Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hi! It was great to see you at the seminar – it is crazy how well Zoom connects us all! I am glad to hear that the boys did well with the games 🙂 I am not surprised that your youngster, Buddy, needed more support – that is totally normal. Keep up the great job with the magnet fingers and keep me posted 🙂
Tracy
Yay! Yes – the fingers move with the dog. Not ahead of the dog, and they don’t stay behind the dog when you are using distance. Have fun!
Hi Wanda! It is great to see you back here and in the live seminars too!!!!! Always fun to have you in class 🙂 I am glad your pups are doing so well – keep me posted on how they do with these games!!
TracyHello! Yay, fun times with the mixy mix dogs! Give me the details – what is she a mix of, and where is she from? Looks like JRT and Staffy in there? And some whippet? She is adorable and FUN FUN FUN FUN!!!! Can’t wait to learn more about her (I might be a bit biased because I have a house full of mixy mix/BorderJack/BorderWhippet/etc dogs 🙂 )
Apologies in advance for the long reply, I get excited by developing training plans for cool dogs like her!
Thank you for telling me a bit about the jumping stuff that is a high priority: I have found that better commitment and better connection can work to improve jumping! And, you won’t have to run as fast… which also improves jumping because our sport mix dogs then don’t try to chase us as much 🙂 Motion is indeed distracting!!! And since she is just 2, she is sorting out about a million things and trying to do it all while going super fast. Fun!!!
On the first video – this was perfect for us to begin to sort out how to help get a better jumping style! I have a bunch of ideas for ya to get us started – she reminds me of a couple of my dogs, so I think these will help!!
First – because she is so drivey and clearly loves that disc, we can develop a reinforcement hierarchy for great effort, good effort, and ‘we didn’t really love that one’ effort 🙂 A lot of her jumping choices are directly influenced by the handling, so the rewards will help her stay settled in her jumping form while you can play with different handling. The disc gets used for the great effort. A tuggie or great cookies (if she likes those) can be for the good efforts – and a boring cookie can be for the ‘we didn’t love that one’ effort. At this early stage, I want to reward a LOT (but not all with the high value disc) because on the video, when you didn’t reward she would get try harder on the next rep, but that turned into over jumping more rather than settling more. And I think we can take out telling her any “no” type of things right now – the reinforcement hierarchy will do that for us and will also keep her in a more settled form, if that makes sense. Plus, some of the errors where she was told she was wrong were actually handling errors, so that is more reason to give her a lower value reward rather than no reward or a no marker.
so if you see a gorgeous jumping form and/or great response to a cue – go wild with a disc. Wheeee! If you see a really nice form/response: praise, tuggie, yummy cookies. If it was not great, either keep going to reward a great one or if you stop, tell her it was nice and give her a lower value cookie. If she splats a bar – you can stop if you want, but be quiet/boring about it, reset it, try again – then reward instantly if she gets it.Tell me more about her likes & dislikes in terms of rewards and we can plan 🙂
And, about the rewards – on the regular connection lines, we want her to look at her jump lines, so you can toss your rewards out on the line rather than from your hands – that will help her think more about her lines and less about driving to you or to the high value reward. So for example – if she is exiting the tunnel, looking at the jump, makes a nice jumping form: toss the disc out on the line. That will encourage her to look forward and choose better takeoff spots on the lines.
The other thing I think will help is if you join what I affectionately call “Team Chill” – I am a founding member of Team Chill LOL!!! This is when we handlers are very calm, very boring, very smooth, super connected – to allow our very drivey young dogs to sort out how to use their bodies on course. You will see on the live videos (I will be posting them soon) that we did a game where the handlers ran with an open bottle of water in their hands… that was to get them to be on Team Chill and be smoooooth and connected. What that will get Kindle to do is be able to look at her lines and not be quite as excited about going fast and chasing your lines. That would include the start – if she has a stay, I recommend having her in a stay, lead out, make a connection, release quietly 🙂 When you send her behind your back to start, it is hard to get connection and both of you are going full steam ahead – which was leading her to not choose the best takeoff spots.
