[NAGDU] backtracking Some Questions About Guiding Eyes

caota4 at gmail.com caota4 at gmail.com
Wed Jul 31 02:51:53 UTC 2019 

Thanks for sharing, Rox, I like your story, too! I think the dogs sense when
we need help like in your situation with convention and being tired and
done.

Charlene
walking somewhere and turn right around to go back, the dogs sometimes do

-----Original Message-----
From: NAGDU <nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Rox Homstad via NAGDU
Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 2019 7:00 PM
To: NAGDU Mailing List, the National Association of Guide Dog Users
<nagdu at nfbnet.org>
Cc: Rox Homstad <pawpower4me at gmail.com>
Subject: Re: [NAGDU] backtracking Some Questions About Guiding Eyes

I loved the story about Irish. Another list member said earlier that back
tracking is a hard skill to teach and is not seen frequently, and I'm going
to have to disagree. I just finished training my 7th dog, and all of them
whether from a program or owner trained have been expected to be able to do
this, and all of them have. Maybe my dogs just feel sorry for me because i'm
extra helpless, lol.
My favorite story of this kind was a couple years ago when I was at NFB
national convention and a friend of mine and I were in the convention center
area on one of the first days and it was the first time I'd ever been to
this hotel. We were both super hungry and tired and just ready to be done,
and we were both super lost so I just looked at soleil and said "find the
way" which is my more Jeddie way of saying I'm lost please figure it out!
And my friend held on to my backpack and Soleil guided us in and around the
crowd, stopped at the escalator and then again at the starbucks because she
knows me far, far to well, and then to the bellstand so we could call our
taxi. 
I have never been more proud of her than I was that day. 

Rox'E and the Kitchen Bitches
Soleil, Rowan, Phoenix
pawpower4me at gmail.com

> On Jul 30, 2019, at 6:37 PM, Charlene Ota via NAGDU <nagdu at nfbnet.org>
wrote:
> 
> Irish was pretty good about reversing routes, one time in particular 
> that boy really saved my bacon!  We had to go to a dinner in a 
> building downtown Honolulu in the evening. That building is a real 
> maize and it was pretty much deserted. I got assistance going into 
> where the restaurant was from the paratransit driver but when the 
> dinner was done, none of the other people at dinner had any idea how 
> to get down to the main floor and out to the street, they had all come 
> in their cars and parked in the parking area next to the restaurant. 
> Nobody seemed to know how to get out and my paratransit ride was 
> waiting for me. I told the driver to please wait because it might take 
> me a while to get out as I might get lost.  Well, I told Irish forward 
> and he wanted to go the opposite way I would have gone and we started 
> out on our way and I kept telling him to go find the lift (being the 
> Ausie boy that he was, he knew lift rather than elevator). He would 
> come to a turn and kind of look up at me and I'd tell him to go and 
> he'd take the turns and sure enough, allof a sudden I felt his tail 
> wagging and there was the elevator and after we got down to the main 
> floor he made a dash for the exit, too, and we got out and found our 
> ride home!  I was never so glad to get in that taxi to go home!  It 
> was so deserted and downtown Honolulu isn't where you want to be in the
later evening, either. Needless to say my boy got a big hug from me!
> 
> I would say that backtracing is something that you can develop with 
> your dog, using encouragement and a lot of praise when they show you 
> landmarks or indicate remembering turns and things. It's just 
> important to keep a good balance so the dog still knows they need to 
> follow your direction if you don't want to actually reverse the route 
> or maybe just want to pass a place they remember.
> 
> Charlene
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: NAGDU <nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Lisa Belville via 
> NAGDU
> Sent: Tuesday, July 30, 2019 12:34 PM
> To: Tracy Carcione via NAGDU <nagdu at nfbnet.org>
> Cc: Lisa Belville <missktlab1217 at frontier.com>
> Subject: Re: [NAGDU] Some Questions About Guiding Eyes
> 
> Tracey, this is what I thought backtracking was, too.?? I've also 
> heard it called reversing a route, i.e. you go someplace using mostly 
> right turns and the route back uses left turns.?? Some dogs find it 
> boring, especially ones with more initiative.?? Still, there are times 
> when this is the way I want to go.?? It could be for safety reasons 
> such as construction work or me just being too hot/tired.
> 
> 
> I wouldn't want a school telling me this is something I shouldn't be 
> doing with my dogs.?? IMO if someone doesn't use backtracking often 
> there's no harm in doing it occasionally.?????? I'd be interested to 
> hear GEB's reasoning for this policy.
> 
> 
> Lisa
> 
> 
> Lisa Belville
> missktlab1217 at frontier.com
> 
>> On 7/30/2019 12:19 PM, Tracy Carcione via NAGDU wrote:
>> What I call backtracking is when the dog can reverse a path, without 
>> too much input from me.  I had one dog who was really good at it.  If 
>> we'd go hiking, say, then decide after a while we wanted to go back 
>> the way we'd come, I'd turn her around, tell her Forward, and she'd 
>> remember where we turned and go back to where we started.  Pretty 
>> handy.  But not all dogs can do it well.  For me, it's a nice extra, 
>> but
> by no means a must-have.
>> Others may feel differently.
>> Tracy
>> 
>>> Hmm, what do you mean by backtracking?
>>> 
>>>> On 7/29/19, Jordan Gallacher via NAGDU <nagdu at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>>>> From what I was told when I had my home visit from Guiding Eyes, 
>>>> they do have mandatory follow ups, and the following is what ended 
>>>> up me taking them off the list.  They absolutely do not want you 
>>>> doing any back tracking nor do they want their dogs doing anything 
>>>> but really simple street crossings.
>>>> 
>>>> Jordan
>>>> 
>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>> From: NAGDU <nagdu-bounces at nfbnet.org> On Behalf Of Danielle Ledet 
>>>> via NAGDU
>>>> Sent: Monday, July 29, 2019 9:48 PM
>>>> To: nagdu at nfbnet.org
>>>> Cc: Danielle Ledet <singingmywayin at gmail.com>
>>>> Subject: [NAGDU] Some Questions About Guiding Eyes
>>>> 
>>>> Hey yall,
>>>> I am considering strongly putting in my application for Guiding Eyes.
>>>> How long do retrains have to stay? And, do they have mandatory 
>>>> yearly followup visits? That's all for now, but do share your 
>>>> experiences with the school for training and after you and your dog 
>>>> have been working for awhile.
>>>> Positives? Negatives? Thanks you guys!
>>>> 
>>>> I met a Guiding Eyes dog and was very impressed with the 
>>>> responsiveness even when not in harness. I prefer my dogs to be 
>>>> seroius when working and not be easily distracted. This was a dog 
>>>> fresh out of training and all of 2 years old.
>>>> 
>>>> --
>>>> How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, 
>>>> compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and 
>>>> tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you 
>>>> will have been all of these.
>>>> George Washington Carver
>>>> Email: singingmywayin at gmail.com
>>>> 
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>>> 
>>> --
>>> How far you go in life depends on your being tender with the young, 
>>> compassionate with the aged, sympathetic with the striving and 
>>> tolerant of the weak and strong. Because someday in your life you 
>>> will have been all of these.
>>> George Washington Carver
>>> Email: singingmywayin at gmail.com
>>> 
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>> 
>> 
>> 
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> 
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