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Good morning!
You have a ton of good stuff happening here so now I will bug you about planning how to incorporate it all, so it gets built into something super and not have any pressure added to something that worries him. I have found the less-is-more approach will actually bring faster results with fewer slide backs. He has a lot of really good skills on the individual elements, and that will be super useful! With all the stuff, think of it as needing a workout schedule so it all gets done eventually but not all at once.
Because this is a lot of stuff all in one day and adds up over the course of several days, plus the training that is not on video… I think you can calendar it and slide it in in smaller pieces, sandwiched between things he finds really stimulating. You already saw that with the tunnel 🙂 that was a great addition to the fun! That will help build value for the movement without added pressure and you’ll see quicker results and fewer “no thanks” moments or times where he poopoos things. I find that shaping with food adds pressure… but playing with toys, balls and tunnels turns it more into a dance party 🙂 So yes, train for the big jackpots with him meals, that is a great opportunity to work skills – but also do a lot of wild stuff with toys and running around. If he has a most favorite toy, save it for a wobble board – tunnel – toy session.So each day, pick one or two things, one element on the list of training something that worries him to work on – do maybe one session in the morning and one later on. The stuff that is not worrisome or is adjunct to building value for the teeter can be done more regularly – but the stuff that might worry him should be done in tiny bits and ideally every other day (because of the stress hormones that might be associated – even if he eats treats/plays with toys, he will still have some stress associated with it and we want to make sure that is not still floating around in his system the next time you attempt something that worries him).
Continue to make the sessions super valuable in terms of rate of success, quality of reinforcement… then be finished. Set a session timer and also a total daily timer 🙂 Resist all temptations of adding something more difficult towards the end of later in the session especially by adding more of what worries him. Think of the sessions as a bell curve – start with something easy, easier than where you left off last time, then go to the harder stuff earlier in the session, then towards the end of the session back it off into the easier stuff and end there. That will help progressively add the harder stuff without the hardest stuff coming when he is the most depleted.
Don’t do ALL the things in one day, even spread out – because what happens it is looks good til the dog gets depleted (which generally coincides when we humans ask for more) and then things go backwards – especially in the evening, for most of our dogs. The science behind depletion and behavior is pretty interesting and has changed my approach to training. I feel it in myself too, when depletion is happening.
He did well on the inflatables! Since those challenge his body (not just brain :)) and build muscle/strength/core – the conditioning vets recommend we limit those to every other day at most or every 2 days, so he doesn’t associate any potential soreness from a workout with something that moves as you work on that positive conditioned response on things that move. That makes it easy to schedule: it can be something like Tuesday/Thursday/Sunday are inflatables days, which leaves Monday/Weds/Friday days for other games. Saturday is for wine drinking lol
And keep the toy involved a lot. He is working nicely for food but he goes cuckoo for the toy – and we like the cuckoo, in this situation 🙂 We want him to loosen his tie and forget himself – and in shaping and cookies, the dogs get thoughtful. With toy games, they get wild and that is good here 🙂
>>We went to LU last night and today but I don’t have video from there. But, we did a wooden wobble board and he was not liking it. I got him to put a paw on it and then I threw a treat away from the board. I did that with him last night and today.??
I think a toy is a better choice for this and if there is a tunnel available, use the tunnel and then the toy. Also, prop the wooden wobble board so it moves a little less for now (tunnel bags or towels or something) and then build the movement back in – make it as easy as possible for him to earn the party then gradually build in more movement.
>>I also got him on an elevated flat teeter and going across 2, 16” tables. I added in him running through the tunnel after her ran across the teeter. Whoa! He loved that.>>
YESS! Fun! More of this! A mini course: tunnel, teeter/tables, tunnel. You can do it at home on the lowered teeter: tunnel, lowered teeter, tunnel – cue the tunnel as soon as he moves the teeter (it doesn’t matter if he stops or not for now because it is relatively easy to install the end position)
>> I added in the finest bit of movement.