Most of our mixy mix dogs need us to be on Team Chill when they are young 🙂 Then when they figure out how to sort out their bodies, we can be on Team No Chill and run fast and yell loud and all the things 🙂 Let me know if that makes sense – speaking for myself, it is HARD to be calm and chill but totally helpful for the dog 🙂
You had a really lovely moment of Team Chill on the first video – at 2:24 when you were adding the verbals…. SO NICE! More of that will get us even smoother jumping because you will be able to show her more connection and also earlier timing. She tended to jump too high when the timing was late, we will keep playing with the timing she needs. For timing, try to keep that good connection and a nice low arm, but turn your shoulder sooner. She exits the tunnel, and you are smoothly turning as soon as she is out. And when she lands from a jump, you are smoothly turning to the middle jump or moving forward to the tunnel. We will see how early you can turn and build up the commitment, which will give her more time to choose takeoff points.Two things that seemed to be consistently hard for her in the regular connection video was good form on the jump after the tunnel when she was on your right side, and good form on the pinwheel jump in the middle. For the jump after the tunnel, I think having a Team Chill style of connection really helped her! When you had your arm low and back and you were super connected and not moving that fast… she did really well!! If the arm was higher and you were moving faster, she had trouble. And on the middle jump, I think it was a combination of you can turn sooner (connection was really good, but if you turn your shoulders when she lands from the previous jump then she can make an earlier adjustment) and also that she does not turn her head when she is turning – the front part of her body is looking straight, so she jumps longer. If we can get her to turn her head as she approaches the jump: boom! You will have great turns. We have started teaching this in the puppy program, here is how to start it. It is in the context of tight turns but it works great for these pinwheely turns too!
Your exit line connection is looking really good, great job using the arm across the body!!! Working backwards from the end of your video: I think your timing on the reps at 1:18 and :57 was awesome, look at how well she turned, YEAH! And great exit line connection. My only suggestion is to keep moving as you exit the turn so she can drive out for the reward. Now, looking back at the beginning of the video – you were a bit later in your timing there, so she didn’t quite know how to jump the bar. If she has a splat moment on the bar, no need to tell her no, because she didn’t have the info in time from you to make the adjustment – try to do the next rep with earlier timing then have a big disc party when the jumping is good. You can decelerate into the turn too – as she is exiting the tunnel, slow down before you rotate because she can process the slowing down and start to shift herself into the turn before the jump.
Nice work here!! Let me know what you think!
TracyOh lordy, DEMI!!!!! Did she just want an expensive spa treatment? I am very glad to hear she is doing well and will be back in action soon 🙂
Tracy
Hello! I was great seeing you at the seminar!!!!! Thanks for coming 🙂
>>I am confused about how long to keep the arm across the body. i set the exercise up with jumps 18 feet apart. Kasoom my 2 yr old is 21 ” and very long strides dog. i found that once I made the connection with him with my arm across my body as he was finishing the turns, I could just move forward and continue supporting him with my inside arm. >>
Correct! If I am understanding you correctly, you made connection then relaxed your ‘outside’ arm and went back to regular connection on the dog-side arm. That sounds perfect.
>>But then I rewatched the tapes (5th time) and saw you kept your arm across your body all the way to the tunnel. i realize we are training new skills for humans as well as dogs, and we are emphasizing things. But it is much easier to run forward, than on the side, once the dog understands the line.>>
Part of that was me exaggerating for the video 🙂 And part of that was probably because some of the demos were with my young dog (the blue merle whippety dog, who just turned a year old) – I was holding the exit line connection until he turned his head the new direction.
So with Kasoom, you might find he changes lines really fast so you don’t need to hold it long at all. Let me know if that makes sense 🙂
Tracy
Hi! Glad to see you here!
