Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Good morning! This session looked beautiful! Really clear, precise mechanics were in play and that helped make her super successful. Nothing to tweak here, so you can move forward to the next step: adding more motion 🙂 You can warm up her by revisiting the Baby Level and when you release her, you start to step forward as soon as you release her (feet move forward, upper body cues the jump behind you with arm and looking back to it). And keep dropping the reward in behind you as you move, like you did on this session. Then, go to the Advanced Level: do everything the same as you did here with walking around – with one difference – don’t stop moving at any point 🙂 As soon as you get past the wing or barrel to the takeoff side, release her without ever stopping. Keep walking forward (towards where the camera is) while you indicate the jump behind you with your arm (and look back at it) – you will probably need to walk slowly, but this will be the ultimate countermotion if you can remain in motion the whole time 🙂 Let me know if that makes sense.
>>It’s sad to see this class ending. I believe you mentioned you would be starting up another class that moves forward from this one. Is that still planned? If so, when do you expect to have it posted and when would it start? >>
Me too, it has been great fun watching all of these super puppies!!! I am trying to figure out what days/times for the live classes, but I believe it will start on Sept 19 🙂 I hope to get it posted either tomorrow or Tuesday 🙂
Tracy
Hi! Yay! I am glad you are back in action and that she is feeling well!!
The blind crosses are looking really good! You were really getting the hang of how early she needed so see them so she was able to see the connection on the new side and make the side change – and then you got beautiful turns on your shoulder after the decel. You can add in acceleration ahead for a big go go go after you do the shoulder turn.
Parallel path – easy peasy! Looking great! She is speedy and already has a big stride, so you can throw the reward further – that will buy you mire time to get ahead or more laterally away from the jump to set up the parallel path before she turns and starts heading towards the jump again 🙂
Prop hits – she was a tiny bit sticky heading to the prop, not always wanting to go past you. I don’t think it was a prop value issue – I think it was more that your dog-side leg was back behind you and not moving – which is a natural cue for the dogs to not drive past you. So, you can step forward with the dog side leg to send her to the prop and she will likely not be sticky at all – the leg supports her line. As you add rotation, you can also step to the prop with which ever leg you want to use 🙂
Back and forth on the cone – looking terrific! She is feeling good and benidng so nicely! If my memory is correct, she already have value on the cone so this was a fun, easy refresher for her. You will be able to quickly fade out the bowls and move to the other games were she gets into the handling stuff 🙂 Yay!
>> strike a pose – she’s NOT a fan of nose touch. We did 3 warm ups and 3 turns – 1 too many.
This was interesting! I thought her touch at 1:39 was *awesome* then she was offering other things on the next/last rep. Have you found that she just doesn’t like nose touching things, in general? It is possible that your hand position on that last rep was different – a little earlier and a little further from your body. So, you can wait until she has turned back to you after the cookie toss to let her see you put the target hand into position, that might help her drive to it.
If she just hates nose touching in general, you can skip forward to where you get the in-then-out chain: click/mark as she approaches the hand, then reward from the other hand (and then from something on the ground). We want her to love serps & threadles, so if she hates nose touching then we don’t need to make an issue out of it 🙂Great job on all of these! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
Table? what’s a table? hahaha!! You were pretty close to it, and when you moved it was on his line, so…. Good boy 🙂 Table value is a good thing!
When you were facing straight (and when he was on your left): great job!!! He came right to you and never considered heading to the yummy table 🙂
He was moving really quickly as you started running forward , so be sure to decelerate sooner – you will likely have to decelerate almost as soon as he turns towards you after eating the cookie. He was doing a lovely job of driving right to your side on the reps here! Turning early helps keep his butt in tight to you when he is on your right. He is naturally tighter on your left, so it is not as important to turn early when he is on your left.
And he seemed just fine with the beeping, what a good boy!!!
