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Hi! He probably is still pretty sensitive to the teeter, which is why I use a less-is-more approach to protect that. I can do 4 or 5 minutes of weaving with a dog, no problem. But 4 or 5 minutes of teetering will be waaaaay too much for some dogs – the one hits wonders are the best way to get them super happy with it and end the session, leaving them wanting more 🙂
>>Sidenote I wanted to ask you how you transitioned your flyball rewards to Agility. Upon reflection I feel chincy if the goal is a KFC bucket time. Are you planning any connection reward seminars that are upcoming LOL…>>
I find that reinforcement value is hard for us humans – we like to do a lot of reps so we end up doing tiny bits of treats which is definitely NOT KFC bucket time LOL!!!! I will be doing the transitioning to trials topic as part of the CAMP class in June (it runs all summer) because that KFC bucket moment is soooooo different for each type of dog. What I did with my Papillon would be totally the wrong thing with my Crollie LOL!
T
Hi!
I am all for coffee before, after, and during weave training LOL!!!
Nice session here! You hit a variety of angles, you had motion involved, and he was highly successful and FAST! Yes – try to delay the click til you see left shoulder at pole 3 for now (we will delay it even more soon). I find that hard, I like to click as soon as the head gets the entry, but left shoulder at pole 3 really isolates that bend: so I remind myself before every single rep LOL!One more suggestion that he is ready for, now that you are adding a lot of motion: on the highly angled sends, don’t stand still or face him til he is in the entry. Move immediately, stepping directly away to where you want to go next (down the line to the MM at first). I don’t want him to rely on lack of motion or handler rotation to help get those wicked entries, so since he is getting them, we will take out any stationary or rotation positions. So it is basically send with your dog-side arm & leg first then immediately step away to the next line. You can start at a walk and on easier angles as he will be seeing the motion while he is still several feet away from the entry. But I bet you will be able to add more speed pretty quickly 🙂
And along with that… onwards to the crazy handling challenges and I bet 12 poles will be fine for him now too 🙂Great job!
TracyHi! I feel the pain of the rain! It is finally not raining here but the wind is howling. Sigh!
He is indeed doing well on the ‘top’ of the clock angles here (10-11-12-1-2)! Adding motion is good, he seemed fine with it – just try to throw the reward a little sooner and lower, to help convince him not to look back at you.
>>Cowboy is very comfortable approaching at 5,6 & 7.>>
I didn’t see a lot of bottom of the clock reps (which would mean starting closer to where the frame and teeter where here) but that are often a little easier because he has to bend more to get into the entry.
>> However as I approach 3:00 & 9:00 he struggles a bit. If that happens, should I open up the second set of poles? >>
Bearing in mind that different angles will progress at different rates – how did he do with the 3 and 9 angles when the 2nd set of poles were at 2 and 8? If he was able to produce 2 consecutive sessions of 90% success… then you can leave the poles at 1 and 7 but change something else: start closer and send without motion (he seemed to do better on this video without the motion). Or, you can leave the 2nd set of poles at 1 and 7 but slide them 2 feet further away, towards the reward target: that can help him find poles 1 and 2 and also isolate the bend into poles 3 and 4.
And you can bring the clicker out for that – click/treat left shoulder at pole 3 for a session or two on the very hard angles.
Let me know what you think! It is totally normal for the dogs to need a couple of sessions extra to solidify the hard angles when we add in poles 3 and 4 🙂 He is doing great!
Tracy
Hi! I think you can still have ‘clean’ mechanics without necessarily doing loops – and you can also be clean but not fussy 🙂
Good session here! Call him right back after he gets the MM cookie, so he doesn’t offer the weaves on the way back to you. You can show your hand to give him a destination to drive to – I think after he gets the MM, he is not sure where to be next, so that quick recall will help.
He had a nice high rate of success on these! The threadle entries on the 3 o’clock side were harder – you can reward him for waiting, letting you step off to the side, then sending him – on the errors, he was sending himself as soon as you started to move to the side 🙂 But he was correct when you were clearer about being ready then sending.
Since he is looking so good here, you can add more of your motion – you were moving, but I think he is ready for you to work it up to going faster (jogging, running) on all the angles of sends – then we can add poles 3 and 4! Yay!
