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Good morning! This is going well, her commitment looks really strong and your connection looks super and you were rocking the verbals, so now all we need to do is talk about the timing! The timing in general was really really good too, just a couple of spots where you can be sooner:
At the beginning of the session, your wrap versus push versus RC cues all looked different in the best way – I could tell from miles away what you wanted, and so did she! Yay! On the Go line, the cue also looked good – just remember to keep running until she gets to the toy and you can throw sooner so she doesn’t look back. Dogs love to look back at us on the last jump!
I think the only timing questions had to do with the wraps – your check wrap (to the right) at :48 was a little late so she was wide, but the RC version of it right after that was really lovely!
When you added the tunnel, it took you a moment to get into the groove of the wrap timing (things were happening pretty fast at that point LOL!) The decel for the transition into the wrap late at 1:03 and 1:10 – she saw it happening over the bar so she responded over the bar but couldn’t actually make an adjustment til after she landed (so she was wider on those). You can look for her landing spot from the jump before the wrap or exit of the tunnel before the wrap jump, to plan your decel into the wrap cue. You were much sooner at 1:19 and her turn was really nice!
BIG yay for the push at 1:22! You were behind her, she was flying… but you nailed the good timing and connection and verbal and she got it independently. That is TERRIFIC especially because she is young and inexperienced!!! You got another good one at 1:29. Double big yay!!!
And at the end you had good timing going on your wrap transitions at 1:33 and 1:38. You are pulling your shoulders a bit on those, meaning turning towards the wrap wing with your upper body before rotating away. I don’t think it is hurting the info but I do think it might end up delaying your rotation and your ability to get outta there really fast (which I believe you will need LOL!) so try less shoulder pull and just use changes in motion and see if she will still commit – your running line will still be towards the wing but you don’t need to turn your shoulders as much. Let me know if that makes sense.
Great job!!!
TracySo the dog comes between the jump and you then turns away to take the jump? I use my threadle slice verbal for that (‘close’) – kind of like this, except the handler continues to move past the jump and not towards the bar:
I probably have video of it somewhere, let me look…
Hi there! I will have more coming on the mat work, but a couple of things here –
I really like that he is moving in a trot to and through the mat: not bouncing or leaping or bunny hopping. Yay!!!!! That is really good- it will make it easier to build the running without leaping 🙂
first question that I always ask people: what is the criteria? It was a little hard to tell – split rear feet? It was hard to tell because the MM was not marking the behavior in terms of the beep – so a few ideas for you with that:
in these early stages, turn the beep off on your target mat and you will use a clicker or the MM beep. Three reasons for that:
first, as you establish criteria, he might hit the mat with front feet so it beeps – but you don’t reward. That causes the beep to lose value and then when you need the beep later on (because you are miles away and can’t see it), the beep won’t be useful to him in terms of knowing if he is correct or not. When my mat beeps, I always reward (more later on how to make sure the mat beep matches criteria :))
Second – if he hits the mat properly on the way back to you – reward him. Otherwise, a whole bunch of gorgeous hits go unrewarded and then you lose the gorgeous hits (I think that was happening here, it became a bit about going to the MM and not necessarily the mat). And if the beeper is on with the mat, a whole bunch of beeps go on rewarded which causes the beep to lose value. So, if he hits it on the way back – reward 🙂 and you can move off to the side to get him to come to your hand or tug on a toy so you can reset (although I do a LOT of back on forth on the mat to get the criteria firmly established).
Third – I like to train my eyes to be able to see what it looks like when the dog hits criteria (they all move differently) so a quiet beeper mat forces me to stare at the mat to watch for criteria – I have to rely on my eyes only and not my ears LOL!Let me know if that makes sense! Welcome to the RDW adventure!!
TracyHi!
>>I had to really break this down.
I think that was a good decision, led to a really strong session!
>> Stark forgot what a straight line and “Go” was so I sat the toy out front for a couple reps. That really helped jog his memory.
Yes – the GO is hard on the 2 jump set up because there is very little momentum. Setting the toy out is fine, he did well! And also good job mixing it in between the reps that had turns, to keep it fresh.
>>I mixed in a couple wraps and and he said check! Got this.
Yes – you were behind him as you did this, so the timing is a little harder (it is about his position) – the 2nd rep was really good! And I like how he was able to read it with you behind him, that is a good skill because we don’t always want to be ahead on the wraps.
