I discovered these ginormous tuggy knots just before the Champ Final at Wyre (our last run of the weekend), thought instantly of Nellie's scissor teeth, the umpteen rather more standard size tuggy toys she has destroyed within a weekend, not to mention the numerous holes and bruising I have endured in my hands, thighs and fingers - and bought the only one they had in stock. Then made myself anxious wondering if I could get another one! Just as well I found I could as the first one started its ordeal as Nellie's tug toy just before that run at Wyre at the end of August and by the last week of September looked like this - see picture below - the pitiful remains on the right.....
Someone expressed surprise at the hugeness of the toy at Prestbury Park and even more surprise when I said I hoped it might last a month.....
On the left is the second one after Iain has unknotted the tight knot ball for me (using a wooden spoon!). I needed this one just after Trent Park...
Please note the tennis ball centrally placed to give an idea of scale!
And below is one of the three I have stockpiled still in its original knot form....
Luckily Nellie will work 'through' her toy when we are training so even though it is huge it doesn't cause problems when it is 'dead' on the ground or in my hand. I can't hide it that's for sure.
She loves it!
Since Prestbury several other people have commented on the size of these toys in relation to her size. And they have a point. This size is meant for seriously large breeds - rotties, GSDs, ridgebacks etc with very strong jaws. Well that is what it says on the website I discovered I can buy them from in multiples. I didn't tell them they were for one relatively dainty border collie girl and that if I am lucky three may get me into the beginning of next season (bearing in mind we have only about three shows between now and March!)
But then they haven't factored in her scissor teeth or my efforts to overcome her 'politeness' when she was a baby dog. We were doing well with the tuggy game, she found it exciting to play with me this way, even around agility going on. She would play a vigorous game of tug in the local garden centre, industrial estate and two different busy high streets. I wrote about the time I threw her toy to her when I was doing some early 'wait' games ages ago in an early blog entry. I had torn the tendon in my little finger when she was 8 months or thereabouts, underestimated how it would affect my throwing, lobbed it anyway to a space behind her but it had landed on her nose! Well as far as she was concerned it had bitten her and there was no way tug was going to happen from that point on.
Re-building that fun was a learning curve in itself. One that neither Henry - who came from rescue with a ball fetish so intense he would disappear into the distance after the tiniest of toys when I first got him - nor Pop who although didn't 'get' toys when I first got her took to them with her inherent gusto once she realised the fun we could have and didn't care two hoots whether it landed on her head or any other part of her anatomy - ever gave me reason to think that hard about. Even sensitive little Archie didn't worry about the toy attacking him - he could bite it back, see!
Nellie didn't see it their way at all. Biting it back was too scarey. So I had to look at it differently too and, notwithstanding the bloodshed (mine!) that occurs even now, because even though the toy is huge she still occasionally catches my fingers and leaves bruises on my thighs, I am very pleased with the result. Yes, she has removed the skin from a knuckle at my field - a quick trip to the chemist for steri-strips sorted that out - and at the semis in September she caught my thumb as I was about to start so I ran that with blood pouring down my hand. But...
It took thought on my part to encourage her to have the confidence to be 'rude', to develop so much drive on her toy, to want that toy so much so that for a long time now she too hasn't cared what it does. And patience to let her develop it at a rate she was happy and comfortable with. We both lose ourselves in our game and she loves this game with Mom. Nellie taught me that really playing with your dog is an art in itself - play should simultaneously create a bond and arise from a bond - of trust, fun, spontaneity and love. Whether it is an agility game or any other excuse for a game!
Nellie now really,really loves all our games, for instance 'get it' and 'give' (though this one I left until way, way later - until her tug action was incredibly strong and robust again. I don't think you get good drivey 'get it' before then and if you introduce 'give' in the context of that game too soon before the driveyness is so intense you can find you take away what they do have and their confidence - especially with a sensitive, thoughtful youngster who wants to get things right. If you are patient and wait til all the parts of the game, and the dog, are ready then 'get it and give' will take your dog into drive orbit! So I waited until Nellie was so confident about winning it that giving it up on command just wasn't a problem. Just my experience...) Our toy games (with agility tug or any other toy) include 'he's going to get you', 'I'm going to get him', 'grrrrgrrrrr', 'you won him!', 'he's mine!', 'I'm gonna getcha' and 'you wanna play?' and when we are both sprawled on the grass or floor playing tug and she holds the toy by my face, asking me to 'play tug' using my teeth I can't help but laugh out loud. Ultimately I do control the games we play but she doesn't mind this at all because she knows that 'control' isn't what our games are about for her or me. We share the whole experience so 'Get it and give' are just a naturally evolved part of the game. It is our special time.
If your heart isn't in the game, if you aren't truly 'play-ful' and can't forget yourself and immerse yourself in the play, if you are just playing with them in order to get them to 'do agility' in a particular way and you don't genuinely want to play with them, then why should their hearts be in it either? And if your heart is and their heart isn't then perhaps you are forcing the wrong game on them and need to take time out to make the whole experience of playing lots of different games with you something they really want to do because you are fun and interaction with you is a warm and mutually binding experience for its own sake? You don't need any trickery or exploitative methods, just a genuine desire to bring out the playful confidence of your dog.