Don’t do that LOL! Working through worry about movement takes human self-control because we want to ‘boil the frog’ and add movement in so gradually that he barely notices it because it is so much fun. He loves it? Great! End. Let him be foaming at the mouth for more. If he can love it twice, 2 separate sessions over a couple of days? Cool – then perhaps on the 3rd session, you do a warm up with where he left off, then the early rep has a tiny bit more movement rather than the end of the session. Bear in mind that this applies in the same environment – so if you get to LU and the teeter is in a different part of the building, the best bet is to do the same session as the last time because a change in location is meaningful to the dogs even if we don’t see it that way. Environment is a different training track, so if environment (location) changes then that is the only change, for that session. He will let you know if he is fine with it or not.
>>He poopooed that but did it anyway.
I am glad he did it but we do want to avoid any poopoo moments where he doesn’t enjoy it. That is where we see the up-and-down coming from. A more gradual approach will have a steadier increase in behavior, working each track separately.
>> I probably won’t be able to do that with him again until next week. I can stop by there and do the disc with him again though.>>
If you go and do the disc there, be sure that it is sandwiched in tiny amounts in between other much more fun things. Make sure it is not first and not last at this point (primacy and recency play a role in association) until we are sure he is loving it. Doing something else easy and fun will get him in a high state of arousal and then a bit if disc then back to something else really fun (tunnels are perfect for that). You will also find that sandwiching it in among other little fun things will help make sure he doesn’t make any negative associations with that environment – for example, if he goes into LU then does the disc right away especially if he is not liking it… you run the risk of him associating going to LU with the pressure of the disc. So sandwiching it in tiny bits will take that pressure off and help protect associations.
Let me know if that makes sense!! I jot out training calendars at the start of each week on a white board, to make sure that I try to get things done without over-balancing any specific behaviors. I am really not all that disciplined about my training, but having the framework jotted out helps me keep all the little bits on track in small pieces, across several dogs – without losing my mind 🙂
Tracy
Hi! She did really well here! 2 little tiny suggestions on the mechanics of this set up: try to have her front feet a tiny bit closer to the bar, so she takes off directly from her hind end and doesn’t tap her front feet on the ground before jump 1. That will be a little more challenging but I think that she will be fine with it. And place the toy another 6 or 8 feet away from jump 2, so she can land and take a full stride.
When you play with this next, give her a warm up in each direction with the angles you had here – and then flatten them out a bit more to add even more challenge. She is doing brilliantly with every challenge we throw at her!Tracy
Hi! You have a fun indoor gym going here! I agree – he does much better when things are nuttier 🙂 So get excited, be a wild woman, throw the toys around (does he like balls? Ball are great for getting nuts LOL!!) The single food treats did not raise the excitement level as much so stick with the toys on the pillow teeter 🙂
For the Bosu ball – a couple of questions/ideas:
– do you have inflatables, like balance discs, fitbones, etc? If so you can do an obstacle course of sorts, of him walking across the various moving surfaces of the inflatables. The bosu is technically an inflatable – do he like get on the blue domed part of it? That can be on the obstacle course as well!– on the upside down bosu: to help him get on it with all four feet, an idea is to have it fully propped by pillows so it barely moves for now – and move it next to a chair or couch. Have him walk from the couch to the bosu to the ground and then from the ground to the bosu to the couch. It is an up and down obstacle course 🙂 Then you can gradually add more and more movement. And it can be incorporated into daily routines – for example, the exit of his crate can have a big wobble disc that he can walk over each time.
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
This was a good intro to the grid for her, now we are going to try to convince her to bounce. If I remember correctly, it took us a while to convince her to bounce on the jump grids we did in the fall. She gave you one bounce rep at approx :30, so now we have to convince her it is worthwhile LOL!!You can try having the wings overlapping instead of touching each other end-to-end. That might shorten the distance enough to help her bounce. Also, do I remember correctly that it was the lotus ball moving that convinced her that grids were NOT dullsville in the fall? If so, feel free to try that – I am confident that she will have no issues bouncing it as soon as she thinks it is fun LOL! And the bounce helps build balance for serp jumping and backside slice jumping too.Nice work on all of these! Let me know what you think!
