Scratchings-and-Sniffings

Monday, June 28, 2010

Scratchings-and-Sniffings


A Shocking Experience for Miles

Posted: 27 Jun 2010 08:05 AM PDT

Dr. Larry-headshot Poor Miles. He rarely gets a harsh word around our house. He's so handsome and intelligent, he's hard to criticize. As such, he's not used to punishment. Well, that ended last week with snake training.Hey-mom-where-ya-going

As you all know I'm a big fan of rewards based training where you reward for the right behavior until it becomes habit. Try as I might, I can't think of a way to teach a dog to avoid something they would be naturally curious about. Like a snake.
 
Aversion training relies on a certain degree of pain. According to our trainer, you want the dog to associate a rattlesnake with a really bad experience. In this case, a shock collar.
 
The shock collar is fitted with two metal prongs that deliver a jolt via a hand held controller. The trainer holds the controls and it is his job to time the shock precisely. The second Miles becomes aware of the snake is when he is supposed to get it. And Miles got it.
 
Miles-at-snake-aversion-class We did the training outside, on a hiking trail. The idea is to simulate the exact conditions where you might encounter a snake. In this case the snake being used is rendered harmless by having his fangs surgically removed. Our snake was quite menacing, despite being fangless.
 
It was my job to walk Miles down the trail on his leash until he saw the snake. Everything went as planned and as we approached the snake rose up and started to buzz. It really is more of a buzz than a rattle, for those of you that haven't seen one.
Black-tailed_rattlesnake
When the snake buzzed, Miles went on point and stared right at the source of the noise. That's when he got his shock. The force of the shock knocked Miles backwards and he ran right into a Cholla cactus; another unpleasant experience I can assure you.
 
He also let out a big yelp. I was not too happy about the whole process, quite frankly, but if this will keep him away from snakes, it will be worth it. We spend a lot of time in the mountains and desert hiking, fishing and backpacking and all that is prime snake habitat for much of the year, here in New Mexico. 
 
We'll be on a long backpacking trip in a couple of weeks and we have a really good chance of seeing a snake or two. We'll be in the same area where I saw four Blacktailed Rattlers just last month. We'll be at least two days from any trail head in the middle of the Gila Wilderness. If anyone gets bit, a quick trip to the emergency room is out of the question.
 
After the training is completed, the trainer asks you to walk your dog back to the snake to see how effective the training was. All the dogs avoided the snake on retest, including Miles. I also noticed something interesting just last night as Miles and I were watering the tomatoes. He was really scared by a section of hose that was lying along a wall looking snakelike. He looked at it and backed away cautiously.
 
Hopefully, that will be his reaction when we run into a real live one in the wild.   

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