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Tracy,
I think you’re right. He probably was still a bit wiped out from all the excitement over the weekend. He was a rockstar at the mini jumping seminar at OTR. Then just being in and around the barn in Duluth was really hard for him. We did some great hikes for decompression each day but that was a lot of new places and people for his furry little puppy brain to process.
For the Find Em – keep the same weave alignment (all a smidge open) to add more motion and then circle back later closing some of them? We’re getting lots of heat, humidity and storms here so no idea if we’ll be doing any training at home until next week or not.
I checked with Lori about the leash during NFC and she was totally cool with it. She’s also on board with us doing casual walk bys of her and meeting her with lots of treats before she offically measures him later in the day. (Yay for entering the penultimate and last set of classes in the day!)
Find Em – 2×2 with Tunnel & Wings – 5/19/21
We had a meh session with nearly straight 6 poles on Monday where he started popping out when I tried moving more. I decided to switch to the Find Em today to try something different and he did amazingly well considering it suddently got hot and humid today. Each set of 2 was very slightly apart since I added in the tunnel & wings. Had a brainfart in the middle where I was thinking tunnel and had my shoulders open and kept moving forward for the tunnel but said poles. Whoops! I rewarded it when he ended up in the tunnel.Yesterday we did a mini jumping seminar back at that Barn in southern MN. In general he did really well playing with both his Frizzer and his Nemo and doing the short sequences at 12in (after the first on at 8in). Discovered that having the seminar presenter stand about 15ft away and off his line but partly facing him was way too much pressure for him to do a jump to a tunnel that would go by her about 6ft away. When she moved, he was able to start the sequence but shortly after his brains fell out and he left work to run over and jump on her and tried it again even when she moved further away and stood behind the ring barrier. Took a short decompression walk after that and he came back for a really good short rep. Then his focus tank went to empty for the last rep and he started leaving work to run over to the ring barrier and bark at people. I got him playing again in the back corner of the ring, did a tunnel to a jump to catch Nemo and called it quits. On the plus side, in all reps, he volunteered to stick his head through his harness at the end when I offered it and then got to catch Nemo again after being harnessed. I was also able to work with him around other attendees while we were waiting. He went from needing a fair amount of distance and treat scatters to getting much closer and being comforatble looking at them and then me for treats and generally acknowledging them without accosting them and re-focusing on me. We’re trying some NFC runs this weekend at Animal Inn (outdoors, fenced, lots of room to distance). I’m a bit concerned that he might fixate on someone (Lori Michaels who is judging or a ring steward) and completely lose it because it seems like it’s hard for him to break out of that when he falls into that rut. However there are a limited number of UKI & USDAA trials in fenced outdoor locations this summer so I wasnt’ about to pass up this one even if all we do is practice going in, doing tricks on and off leash, and then leashing up again to leave.
6 Nearly Straight – 5/13/21
Decided to go in the other direction so I didn’t try to chuck the frizzer into the neighbor’s yard again. Poles 3&4 are slightly offset. I had originally intended to straighten those out partway through the session, but we had a pop out when I added more motion on a harder entry and missed an entry on my right. I also accidentally rewarded a pop out around 1:15 (whoops). He’s thinking pretty hard on these so I decided to keep the middle set slightly offset.
Whad do you think of the idea of giving him a break on thinking about striding and circling back to the Find Em games with the offset poles that I skipped over to focus on striding? Or should I get to 6 straight poles first?In other news, he rocked his mini “speedy jumpers” seminar this afternoon at On the Run! (he’s been there a few times in the last 18 months but never had to do “real agility” there before. He gets to play on a practice jump and hang out in his 2nd barn this weekend while Min runs USDAA.
Full Teeter at class – 5/13/21
He did so well at the crazy elevator game at class (Including with some of my motion past the board) that I decided to throw in the full teeter. I think I can see a bit more of a weight shift this time.
