COMING ON CALL"
..or "the statue game"

THE METHOD I'M USING

It is extremely useful to have any animal come when it is called and this is true of llamas. I have found it particularly useful when trekking and allowing a llama to run off-lead. If I see a dog approaching, I call my loose llama in (often to the astonishment of the dog-owner!)

In training the llama to come, I feel that the food reward factor is important; I do not believe that it would be possible, in the first instance, to train a llama to come when called without a food reward. Others might disagree; I would be interested in their method. It is the association between arrival and something pleasurable that is the underpinning factor. I have tried to make the seven separate calls for each of the llamas phonetically different, whilst maintaining consistency of call for each llama, because my final aim is to have just the "called llama" respond.. and without reward! Maybe I'm being unrealistic!

 

 

 

HOW WE'RE DOING

The Story so far: The boys are better than the girls! All five boys know their call. I must confess that when I give an individual call I tend to get more than one llama respond, but I kid myself that this is the herding instinct!! Mary-Ann is beginning to come when called ( a year ago she would have run in the opposite direction!) Maggie has not responded yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sept 7th'08

RECENT NOTES ON PROGRESS

This is something I work on almost every day. I have to say that it is very difficult not to reward a llama that has galloped 200 yards in response to a call meant for another llama. But training sometimes means hard heartedness. Today I called David, using his call " Day Day David". And up got David and cantered towards me. But also came Dillon.. at the gallop. I declined to reward him, but eventually "found an excuse" to give him a treat by asking him to shake hands. Perhaps this was wrong? Maybe he's got the message that if he comes on David's call, he will be asked to do a simple task to get a reward.