[Kathy McClung]

Hi!

>That reminds me of another lotus-ball-alternative, called the clam: less velcro, easy to throw, very easy to open with mouth or feet:>
PURCHASED!!! Thank you!

Thanks for the great feedback. Especially this – I never would have considered that. I’ll figure out a different location.

>The weirdness gauntlet was interesting! He definitely noticed the thing, and stopped moving: I wonder if he was waiting for further instructions, because it was in his training area? He did not seem to be worried about it or surprised, so it is possible that freeze moment when he did not immediately follow you was him asking if you were going to shape behavior on the object LOL! You can definitely try this in other places that are not associated with training, and see how he feels about it 🙂>

We tried our last 2 games today. I was scared to try them because I thought he may not be ready but he really impressed me.

Lateral Startline Baby Level

I did a lot of “catches” I left them in in case you wanted to see how he did on that part. Fast forward if not. hee hee hee

Strike a Pose in Motion – Countermotion Serp Exits

I cut out many of the “catches” on this one. This session was right after the Lateral startline so he was pretty warmed up on cacthes and I did less here.
One side was easy and the other side was really hard for him. I re-introdiced him to the treat hugger toy. He was not into it the first time I showed it to him a while back but I spent a little time showing him how it worked and he liked it! Yay!
I learned more watching your video for this game, this time around vs when I watched it for Bazinga’s class. I think I may not completely undertand the final moves. I’m trying to wrap my head around them. Frankie loves serps but we always did the 3 jump serp from the same side. She is awesome at it, but I think I’d like to have more flexibility with Lew & Bazinga. I’m getting the Backside Serp description from your “final product” clips ( think), but I’m having trouble visualizing the “handler & dog on the takeoff side of the jump at the same time” in a final scenario. I’m sorry if I’m slow!

Thank you so much for an amazing class! I can’t believe little Lew has completed his first MaxPup
class! ❤️ He really, really impressed me here. I wasn’t sure what to expect but he surprised me at every turn. We’ve really bonded and he is thirsty to play these games. I wish you could see the way his eyes change when he thinks we are going to play! He loves it.
See you in MP2!!!!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

I’ve been working on his startline stay and adding “breaks” to it. I wanted him to be ready for the Decel game because he hasn’t done them in front of a jump yet. We gave it a try though! I think he did really well. He did get up a few times but I made it easier for a few reps after that. He was not sure what I wanted at the wing but he was getting more confident toawrds the end.

I probably should not be placing the treats on the ground for the parallel path but it is so hard for him to find them in the grass. I saw a toy that was like a lotus ball but called “the pill” It looks like it has less velcro, I’m going to see if they have small ones and see if I can teach him to use it for thrown treats.

I really wanted to do the Weirdness Gauntlet with Lew before class ended! We finally did it. I used something new but not too big – a paper towel holder. I put the girls in another room and Lew & I went outside & came back in and walked theough the house. He didn’t want to walk ahead of me. (He is used to following Bazinga everywhere, I think) so I walked ahead and then he came through the room with the object. I’m curious to hear what you think. YouTube would only let me save the video as a “short” I guess maybe if it is under 30 seconds they do that.

Thanks so much!!!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi!

Thanks for the great feedback! we’ll keep working these games. I have to remember the connection on the rocking horses. I am hoping the heatwave breaks so we can work outside & have more room.

>You can also shake the threadle/serp hand a bit to give him more of a focal point, especially when he can see you between the uprights.>

Thank you for this! Brilliant.

>He seemed to think the mini jump bars were things to NOT be touched, so he looked like a rodeo dog there as he went over them LOL!! But he was bouncing the distances really well and did not seem as concerned about touching them by the end LOL! >

I had not notived this so I went back & watched. He was every bouncy!

We did another session of Happy Stays and I introduced him to “break” tonight! He liked that!
No video – just an update 🙂

Here is what we worked on tonight. I wanted to do the volume dial with the leash and introduce the “break” before we try the lateral startline game.

Volume Dial – with a leash

Turn & Burn on a Wing!
I was surpised he offered it but oh, so excited about it! I tried a toy but h was really on the treats, so I tossed him a treat after he chased the toy.

Thanks so much!!!
Hope you have a fun holiday weekend!
Boooo to fireworks! Can’t they just make them silent & pretty?