>>His backside are weaker than wraps but we have not done nearly as much training with these. So I had to start in front of one jump with little motion. I was able to quickly add a second jump and more movement. This was nice to see. He appeared to be good on both sides.>>
Yes, backsides are usually a little weaker at this age because most of the value and training is on the front side (in terms of prioritizing, he really won’t need backsides skills any time soon :)) On the first part of the backside section, you recognized that the default to taking the jump was not yet in place and then you did a great job with the early placement of reward – that really helped him come in and take the jump! My only suggestion on those early toy drops (or any toy drops for this) is to have the toy already in your dog side arm (the same side he is sent to the backside with) and then that is the arm that drops the toy back: it will give you the physical look of the arm back serp posture that we use on those, rather than the cross arm (which we don’t use anymore on the serps). I think he did better on the backsides on the left turn side (starting on your right arm) than on the right turn side, but that might have been because you had already rewarded a bunch on the right turn side.
>>His rear crosses are basically non existing. I think I need to break these down some more and focus on these. He really does not understand them and that’s because we really haven’t spent much time on them at all.>>
He did really well! I have more rear cross work coming up soon. The handling is a little tricky, because you will want to run with pressure on the line without pushing him to the backside (which happened a couple of times) and also, try not to ‘pull’ your upper body to the front of the jump: that can set the line to the wrap side rather than the rear cross side. I like to think of my entire body (feet and shoulders) moving to the center of the bar – and then I cut in behind the dog when he is pretty close to the bar, within a couple of feet. It is the pressure line that creates the RC, not cutting in behind him – so on the reps where he ended up on the backside, your running line was cutting in to the new side before he had a chance to commit or get past you. Going to the new side on a rear cross will actually feel kinda late, a little last minute – because it doesn’t happen til he has made the adjustment just before takeoff, if that makes sense.
>>Next time I’d like to start with rear crosses and also add some backside wraps.
You can start with general RCs without the wraps, that will make it easier to get commitment because you don’t also need to cue collection. And yes you can totally add in backside wraps here – don’t do too many because they are the hardest thing on the dog’s body, so you can throw in a couple to reward the countermotion of you moving forward while he turns back to commit to the jump.
Great job!
TracyHi! Thanks for the update! The weather has been a pain lately!!! We have plenty of time for the games, so fingers crossed for a dry yard soon!!!
>>None of my dogs stare at the TNT if I’m at the side. They all still stare at me and come off sideways. It’s a high value reinforcer but they still stare at me. I’ve kind of given up on a forward focus on the plank :(. It’s never been an issue in trials so far anyway.>>
If it is not an issue at trials, it might fall into the category of “don’t fix it if is it not broken” 🙂 You can play with a focus forward on a food bowl as you move around to the side and behind, just as a training skill? Then you have the concept ready in case you do end up needing it at some point.
Hope the rain clears soon for you, nd you get can get for some running 🙂
Tracy
Hi! I think it only comes with general directions such as getting the dog to go up it, but not training directions to get to the full finished teeter performance.
T
Hi! This was a cool session to watch – good job noticing her frustration and fixing it! Yay!! That is the mark of an excellent dog trainer!
On the first part of the video, you were pointing to the edge of the wing closer to you, so she would have to come between you and the wing. The goal was to have her put the wing between you and her, so pointing to the outside of the wing would make it happen. And when you came back in the 2nd half of the video, you nailed it. Yay! She was really strong about going around the wing and you started the front cross earlier. She was nice and fast but also turned tight. So now you can start adding challenge by gradually leaving earlier and earlier – working up to starting the FC and run just before she gets to the wing. Great job here!!!
TracyHi!
Yes, I would agree that she is enjoying the tunnel LOL!! That is not a bad thing, but we can definitely get it so she only goes by permission 🙂 Some ideas:
– rather than use a ball for now, use tug toys. That will help her focus on your for each reset by bringing her into you (rather than sending her out for the toy). It looks like one of the balls was a hollee roller, so you can use it by tying it to a tug toy, that way she gets her high value reward by then won’t take it on road trips through the tunnel LOL!
– you can do tricks near the tunnel for the tug rewards – this helps her see that just because the tunnel is there does not mean to always go to it 🙂
– when you do send her to the tunnel – reward and move away from hit to play, bringing her into you – then get the reward back, reset, and send her again. That can help prevent her from sending herself – I think some of that was because you were close to the tunnel, so she was taking it as a sign of “dad must want me to offer the tunnel again” LOL!
