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I tried a bit more engaged chill. Upon reflecting on the footage, I really came at the affection like a wrecking ball and he needs more like a ping pong ball 🥲. He truly loves me, I promise. We cuddle and hug a lot in the home 😅. You are correct about the learning over too. This is carry over in training from Callie because she’s so little and loves it. He just tolerates it.
I think maybe just continuing to cue paws up and working from there. I did learn that cueing paws up looks a lot like cueing jump into my arms.
What would happen if he had his front feet on your thigh or stomach, and you maybe scratch his chest?
I really liked that all of your dogs did this. I probably could work with that but would have to cue it. Is that okay?
(you will have to fake your chill, but his will be real haha!!)
I appreciate your confidence that we can have chills
I tried the engaged chill. I’m not sure it’s ready to be called that but we tried. In the house, he’s my more chill dog. He’s usually found at my feet or in my lap. If I move rooms and sit down, he’s under my feet. In public where he’s not worried, he’s down on the floor in a relaxed position.
When we are in a competition environment or areas with other dogs, he doesn’t usually offer a down because he’s on high alert. I didn’t really know where to begin here.
He offered these downs and we just chilled. If he thinks work may happen, he’s not so big on pets or affection… although I’m adding it into frisbee so he can learn to tolerate it 😅I tried increasing my speed!
These are very hard for me. I feel like I’m the cause of the mistakes but also the verbals need to be great because I can’t always be perfect.
So we had a bobble on the first set of BS slices because I got so focused on my path relative to the bar that I rewarded way too early so the second time he didn’t feel the need for the jump.
I was out of place on the other side.
Enjoy me sorting out the wing because you said post turn or spin but no front cross. I imagine this is what scent work feels like to dogs. Mentally taxing 🤣I will probably move on to the serp drills next. I’m really happy with how he’s setting himself up for l and r. He really does better with those than I deserve.
haha you keep bring up this engaged chill that I keep avoiding because I personally have zero chill 🙂
Do you have a human version too? Is that called vodka?I posted like 1291341 posts at one time. Did you get a chance to see this one too? I tried a food toy.
I tried FOMO with Fever yesterday but didn’t film because it was a spur of the moment thing. I will describe it so accurately it will be like filming lol.
He for sure got excited, screaming and pulling on the leash. As soon as I brought him in, he struck his toy and did a drive by to the pool. He then picked up a toy in the yard and zoomied with it. It was a sheep toy-which must be killed. He then was able to work, still some passive thoughts about how great swimming is, but came back when called.
I think I have room to work with this. I probably should get him super vigorously tugging before coming off leash or transition directly to frizz and then agility.They are different words. Line up is in between my feet from behind and through is through my feet from the front to end up on my side
I didn’t mention what the third is. I pat my side and he comes in for a down. The down isn’t quite automatic yet but is the best starting position for him IMO.
I videoed all three. The pressure of me standing over him is a lot so we worked that a bit too.
Looking to the line up games, I have a few different things I’ve trained and wanted to know what would be best
He can line up in between my feet from behind- he offered this in my VOTR video and I left it in.
I often send him through- and can ask for a quick down or turn that into a slingshot pending his state at the time.
Should I continue to work all three or pick one?Fevs and I would like to congratulate CB Alexander on his flyball debut 🥳
I took out a food toy. Not sure if this is what you had in mind but it works!
Part 2.
Still doing this awkward spin because I have to walk and not focus on running 🙈
He decided the frizz was the superior toy for this session. I really like his effort and not flanking with the frizzer out.
Backsides without help are still a bit challenging but he’s getting it!I can jog tomorrow
Trick toolbox part 2
I went directly from verbals to this, which was probably too much but here’s a short food session.
Back and forth combos
Please note the footwear to prevent running. I did a little too much today and my face hurts but the red one needed training
I feel as though feedback on rehearsal will be given because I kept fucking up the wing wrap thinking so hard about the jump. Got it!Also my bar was locked in, he still knocked it.
