So a flyball teammate of mine has a new BC, a rescue, maybe a year old.
Skinny, spazzy, typical in every way except he has next to no ball
drive. Toss him a tennis ball and he'll either duck, or let it bounce
off his skull. Kinda makes my heart sink. Flyball can be taught as a
straight up retrieving game but it's a lot easier if the dog loves
balls. And this guy doesn't. Maybe it'll come, as he settles in and
settles down.

Meanwhile, we were working on blind runs - just having him run down the
jump lane, turn around and run back. And this dog is a major Mama's
boy. And Mama can't be at both ends of the lane. So after several
abortive efforts to lure him to me with treats, balls, verbal praise and
tug toys, on a hunch I ran and got Scully's motivator, a rubber t-rex
hand puppet. Put it on, held my hand out where he could see it, opened
its jaws. His ears came up, he cocked his head and when his handler
sent him he came on the run to investigate.

We had a great session of, "I'm gonna bite your toes", I took the puppet
off and sat on it and he ran back to his mom. Lather, rinse, repeat.
So this evening Flip's handler is going to be searching e-bay for a
rubber Jurassic Park t-rex hand puppet, circa 1993.

I'd have given it to her if Scully wasn't so attached to it. Zane likes
it, too, but you don't actually want to have your hand inside the thing
when he's around. It gives Cooper and Tilt (both jrts) the heebie
jeebies, and they'll scream if you open its mouth at them, which
actually strikes me as the more normal reaction. I guess it's a border
collie thing.

*So after several
abortive efforts to lure him to me with treats, balls, verbal praise and
tug toys, on a hunch I ran and got Scully's motivator, a rubber t-rex
hand puppet. *Put it on, held my hand out where he could see it, opened
its jaws. *His ears came up, he cocked his head and when his handler
sent him he came on the run to investigate.

Our ACD is ball motivated, but we've also done something similar using
stuffed toys. Now granted, he's more than willing to persue and hunt
down stuffed toys on their own, but if you hold the body of the
stuffed toy in one hand, and use the other to grasp the back of the
head to make lifelike movements (turns, tilts, etc.) relative to the
body, he loses it completely and Must Have It. It's like a direct
short circuit into his prey drive...

I also would not want to have my hand inside any puppet with him
around.
--Glenn Lyford