Great job!!Hi! This is looking really good too 🙂
Interesting that he comes in straight to your left hand but swings his butt out on your right side. You can start with shorter distances on your right side, so that he doesn’t come in with as much speed on that side and can line his butt up. I didn’t notice a difference in your timing or hand placement, so it is possible he is just better on one side than the other (this is totally normal :))The circles looked good, nice and tight! He was a little better on your left than on your right (probably because he already comes in tighter on that side of you) but it evened out when you got the cookie hand down into the picture nice and early on your right and started the turning earlier. He turned away from you at 1:37, it did look like a turn away on the flat with a quick shoulder movement that direction. You were smoother and slower on the others and he had no problem. Yay!
Great job!
TracyHi there!
He did really well here, great focus forward and drive to the toy – I think he likes this game 🙂 Your transitions into the toy throw got faster and faster as you went through the session, and that really helped him focus ahead! Yay!! I could see enough of his face to know where he was looking haha 🙂 My only suggestion is that as you throw the toy, watch him the whole time and resist temptation to look at the toy then back at him: as you add distance, looking at him the whole time will help you release really quickly while he is focusing ahead. I think he is definitely ready for more distance! Great job!
THi! The target hits look good! A suggestion about the mechanics: have the cookie in the clicker hand so you can click then bring that hand over to the reward and drop it in on the target (you can turn your target hand to catch it). I think the barking was because the mechanics of the treat placement were drawing his eyes away from the target, so he was looking at the treat, plus you were doing some transferring of the treat and moving the target so there was a delay (Aussies don’t like delay LOL!) – having it ready to plop right in on the target will keep him focused on the target, If you feel like you need a third arm, you can get rid of the clicker and just use a ‘yes’ marker with the cookies in the non-target hand 🙂
Good work!
TracyGood morning! Looks like the tech issues are smoothed out! No worries about the slow motion, I can adjust the viewing setting on youtube to speed it up 🙂
Nice job building the value of the prop! Starting nice and close, and hand-delivering the reinforcement helped you get value on it really quickly. Good job changing your position – as you change position, either click earlier or just skip the click in favor of fast treat delivery 🙂
The next step would be to click and then toss the treat away, which sets up the next rep of click and toss the treat – which builds nicely into the games. Great job!
TGood morning!
Whoa! A lot of distance on this one! I was sweating just watching it haha! Maybe too far for the first couple of reps, he was asking some questions. You can start with the barrels closer as a warm up then increase the distance on each rep. It is quite a workout LOL! At about :31 he was figuring out to look for the barrel out ahead and did really well. His Turn And Burns looked GREAT every time! And he is reading the FC and the spins really nicely too!
A couple of suggestions to help make it even smoother:
in terms of timing of the barrel sends, if you send with your arm too soon (before he is passing you) then he asks questions by jumping up, not committing, or slamming into your butt like at 1:32 (hopefully it didn’t hurt as much as when Contraband did that with my butt LOL!) That is all just him saying “I don’t see connection, help me out mom” (baby dog stuff, I mean they aren’t even 6 months old yet).
When you stayed connected and then pointed/sent forward after he was passing you: perfect! This is what you did at 1:30, 2:00 and 2:13 for example. Just lovely!2 things to help with getting that connection to the correct side when you are on these bigger distances:
you already started more movement (shake shake) of the dog-side arm as you made eye contact – you did this in the 2nd half of the video and I think it was a tremendous help to him! Nice! Keep doing it (and he was NOT sad about the reinforcement you built into it either :))The other thing you can add is a challenge for you: run the rocking horses with your hands in your back pockets (or holding your butt cheeks haha) – this really opens up your upper body to let him see which side to be on and commit past you. It is important that you put your hands in your back pockets because it opens up the connection as you run – not at your sides, because that closes the connection and won’t help him.
Did you see the race track/post turns game on the rocking horses? I don’t think you have tried those yet and he is definitely ready for them 🙂
Backsides – When he was on your right at the beginning – very nice! You did a good job of moving forward til he committed on all reps except the first rep and :24 – you turned your shoulders in anticipation of rewarding too early so it pulled him to the front.