He wasn’t super excited for this session but we had also played frizz about 6 different times today so he may have been a bit drained.
<blockquote?Does he bark on cue? If not… let’s train it. SUPER useful trick for engagement!!
I’m working on capturing this one. I think we will get it soon. I never train via capturing so it’s a slower processesMaybe try a friz toss! Have a friz stuff in your pants or something and it can come out in those moments. It is both a high value pairing AND it gets him out of the situation faster – it can be a short toss but he loves the friz so much I think he will be fine with that 🙂</blockquote)
This is an interesting idea. I will have to try. He sometimes won’t take his toy if he’s scare or barky lungy but we can always keep building.Looking at things behaviorally: the transitions are critical for him. When you are talking to the instructor, he is tugging for a long while then eating cookies for a long while… so he never really gets to relax and look around. His state of arousal drops in that moment, which is fine – but then you were sending him right back into the sequence, which directly correlated to the disconnections.
I adore seminars but the talking part worries me for him. I try to keep him engaged or put him back on leash. I will say something I need to work on is being less grabby when he disconnects. Because I don’t fully trust him around new dogs, I tend to overreact and am probably coming off intimidating. He’s had several opportunism around strange dogs who have even pushed him and he’s chosen to be a good boy so I need to work on my insecurity here.
Also… where is the friz? The presence of the friz totally helps increase arousal, so I highly recommend it during seminar work where the sessions are long.
Oh I must have not posted the video I though I had (facepalm). For his very first turn, I had a new frizz on a string for him that he really liked tugging outside of the ring on. I went to reward him with it the first turn and he was just like mehhhhh so I switched tugs and didn’t revisit it.
I need to also work on letting him take the toy not attached to mom in a seminar setting. I still don’t feel secure enough in that yet.When he screams with excitement while other dogs are running – how does he do if he runs next? Have you ever tried that?
I don’t think that I have recently. I also noticed at your seminar when you held him for me and I ran without a dog, he got very excited and screamed so it’s certainly something I should revisit. I had done FOMO in the past when he was younger with Callie and usually got the result that I needed in training.
At trials, he really just keeps oriented to me and doesn’t get as excited. It’s very interesting.>>He is somewhat of a target by other dogs- when I pull him out of his crate, often other dogs growl and lung as we walk by at their crates
When that happens, what do you do?If I know it’s coming, I will walk him with a cookie lure. If it’s unexpected, I give him food to or toss a cookie or just try to pet and console him. Sometimes he will get barky-lungy in response so we add distance, walk quickly and just crisis manage.
Does he tug on his leash?
He is not the best at this. I am working on building it, but he doesn’t love it. I’ve had to build it with Callie as well, so I think we can get there. He loves picking up things and bringing them to me, so I think we can get more value. He also loves tugging with me.
<blockquote?Ah, Xanax LOL! And PRN – as needed. Have you considered a daily pharm to balance his chemistry, in conjunction with the other stuff? The ‘better living through chemistry’ side of dog training is INCREDIBLE nowadays!
he gets xanax very infrequently- maybe less than once every other month. It often depends on storms or if there’s a firework holiday. The rex specs ear pros have been more of my default now and he does well with those
The clonidine is more frequent (not to be confused with clomicalm which is different). I’d say he gets that about 3-4 times per week if I’m training often or traveling. I do like the response it gives but it only lasts about 6 hours so for long days, I haven’t quite figured out the timing of the second dose. When we first considered meds, the behaviorist didn’t think he needed something daily (like an SSRI) but we have a follow up scheduled in April so I can discuss more at that time. I’ve seen a dramatic reduction in his general anxiety at home- he used to freak by all sorts of sounds and get stressed/shake and that’s exponentially better.
Before he was on the clonidine, I was fighting so hard for engagement and he was checking out so frequently. I felt like I was always paddling upstream. Now, I feel like a majority of our sessions go well with an occasional bugger session. I think he’s more resilient. We did have that big set back in September when he got chased but I think now that’s behind us.
