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Hi!
>> I’ll have to visit a park to work on this week’s games, as I can already tell my basement will be too small lol! I think we can do the Set Point game down there, but otherwise will need more room.
You can also do the proofing with a squished up tunnel 🙂
>>If we are right by the wing and can use physical cues to indicate a wrap, should we still use the wrap verbals?
Yes, for two reasons –
First, because the more info we can give to the dogs, the better 🙂 Give every possible cue.
Second, to get us in the habit of using verbals, so that ti becomes second nature and then it will be easy to do when we really need them (when the physical cue might not be as strong).>> And what exactly do “left” and “right” mean? In what situations would you want to use “left” and “right”?
My left and right cues are for mild collections, approximately 90 degrees where I want the dog to turn parallel to the bar but NOT wrap the wing.
>>And when do you start saying the verbal and does it mean turn and take that obstacle? Or just turn?
Everyone defines things differently, but my verbals also imply commitment, meaning: take the jump and wrap (as an example). So I start saying it at the exit of the previous obstacle or earlier, depending on the line.
>>The only “left” and “right” we have done is with Minny Pinny – do you think there are in between steps he needs to understand what it means in the context of the Smiley Face Game? Like should I isolate the verbal with just one wing at first?>>
You can warm it up on a wing. Then you can handle it without verbals… and if you can handle it and produce the turns, add in the verbals to name the behavior 🙂
let me know if that makes sense!
TracyGreat to see you here, you and Fizz are so fun to watch!
Working backwards on the video: that last rep was perfection, look at how he can use his body! Yessssss 🙂 I think he was sorting out how to leave the reinforcement early on (the toy makes it harder, as you mentioned) so you can pull the barrel in closer so the option of coming to your front in not really possible. You can also do that by straightening your legs out so the barrel is between your knees. I figure he just needs to see this set up with the verbal one more time, then he will own it and you can add more distance and challenge.
The scenery behind you is gorgeous!
And you can also start the other games I posted 🙂 have fun!
TracyHi! I have found that Vs are very clear about how they are feeling LOL!!! And I appreciate that 🙂 They are also the ‘complete package’ in many ways: loving companions, incredible athletes, and amazing teammates. And smart! I really like the breed 🙂
She looked great here! She can bend really nicely. I think your position was really good – just far enough away to challenge her a bit (one oopsie) but also close enough to help her be very successful 🙂 strong session!!!
Onwards to the new games, they should be visible in the Course Syllabus section. Great job!
TracyLovely session here! Nice transitions into the collar holding (great job rewarding the collar hold moments), the wraps looked strong with the added distance, and he even did the whippet head toss a couple of times when he heard the verbal: “let me go, I know what it is!” Haha!!
He also really seemed to like the cookie game you played in the middle! Yay!
Onwards to the new games, he is ready 🙂 have fun!
TracyThis looks great, Lori! Perfect! You can move the upright even further away now, to add some challenge (I think he will still think it is easy :))
And the video posting worked 🙂 double yay!!! He is ready for today’s games for sure, I am looking forward to seeing him in action 🙂
Great job!
TracyHi! Great job with the verbals (I like how distinct they are) and she is terrific with her wrapping! I feel your pain about sometimes forgetting to use the verbal, or using the wrong one LOL!! It gets easier with practice 🙂 and it is definitely worth it.
I see what you mean about the collar grab – it doesn’t look like you were choking her, but she definitely thought it was weird LOL!! She totally wears her heart on her sleeve 🙂 So, a few ideas – with each touch of the collar, give an immediate cookie. It is also something you can do randomly throughout the day. That can help make holding the collar into a super happy thing in this context. You can do the progression of collar touch – cookie – wrap – cookie (she will hopefully like all the cookies :))
Now, because she thought it was a little weird and we don’t want any feelings of weird things happening to bubble over into the games, I suggest doing the game and the collar touch/hold for cookies a few different ways to reduce the weirdness factor (you were not being weird, but she did think it was weird):
– a very quick touch/hold for the cookie then quickly into the wrap
– a gentle touch to her chest to hold her back as you start the cue – she will let us know if she likes it or if she thinks it is weird 🙂 I sometimes use a harness for the pups who think the collar holding is weird
– you can start the game with your hand near the collar or barely touching it (not actually holding it) then quickly send her into the wrap. That can introduce the hand near or on the collar as the thing that happens right before the fun begins, which can help make the collar touch/hold more fun too.
