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Oookay. Keeping things short is hard 🙁 Especially when it’s fun. But I was successful today. hah. I first did the tunnel and jumps again, but I still felt like he was pooping out before I got to more than just running around in the circle. So we stopped pretty quickly. And I feel like I still have to run up to the tunnel quite a bit to support it so he’ll go in, which makes it hard for me to get where I need to be for the blinds. But he had fun and loved the toy.
I haven’t worked. his teeter since I last posted, so today we only did two reps, one with me on each side. and he seemed to think that was fun and wanted more. 🙂
We also worked a little wobbly-plank (I always say that because of Professor Grubbly-Plank from Harry Potter lol). When he was a wee tot at his breeder’s, she had a puppy teeter out for the litter and he would ride it up and down, which was awesome. Though I would worry some of the puppies would be under the down end and get squished! Fortunately, that didn’t happen. 😛
All sounds good about the teeter. I haven’t trained it again since that last video. I may try a little bit this evening after it cools off, see how he does with just a couple reps with high-value treats!
I am loving running with him! I also think he has the potential to be really fast. I am hoping his shorter stride will make it a bit easier for me to handle him LOL. But his little legs seem to pump really quickly!
Oh yeah, I forget about the darn lotus ball. LOL. He’s getting good at getting the cookies out of it, so I can try that next time and see how he does. I really love how he’s running after the tug too! I put the tunnel in today. Did a couple of reps of the lazy game with treats. Then switched to the toy and was so glad he was able to switch to the toy and keep him engaged. I think he’s loving this game too. I tried a few circles and he seemed to love them even with a delayed reward. And at the end I tried to put some blinds in. I did realize I would need more room between the jumps to even get the blinds in, lol, so I moved the jumps out further. He seemed fine with the distance, what do you think?
Okay, so walking helped a lot LOL. I will admit my silliness! Keeping moving in the small area with the chairs in the way is actually a little bit difficult!
One of these days I’m going to have a dedicated agility yard so I don’t have to set everything up and do poop cleanup before I train every time. :p.
I still felt like my movement was pretty minimal, but I guess with Dreamer that’s all he needs. We only ran it these three times and I was really happy with how we both did!
I do need to look at some of the other little course popouts and see what we can do. I do plan on renting an agility yard next week though, that will expand what we can do. 🙂
That sounds good not doing the teeter too much! I’ll just do it two or three times a week, and only a couple of reps. We will both like that better. 🙂 I definitely don’t want to stress him out by pushing too hard. Thanks for that feedback, I will do those things!
I actually posted another post up there too, with two videos, one of the teeter and one more of the lazy game. Sorry, I posted twice in a row. :p
This evening I went out just for a couple of minutes and put the toy and running into the lazy game. It was just short and fun. And my husband walked out in the middle (you can see him in the garden) so Kaz had to go say hi, but he came right back. :). Since he still doesn’t have a wait it makes starting a big hard. :p
So maybe it’s not the sun and he’s just unsure about the height after all. :p I took Kaz out again this evening when it was cooler and tried to teeter again, and he still wants to jump off. So maybe I should give him a break tomorrow and work something else then go back to the teeter.
As for the long flat board game, I don’t actually have a long flat board that is as long as a dog walk plank. Would it be okay for me to lay the teeter flat and use that? It can lay completely flat and I can make it so it doesn’t move.
Thanks!
He did seem to like the lazy game! I did some more this morning and had him go over more jumps at once before the reward. I also went back and forth between sides, being super lazy, but he seemed fine with that. I wasn’t sure if I should just do one side then the other.
He is still searching for treats in the grass a little. I’m using string cheese, which is only semi-high value for him, but is more visible in the grass. Though he’s using his nose more. He still has zero stay, and he won’t bring a toy back to me yet. He is getting the idea that if he brings me a toy or ball it’s more fun ’cause I’ll play with him. But that is slow progress. :p. So I stuck with the cheese today. And I moved the jumps into the shade because I know he doesn’t like the sun…
As for the teeter, I left that in the sun, which was probably a mistake. He was jumping off again and going into the shade. And again he was better on the first side than the second side. I did smoosh some cheese onto the end of the teeter on a clip (the spoon idea is great too!), but I may need to go back to the liver treats since it’s higher value. I’m pushing the teeter over onto its side when we are not training, which is easy, and will keep him off it unless we are training. Though sometimes he seems like a teenager who isn’t sure about doing what I ask, then goes and does it on his own when he thinks no one is watching. LOL
Yeah He is such a baby boy. I’m thrilled he starting to run towards things and take them! He’ll be 11 months old in about a week. And it’s always interesting how different dogs learn and mature at different rates. I was teaching Dreamer 2×2 weaves at 13 months, and I don’t think I’ll be doing that with Kaz. I don’t think he’ll be ready when he’s only 13 months old.
