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Yay for a great session!! Boo for no video. I feel this: yesterday I did a great session of the final stages to build to a full teeter, including Elektra’s first ever full teeter. YAY!!! And when I went to turn off the camera… I never hit record. f*#$(%%ck! Oh well, I will try again today LOL!!!
I am glad Stark was fabulous on it! He is really progressing beautifully 🙂
T
Good morning!
Behold the magic of duct tape!
I also use random leftover masks as targets for Elektra. LOL!!! Mask + duct tape = target position. She is truly a pandemic puppy.He is doing well finding the position AND holding it while you move past! Good boy!
He likes to look at da momma while he is going into position. He will be more balanced riding it down if we can keep his heads straighter. He is quick – does it so fast that we can’t go faster than he does to try to get him to not look at you. He is totally fine to look for you after arriving in position, I just want to see if we can convince him to not look for you while moving into position. So, 2 ideas to keep him looking at his ‘job’ and less at you while moving into position:
As you move ahead of him, you can toss the reward back towards the target as he gets to position. I use my ‘catch’ cue, which means the cookie or toy is coming back towards him. Ideally, I magically get the reward to land on the target. But the catch cue means he can move when the throw is poopy. So the end result is he watches the target area more and me less 🙂
You can also have a reward target out ahead (bowl or toy on the ground or the MM if he is liking it again) – and sometimes release him to it.So the main reinforcement strategies will be throwing back or releasing ahead rather than trying to place the cookie on the target – and then it will be all about looking at the target and ahead, and not at your hands.
He seems SUPER confident here and was leaving you to start the game! Ha! So you can add a little more tip! I think you can also add the Elevator Game first steps, he will like that a lot based on his joyous attitude here!
Downhills – it took him a moment to realize that it was about the toys and to not look for cookies – but then he was much happier driving straight across! I agree – the last rep was great and I also like the 2nd to last rep (yes, he didn’t really stop on that one but he was not sure if he should stop – but you got a great reward in for driving all the way across the board.)
>>I think this is the setup I’m going to start with for Downhill all the way to the ground 🙂
Yes! I like it! He is very close to the ground here. I think the next step is to go to the lower PVC thingies on the teach it, so there is less of a visual as he is coming down the board. Go to the medium sized ones, then to the little ones. The visual of the PVC poles really helped Contraband get this game rolling and then it was easy to fade them.
Then onwards to more tip!Great job here!!! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
The uphill looked really good! He took a moment to get organized but then drove across the board beautifully! Was it just a one hit wonder session? I am really happy with how he drove up the board there.
Backing up – once he got started, he did a really good job! You can jump start the behavior in new places but having him in his 2o2o to start, then draw him forward (cookie lure :)) then let him offer leaning back. Then draw him all the way off, so he can back up. It is a good one to keep bringing to new places. My only suggestion is to be a couple of inches closer to the board, so when he backs up you can feed him closer to the edge of the board – that will produce a better weight shift. He was reaching forward a little here so changing your position a bit will fix that.
Downhills – so much good about the way you structured this session!!! Play – hop on and balance and eat the cookie. Down the board, food… then you got him the heck off the board (which is also pretty reinforcing and then the toy gets involved, which he enjoys, and that likely raises the value of the food and the drive across the board). So the behavior you got was pretty ideal, especially on that last rep: run fast down the board, head low and weight shift at the end (where he would be weight shifting in the target position). LOVELY! I think another session or two here like this, and then add some more tip! How is the end position going? He is very close to the downhills meeting the ground, so be sure to play with your bang game – the bang game and downhills are going to merge soon for him 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
He did a great job here, 100% finding the entry and making a nice bend down the line. The only miss was when he sent himself as you were changing positions, so you can use line up cookies to help prevent that.>Should I do another session making the entries harder with the same angle on the poles?>>
Yes – and also add your motion. Now that he recognizes the progression so well, you can mix in your motion right away. Rather than doing an entire session of sending, you can mix in sending and motion as you work all the angles. So one more session with these angles to be sure the harder entries and motion are all good (I am sure they will be) and then you can quickly progress to angling poles 3 and 4 (sends, motion, entries) then things will come together really quickly! You’ll find that the poles will tighten up pretty fast at this stage.
Great job!
TracyHi!
I agree, it is really fun watching them put it together!!! And yes, they do figure us out pretty quickly LOL! Half of the verbals I use are ones that developed by accident that the dogs figured out LOL!She is doing well here – before tightening the poles more, I think we should try to convince her to run to the poles more rather than trot in then pick up speed. She is probably still sorting out the weight shift to make the entry, so a couple more sessions at this angle or even a slightly easier angle (for the toy throw idea, see below) can help. As soon as she consistently runs to the entry, we can move to the next steps.