Trying to be sure I understand the question: if you are in the middle of the pinwheel and she is exiting the tunnel, your arm should be down and back, towards her collar (magnet fingers :)) and then your arm keeps moving with her as she moves through the pinwheel. Staying in motion a bit and using verbals should get it done nicely without having to run.>>When I don’t move a lot she shifts from ahead of me to behind me. >>
Do you mean she will cut in behind you, like she is blind crossing you? Let me know and I will give yo ua better answer 🙂
Tracy
Welcome back!! You two are looking great!
The regular connection is looking really good. So good, in fact, that you might have been TOO good and watching too much… and not turning soon enough 🙂 So yes, watch her eyes, but keep your shoulders turning so when she lands from a jump or exits the tunnel, she gets the physical cue to turn. It is a gentle turn on these pinwheels but you were facing straight for too long (which is why she went wide at :19).
The timing reps help you turn sooner – the first rep was a little late but the 2nd rep starting at :34 was really nice – and she turned perfectly!
At :43, I think the verbal was one stride late and the body turn was 2 strides late (she was gathering for liftoff when you turned) so note how she grunted when she landed there and was a little wide. The last rep looked good! So keep working to be early on the verbals (starting early is fine because we can repeat them) and match the timing of your shoulder turns/physical cues to the same timing as the verbals. Connection looked terrific!!Sequence 1: connection to her on the tunnel exit at 1:02 looked great! At 1:03 she had a little question (looked at you when she landed from 3): you had your eyes back to her after the FC, but note how your right arm (dog side arm) was trying to create exit line connection – try to get that right arm back behind you (using your left arm across your body) and then she will not look up at you.
At 1:08 she had a little question – not connection based but more that you went to your right arm too soon (she saw it as she was exiting the tunnel) so for a moment she was not sure if she should take the jump or come in to your rotation. That delayed the timing of the spin a little because you had to wait for her to commit – so you can wait longer to start that rotation (keep moving forward, decel, then rotate). And remember to get your dog-side arm back behind you (left arm on the spin at 1:10) so she can see the clear connection on the exit line.
Better timing on the FC on the last rep! It was slightly later, which smoothed it all out. Note how at 1:18 she looks up at you as she is moving up the line – that is because you were using the dog-side arm for exit line connection… and that actually blocks connection. So with all of the exits of these crosses, move your dog-side arm back behind you (using the arm across the body really helps that) so she can see the clear connection to commit to the next line.Great start here! I am excited to see more!!
TracyI am sooooo glad you enjoyed it!!! You and Enzo looked fabulous 🙂 I am ever grateful for great internet connections because we can actually get some good training done live on Zoom!!!! Great job 🙂
Hi! Thanks for the videos!
JWW is looking good! A nice glimpse into the future, he is SO FUN!!! The barking at the judge/crew will go away, that is simply lack of experience in that environment. Same with popping out of the tunnel – baby dog moment 🙂 I like that you chose the blind! It was a little late but he responded to the right verbal! And we will be working on the exit line connection to get the side change even if you are late 🙂T2B
It was hard to see the aframe performance but blind looked great!
Yeah, he totally didn’t know how to get on the teeter at the speed LOL!!! Because he is so young, you can hang back at the weaves and help him get on.
And WOWZA to the ending line!!! That is why we trained the go go go!!!!>> I like where this is going and how he is handling his start line and doing fairly well with focus and drive. Young dog stuff noticing the extra people in the ring should diminish over time and he does get a bit excited and barky and loses his focus for a second or two every now and then but he is SO much easier than CAVU which just makes it more fun and relaxed for me.>>
totally agree – everything about this is going the right direction and fun times are ahead!! And double hooray for the 14″ measurement 🙂
On the connection games: the regular connection looks great! You can add distance to this, or run deeper in towards the tunnel to practice connecting with him driving ahead!
Exit line connection: the FC wraps are looking really good – try to see if you can add in standing up more as you do them – standing up more will make it easier to transfer to the bigger courses lie your BC in T2B – you were hustling and didn’t have time to bend over. You were standing up more on your spins and that looked great! He turned tight, no questions about where to be, and then accelerated out of the turns. Perfect!