Okay great I’m glad I did the right thing with the teeter. And today… he did great again! So yeah I agree it’s the icky picking up he didn’t like. When I have to pick him up for anything else, I don’t… I kneel down and encourage him to jump on my shoulder. I’ve been doing that in the breed ring too, for when I put him on the table, and he seems a lot more comfortable with that. I have probably said that before. 😀 It seems like he wants to make the choice of being carried. Which is fine, it might turn into a jump into my arms after an agility run too. I love doing that with Dreamer.
Sorry for the bad sunshine on the teeter video, didn’t realize it was that bad until after we worked it and I watched the video. I definitely need to get something to put the treat on on the end of the teeter. So that he knows that is where the cookie is. When I switched sides he jumped off a couple of times again, not sure why. But by the last rep he was running up for the cookie.
(And when I looked out the window later, he was definitely up there on his own checking it out again! Oops!)
The Lazy Game was a lot more fun than I thought it would be! And I think he did really great. I did push him over a jump at one point then thought maybe I should not have, and let him just go around like I did on the first rep of each side. I didn’t move the far jump out at all, but I think he was really starting to understand about going over each jump and getting his cheese.
Okay great it was enough challenge! For me, though, you probably mean. Not so much for him LOL.
I can forget where I’m going even on short little courses like this. This morning I removed the tunnel and put a jump in instead. I think it worked pretty well. Our First rep we got the whole thing, but his turn isn’t very tight from 6-7. I am probably not putting in enough decel, I think. And not cueing it soon enough. Even 3-4 is pretty wide.
In rep 2 I forgot where I was going, so definitely didn’t support the far jump nearly enough. :p Same for rep 3. Ooops.
Rep 4 I got it back together again. :). But he was still wide, and I’m pretty sure he knocked the last bar because of my poorly timed toy throw! 😀
He is a confident guy! Though I messed him up today on the teeter. Though I’m not sure if he was hesitating to go up because he fell off, or because I picked him up. I almost suspect it’s because I picked him up. He really doesn’t like being picked up, that’s why I’m trying to turn him around on the top and have him run down. So the first time today he ran right to the top, then lost his footing and fell off. The second time I picked him up at the top. Then he wasn’t so sure about going up again, so I did lure him a bit with freeze dried liver which is his favorite. I hope I did the right thing.
And I’m not quite doing the lazy game, but I will do that next time. I just tried running him through the tunnel with some jump uprights and then some jumps. He did great! This is really the first time this is coming together. He hasn’t been great at any kind of sequencing, but I’ve been working this tunnel with stanchions a little bit, and I think that’s clicking. So tomorrow I’ll try the lazy game where I stand and send him around, and just use the jumps pinwheel. 🙂
Thanks! I was also thinking I will need to block it so he can’t go party on his own. Lol. Though if I just block the end he still wants to jump on the side! So I may just have to put it away or lower it. I do love his enthusiasm!
Ok I tried the layering a little bit and I put the tunnel out, but I folded the ends down so he couldn’t go in. Which probably makes it not as challenging. :p Should I put a jump out there instead of a tunnel and layer that?
It was still a bit of a challenge and we didn’t get that far jump every time. And I put in a wrap around the first jump a couple of times at the start. 🙂
Ugh tails are so slow to heal. I did try to run him this weekend but he won’t weave, I’m assuming because his tail is hitting the poles as he weaves, so he keeps coming out. So I pulled him from the whole weekend. Four days. Ugh. But I want to give it a good amount of time to heal.
So… that said, I think I can still train as long as we don’t do weaves or tunnels. Nothing that he could hit his tail on. I’m still out of town, but will be looking through the exercises to see what we can do!
