2021 John Mallon Clinic

Never look into a her eyes. Direct eye contact to a llama is naturally an aggressive form of communication. Instead, I learned to keep my eyes on her nose. When he moved into the round pen, a small 10x10 area, with his first subject, he communicated the importance of waiting for the right moments to mark. John said, "90% of time spent training is waiting for the opportunity to reward the animal." I thought back to the ways I'd used food to reward my llamas while clicker training. He spoke adamantly against using food as a reward, and he sited the way llamas interact with each other in nature.

He explained that mothers never directly hand over feed to their cria. Instead, the transferance of food from one llama to another is actually the yielding of power. So each time I used to reward/feed my llama, I communicated a loss of dominance each time. John explained the use of food to reward or communicate praise is better suited for predatory animals, like dogs. For llamas, however, Mallon emphasized reward enough for the llama is the release of pressure.

In the round pen, John turned to face the llama. It looked off toward the livestock trailers housing other llamas. He put upon her some pressure by walking toward her. Subsequently, she sensed the pressure and turned to face John. As a reward, John turned his back to her and walked to the other side of the pen. Release of pressure.

John spent time progressing each llama that others brought to him from their trailers. He gained their attention, he progressed to letting him approach them, he facilitated the trust of the llama needed for him to touch and pet them. I watched him act assertively, not by sneaking up to get a chance to swipe his hand across their backs, but by making his intention known, carrying out the plan, and then releasing the pressure within a span of seconds.

After a long day of watching and learning, I decided to put my newly learned skills to work on Vetta and Lada, separately. The work Niki had done with them prior to the clinic helped, and I marveled at the way those girls responded so positively and quickly to the "release of pressure" reward. Within just 5 releases, Lada understood my intentions, turned to face me directly in the middle of the round pen, and then held her position while she not only let me approach her, but pet her, too. Vetta, about one month older and with a bit more training by Niki using the Mallon techniques, also allowed me to brush her, unhaltered and unrestrained, in the middle of the roundpen.