– if she offers going through it but you did not cue it… don’t reward 🙂 Just call her further away from it so you can reset for the next send.
– you can also ask for focus on you before a tunnel cue: use a ‘ready’ word or her name – and when she gives you eye contact, reward her with the tunnel cue. She did a nice focus on you at 3:24 so that is what you would be looking for.About the sends – the sends look great!!! I consider a send when she is on your outside arm (you are the middle: tunnel, you, Ria). She is sending with distance and confidence! Even on the very last rep, I think you wanted her to on the entry closer to you but the line made it look like you wanted the other side, so she travelled a good distance to find the entry. Good girl!!!!
The threadles were harder (they are harder for all dogs) – the threadle is where she is between you and the tunnel, and she has to turn away from you to get the entry. She had more question on those, so when she is between you and the tunnel, start closer to the tunnel entry so that she can very easily see it and turn away to it. I think if you stay within about 1 foot of the tunnel entry for 2 sessions when you do the threadles, she will figure it out and then you can add more distance. (You can already add distance on the sends, when you are in the middle).
Nice work here!!!
TracyHi!
>> (Greatest Of All Time. LOL. GOAT. They use that now for someone. That’s what I thought you meant at first.>>
Yes, here on the East Coast they use GOAT for Tom Brady the Quarterback (blech, I don’t like him LOL!!!) and also for Michael Jordan.
She was great with her goating on the stool here! Jumped right up and tucking her hind end in under her. The high five is actually great for teaching her to stay balanced and for building core strength (it is on the list of things my rehab vet told me to teach my dogs!).
Do you have any of those big balance discs or anything unstable/inflatable? Or those paw pods (although before those were invented, we use cans of tuna hahaha) – I think she is ready for harder Goat Games by using more ‘unstable’ surfaces as well as getting her to put her feet on smaller things.
The other thing to do is take the familiar items (like the stool) to get her to do this in as many different places as possible: it begins to lay the foundation for generalizing behavior in new places. That is hard for pups! So the stool can travel with you to all sorts of places and she can hop on for treats! Think of it as the foundation for future contacts and weaves in alllllll sorts of different trial locations.
Great job!
TracyHi! Sorry that I missed this post!!! Just found it now 🙁
>> It seems if I go on too long she has that head explode and then she is done, or hard to get back. She will end it herself. And THAT’s not good. I need to keep sessions really short. Doing the tugging in between really helps! Or yea. Keeping the arousal level high.>>
I agree! It is easy to keep going and going and going with puppies… til their heads explode and then the session turns to poo. So I like setting a timer, breaking things up after 3 or 4 or 5 or 6 treats, and tugging lots 🙂 It helps prevent brain explosion LOL!
On the plank video:
I love her coat! She is very focused on the back and forth here – see f you can get her to leap on in the middle and balance because it is always harder to stick a landing and be stationary than it is to keep moving. Then she can turn in a full 360 degree circle.
And having her hop off on her own was too cute at the end – she had to take a moment to figure it out, then she was like “oh, I step off” LOL!!! You laughed and so did I 🙂 I also like to get the pup to jump on in the middle, turn a full 360 and then hop off – this is hard! But as you mentioned, teaching the pup how to get off is super important, in case they ever need to bail off the dog walk if they lose their balance. If she ever loses her balance, she will know how to safely jump off rather than fall and possibly get hurt.Keep visiting this as she grows, maybe once a week – it will change as she gets bigger ( not sure how much bigger she will get? But a little bigger :)) and she will need to keep ‘finding’ her balance and hind end. It will really help with your dog walk training.
Great job!
TracyHi!
>>And as for his slower performance when going to the right, I think that is relatively new. He had a short puppy massage last week and turned up. He does see Dr Julia in about 2 weeks so I’ll see if she turns up anything.>>
He might have a trigger point that needs releasing or something a little out in his chiro -we have been obsessing on his videos since July, and I simply don’t recall noticing that before. No worries – he might just be muscling up and not quite balanced yet.
On the teeter – bonus points for his fancy holiday attire! And yes… the magic of peanut butter LOL! Good boy! His balance on the board is looking good and I am glad he was trying to start without you. He is definitely growing in confidence! I suggest a two-pronged approach to more teetering:
– on the home teeter, do a ‘boil the frog’ approach: when he drives up the teeter at the beginning of the session with no questions and goes right to the end (for 2 short sessions in a row), you can start to raise the teeter a tiny tiny amount at the start of each session. It is like boiling a frog: it is so gradual, he won’t even notice 🙂 (Or at least that is what I hear, I have never actually boiled a frog!) And if he asks a question at any point, you stay there for a couple of sessions until he is driving up it again.