6 poles almost straight – 5/11/21
Started out with the same arrangement (3&4 a smidge open and 5&6 a bit mroe) and used the PT -he nailed the entries with me running. Then moved 5&6 to almost straight and finally to straight. He slowed a bit to think about that but still did his weaves!
I’m getting better about keeping the frizzer in motion as he is exciting but it’s tricky because I don’t want to run him into the fence (it’s right behind the video camera). We narrowly averted disaster when the frizzer almost landed in the neighbor’s yard. Luckily it was a crappy throw so it arced back in to our yard before it dropped below the fence. (And that’s the main reason why I don’t do disc dog!)Merged Tracks – Full teeter – 5/10/21
Whoohoo! He nailed it and meatballs rained down from the sky.
Put him in a sit when I was setting up so he didn’t jump on when the board was up on the teach it. I tossed food as a reward for his release on the stationary elevator games and used raw food in a toppl for the crazy elevator game release reward. I caught the board high on one of the crazy elevators and he couldn’t control the landing so we had a bunch of treats and did a stationary elevator game followed by a crazy before we did the full teeter. I think he may have been a bit surprised that the board went all the way down but he seemed pretty happy about the meatballs and his crazy elevator after it looked good.Ah so the MM/PT just has a delayed reward for the last thing you did in the ring and the beep is the bridge. I’m not sure my PT beep gets loud enough for that to work well if there are people talking by the exit. Can you do this for a UKI NFC run where the food reward box isn’t an option?
Tracy –
So how do you use the MM/PT outside of the ring in an NFC run when the dog can’t leave the ring to get a reward?
JulieOMG! Laughing pretty hard at the AKC comment, but completely agree. Plus since he’s a bit sensitive to environment, I don’t want that tense AKC energy right now anyway. No worries. He’s not even AKC registered yet. His CKC registration got majorly held up due to Covid. I only just got it and havent’ gotten around to forking over the big bucks to AKC to transfer it.
So – he’s entered in 12s NFC for the MAC UKI trial in 2 weeks. I went back and forth on it and decided to enter because our area lost a lot of UKI trials due to Covid and he’s been to Animal Inn a few times last year so it’s not completely new. It’s also an outdoor fenced ring and he seems to like that better than indoors. I picked classes towards the end of the day so he has plenty of time to settle in and get out of his crate for multiple short play sessions before he has to go in the ring and Min is running earlier in the day so I can shift gears and just focus on Kaladin at the end of the day. We’re offering the food reward box, but I think my best plan is to bring Nemo in with me. I’ve also got some good USDAA opportunities in outdoor fenced rings this summer, but the next MN UKI trial is at the end of August in Duluth. I am thinking about trying a UKI at Lori Michaels’ place at the end of June, but inside in a new place is hard for him now so I’ll see how things progress. All of Think Pawsitive’s UKI trials are during local USDAA trials or the north central regional which landed out of the blue at Canine Sports Zone in late July. I do have him in a few more mini seminars in the next few weeks too and am keeping an eye out for more. 1 is back at the barn and another is at On the Run. He’s doing Jacque Hoye’s speedy jumpers seminar along with a bunch of masters level dogs! I told her he’s not doing weaves yet but he’s capable of running those courses as long as he’s comfortable in the environment.
2×2 – 6 poles and more running 5/9/21
Whoohoo! The Pet Tutor worked. Nailed all his entries and with me running ahead and with him. He did have to think about whether he wanted the frizzer reward after 2 sets of PT treats. (when he went over to the camera that was where I had stashed the PT out of the way – little goof!) Scrunched the 3rd set in a tiny bit more for the last few reps. Also started adding a bit more angle for the entries. Do you think 1 more session with poles like this (PT for the first one) and harder angles mixed in? Or go to 6 all nearly straight (well the first 2 are straight, but 3-6) and back off the motion and angles to see what he does?Recap of our barn adventure in the Teeter forum.