Great job!
TracyHi! He did well here when you get the throws more exciting after the first rep haha! I think the big difference was that there was no reward target to help prompt the behavior, so being in a new place with other stuff around made it harder to find the poles on your right and on the RCs. You can carry the PT to class or develop another reward target that is more easy to drag around (like an empty food bowl) – I think that will help generalize the behavior. The other option is to have the instructor throw the reward when his left shoulder gets to pole 3, especially on the rear crosses, so you can tap dance and do cartwheels and he will continue through the poles 🙂
It was really fun to see him picking this up so quickly!!!! Nice work!
TracyHi! Super session here!
He was nailing it and seemed to have no questions. Easy peasy! So…. add motion 🙂 The other thing to do is work the ‘bottom’ of the clock more (4-5-6-7-8) so he gets really good at finding those crazy ones before we make it harder – you can start him closer to the poles on those so there is less yardage to curl off the entry.
So you can do the next session with a bit of sending from the bottom of the clock on 2 straight poles, then go to the easier angles and add motion, once again working your way to the bottom with motion. Let me know if that makes sense!And on the threadles – yes, throw in a session of sending on slightly open poles. There is no need to go past 3 and 9 on the threadles at this stage. I think it will be easy for him.
If these next sessions go well, onwards to adding poles 3 and 4 🙂
Great job!
TracyHi!
>> I think I was cheating a bit the first couple attempts because I threw the toy before I could confirm she was looking over jump.>>
You call it cheating, I call it nice early timing to affirm the line. Ha! Better to be early to get it started than to wait too long 🙂 She is doing really well finding the line!
At :57, she ended up behind you. That was a connection break moment (and not a naughty moment haha) – as she exited the wing at :56, she saw your head turn from looking over your left shoulder to looking straight (I think you were looking at the jump) so she read it as the beginning of a blind cross cue – so she blind crossed. Compare it to the connection at :09 and :30 and 1:25 as she came around the wing – you kept your head turned towards her until you tossed the toy so she knew to stay on your side and not change sides. Clever girl! That head turn is an intuitive blind cross cue, so exaggerate the connection a little bit more to help her know where to be.
The foot rotation at 1:04 got the turn but you did not have a lot of connection there – the connection you had at 1:15 was really nice!
So, definitely keep connection as she exits the wing, let your eyes follow her head as she moves past you (rather than turning and looking forward to the jump while she is still behind you). She did REALLY well finding the jump, so you can add more motion and also delay the reward: keep it in your hand until she is just about taking off, then throw it.
You can also add challenge and hang out right next to the wing, close enough to touch it, til she exits the wrap – them move forward to give her the feel of driving ahead of you.
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! I must have scrolled right past this video this morning, sorry!!
She is VERY cool, I love her toy play and the ability to go back to food then back to the toy. NICE!!! Silly question – what breed(s) is she?
>>Here’s our first video! When I first read submission guidelines I thought we only did 2 minutes for entire first lesson but I went back and saw 2 minutes per “game” so I’m assuming you want approx 2 minutes of each game in the lesson?>>
Sorry for any confusion – 2 minutes or so for each game, so it can be 8-10 minutes per week 🙂 And I am not a strict time watcher, I just like to be sure we don’t over-train and we keep it fun for the dogs.
Nice work on the set point here! The very first rep was a great angle on what we want from her: you set her up nice and close and not how she powers off her rear, then lands basically in the middle of the 2 jumps, then powers over the next bump with a nice arc. YAY! And it looks like the 2nd rep was virtually identical. Double yay! It was harder to see on the next reps coming towards the camera – it looks like she was landing shorter to the jumps but that might have just been the camera perspective from the angle. So if it was the same – great! It she was shorter, then you can move the bumps in a tiny bit closer to keep that nice arc. As she matures, you can stretch them back out.
Great job training the stay and also great job training the self-control to get the toy to the ground, it really helps create a good body position!
Nice work!
TracyHi!
>> Regarding the party of one, yes she still steals and runs off, but it is improving. So that impacts my behavior, worried about that outcome. The other issue is the trade game doesn’t work, because she drops the toy when she realizes I have food. I need to improve that and it will help. Perhaps as the game becomes more fun, the running off will improve.>>
You can try working with 2 toys! Reward then trade, without losing the toy value when food comes out.
