Some of you might remember my troubles with remote control cars...I actually had to buy one and desensitise Charlie to it in order to stop him dashing off to jump on them in the parks and Common. I had great fun learning to drive a remote controlled truck. Anyway, today Charlie dashed off at super sonic speed - I thought "I know that look" so quickly recalled him (he ran around a corner and I couldn't see what was the big distraction). It was a drone - and remote controlled plane! Arghhh......dog hastily put on lead. Charlie was a billion times calmer than he used to be meeting new toys, and I was pleased with him (you might not think his performance is impressive, but if you only saw the lunging out of control disgrace he used to be when meeting things like this, you'd understand why I am pleased). I walked up to the guy (he had put his plane away) and chatted to him - he said that the plane uses sonar to bounce signals off the ground to detect how high it is etc. and dogs can hear this, it's within their hearing range, and that's why they are so very interesting to dogs. Very interesting indeed. Although since Charlie would react about the same way to kite, I'm not altogether convinced his interest was in the sonar. plane by Julie T, on Flickr
Oh no! Hope we don't get them round here as kites are very exciting, so a drone even more so. I have a friend with a Collie who chases jet planes across the common until she is out of sight!
Luckily we're not interested in kites despite our local farmer flying absolutely huge ones in his fields . Bit worrying though that the latest "in" toy uses sonar which dogs can hear but we can't - something else to keep an eye out for when walking in parks etc.
Although they seem to have fallen out of favour Hot Air Balloons set dogs off. They don't even need to be audible. You could chart the balloons progress across the area as the frantic barking erupted. My husband is a keen aero modler, spends much of the winter in a freezing garage building ready for the summer. He is very careful NOT to fly them when there are dogs around, doesn't want them returning to him in kit form OH tells that Amazon are considering delivering goods with drones (they can be very accurately programmed using GPS) perhaps Charlie was practicing for when his food and goodies are delivered by drone
Fab, fab, fab. Thanks for mentioning this, @Mollly - I'll definitely continue with the drone desensitisation - drones will be the new postmen for dogs! "Don't bark at the drone, Fido!". http://www.amazon.com/b?node=8037720011
Believe Amazon drones will be able to find my house when GPS says it doesn't exist . My DPD driver on the other hand finds me with no problem because he uses his brain as well as GPS