Serp – one jump reps were great on both sides! When you add in the tunnel, one subtle tweak: you can open up your upper body sooner to him so he sees the serp cue sooner. You were closing your shoulder then opening it back up, which might delay the cue timing. As soon as you are between the uprights, your shoulders can be facing the jump even if he is still back by the tunnel (but keep your feet facing forward on the line, that looked great!)
You were making a big obvious exit line connection with the toy, he read it perfectly. Since he did so well, you can soften the toy presentation and try to make exit line connection with a tiny hand cue and eye contact when he lands, and see how it goes! Great job!
TracyHi there!
Adding motion to serps is hard! My new mantra is:
Motion is the graveyard of behavior 🙂
Agility is a motion-based game (in other words, we have to run run run) so good job breaking it down to get him to see this while you were moving!
Try to stay parallel to the serp jump line as you are moving, that is where he was having the most trouble – if you were pulling away (towards the tunnel) he would get it but it was not really as much of a serp.
A couple of things to try to be able to add more motion
– he seemed to do best on the serps when you were closer to the exit wing as he finished coming around the wing, so you can send ot the wing from further away so you are further ahead (you were also not moving as fast when you were ahead like that, which really helped!)
– to be able to get more motion involved and also get the behavior when you are not as far ahead, try angling the serp jump. The wing closer to the MM can be moved out closer to his line, so he can see the bump/bar pretty directly as he comes around the wing and you are moving up the line. You can make it really easy at first to be able to add running! Then gradually shift the angle of the jump back to that flat line serp angle – it might take a couple of sessions to be able to get that flat again with you also running, but I think it will help solidify the motion element.All of the balance reps looked really good, except for the one where he went behind you to the tunnel – he hadn’t quite gotten to the new side yet when you said tunnel… so he just went to the tunnel when he heard it LOL! Good boy 🙂
>> He also wanted to know why we weren’t doing tunnels so he got rewarded by being sent to the tunnel a few times. He was becoming less excited about the Treat N Train as we went along so started sometimes rewarding cookie eating with a toy.>>
Tunnels as rewards can be fun! And he might have started to think the TnT was stoooooopid because he kept going to it and getting nothing (because he didn’t take the jump on those reps :))
Nice work here! Let me know if the serp ideas make sense!
TracyGood morning!
I feel the pain about the barking! I call it ‘voted off the island’ when one of the other dogs is barking 🙂 Right now the only dogs allowed to remain on the training island while barking are Export and Crusher LOL!!!! Working barkers can remain on the island 🙂 A common phrase in my house is “Nacho, you’ve been voted off the island” 🙂On the Differ video:
The wing wrap on the go after the tunnel is a super difficult element because either the pups need to have great verbal understanding (difficult and requires experience, as you mentioned) or we need to be up there to get great connection (difficult trying to outrun the little speedsters!) So looking at the go strugglies at :06 and :34, she was exiting straight on the go cue, but needed more connection and physical support for commitment.Compare it to :39 when she was self-fixing the tunnel line (that was the funniest moment EVER! of back and forth through the tunnel) and you were at the wing and connected – easy peasy to get the wing!
The slight curve of the tunnel made is a little harder, as the curve plus your position tends to produce the pups wanting to turn left on the tunnel exit (which was also part of the reason the left turn exits were really really nice :))
At :47 and :53 and 1:19 and 2:04 you had a lot of physical support and more connection and she got the wing each time on those – nice! When you see her heading to the wing, you can also switch to a wrap verbal as that might help with commitment. And, the experience of seeing it and the reinforcement was absolutely helping to build the skill.
Towards the end, at 2:14, you were not as far ahead and not giving quite enough connection – so she didn’t get the wing. You can ramp up the connection when you get behind to help her commit (or move the wing closer to the tunnel exit so it is more obvious).
The go reps at the end looked good!