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

>If he is sensitive to sitting on different surfaces like wet grass or pokey grass or dirt, you can also work a stay in a stand position: I add a stay verbal to the sit position (you might already be doing this, it was hard to hear). Then when he is standing, use the stay verbal and move away, then reward pretty quickly. It is surprisingly easy to get a stand stay and it can take out any of the ‘ick’ about sitting on weird surfaces>

Thanks for this note! I will work on the stand stay too. Bazinga has it but it developed by accident. When we are warming up outside the ring, she can sit between my legs, when we are very close to the ring and she is up in a few dogs, she can’t sit anymore. So I let her stand. Now that I am examining it, I don’t even ask her for the sit, I just say “middle, middle” to take her position and then say “wait”.

>Yes, the spins were right (you asked if they were right on the video :)) Great job really emphasizing the connection.>
Hahahaha! Thank you for answering my question!!! I am spin-phobic, I never think it feels right!

>Do you have a cool coat for him (and for the Bostons?) It is a good thing to add to his routine at this stage.>

Yes, he inherited Frankie’s because she hates wearing anything. I found her a cool blanket instead. You wet it like a cool coat & put it in their crate. She loves that. She can bunch it up & move it if she gets cold and usually just puts half her body on it. I wondered if a cool coat helps coated breeds but it seems like they do.

We had the air conditioning cranking & Lew was wild tonight!

We revisited the Strike a Pose Serps & Threadles since our last session didn’t have the best mechanics for treat delivery. I had an idea and dug out my little “click & treat” single treat dispenser from clip&go. You have to eload it each time, but it was worth it! It is the perfect size for Lew. and I can put sticky treats like hot dogs & steak in there! He was super excited about it. I think he was getting the hang of coming in & going out by the end. He needed me to pull out the target and then he remembered the game better.

Strike a Pose – serps & threadles revisited

We did the Rocking Horses inside & cold! I think the barrels were a bit further apart than they were in our outside session. He definitely likes this game.

Rocking Horses with spins & racetrack

We added the prop & the volume dial game to Happy Stays
He did a good job working when he was amped up. I forgot to do breaks!! I haven’t really whipped that on him yet. We did get one rep where he stood after the sit, so I said “catch” and treated him before he could move.

We also revisited the Minny Pinny to see how his right turns looked. He was amped up!
I was laughing the whole time.

Thanks for watching! We are going to try & catch up some this week. I actually have a 5 day weekend! 🙂
We really need to revisit the tunnel games. The last time we did them, he was not in to the manners minder but maybe the other treat dispenser will be more fun for him.

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

We’ll definitely do another session of the Minny Pinny and see how his right turns go!
We’ve just been working some of the quiet stuff like the sit stays and find my face. We have a lot of catching up to do. We did a few short sessions this morning!

Parallel Path
We revisited the parallel path game and I tried to get some good lateral distance.
I edited out the very long “finding of the treats” from each rep.

Happy Stays
We moved the happy stays from inside to outside. It was harder for him to sit outside but he warmed up to the idea as we went along. I need to start working on the Happy Stays challenge & adding the break cue but I wanted to do a session outside the house first.

Find My Face
This is his second session of Find My Face. The first one we did inside and this one is outside.

Rocking Horses 2
It was cool enough to try this outside. He was very excited to play at first 🙂

Thanks for your feedback!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi! I hope you had an amazing Birthday Weekend & are still celebrating!!!
I really think they should be birthday-months.

We did another session of the minny pinny. We added the dowels, the verbals and tried to eliminate the hand movement. You’ll see the harness holds – hahaha

Thank you for the feedback.

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

The rugs have really allowed us to play inside which has been great with the heat of summer.

>That might be the trickiest part (figuring out what to use as bars). Regular jump bars might be too thick for this game? So maybe weave poles if they are slimmer than the bars.>

We did a short session of the Minny Pinny again and added verbals. I wasn’t sure what to use for bars. Did you mean to try & find something that isn’t very high for him to jump over or short so they fit in my tiny room?

I have some dowels that I was using for cavaletti. They are a small diameter. Or I can take apart a jump & use 3 foot long pvc bars. I think it is 3/4 inch pvc so it’s not very “tall”

We did our first session of the volume dial game! We need more tricks!

Thanks so much!
Have a fun weekend!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi!
Thanks for the feedback. I’m looking forward to giving these another round & seeing what he does. ☺

We did an indoor minny pinny to avoid the heat! I was pretty impressed with his sending. We just did the baby level. I started with treats and did some with a toy. It took him a minute to get excited about the toy and then he got really excited about it – but he wants his treat for his out – hahaha.

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

>But for the American-style threadle and AKC premier threadles, the off-hand is used more (the lines are very different and a lot less intuitive to the dog). And for those classic Premier threadles (where the jumps are set up like a serpentine and the dogs come through the gap), the off hand is very helpful and I also use foot rotation on those!>

Thank you for the description – I get it now, it makes sense!