When Nellie's small tuggy knot 'bit her' back when she was little I simply stopped trying to play tuggy games with it, I didn't want to make it an issue and our 'wait' training therefore had to continue differently too as I couldn't throw the toy around her from a distance anymore either. That winter, for a few weeks, when we did any agility stuff I just threw the toy away from her instead and made it a pounce game. I never gave her any reason to think he might 'bite her' again in any kind of agility context. Consequently she stopped worrying about it.
Meanwhile we carried on playing our other different toy games at home and out and about. For instance, sometimes 'Strawberry' or 'fluffy duck' would pounce on her from behind the pine box in the living room and land gently on her bottom! He would then disappear and while she was looking round the corner of the box to see where he had gone, he would suddenly get her playfully on the bottom again from the other direction! Great game. Of course, gradually,naturally a game of tug with him would sometimes begin as she went to put her teeth on him...... she would always win...and there was absolutely no pressure on her to continue
Now and then, without any pressure of my hopes for anything more than what she was happy to offer, her little tuggy knot didn't fly through the air to be pounced on, sometimes he too 'got her' on the bottom before being wriggled along the ground..and of course she would start to grab him. Tentatively at first, yes, but her confidence grew.....and, when she held on even if only for a tiny moment, she always won him and got to parade about. Before being asked 'Do you wanna play?' which is her cue to come into the side of me with her toy that I taught her as a puppy.
When she was old enough the following summer, taking a tennis ball and then, once we discovered him a year after that, crazy blue bouncy ball to the sea all summer long (and our last swim in the end this year was on the beautiful sunny afternoon of 15th October!) or to the sandy beaches in the winter, and playing careful games with sticks on walks again helped to increase her confidence. Despite Henry and Pop's cleverness at these games I made sure that Nellie got the ball or stick too and winning it ahead of the others boosted her confidence no end and made the game so exciting. Sometimes I would hold on to the end of the stick.....and then Pop would join in too!
After a few weeks that first winter when she was 8 months old we were back to where we had been and we played tug and I could throw the knot tug around her again. At the time I was quite happy with that, we both loved our play but I didn't realise where our enthusiasm for it would take it.
One of the monkey knots began to fray but I found she was becoming so absolutely full on confident the knot ends didn't bother her at all. Before then it had to stay a small, predictable 'well behaved' knot that I threw away when it began to disintegrate, because if it caught her 'wrong' I could see she still worried a little bit. She would recover well by then but I didn't want any worry at all. I didn't want to go backwards again. So, frayed bits at the end of the rope knot were out. One day I found she just wanted to tug even with frayed bits and cared less what the knot did so I could go on with it even when it was 'past its best' as it were - consequently there was more to grab and she could tug harder because she could get a better grip. It all became even more exciting... It took a while to get to a completely frayed state which was probably why she adapted to it as she did, but once it was a complete frayed rope knot and she loved the fact the rope ends went in all directions around her face, that the toy behaved unpredictably, and she held on despite it 'being rude' and was determined to 'be rude' grabbing it we found ourselves on another level of play! That was the point I introduced the 'control' game : 'get it and give'. It seemed the right thing to do then and it too created a new dimension to our play.....and, it has enriched our bond and this has deepened our agility partnership as we have gone on.
So after a while I got a crazy tug monster who, now at 4.5 years old, accidently 'gets' me sometimes. Do I tell her off? Don't be silly. So we need 'barge rope' size tug toys to withstand her scissor teeth (at least for a while), to protect my fingers (as much as possible) and cope with the strength and determination of her tugging..... but do I care? Next question!
The only worry I have is do I let her play tug with lovely toys like this?
Maybe not! Well not for very long anyway :-)
Naturally, we still have great fun with Strawberry and Fluffy Duck and the fact she and Arch try to dig into my rucksack on the beach to find blue bouncy ball indicates her (and his) joy in that game! I egg them on by excitedly telling them he's 'gonna come out to play a-n-y minute....' and 'Ooh, there he is...Oh my!' Large sticks or small ones are sometimes presented to me in an invitation to play but this summer just after her paw healed we found 'Shoe' (an old discarded rubber sole) on the heath and we play with him for short stretches as we walk there and then, when I feel she has played that game enough, she watches me hide him in one of his 'shoe goes night-night' places so we can find him next time we walk past that spot. She knows all the places and stops to investigate the trace of his scent until we get to the one where he actually is waiting for us. She thinks that game is great and I love seeing her face all bright with the joy of it as she flies past me having retrieved it from where I have lobbed it for her into the heather.
So if you hear me and Nellie quite obviously in a little world of our own before a run and after, having entire 'conversations' with each other about how naughty tuggy is, how clever she is and how 'I'm gonna get him' and I laugh at her 'moomin' noises I'm not crazy. We are just playing and, nothing personal, but I have forgotten you are there listening anyway.
And no, I haven't lost a barge anywhere en route to the show...
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