I adopted a female Australian Shepherd from a breed rescue 5 years ago. She is now 8 years old.
She would love to chase noisy vehicles such as cars, motorcycles, snowmobiles etc., but I have been able to control her from doing this through obedience training, and by bringing her to heel when one passes us.

The other day, however, when we were out for our walk, a very noisy motorcycle and an ATV came up behind us on the trail. I called my dog to heel, which she did, but when they began to go past us, before I knew what happened, she had run in front of the Motorcycle and around to the side and took a dive at the guys leg! She did not connect, and actually stopped her *attack* about a foot away, but he was, understandably upset, and so was I. I called her to heel again and they went past without further incident, but they shot some nasty looks over their shoulder's at us.

I am thinking that since I do have an e-collar I should use it on her before it gets to be a bigger problem. My question is:

Should I call her to heel as I always do when a motorcycle etc. approaches us and if she breaks or ignors me, stimulate her? Or should I not say anything to her and when she goes after the vehicle stimulate her?

Eather / or.

If you call to heal first, you would be correcting for breaking the heal.( has nothing to do with the distraction.
If you just stimulate when the dog goes after the auto, you are correcting for what ever the dog is doing at the time ( in his mind. (chasing prey etc.

I would use the E-collar on a low setting. Go were you will find bikes or ATV, whatever.
The instant the dog even looks at the distraction, stim. evan if its a 100 yards away. I use the command "leave it" and stem. Then praise.
ANY, ANY interest in the vehicle, Leave it Stem. Praise when he looks away. Repeat 5 or 6 times and you should see a differance..
Luck
Ron

This is a typical use of the Ecollar. It's actually an example of aversion or punishment training and while it usually works there can be fallout, undesired or even unexpected behavior that occurs in addition to the training that's being attempted. It can occur even at low levels if the dog isn't guided into the proper behavior to shut off the stim.

Instead of doing it this way I'd enlist the assistance of someone who has a motorcycle and I'd use my "crittering protocol." This method doesn't use a command, instead the dog is doing the work. The problem with a method that uses a command is that you must see the chase start in order to give the command to stop the chase. If you miss the start of the chase, the command may not work.

http://www.leerburg.com/ubb//ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=23;t=000028#000001

I'd also suggest teaching the recall with the Ecollar and then proofing with the "hierarchy of toys." That article can be found on my website.

Thank you for your replies.

I have read the article on "crittering", but the problem is that I don't know anyone with a motorcycle or ATV and the only time we encounter them, except for roaring past our property from time to time, which is soooo annoying, is occassionally on our walk. Judging from the attitude of those kids, I'm not sure I want to ask them to help me, so I'm thinking perhaps I should do the "recall" training instead. However, I definately want to do what works the best to stop the behavior and I'm just unsure at this point on which method I should use on her.
I sure wish I had one of you here to help me! <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

I'd suggest that you approach one of the more mature appearing ones and explain your problem. In a way it's his problem too. Offer him a few bucks to help you solve your problem. He might go along with it. Failing that you could contact a local motorcycle club, avoid the Hells' Angels and the like, and see if you can get one of them to help you out. It will only take them half an hour or so for a couple of days. All they'll be doing is riding back and forth to act as the "prey animal."

The recall will give you a reliable recall but the crittering protocol will stop the chasing before it starts.

Hi Lou,

I wanted to know if it's ok to do the crittering on an 8 month old mal pup that I'm doing Drive, Focus, and Grip work with? Should I wait until he is older? Thanks for the great info Lou!

Lois, was your dog running loose? Maybe you should consider using a leash if this is a trail that is used by others. JMO

Yes, John, my dog runs loose on that trail, but I refuse to leash her there, because it's one right behind our house and the motorcyclists and atv guys have to cross private property to access it, plus the property itself is private property, but my neighbor and I have gotten permission from the owner to walk our dogs there. The owner has even tried posting signs and blocking it off, but they ignore the signs and go around the blockades. They act like they own it and no one else should be there, so the next time they come through when I am there I am going to get their license number's (if I can) and report them, but I would also like to stop my dog from chasing them, because with their attitude they will run her down one of these days.

Lois, I hope you don't get offended but this sounds like this a no win situation. For starters you have kids on motorized vehicles terrorizing walkers on the trail, yet in spite of the apparent danger you won't consider leashing your dog. Even if you get an e-collar, Lou's article mentions using a leash in conjunction with the e-collar when you begin training. I agree that it must be very frustrating to have those kids ride through when they are not supposed to be there, but given the situation and the fact that they are there, then it seems to me that you are the one that can control a potentially dangerous situation by leashing your dog. JMO

I understand where you are coming from and if you mean by "leash her", to call her when they appear and leash her until they go by, then yes, I agree, that is the best short term solution and I will do that in the future, but I refuse to make her walk permanently on a leash in that area, when they are the intruder's, and that is why I want to stop her from ignoring my command, or breaking from one and chasing them.

I am usually the only one walking in that area, because I am careful about when I walk there. I try to walk before school is out in the afternoon, or when school is out for the summer I walk early in the morning before the kids are up, and I seldom meet anyone else, but very occassionally we do have a situation like we had the other day, and the problem of her breaking and chasing just happened the other day too. Previously I have been able to call her to heel until they have gone by, but this last time with the two noisy vehicles passing so close to her, was too much for her and she broke.

I know the problem is one of training and the solution is getting her to ignore the vehicles or to get a rock solid "heel" under that kind of distraction. I was just asking if the e-collar would be the best tool to use and what would be the best way to use it to accomplish that goal.