I loved :27! And :32! Lovely connection and line with more challenge because you were further away.
Good job going back to an easier line when you changed sides. I think at :44 he just needed you to walk forward another step or 2 to set the line before you gave the cue. When you move AND say push at the same time, the line is not as clear so he comes into you first then goes back out. Your connection on the other reps on that side was really strong, so he did really well! You can make more progress across the bar if you walk 2 or 3 steps up the line then give the push cue. Keep up the great job with the connection, though, that is REALLY looking good and helping him!!!
You can delay the reward now and see if he automatically turns and comes in over the little bar – then reward. And if he does… he is ready for the Advanced Level, where you step away on a serpentine line. If he doesn’t default to the jump on the baby level, do a few more sessions of rewarding early like you did and then test again to see if he defaults, before moving to Advanced.
Great job on these 🙂 Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! I was thinking about this!
You can probably add a serpentine verbal to override body language, same as we do for threadles. But it is easy enough to turn the upper body to her on serpentines, so a specific serp verbal is a lower priority, as compared to threadle and backside verbals and turn verbals, if that makes sense 🙂T
Good morning! Lots of lovely work here!
Seq 1, first run: really really nice!!!
She read the slicey serpy line 1-2 really nicely!!!
Wrapping 3-4 looked really good, and the 5-6-7-8 section looked lovely too. You were super perfectly connected throughout – click/treat for you!!! You can push the timing forward and see if you can do the decel into the wrap cue sooner for 3, to see if you can leave sooner. And same with the FC 6-7 – see if you can rotate sooner and if she will still commit – all without sacrificing the connection, which is great here.Last run – nice job on the RC – is it a pretty hard rear cross and that is probably why she needed to see it sooner than Pippin, who is a highly experienced professional LOL!
Tiny break in connection at :07/:08 is why she didn’t take 5. You were looking a bit down at your side with your arm at your side, drawing the line more than looking at her. Ideally, your arm would be back behind you and eyes on her eyes for perfect connection (you had more of this on the first run). But, since your handling here was still in the ‘should be strong enough’ category, you can add a bit of lazy game to these types of sequences – walk/job through them, near the jumps, only semi-connected: throwing the ball or treats when she takes the jump even if you are not perfectly perfect in connection. Yes, we all keep trying to be perfect 🙂 but we also need the speedsters to help us out and commit LOL!The rest looked great!!
Next sequence, 1st try:
1-2-43 looked great! She had a little question on the rear cross on the flat to 4 – when you do those types of rears with Pip, do you use the dog-side arm or the outside arm to help set it? I use the outside arm with my dogs, it seems to help get their attention and then helps flip them away – but if you use the dog-side arm already, we want to keep it the same because it is too hard for us humans to remember 2 different handling ‘systems’ LOL! You can use whichever arm you prefer to get her attention then turn her away on the flat to smooth it out.
She found the backside at 5 really well!! On the 5-6 serpentine – at :08 you turned your upper body forward, so the center of your chest was perpendicular to the 5 jump bar, so she read it as a regular post turn – to serp to 6, you can keep your shoulders open to the 5 bar so you are facing her with your upper body (shoulders parallel to the bar) to help get he turn back out to 6. Your feet were really good on this line, so it is more about turning your upper body towards her more to cue the serp.
When in doubt, she jumps for the toy – which is better than biting you 🙂 So take that as a sign of her asking a question, because she doesn’t jump for it when she is clear on the line.2nd rep: I totally like he blind cross 3-4 (I am sure that does NOT come as a surprise to you haha!) And also – especially since you are in a smaller space – NICE TIMING! It is not easy to get the timing in so nicely when on shorter distances, but you rocked it! And got the reconnection doen on time so she knew where 4 was Yay!
Nice job staying open with your upper body on 5-6 AND being really quick to get into that gap! On a bigger distance you will have more itme so it will actually be easier. But you were clear – she would not have gotten 6 as the backside if you were not clear about it. Nice!
