[Tricia Lude]

Hi!

Here are a couple of days of work. Threadles and the serp bounce grid. We had some struggles😊

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Here are two sets of slices. We did one each direction on the first set up. Then, we did two directions where I made the angles more shallow. He had a five minute break in between while I worked Flurry. I kept in some of the rewarding and tugging before and after so you could see what was going on. I think he did really well!

I tried doing some serpentines from week four on my jumps near the house. I didn’t have any wings available. He does not like to do them without wings.😯

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi!

Here’s the serps on 1 and 2 jumps.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Yes, so, I understand the new step up. I’ll try today. If he’s bouncing the two jumps, should I add the third one back in on the next session tomorrow maybe?

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

So, this all makes sense. His grabbing stuff isn’t all operant yet for all situations, but I’ll take it as a good thing. Pat Miller had a dog, who it was hard for her to keep from picking up rocks. She got it to the point that Bonnie used rocks as a form of currency and brought them to her for treats, but at least she wouldn’t chew on them anymore.

Here are some reps from this evening on bends with Skye. He seems to need speed or more stimulation to bounce them. I have them at 3’. I was thinking he bounced on the way in, but that’s not always the case.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Here are Skye’s bend grids. Should he be bouncing these? I used his elephant:-)

I did these over the course of 45 minutes with trips to the expen or snuggle time, walking a path, or ball throwing. I left some of our expen exits for you to look at. At one point, near the last rep, he grabbed some mulch. I played a good long session of tug and chasing me.

One thing I worry about with him, which hasn’t happened yet with this, and I think the our plan is good, is he now eats stuff to get me to ask him to “drop” (which he does really, really, well.) so he gets attention or a cookie. When I think it is on one of those occasions, I ask him to do a few behaviors before giving him his cookie. I don’t want him to keep picking things up to get cookies. I have noticed on our walks, that he has looked at a leaf (he loves leaves!), reached down to grab it, and then stopped. I believe because on our walks, I always ask him to drop them. To me it looked like a trained behavior of “I pick up a leaf, and I drop” type of thing. I wish I could really know what is going through his head:-) The price I have to pay for such a lovely dog who loves every person and dog he has ever met.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

I alternated between Skye and Flurry on these. He had at least 5 minutes between each of these reps. On the second to last one, Flurry barked at him as I took him out of his expen which got him rattled. Of course, it’s the one time I waited two steps to play with him. Maybe he looked at her. She absolutely does not want any dog to have fun with me. So, The second I asked Skye to give me the toy, he grabbed leaves. I left the part in on how I handled it. The last rep he went behind my back. I’m pretty sure I was indicating where to go, but I wasn’t connected with him.

I feel like I have a hard time connecting with him because I have this freight train barreling down on me. When I can start adding some height to the jumps it might be better😊

No hurry though, don’t plan on leaving my house til at least January 🙂
Thanks for all your help.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Here are the tunnel exits for Skye. I alternated between Flurry and Skye. Slider and Flurry were in the expens barking which can cause Skye to get a little stressed. Before coming out of the expen, Skye gave me eye contact and then played with his toy all the way to the start of the sequence. One of the sequences I forgot to put the jumps down from Flurry and immediately after taking the jump and knocking the bar he initially grabbed his toy but then changed to mulch. I then had him do some tricks and tried the sequence again. It was too long for him. https://youtu.be/tiix1vt6hZo

I was looking at Denise Fenzi’s stages of engagement. It very similar to our plan here. a) Start off with him tugging/playing with me from car to start, b) start off with a step and then tug c) keep increasing amount of time from car to tugging…. all before he starts grabbing stuff.

Do you think there is something I could condition him to grab instead of just stuff. I know in search work, some dogs are taught to grab a fire hose type toy that is hanging from the handler’s belt to indicate they’ve found something. Could I train Skye to come grab a cord on my bait bag instead of dirt and rocks? Of course, this wouldn’t work for in the agility ring . .. He needs a mouth occupier, maybe having a cord/fire hose thing from his harness or end of his leash to grab. Or, maybe a leash that he can tug on. He could just turn and grab the leash instead of stuff off the ground.