So, to get her to run to the entry, there are a few ways to do it and you can mix them all in during the training:
– you can take out your movement entirely, standing totally still, so she is not cuing off your motion (she runs when you start moving in the poles, for example). To take out your motion while also getting speed, the toy throws should happen at when her right shoulder is at pole 2, so basically she bends into the entry and then the toy is thrown – which means the 2nd base should be a ‘gimme’ that she can easily find while running to the toy (a gimme angle for her is probably 2&8 on that 2nd base).
You can verbally mark and be exciting… but don’t move or run – the propulsion to the poles should be separate from your motion.– you can also do a bit of the polar opposite: you are running at high speed, the whole time. I still suggest early toy throws (right shoulder at pole 2, as soon as she bends into the entry) but basically you cue the poles and take off and run. Wheeeee!
On both of those, work in the harder angles too – kind of as a back and forth between easy entry, hard entry, easy entry, hard entry – so the running to the easier entries gets mixed in too.
– the other thing to add in is the Find ‘Em game using wings that I posted yesterday – the wing wraps are stimulating and you can use those to elicit more driving to the weaves. Get her all excited, cue a wing wrap, and throw the reward early 🙂
>>The next session I switched back to the ball but really watched my verbals. She trotted out to the weaves but as soon as she got to them she drove through and kept her head looking forward down the line. I can try another session increasing around the arch with both the pet tutor vs the ball to see how that goes.>>
It is pretty normal that the PT elicits a bit of a slower drive to the poles at some point than a toy does (ball or lotus ball etc) – Because her head was straight with the ball and your verbals were stronger, I think sticking with the ball now will work. She is doing a great job of finding the behavior with the PT out there (rather than just running to the PT :)) and her head is straight, so you can keep the ball in play for now. If she starts to look back at you too much, we can switch back to the PT but I don’t think that will happen, I think she has the idea of ‘go straight’.
Nice work here!!! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
He did well here – I agree that it is a hard game and the dogs really have to think about it, which is why the speed is not necessarily the same as it would be going towards the MM. He hit the angles nicely and only had one judgey look at the MM haha 🙂 He stayed in really well too except when you were moving away a little and have a really excited marker verbal so he came out, perhaps expecting reinforcement. He was faster when you were moving more – so as you mentioned, using a toy reward will help that so he won’t be as thoughtful about having to move away from the MM. And it helps us fade the MM and layers in a bit of arousal because he also has to ignore the toy in your hand. And the toy will allow you to set up the next rep without him going back through the weaves 🙂 It is good to mix the throw reward in more and more at this point because then we will get the MM out entirely pretty soon too.This game only needs to be looked at a little bit here and there, so you move into the other games that involve tightening the poles 🙂
>>Hope it’s ok that I shared videos of Presto from class – probably should ask first>>
No problem!!! It is fun to see the compilation!!!
Great job here 🙂
TracyHi Leslie and Tofer!
Lisa is THE BEST! He did really well on the channels intro here – for a Border Collie, I believe the channels are terrific for getting the footwork. He is probably going to ‘swim’ – I posted some info about striding today. Bouncing is fine too, but based on his size, length and power, I think we will get swimming.
Plus the channels are great for teaching sooooo much independence! You can already see that in the 2 videos.
First video:
He had no trouble with this session – good boy, he was finding the entry and heading down the channel really well on your left side! On your right side, he just needed to be patient to let you set him up – so you can call him back and reward him as you line him up, so he doesn’t start without you. When you started him, he found those entries really well!On the 2nd video, with you moving, he did exactly what we want: hit the entry and run down the channels without paying the slightest attention to what you were doing LOL! Send, rear cross, run, it didn’t matter, he was weaving! Great job!
So now you can go onwards in the channel progression: adding harder angles of sending, countermotion, lateral motion, etc.
If he continues as well as he did here, you will be able to introduce him to the 12 pole channel really quickly and work the challenges on 12 poles.Great job!!!!
TracyExactly! She will let us know. If she chooses one that looks awkward, we can gently massage her choice towards the other haha! For example, Contraband for a moment chose the bounce, but he was very scrunched up. So I let him feel the swim on the channels, and that was soooo much more comfy. We will find out in the next week or so 🙂
TPS – his front end angulation will be what makes the difference – if he can get his head down and can reach for the swim, then we go with that. But if it is awkward, then we can let him keep his elbows in tight and bounce. He will tell us 🙂
T
Hi! At 20″, he might be a swimmer or a bouncer, but probably a swimmer? Channels are really good for helping the dogs sort that out but since the facility doesn’t have channels – I think it would work with Weaveamatics! You can totally try it – similar concept to channels and can totally be used the same way. Or, use 6 2x2s poles (3 bases) in that slightly open format and see what he does. It will be fun to play with striding this week!