Crazy Elevator Game at the barn – 5/8/21
We had the opportunity to try another new teeter at the barn I took him to yesterday. It was better than a seminar – my friend’s new dog business was hosting the UKI virtual trial and there were only a few people signed up so perfect for me to bring Kaladin just to do some short sessions in a new place. (only downside is it’s an 1hr 40min drive each way – but a really nice barn!) It started out rough. He was carsick on the way down (which I thought he had outgrown, but apparently it’s back). When we got there he was overwhelmed by the new place and declining treats (I think more from the car-sickness than the new place). We hung out at a distance, walked around the field some and then he decided that Nemo was still magic in this place so we did a short session in the ring just playing goofy games with Nemo and then doing 2 tunnels when he looked comfortable. 2nd session he was really engaged with the games so we did some short sequences at 8in and he looked great. 3rd session we did sequences at 12in and he still looked good. (mash-up of the sequences is going up on my FB page later). Everyone cleared out of the barn (there is only a small waiting space inside) for his first session. The 2nd and 3rd there was normal conversation happening just outside the ring and 2 dogs waiting and Kaladin never got distracted by that (He can get distracted by classmates talking outside the ring in his regular class so this was great)4th session we got to play on the teeter which was rather loud hitting the dirt and rather boingy. I decided I should save the full teeter for our home turf so we took it easy on this one and used meatballs plus his raw food as the reward for releasing. I was really impressed with how he controlled the rebound and didn’t seem upset by it.
We’re back at the same barn for a mini seminar on the 18th so it will be interesting to see if he acclimates faster. Luckily the toy that is easiest to clean off dirt from is his favorite option!
We did weaves and went for a jog this morning so we’ll try the full teeter at home tomorrow. Plus – I’m busy dying my hair and the neighbors already thing I’m strange enough. Running around in my yard with a plastic bag on my head is not going to help that perception!
2x2s – 6 poles with more speed – 5/7/21
Same configuration with nearly straight 1-4 and slightly more open 5&6. He had lots of great entries with me running faster and ahead of him, but he missed the first 2 when I tried to run fast right from the start. He got that same entry later, but given the roughly 80% success rate, I feel like we need another session like this, but starting with the 1 o clock entry off my right as that is his favorite one compared to straight on our 11 o clock off my left. Today’s frizzer of choice was a soft sided 4MyMerles frizzer that can still roll well.I also discovered after this in our Nemo play time that while he is fabulous at not being distracted by a toy in my hand or pocket, we need to brush up on his “how to work with a toy on the ground” skills. His stalking/freezing behavior really went into overdrive and it was really hard to do a hand touch or a wing wrap if Nemo was innocently hanging out on the ground 10 feet away. I think I’ll start with having a frizzer on the ground while we do simple games and then work back up to Nemo on the ground.
Crazy Elevator Game with Tunnel – 5/6/21
Dragged the tunnel out of the basement and located my tunnel bags so we are in business! He seemed pretty happy with the high and low catches and with the pieces of meatball I was throwing back at him.2x2s – Adding 3rd set – 5/4/21
Left poles at the same configuration and worked on adding more motion. Once I stopped hitting divots in the yard, rolling the frizzer went well. He faked me out on one set where I tossed as he was missing the 3rd set – whoops! But I did succeed (inadvertently) in matching the toy to my fleece.5/4/21 – Plank to Pet Tutor
So glad you’re offering an extension!
I felt like we were spinning our wheels a bit so we took a break from RDW to focus on his weaves and teeter. Then I went back to using his Pet Tutor this morning. Not sure if it was the cool weather (about 50 this morning) or that he knew breakfast was coming up soon, or just that we needed a break, but he actually did a whole session with me stationary (or almost stationary) and no trotting! He launched the first one even with sitting right at the edge of the board, but then did all but one of the rest with some really nice running and rear leg separation.
5/10/21 – Plank on low 8in table
Previously when we tried propping up the plank a bit, I’d get trotting or complete launches, but I got a decent session last week on 5/5 where he didn’t trot or launch. Not all the hits had good separation but it was way better than earlier attempts. Then we tried it again today and voila!