>>I also noted the stay issue. I thought there was an instruction to face the direction you were going…I took things too literal!!>>
Sorry! I just didn’t want anyone to be turned and facing the dog 🙂
>It will be fun to work on these without the arms. My guess is you will comment on less arms more in the future. It’s a bad handler habit….
Yes, there will be more about arms – mainly, less is more when we are close to the dog, plus we run faster when we don’t have are arms up – and judging by her speed already, you’re going to be running fast fast fast 🙂
Have fun!
TracyHi! I wouldn’t call him unstable, it is more like he is moving like a puppy 🙂 My Elektra (the smaller one) is totally still moving like a puppy and she just turned a year old: hoppy, front legs doing all the thinking and back legs kind of along for the ride. That is what I see with Robbie. I approach this puppy movement in 3 parts:
Part of working on it is the extreme patience of letting the develop and not worrying too much about it 🙂 Some dogs develop faster than others 🙂
And part of it working on proprioception – cavalettis, discs, balance, foot targeting body part tricks, backing up, mat work, etc.
And the other piece is developing a conditioning program specific to the needs of the individual pup (I do this starting at about a year unless I see an issue) – this includes a look at structure, a look at muscle development, and a look “under the hood” (radiographs and soft tissue palpations) to make sure there is nothing unseen that might be holding the dog back. Now, I do this with a vet specialist because it is out of my wheelhouse 🙂 There are a couple of vets I go to in the MidAtlantic area, and online I highly recommend Dr. Leslie Eide (she might do in-person stuff too, but is too far from me). Dr. Leslie and my other vets have given the dogs specific things – for example, quad strengthening stuff for one dog who needs to get stronger there, and core stuff for Elektra.
Hope that helps!
TracyHi!
The stay comes together as soon as we crack the code to figure out what helps him. If he is figuring it out, yay! You can also play with alternate routes to stays, like stationing on a platform (you can leave the MM up there with him) or crate games (old school, but effective :))For the set point, without a stay – I liked the position you used on the very first rep where you were sending, holding him a little from behind – that way you can send him without him also trying to read any body language or position. If he is comfortable with it, you can hold him like that from a sit so he engages his rear on the send. It is also perfectly fine if someone else holds him and you are out at the MM 🙂
As for the distance between the jumps… hard to tell! The first 30 seconds here were basically a familiarization where he sorted out the setup. He did something slightly different on each rep. At about :31, he got into the groove and then was repeating the behavior and striding more consistently. I think for now move the jumps in 6 inches closer, so he is more in the middle of the jumps on the first landing and that arc carries him through to a landing a little further from the 2nd jump. The other thing to add is starting him closer to the 1st bump – his front feets should be about 6 inches from it, as that will encourage immediately pushing off from the rear rather than striding in which encourages more front end use.
I think the more he sees this, the more we will see a form percolate and then might vary the distance – I am sure he will end up at 6 feet between the 2 jumps but he is young enough that he can start on a smaller distance 🙂
Great job! It is fun to see him in action again!Tracy
Hi!
>> for the most part LOVE having the Training Center but damn….I always end up with stuff at home that I want here and vice versa! >>
Ha! I feel that – so much stuff ends up living in my car for that reason LOL!
He did well on the backing up here – he was really good with ‘looking’ for the board with his back feet, didn’t seem to mind the little bit of movement! Yay! I liked your reward placement, and I think he had enough weight shift for what we need here – because the board was not moving, he was a little weight shifted back, mainly balanced – but not fully on his front. You can keep adding a tiny bit more tip to add some challenge here.
On the Think Less Teeter More game – I am glad he likes it! It is supposed to be a bit silly fun 🙂 I am glad you went to the target to prompt the behavior – on the first few reps without it, he was offering a bit of 4on and down, it was unclear what the exact behavior should be. So keep using the target for now, but not the loaded target. The target prompts the behavior but the loaded cookies make it too easy 🙂 On the last rep, he did a 2o2o without the target but he was stretched and might have been cuing off your body language. I think leaving the target in for this and also for some of the end position games will help him as other elements get more complex 🙂 Then we fade it out next week 🙂
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