Thanks for the help with my mechanics on the tight turns game. It was helpful to watch the reps you pointed out. We gave it another try. Lew was driving around the pole much better by the end. Not sure my mechanics got much better but he did in spite of me!

We did the Backside Slice Foundation game! He did so good!!!!
Towards the end, I stopped backing up & he was pausing before coming over the bar. I’ll keep moving next time.
Funny story, I started with Bazinga and Frankie on this one for rainy day fun and watched your video so many times that I did their turns saying “back, back” instead of our “push” verbal. LOL I guess my body cues worked!

Baby Chin does Threadle Wrap Barrel game!!! Eeeek!

We did another round of the Shpile game and I wilded him up with a toy and he was much wilder jumping around the pile. I could see him working to control his body when it felt out of control. I messed up the video though 🙁

I want to revisit the baby tunnel games with him the last time we did it, he was not really driving to the tunnel. Maybe if the manners minder is more valuable to him now, it will help.

Thank you! Hope you are having a great weekend!

• This reply was modified 1 month, 2 weeks ago by Kathy McClung.
• This reply was modified 1 month, 2 weeks ago by Kathy McClung.

[Kathy McClung]

Hi!

We are slacking but got back to some games!

We did the Shipile game & Lew thought it was awesome! I really thought he would be afraid of heights but I am learning that the saying that Chin are catlike is pretty literal and he really seems to like to climb up high.

We tried the Tight Turns & Leading with the Head 360 game and it was very hard…for ME!
I am having a hard time figuring out where I should be, where the pole is and where Lew should be. I couldn’t quite understand how to put the magic cookie hand turn away into the mix with my mechanics.

We did the Strike a Pose Threadle Slices and I think he did really good. He needed more help moving towards the manners minder than he did moving towards my hand. Yay Lew!

I have a question about the progression of this one. When we start alternating Threadles & Serps, if I am doing a cookie toos to start, do I just say nothing for the Serp since I’m not asking him to “break” from a stay?

Also, you know that I’m going to be one of those people that asks about the alternate off-hand position. When would you need that vs the other hand?

Thanks for the help!!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!

If I am getting too far ahead, that actually makes me feel better because I am so worried about getting ahead of her at a trial because she is so fast. I know distance & commitment are going to be my friend. I think these distances are a little closer than they would be in a trial so I hope her commitment will be there in that environment. These exercises are great practice!

>but you can also start the blind when you see the blur exit the tunnel, so it is a little earlier to show her the new connection.>🤣😂🤣 “look for the blur”

We tried again. I flipped the course to try & make it new to her again. I tried to stay moving and see her commitment better so I could be early.

• This reply was modified 1 month, 3 weeks ago by Kathy McClung.

[Kathy McClung]

We tried the advanced 2 jump games!!!
I see her having to swerve to get around me, am I too far over the mouseline?
Or do I need more room between the 2 jumps? I think I can spread it out a little more.
I broke the games up into a morning & evening session. I think she got hot in the evening because she was pulling off the tunnel and the jump after the tunnel so we rested and then did the last rep that you see on the video.
Morning session

evening session

Thanks so much!

[Kathy McClung]

Good morning!
We did another session of the Strike a Pose Serp game. I think he was more confident this session.
He had a few hiccups where he wanted to come around the jump on the hardest position, but he thought it through.
I added an empty bowl and got him used to it instead of taking a treat from my hand. I made the mistake of just giving him a treat in the bowl for no reason & then he bowl visited for one rep but he got it back together after that.

He was doing his extra credit mat work last night & had fun! We have catching up in here to do though!
Thank you!

[Kathy McClung]

Lew is back in the game & he was MAD that he wasn’t getting to play games! LOL

We are still working on week 6 & 7 but we have been working on the startline stays and reinforcement game here & there.

This is our second Get Out session. I had trouble getting him to come to me on the contrast reps!

This is our second Strike a Pose (Serps) session

Thank you!

[Kathy McClung]

Hi Tracy!
We tried the 2 jump game. I broke it up into 2 clips. The first one the jumps are aligned and the second one, I moved the 2nd jump out twice. I’m not sure I moved it out far enough. It was interesting. Things were going smoothly & it made me question if I was doing it right…but I think we are actually getting it!!! Eeeeek!
How do you think the timing is looking? I feel like I am either waiting to see her commit to the first jump & then I’m behind for the BC (we dropped a few bars) or I am blinding too soon, but she’s just being really good about repeating the pattern.
I’m excited to try the sequences when we are ready! is 40x40ish enough room for those?

Straight jumps

Offset jumps

Thank you!

• This reply was modified 2 months ago by Kathy McClung.

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