She had a tiny question on the way to the last tunnel because you turned forward and pulled away a little so she zigged into you then zagged back out – so keep connection to her eyes there 🙂Backside after tunnel –
This was also a good session for your stay-in-front-of-tunnel practice!
Very nice job here. You can add in a ‘go’ cue before the tunnel then the back cue (when the tunnel lines the pup up to the backside so directly) and a name call before it when you want the front side.
The first backside reps when you were a little closer to the entry wing went REALLY well (impressive backside commitment for a young dog!)
When you moved over to the outside wing, it was harder (of course LOL!) 2 things can help: *Less* of a lead out, so she is seeing more parallel motion on the entry and exit of the tunnel. And, more connection to her eyes where your upper body rotates towards her in a way that brings your outside shoulder across your body and in front of you – I use my outside arm moving forward like that as part of the cue when I am all the way across the bar for my big dog so I can get the shoulder rotation.
She responds REALY nicely to one little step towards the entry wing, so that is something you can continue to do as you work on getting all the way across the bar and getting the verbal really independent – when ou are that far across, the one little step will not hinder you from getting waaaay up the next line.
Good work reinforcing taking the jump after the backside too!Course 2 first try:
I think you did a great job connecting on the opening line here! 1 to *almost* 8 was perfect – she was about to commit to 8 and you turned and called so she changed her mind at :11 Her commitment question there and also at :19 tell me that the lazy game is PERECT for her right now (you get to be the lazy one hahaha)
The rest was really terrific- you really held strong connection and she committed beautifully. Yes, you can be earlier on the cues but right now being able to get commitment and stay connected on these big distances are more important than timing.2nd try: poor girl didn’t like hitting the bar! That is better than enjoying hitting the bar LOL you handled it perfectly.
The opening was gorgeous all the way til :47 (big wing jump) – I thought your connection was fine, she disagreed 🙂 See below for the lazy game – that keeps leaping into my mind as a way to make these little questions go away.
You were maybe a little early at :54 but I think it was more of a lazy-game-needed moment to get even more commitment when you aren’t perfect.Course 3 – another great opening with great commitment!! 1-9 was just about perfect – the only suggestion is to try to call & turn sooner before 8 (yellow tunnel) so she turns tighter on the exit to see 9 (small detail, her commitment looked fabulous).
At :18 after the red tunnel, she smoked you a little so you didn’t quite get across enough to make the new connection. You can probably send to the red tunnel from further away so you can across and connect on your lef t side sooner before she exits.
She did well on the RC on the flat to the ending line! She had a little question before the last jump (after the RC) – more connection there will help her know to drive ahead.2nd run on course 3 – I don’t blame her for being worried about the stay near the tractor, that thing is huge! Ha! She did a great job and read the opening line beautifully 🙂 And it is a great learning opportunity for trials, where she might have to line up in front of weird things.
Great job sending to 3 (red tunnel) from way far away to make the BC to 4 look easy!
And you sent to 9 from further away and easily got the BC at :22. Nice!
She did well on the RC on the flat but had the same question on the line to the last jump – she is still learning the Go verbal, so add more connection to it so she can accelerate ahead when you are behind.These courses looked REALLY good, I am glad you posted them! The little blips had more to do with some commitment training we can do so that you don’t have to be 1000% perfect with connection at all times. Yes, keep trying to be perfect, but we can apply her commitment training to the bigger courses so that you can be almost perfect and she will still commit (because, when she didn’t commit, you were close to perfect and that is a good thing!)
So, the lazy game – if my memory serves, she has done some of this already. Now we apply it to the bigger distances/higher jump heights: I think at the barn, a ball will work best but on the turf, you can also use food. You will get more/faster reps with big pieces of cheese 🙂 Take a sequence and walk near the jumps, showing really mediocre connection – and when she takes the jump, toss a treat and keep walking to the next one. If she doesn’t take the jump, just ignore and keep walking to the next one – and reward that one if she does take it. If she doesn’t take any of them, you can add in just enough connection to get her to commit. At the barn, you can toss a ball instead of treats, ten call her back, trade for the ball, and keep going. The goal is that she will stay on a line while you are not 1000% connected – working from walking to jogging to running. I think she will figure it out really quickly.Great job on these! Let me know if the lazy game idea makes sense 🙂
Tracy
Hi!