TracyVery very nice banana line here!! She is doing a good job with hitting the target even as you added more speed – and good catch by *not* rewarding when she didn’t touch it 🙂
Now, if the weather gets poopy again and you want some indoor hind end work – this game can be done indoors on a raised target where you are marking all 4 feet moving across the target. It is from the running DW class but it is a great game for getting the dogs to think of all their feet and put them in a small space: I think it has uses for jumping, weaving,2o2o on the dog walk and teeter, etc. Here is a video of Contraband on the bigger target (an aerobics step with his mat on top of it) and also a smaller target (a small carrying case). I was trying to mark for the 4th foot on – he was doing banana lines with me sitting on the couch in pajamas haha!
Hi! She was terrific here with the hopping on in the center and hopping off, and also turning around… but only turning around the her left. Whether she was turning towards you or away, she was always choosing to turn to her left! I had to watch a few times to make sure I was not going crazy haha! She turned to her right only once – at :50ish, and she lost her balance. So we have unveiled a side preference and we can strengthen right turns! You will probably have to lure her to convince her to do it – nothing wrong with a good use of a lure LOL! You can put a cookie on her nose and slowly turn her to her right on the plank. That will help balance her on the plank and also strengthen her right turns in general.
Everything else looks great, it is just one little thing to add 🙂
Have fun!
TracyOh good! He might like the smack the baby stuff! I figured a Lab would like it but I didn’t want to assume then have him get offended by it!
T
Cool! I went to Facebook to friend her, but it turns out we are already friends but FB doesn’t show her to me for some reason. I am looking forward to following her adventures too!
Hi! He is doing well here!
On the threadle/serps: He is hitting the target and moving to the next line really nicely on both!!! I think the hardest part was the stationary elements (for both you and him :)) After he has touched your hand, maintain that position without turning towards the MM until after he reaches the MM. That is so he doesn’t rely on shoulder turn to take the jump (on the threadle) or to make the next turn (on the serp). Getting them to be defaults and independent of additional body cues will make it much easier on course when he is going 10,000 MPH 🙂
The other place to be careful of motion is when you put the hand target cue into position – he is pairing the movement of the hand with the release cue (which is why he had trouble later in the session when you did not have the verbal). So make the hand going to position and the verbal distinctly separated – both in time (have at least 2 or 3 seconds between your hand getting into position and the verbal cue) and in motion (try not to move your hand before/during/after the release, until after he has hit the hand). It is super easy for dogs to pair motion and verbal, making the verbal secondary to the motion. And one good way to separate it is to put the hand in position, then reward him back in position on the place. That will help the stimulus control of the cue on the hand. It is not super important for serps and threadles because he will generally find those in the middle of courses when he is not in a stay – but it will be super helpful on lead outs for stuff like lead out pushes, forced front crosses, etc. and the times when you want to get your hand in position before he starts to move.His stay practice is looking good in the 3 positions! Feeding in position like that will work perfectly for building the stimulus control on the verbal in the serps and threadles! Question about your ‘free’ on these – I think it was generally a release but sometimes you were saying it when you were delivering the cookie to his mouth in the sit? So I wasn’t sure if he should move or not. I use a different verbal for ‘cookie is approaching mouth’ 🙂
The wraps are also going well! You can start start further away now so you don’t have to move so fast as you turn, and you can start to turn just before his nose arrives at the wing! You were generally doing spins and post turns, so remember to add in some plain ol’ front crosses to pick him up on the other side too 🙂 He only had one question (:34) and it looks like there was not enough support from your dog side leg there – so remember to step the wing with the dog-side leg as you give the upper body cue. You can also start him with you sideways or backwards to the wing, as long as the dog-side leg (which will also be the leg closer to the wing when you are sideways) moves to help deliver the cue to start.
You can also add in tugging to these wing wrap games: the food rewards and MM are good but getting the tugging will help get a lot of drive to da momma after he exits, which sets up really lovely turns! Now, I realize that you might be avoiding tugging indoors 🙂 and that is fine, it can happen when the ice has melted and you are outdoors again 🙂Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
>>but he won’t perform it the same with the treat and train.
Was he not as fast driving through the tunnel to it? Or he doesn’t yet perceive it as a reinforcement to run to?
If he isn’t that fast about it yet, no problem 🙂 Food-based reinforcement does not always produce the same speed as a toy. You can put the toy in the cookie tray and send him to it 🙂
If he doesn’t yet perceive it as a source of reinforcement, you can start using it to shape behaviors (he does something and you click the MM) – provided he doesn’t mind the noise of the gears.