Tracy
Yay! He certainly seemed to have no trouble with this at all! Perfect! You can revisit it here and there as you work the bang game and elevator games, but because he was fine with the movement – you don’t need to do sessions specifically for the rebound game. You can just add a little wiggle to the board maybe one time when he is in target position for the other games. Great job!
TracyHi! Thanks for the Krome update!
The first section with the bang game looked good but I agree – he was a bit too chill about it all. But then when you changed to a spoonful of delish for the 2nd session, wow what a difference! He was a wild man for it! That is good to know- you can see if he likes squeeze cheese or whipped cream, as those might be as high value but easier to run around with LOL! The reason I mention ease of running around: when he is in class and there is a teeter on course, you can reward before the teeter, then have him do a bang game just like this, for some crazy high value reward. That can start transferring his good teeter work in the class/course setting (which will help transfer it to trials). I suggest the bang game like this as a starting point for that, because there is probably no history of running up and bailing off the board in that context, so you should be able to get good reps in. You can bring the target too, if it is easy to attach to the board in other places. That wild man “I LOVE THIS” approach to the teeter is exactly what we want 🙂At home, using the spoon of delish: add a little more tip! And let him run through some tunnels before, to get him as excited as possible 🙂
He did really well on the teeter tables too! On the first rep at 2:19, he went righ across the board and into position, and looked pretty smiley about it! On that rep, the target was empty. On the other reps, I think the target had treats, so he did not go into position right away – and that is fine 🙂 I keep the target loaded until the board is hitting the ground – then it merges with the other end position games and he runs down and into target position. So for now, leave treats on the target to keep him running fast across the board, then just release him rather than ask for the target position (but keep working the end position cue & behavior separately so he builds that up). And you can add more tip here too, he looked very confident!
Nice work! Let me know what you think!
TracyLook at the good weather! Yay!!!
Great session here. The check-it-out rep to start was really helpful! And then I think she REALLY liked the tunnels before running the board – SUPER fast on rep 3 where you were ahead and also moving. When you were not as far ahead or not moving as much on the other reps, she was still fast and drove straight across. NICE!
Now because she is coming in with so much speed from the tunnel – see if you can get her nutty with the tunnel, then maybe tug or hop her up onto the table and get balanced on the table… THEN run down the board. It happens quickly so you can maintain the tunnel excitement, but that stop & balance moment will get more speed across the board. When she runs and leaps on and runs across the board, she was moving fast enough that she had to shift her weight back on the top of the board when landing from the leap on, then she had to try to pick up speed in order to shift her weight back. So she didn’t quite get all the way up to speed on the board. Balancing on the table and then running down should help that. Let me know if that makes sense 🙂
For the uphills/mountain climbers, you can urn directly from a tunnel and up the board (as long as you show it to her first, I don’t want her to be surprised and fly off :)). That simulates the teeter on a course.Great job!!!
TracyHi!
More good work from Ms. Confident here!!! Love it!On the elevator game: your attention to the mechanics needed was MOST EXCELLENT. Click/treat for you! I think you were doing a quiet countdown and then a louder target cue, and that is great. She did really well here – the first couple of reps were nice but check out the last rep: she was focusing forward AND shifting her weight in anticipation of the board moving. YES! Perfect. For now, other than playing this on as many different teeters as possible (which, due ot lockdown, might mean simply moving the teeters you have access to into differet places in the barn or yard) – you can add a little more independence on the target position and as she is arriving in target position, you are walking forward to challenge her to hit and hold the position as you move past.
The downhills are looking good! The target might be a little too close to give her enough room for her front feet? Maybe move it one paw-length away from the edge of the board 🙂
She is fast and confident, so you have to be really careful to always start her from a standstill on the barrel (or table or whatever is there) and NOT start her by leaping then down the board. Leaping on presents a balance & weight shift issue. Because she has to balance and weight shift after leaping on, but that leaves her no time to get up to speed and then weight shift again as the board moves. She was trying to get up to speed on the board, but it can’t happen after hte leap on which is why she fell off at :27 and was losing her balance and scrambling on the other reps where she was leaping on. We don’t want her to scare herself or consider slowing down across the board, so it is easier to not have her leap on.
Her end position work looks great! So for now, have the target empty and you can deliver the cookies after she hits and holds the position.
Great job!! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