Let me know what you think!
TracyHello and welcome! He is already 7 months… and only 7 months LOL!!! He is doing great! A break for vacation is a beautiful thing – hope you all had a great time! And revisiting these games with Sole will be fun too, she is going to enjoy the puppy stuff and you can make it more challenging for her too 🙂
Good choices on verbals! They are pretty distinct. Plus they will make you chuckle: loop loop loop said quickly starts to sound like plooplooploop (makes me chuckle) and row row row makes me want to sing row row row your boat. LOL! Maybe I am just nuts.
He did really really well here! Since he is understanding it so nicely, I think you can move him to a wing – mainly so you can start to differentiate the no-touching reps from the touching reps. He is far less likely to want to push the solid wing than the soft barrel, so moving him to a wing will let you say “great job for not touching it” with big reward parties and “please don’t touch it” with either less exciting reinforcement or just praise 🙂 I don’t think he touched the wingless upright at all, so I am guessing he will not touch the PVC wing either. He is turning his head beautifully on all of these.
Great job!! Let me know what you think!
TracyYay! Glad to see you here 🙂 Eden is awesome! There are two Vizslas here – Eden and Paco. I love the breed and I am excited to see more of her!
T
Hi!
Yes, I personally found the circle work to get boring pretty quickly, for me and the dog, and it put a little too much emphasis on being near me as highest value, when I like the pups to drive away to do things. We were also seeing some weird habits develop (like too much head checking on driving ahead) which then had to be untrained, so it is easier and more fast-paced to use different approaches 🙂 We can certainly teach the balance of drive to commit with drive to handler without the circle work, so I have embedded some elements into the other games but I don’t do much traditional circle work anymore.The tunnel-wing games are going well – they are actually pretty challenging with youngsters!!
One thing you can do to help ramp up the speed (and terror haha) even more is to send to the tunnel on less of an angle (more of a straight approach) so you are accelerating as he exits the tunnel and not as stationary at the wing. That will make it easier to get commitment to the wing. Connection overall was strong, which is harder to do on this game than it looks 🙂 Yay! The more you can keep your hand back (not use it to point at the line) and the more you look at his eyeballs… the better it goes.
>>Not quite sure what I am doing to get him to duck back in the tunnel exit on the threadle. I called him to get a turn to me just to break it up and then he started threading again.>>
2 things were contributing:
– he was surprised 🙂 based on how the game was being played, the threadle was totally unexpected. When he realized that it was a “thing” in this game, he was much better
– there was no turning cue before he entered the tunnel, so he exited going straight (that was the last cue he saw, so he was correct) then he turned and the object on his line was the tunnel exit – so he hurried back to it (good boy, trying SUPER hard to read lines).So at :51 and then again at 2:07, using your wrap verbal for the exit and letting him see you begin the rotation – all while he is still about 3 feet from the tunnel entry – will cue the tight turn on the exit needed for the threadle line. Then you can give the threadle cue as soon as you make connection with him after the tunnel exit.
It was better when you isolated it then it was fine for the reps after it – partially because he was not surprised by the context and partially because you were more rotated before he entered so he turned better on the exit.
>>Around 2:30 I think I have proof that my connection and shoulder is way more important than the tunnel cue since the cue was really late and he still locked on to the tunnel.>>
Yes, at 11 months, connection and motion will override almost every other cue. For example, at 1:33, you took off saying your tunnel cue but there was not a clear connection. You looked forward, so for a moment it looked like a spin move on the wing and he ran directly to you. I think you were briefly in “running for your life” mode, I understand that feeling LOL! Then you were using your dog-side arm to point to the line, so he was missing the tunnel (pointing ahead of the pup obscures the connection) so keep working to have your hand back. I have begun telling myself that there are magnets in my fingertips and they are drawn back to where the collar is 🙂 As the pups get more experienced, hand movement is less critical but for now, they do better when we are less pointy.