– try to get to different teeters and start with the easiest form of the game, just to build confidence in different places. It is easier said than done during the winter in a pandemic for sure but there is no rush 🙂
Great job!
TracyHi! I definitely encourage the run to the end, as it is much faster. The teeter Teach It will help encourage that too, because he can learn to do it independently without you and without needing to have a lot of speed to do it 🙂
Tracy
Hi! I love the fun lazy mini mountain climber! What a great variation to build confidence, he seemed super happy to run up it! We shall name it: Hill Climber! Ha! And it is the type of thing that might be small enough to take different places to help generalize the behavior, which is useful for all 3 contacts not just the teeter! Brilliant! Click/treat for you!
On the Lazy contacts game: I think will really help the bang game on the teeter (where he was still sorting out hind end) and also the hind end awareness on the running dog walk. He did really beautifully here, the hardest part was not wanting to play with the toy LOL I am not worried about that – you might have to go to highest value toy, just to get him wilder. Or a ball to chase? You can also try doing it all with a toy, and tugging in position (that is hard but it builds into my teeter games for a 2o2o in particular). It looks like he is doing a bit of a nose touch to the target, and that is GREAT – I fully support a little extra *something* in terms of targeting behavior for stopped contacts, as the criteria holds up a lot longer in competition. You don’t always need to keep the nose touch, but it will help teach him the weight shift. If he wants to scratch at the target and nose touch it, even better: really shifts his weight back when that happens.
Yes, he was not ready to run down the hill to the target – there was a lot of motion from you as you were trying to get the target in so he was shifting his weight forward and his butt was coming off the side. We will add that in at a later date.
Great job on these!!!!Tracy
Hi! This is a cool video to watch – because he understands turns so well, at this point you don’t need to work that hard to get a great turn (makes life so much easier!!!) It looks like when you drive in to the turn and decel and rotate relatively last minute – you are getting stunning turns. He seems to NOT need you to do a big decel and stick your hands in his face as you rotate. You can drive in, slide on the brakes, and rotate and go – I guess it is the difference between driving a Mack truck and a Ferrari. He is currently in Ferrari mode, so the rotation is more about getting outta there because the decel is creating the turn. The throw back rewards are definitely helping maintain the commitment – but you can see on rep 3 how you drove in more and rotated later – and he was speedy around the wing and maintained his commitment 🙂
Now, I see the difference between running through the left turn and trotting through the right on some of these. So let’s mull that one over, I don’t recall see that but I need to go back and look. I think the side preference was more committing easily versus needing more support? He might need an adjustment or extra stretching on that side. Let me know what you think!
Great job here!!!
TracyHi! These are going really well!
I think the first rep, I could see the difference in right versus left turns (trotting versus running) but then a switch flipped and he got balanced and was running on both sides. Maybe it is a warm up thing and he needs a bit of an explosive warm up on both sides? But the blinds with the wrap and the blind to the spin looked strong – your transitions were really good moving into them so you were super timely and smooth getting out of them. When you blocked the wing a bit, he slowed down, but I think that was a product of a small set-up so you didn’t have a lot of room to show him the line.
There was a little zig zag happening on the double blind – I agree that you were getting a little too deep on the first wing and then had to move away to not impale yourself 🙂 Also, I think it might have been the arms out to the side causing it? To make connection, you had to do a little more shoulder movement and that was pulling you side-to-side a bit. I think squirrel position (or t-Rex arms LOL!) can get you to be very quick twitch on the doubles so you can run a straight line and just do quick switches.
Watching the 2nd video, I had the same feeling that it was the arms being too flowing that set up the zig zag line – so you can try running to the wing, bringing your arms in super tight, and snapping through the upper body changes without as much smoothness 🙂 You get to be choppy LOL! On the wrap on the center wing, the flowing arms were fine, he liked that! But on the doubles, he is reading them well, your connection looks good, but I think the centrifugal force of the arms being further from the body is what is changing the running line. Let me know if that makes sense! Great job on these!
Tracy
PS – forgot to add that the long run to the tunnel was a SUPER fun addition! And a good reminder to maintain connection all the way through, you pulled off at the last minute and he was paying attention. Baby dogs need us to drive all the way into a tunnel LOL!