This is quite the interesting challenge. He’s such a lovely dog. I haven’t had a dog that loved every dog he met for a very very long time.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

I’ve been working on the 1,2,3 jump game a little each day. I’m having a problem with him running into me on the front crosses on the 1 jump. If I do it on the 2 jumps he does fine. I also had a problem with him skipping the 2nd jump when I tried to do 3 jumps. I probably lost connection:-) I don’t think I was looking at him.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

I did the grid with his elephant. 😁. The last two are at 18’. I was waving his elephant and he only took one stride. Yay! So he needs more motivation to put more energy into it.

He grabs paper and rips it up and then eats it. I kind of remember get it right the first time. I’ll need a refresher though😊. I think giving him an alternative behavior is a great idea. I’ll work on figuring that out. Thanks.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Here’s grid work from yesterday. https://youtu.be/4tUC1W4l32I

I just tried it again today, and he went around the last jump. If I’m right on the video, he started double striding. Today, I only did 3 reps at 15 feet. He went around on the first attempt, on the second attempt he double strided and started to eat stuff. On the third attempt, he was eating stuff at the start line. Obviously, he is a little stressed or confused about this. I could do this with his Outfox on so I don’t have to worry about him eating stuf and use a ball as his toy. When he starts grabbing things I get a little anxious.

I’m doing the Crazy Commitment stuff with him too, and when I got the MM out he started eating stuff. He wants to be right and tries really hard to be right. If he’s not, he starts eating stuff. I almost wish he’d bark instead. Eating stuff can be dangerous. Barking is just annoying:-)

On a tangent type question, (hope you don’t mind.) you know he has this grabbing of stuff issue. He’s on medication hopefully short term (less than a year) to work through this. It has really helped, but he has an extreme fetish for paper and wood. He sees or smells paper, and he has to get it. He grabbed the whole stack of paper out of my printer! This is in addition to taking papers off of desks, counters, coffee tables etc. We try to manage what’s accessible, but not always 100%. What do you suggest I do to work him out of this? I was thinking of the It’s your choice games with paper as the distraction. I’ve tried that, and it works for the duration of the training but doesn’t seem to carry over to real life well. Maybe I just haven’t given it enough chance. I would love to, at some point in his life, not have him have to where his Outfox outside, but that’s a whole other issue.

Any suggestions you have would be appreciated.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Here are our Progressive Grids. This is his first three attempts. We only did three passes today.

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

So totally agree with everything you said!

It turns out he didn’t eat his dinner last night. He hasn’t been eating well all week. This morning he had a very stinky poo and a little weird, and now he’s eating like a champ! So, this video is when he was a little under the weather too.

I keep forgetting that he likes toys better than food. He’s an Aussie!! What’s with that! All my other Aussies would kill for the Manners Minder:-) So, this time for the decelerations, I used the MM as the distraction. He didn’t even want to eat out of it. (Could be a little of his tummy issue too.)

Boy, I sure do talk a lot on the threads. For just going around one wing, there’s a lot of words going on there. This one is better I think though he doesn’t seem to understand threadles. Could be me. Flurry doesn’t get them well either. I’ve been practicing this with her too.

Thanks so much for all your help,

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Sorry this is so long. I didn’t take out some of the transitions because I wanted you see want went on, especially on the threadles where I used a MM. when he gets stressed he starts eating stuff. He was great when he was turning right, but not on he was on my left. I’m not sure if I had my feet going correctly. I tried using my off arm like I do with Flurry. Not sure this is the best. I’m facing the jump.

The wraps and go went well, but the go was not good when he was on my left.

We need help with the deceleration.

Thanks!

Tricia

[Tricia Lude]

Hi,

Here are some rear crosses. I couldn’t get the jumps spread out far enough with where I had my tunnel placed. My timing was off, and Skye got rewarded for going around jumps😳. But, I think there was at least one that worked well. I think I need to stay further back when he was in the tunnel so he would be farther ahead of me. Plus, I use a low gravely voice with him. Why! I should just use a normal voice.

It was VERY windy😊

Tricia

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