To help get better commitment to the tunnel as you run for your life, oops I mean as you drive up the line 🙂 you can also change angle of wing so the tunnel is on a straight path after the wrap rather than a push back to it – so he rounds the wing and the tunnel is right there, as you run away yelling tunnel tunnel tunnel.
>>In the video did you really do a FC after the wing wrap but send to a toy next to the tunnel? I did it as a post turn here as it felt like a FC sending to the toy was muddying the waters too much for my puppy that missed the tunnel when I Iost connection earlier.>>
I went back and watched it – all of the FCs were either followed by through the tunnel or a reward in my hand – there were several there were FC on the wing then through the tunnel to the toy on the ground? But never FC on the wing then to a toy next to the tunnel without taking the tunnel… let me know if I missed something?
Nice work here!
TracyAh yes, I see what you are saying – wider and then the OMG reaction where he pinned his ears and leapt away.
A couple of ideas for you:
– Change the context – don’t use the circle work, it is a bit poisoned for now. We can accomplish all of the same things without the context of outside or inside circles, where he is not comfortable.– Change your feeding position/placement of reinforcement ever-so-slightly when you do play games where he drives in close – when you are delivering a treat at your side, hand your hand touching the outside of your leg, right next to the knee. In a different context, the placement of reinforcement will help him want to get nice and tight to your leg.
– Different contexts to play with will help. Both of these add a lot more “action” – and action is important for him here, because if he is feeling pumped up and running more, he will be in a different state of arousal (hotter porridge :)) and is less likely to worry about being too close:
—- revisiting the contexts, we can get the reinforcement tight to you without using the old context. Look back at the week 1 Teaching Deceleration and Drive To Handler and also the Week 2 Collection Sandwich – both of those has circle work elements embedded into them. In the moments when he drives to you and you turn, place the reinforcement right next to your leg (hand touching leg) and then you have 3 options for actually delivering the cookie to his mouth: either from your hand as you are touching your leg, or by moving your hand forward so he stays tight but goes past your leg, or by turning with him tight to you and then throwing the reward forward.Throwing the reward forward after being tight to you can relieve some of the pressure of being so close to you (herding dogs in particular do feel the pressure on this). There is also another way to reinforce, see below:– I use these ‘pill bug’ games to develop what is created in circle work, but there is a lot more fun and action 🙂 Here is the first session with Hot Sauce as a baby, including some of my mistakes (late rewards, almost falling over the tunnel, etc haha!) You can see that she gets tighter and tighter to me on each rep, very close to my leg on the last rep.
Beginning stages: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DLV-J0kSS9IAdding blinds crosses to build inside circles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hwIBvE8Ozk
You can reward at your side with a cookie as described above, or you can use the cross-body style of reinforcement that I am using here. That is a European-style of reinforcement that opens up connection and gets the dogs to drive in REALLY tight (no, the pups don’t cut in front of us :)) so that is something to consider with Kal – he will be seeing different contexts so will likely not be thinking about how to avoid your legs. I work that “don’t worry about my feet” skill with my Papillons too and this really helps.
Let me know what you think!
TracyGlad you had fun! Spot is a superstar in the making 🙂 Hope your knee is better and you can get back to running asap!
T
Goooooood morning! On the video: Excellent! I think the lala and roro will be great – when you are moving and being louder, they will sound even more different and that will be useful to him on course.
I love the way he slithers around the barrels 🙂 That is going to set up some really gorgeous turns over bars!!
He wasn’t always sure if he should leave the sit when you were doing the lala or roro, so you can add in a gentle collar hold: hold him (you’ll have to bend over so his feet don’t come off the ground :)), start your lala or roro, then let go. The lala or roro *can* be a release but really never need to be, so we can start it without a stay 🙂
Great job here!