>>I think Mookie has mastered the zig zag grid.
That is great news! I think that part of the grid is teaching the dogs how to use their bodies on those slices – it is hard but it sounds like he has figured it out!
>>Should I now keep the grid straight and at a lower height for Mookie for Maintenance or should I keep it at 20 inches for him ??>>
Depending on how much you get to practice it – I would start each session of one warm up rep in each directions at a low height and slightly opened. Then one rep in each direction straight at a low height. Then one rep each direction at a higher height – can be full height but doesn’t need to be. And 6 total reps is about all I recommend for one session.
>>And I just want to say thank you again for doing this camp. Even though I could not do the full courses due to lack of space and equipment, I could do the Novice and Masters sequences and sections of the courses. I loved the custom skill sets, your structure and the vidoes which I watched repeatedly. I can now do backside blinds easily with Mookie and Buddy and they both read my “close ” cue well n
Awww, you are more than welcome!! I am so glad you had fun and got good work in for the boys 🙂 It has been a crazy summer for all of us and I am glad you enjoyed the agility! Fingers crossed that we can go back to ‘normal’ trials at some point soon 🙂
TracyHi!
The rear crosses looked great! You had really good timing and that totally helped! He glanced to his left on the first 2 reps and turned to his right without spinning – good boy!! And the turns to his left were perfect.
Rocking horses look really good! My only little tweak is to hold your arm back until he is passed you, I think that will strengthen your connection even more so he drives past you more easily. The spin looked good! I think most of your rewads were from your hand – so you can also shift to tossing them out past the wings (or past you as he drives back) so he keeps looking out ahead and not at you 🙂 He really seemed to like it when you were running a bit!!!
On the ‘away’ cue – I think your arm is fine – he could see your arm and your connection perfectly. Remember that you will be doing this at a run, so whatever is comfy is great as long as he can still see your connection (which he totally could here :)) I love how he was able to easily balance back and forth between moving with you and doing the away!!
Great job on all of these 🙂
Tracy
Awesome update!!! Sounds like you are doing a little bit of ALL the good things and keeping it fun for him. Yay!! Yes, it is hard to not be greedy but so important 🙂 Great job!!!
TracyHi! I guess a little rain is better than the scorching heat, right? She looked like she was having fun here especially on the tunnel-tire-tunnel line: wheeeee!!!!!
The in in sequences on the 2nd rep, last rep, and beginning of 2nd to last rep all looked good – she is still thinking her way through it, but she is turning into the gap then back out with out any big handling help, and that is great! She also is doing well on the serpentines, but she has a little quesiton on the back-out part of it because your shoulder is turning away, cuing her to not go back out (and serps don’t have the same super-specific verbal as a threadle). You can see this at :04 (she didn’t automatically go back out because you were moving away towards the tunnel) as well as a little less so at :29 and :40. The serp does have a physical cue/line of motion attached to it (unlike the threadle which is more of a verbal cue), so 2 things will help smooth that out: staying closer to the serp line of jumps (like you did at :29 and :40) and keeping your chest open to her on the serp jump – center of the chest facing center of the bar, as if your upper body is facing her (dog side arm extended way back) and your feet keep moving forward down the line (like they were). That cues the ‘go out’ element that she was questioning.
Great job with your feet moving forward throughout! Yay! And also great job on all the verbals!!!!Tracy
Interesting about how he got it on the hard angles but not on the easy angles! Maybe do an easy angle warm up then move to hard angles?
About heights – I almost never go to full he9ght on this grid. I *might* with a super angulated dog with a lot of fitness, but I generally don’t because they learn the concepts nicely on a lower height and then it is easier to transfer when they have more room to the full height.
Tracy
