so we're hoping that uh everything in the dog business is kind of the same guys it's just you make improvement based on progressive exposure so each time I come over to the pond with the dog I expect for him to do just a little bit better but like the rate of improvement is always way different between different types of dogs all right so we'll get Murphy come on Murphy you can get in there you get in the front because you're a big girl okay all right and then we're all right well Murphy has settled in very nicely and hasn't jumped out one time which I might have just jinxed myself now notice again guys these black lab puppies are just sitting in the canoe perfectly and that's why I always say all dogs want to be labs and all labs want to be black but some dogs are Rhodesian Ridgebacks so we do what we can you know all right so I like to come to this end of the pond because of these let me turn around here and show you these willows if you're going to have a problem with your dog jumping out of the canoe it's usually going to be kind of related to either being close to the bank or being close to something that the dogs kind of feel like is a you know solid ground so sometimes you'll just be out paddling around and you will go through a little area where there's some vegetation and when you do like the dogs will hop out of the boat because I don't know if you guys can see this exactly because I'm kind of far away um hey cameraman go ahead and hit 2.5 on that phone all right but you see this little clump of willows that's growing out of the pond from a dog's perspective especially a dog that has doesn't have a lot of experience in the boat this kind of looks like it might be solid ground and so sometimes they'll like reach out here they'll start smelling that there might be something in the in the bush that's interesting and then they'll reach a little far or they'll reach with their paw and think they're going to be able to step on the solid ground and there's no solid ground there to step on and they fall out of the canoe and of course if one thing falls out of the canoe then generally everything else in the canoe follows okay so it's super important when you're going on your adventures to do a little bit of pre-adventure training in a relatively controlled environment and you guys will notice again today we're out training in the rain big mistake that people make is not training in the rain I mean I'm deliberately getting over here close to the pond bank where it's really shallow and presenting the dog with an opportunity to get out of the canoe if she wants that way later on in the summer when her owner is out you know using their vacation days and they're in a real life situation the dog already has had plenty of experiences see look she's thinking about getting out I can reach up here and get her by her leash so you don't need to get out yet you know it's just this combination of factors I've got people over there there's other dogs we're close to the bank and it's raining okay but this right here is what we call environmental socialization and this teaches a dog to stay calm and focused you know under high levels of distraction we like to think of it as developing poise you know and that's one thing that certain breeds like rhodesian ridgebacks are not known for you know you'll never hear somebody talk about how much poise they have how how calm they are under pressure okay but through progressive exposure techniques you can definitely let me turn around here where you guys can see her you can definitely make them a lot more calm than their reputation would lead you to believe that they can be all right cameraman just get a little let's say talk to her a little bit so we can get one last little look at her nice look at her very nice all right guys well we're going to get going before uh before the rain settles in too much see y'all next week