Let me know!
TracyHi –
The current update on this is that it has something to do with this specific iPad update (14 generation on iPhone and iPad) being perhaps the buggiest update yet. This seems to involve the 14.2 and 14.3 updates and YouTube not playing nicely in the sandbox. I experienced it on my ipad that is running 14.2 when I was doing something on YouTube (but haven’t experienced on the other devices that I refuse to update LOL!!)
The LifterLMS and the Agility U folks have not been able to reproduce the issue directly and we haven’t heard of it happening to others, so the suggestion from tech right now is to try a workaround while Apple develops fixes: on a mobile device, copy/paste the URL into the text and then make it a live link using the ‘LINK’ feature above (rather than have it come up as a video in the message, if that makes sense). Let me know if it works better!Tracy
Hi! Yes, I agree with your assessment of the sticky moments: not enough connection. It is a little about eye contact, but more about shoulder position. In those 2 moments (:36 and :48), your shoulders ‘close’ forward and so he no longer has side information… at which point he abstains (“I can neither confirm nor deny that you want me on your left side” LOL!!) On the reps where he knew where to go, you had more connection, for longer, so he moved through really nicely!
So 2 ideas for you:
from the handling perspective, make eye contact for longer but more importantly – keep your dog-side hand pointing to his nose (so it is back and reveals connection) for longer too. I generally keep my arm back until I see the dog has exited the wrap and is coming to the new side, at which point the arm can shift forward a bit for the send to the next wing (while maintaining that eye contact too :)) It will feel like a long wait with a baby dog, but as he grows up, he will be able to read the new side sooner and sooner so you won’t have to be as perfect for as long.
from the dog training perspective, we want to convince him to always choose something involving commitment rather than abstain 🙂 So if he ever ends up on the wrong side… reward as if he was correct (then go to the video to see if he was correct LOL!). If he ever freezes, throw a reward forward to break him out of it rather than re-cue or ask him to continue. That way, when he is in a rocking horse configuration, he will lean towards choosing commitment rather than delaying to get more info. When the pups choose commitment, it is easy to massage the info to get the lines we want 🙂
Nice work here! Let me know what you think,
TracyHi! He did a good job on going to the backside here! As you build up the backside and have more room, you will want to do it as less of a send and more of a parallel path moving forward (that can wait til you are outside again). Inside with less room, you can show him the difference between the send to the backside of the wing and the send to the bar/front side by changing your starting position and switching sides.
About the rewarding –
On the first part of the video, when he was starting on your left – the reward was a little delayed because it was in your pocket so he ended up getting all the way back to you and looking up at you. On the second half, after about :30, you got the reward in a lot sooner by having it in your hand already – I like that a lot better because it keeps his eyes down and not on your hands or pocket 🙂>>I realize that he sometimes got his treat before he was all the way past the “bar.” I realize that this won’t be an issue when he starts actually jumping, but should I made a point to place the reward deeper in the future?>>
And yes, when you drop that reward in – now try to have it deeper so he comes all the way across the bar. Dropping it in close is perfectly fine for the first session or two, but then we want to use the placement to help him come all the way over the bar, so he also thinks about his back feet and staying in motion. He is definitely ready for that 🙂
Great job!
TracyYay! He definitely liked this toy and was doing some really good head shaking while tugging 🙂 And that is a really impressive toy!!
How does he feel about being touched while tugging? One way to increase tugging is to have one hand on the toy, holding it relatively stationary – and the other hand touching the dog. We start by moving our hand near the flank, or on the flank -then stroking, then patting. I suggest this because dogs tend to get really into the tugging and weight shift into it even more when we do this. And it can get worked up to gentle smack the baby 🙂 But some dogs find it very offensive if we go directly to smack the baby, so you will want to start with hands near him and see how he does. You had mentioned that he was not loving the collar grabs at the moment, and so adding in touch to tugging also builds the value of the collar grabbing (I grab the collar all the time during tugging, and I never touch the collar as a ‘drop it’ cue).Let me know what you think!
Tracy