Thanks for the feedback! Unfortunately, we’ve had a thing happen and Dreamer now has stitches in his tail so can’t run for a while. *sigh* I hope he heals up quickly but tails are a pain.
>>>I think it is more about being reactive, meaning you are waiting to see what he will do before going to the next thing, rather than being proactive: seeing him lock onto a line then just leaving for the next thing. We will definitely be working on that this summer!<<<
yes, I definitely need help with this!
I’m a bit stressed with the tail stitches so I will read back more in a bit. 🙂
Thanks for the feedback! I appreciate the wisdom on why the bars are coming down. I am training at full height (16″) because my backyard is pretty soft, and I want to see how he handles these things at full height and if bars come down. And I don’t think I’m training him too much. 🙂
I will admit I’m not great at decel. For some reason, my brain has a hard time running fast and then slowing down. It’s like a very difficult try of walking and chewing gum at the same time for me. :p. I should probably go practice it without a dog. And sometimes, like if a tunnel is involved, Dreamer can ignore my decel anyway since he loves to extend!
When I went out and trained this morning (before I dropped him off at the vet to have his tail looked at under sedation), I really tried to think of starting my blind after 3 when he was taking off for 2. I think I did better! The tunnel isn’t in the right position because I had it out to train with Kaz yesterday, and I was too lazy to move it. :p But, since I was so proud of my blind, I wasn’t in the right position and he took the tunnel. LOL. I also put that off course jump out, and he didn’t seem to think about that much at all. But watching today, my timing and positioning still aren’t great. I’m still tending to be late in my cue or in the wrong position, which still causes him to take down bars.
So this is challenging for me, to be in the right positions, get my cues out at the right time, and do the decel. It taxes my brain!
And I don’t really trust him to take things without my supporting them. I think I should really take your counter-motion course and do it on my own. I never really realized how important counter motion is for a fast dog. I didn’t really need it for my slower shorter dogs when I was running them. However, I’m sure it will be a really good skill for Kaz to have too.
BAHAAHHA I didn’t even noticed he missed jump 2 until I watched the video again! Ooops!
When doing exercise 2, I moved the first jump a bit so it would set him up for a backside like you suggested. I did have to0 show him to turn left away from me, which took a bit of work. Then he took the back side, but would swing wide and not take the jump. So that whole session just ended up being… take jump 1, wrap to the left, take the backside then collect and turn over the jump for the toy. 😀
However, reading your feedback again, I still used too much arm on the backside and not much eye contact. He’s such an amazing boy, and he loves playing agility!
Oh my gosh how can it be 6 days since my last post? Gah time goes by too fast. :p
Thanks for the feedback! It all sounds good. I’m still working a lot in Max Pup 1… but he is still a puppy with an attention span of a knat. :p.He actually really really REALLY hates to be grabbed and held, even if I try to do it positively. I have been working on that in non-agility training sessions but it’s slow going.
I will do the little-bit-wet tunnels at home again in the future. And use higher-value rewards. He has a bit of a stubborn streak in him. :p
Today I dropped my mom off at the dentist and the agility barn is just 10 minutes away so I went there. Outside he thought it was hot again, and lots of grass to sniff, so he didn’t really want to come and engage with me. He would sniff and do his own independent thing even if I ran around, so I brought out the big guns… Dreamer! That got Kaz’s attention! I just did a little tunnels outside with them both, then I put Dreamer away and did a couple with Kaz by himself.
Then we moved inside because he really loves it inside and it’s a bit cooler, and there are a lot fewer distractions. We started with the little straight tunnel again with the MM and I think that went well. I can fade the MM but I was thinking just to do a little with food at first.
I put him away between these sessions and worked Dreamer so they would each get a break. I worked the barrel wraps a little and was thrilled he stayed with me and wanted to play. I’m keeping the training sessions super short.
Another short session of barrel wraps came after we just worked some middle to bring his energy level down again with food.
Then when I was going to leave, this is what I get. :p He does not want it to be over. And I am still trying to convince him that coming to me is Super Fun, but he’s not so sure. He doesn’t want to go into the crate and have the fun be over. Usually it’s my Kromis that are more stubborn!