On your softer turns – the left turns in general were really nice, in terms of turns and your cue timing particularly in the first half of the video. As the video progressed, you started using more “Go tunnel go tunnel” before the directional, and I think it might have been a little toooooo sitmulating plus delayed the directional. For example, at 1:05 after the wing wrap you gave a big Go tunnel Go tunnel then a quieter right at 1:06 (after she was in the tunnel) – which produced a very straight exit, likely because she was processing the high energy Go Tunnel verbals. I think the Go tunnel for commitment is too exciting for now – she really drives the lines, so you can give a more casual tunnel cue (quieter, said once maybe) and then switch to the lower energy, quieter left/right verbal. Even with a timely ‘right’ verbal at 1:30 you were very high energy, you so she was wide on the exit of the tunnel (1:31) but gotta admire her “I nailed it, 10/10!” there when she came in and grabbed her toy LOL! She is so fun to watch!!
The right was a different energy at 2:06 but late – so she did turn but it was late. That same energy plus a little earlier before she enters should be perfect 🙂 At this early state of training verbals, I believe the pups are processing tone/energy/context more than the actual words – picking out the actual words comes later. For example, Elektra at 6 months old perks her ears up if I looks at her and in a quiet, clear tone, say “cookie?”. With my older dogs, I can put the word ‘cookie’ in the middle of a rambling paragraph and they will pick it out and perk up LOL!! So your high energy GO is perfect for Differ and you can change the energy for different turns to help her pick them out when things get exciting 🙂
Great job!
TracyHi!
Your zig zags are looking so terrific! She was holding her stays and that made it all so much easier – she looks so serious in her stays LOL!!! Great job helping her with the handling – I can already see her changing leads and offering the zig zag, which is going to make for a ton of gorgeous slice line jumping in the future. YES!! She was also anticipating the game already and offering to do it independently (which is perfectly fine for this game :))
I think she is ready for you to build to 4 then 5 wings here, and you can also start to spread out the distances (on 3 wings first, because she will move faster which means you have to handle faster LOL!!)On the 2nd video:
She was awesome on her jump finding!! She had no trouble finding the line to the jump as you added more and more lateral distance.>>Looking at video I realized the last couple reps where I started getting more distance I should have been running more of converging parallel line to support her more but she seemed to find the jump anyways>>
I think your running line was great – you were pretty parallel to her and she seemed to have no questions at all. You can add a tiny bit more connection (looking back at her) but you don’t need to converge towards her, as that might cue a rear cross by accident. So keep adding distance like you were! She also did really well with you parallel to her and close to the jump. Because she did so well, you can add two other challenges in your next session:
send her to the tunnel from further away and get way ahead, so you are passing the jump when she exits the tunnel – this will challenge your tunnel send as well as finding the jump 🙂 Start relatively close to the line of the jump but if it is easy, add in lateral distance.
And, do the opposite: drive all the way down to the tunnel entry, so close that you can touch it… then drive forward for she learns to drive ahead of you to the jump.
Great job throwing the reward, she is finding the line brilliantly!
TracyHi!
OMG thankfully you didn’t hit the wall too hard!I see why he asked a question on the first rep when you started him on your right at :27 (he almost came in and took the other side of the jump) – it was because on the reps at the beginning where you started him on your other side, you were doing a front cross on the post (right arm to left arm) so he had to go to the other side of the jump to get the serp. When you switched sides, he was still in the ‘pop around to the other side’ mode on that first rep. So on the first part of the video, start him on your left and send him around the outside of the post so he doesn’t have to find the other side of the jump – this is what you weer doing perfectly on the 2nd half of the video, and he was nailing it. Yay!! Very nice!!
Minny Pinny:
Well, he is indeed related to my Contraband, correct? That move at :19 when you said ‘left’ and he went behind you to turn right: that is EXACTLY what Contraband will offer – creatively going to the easier side. LOL!!!!
He figured it out really quickly though and ended up doing REALLY nice on the motion-less lefts and rights.
Your ‘turn away’ left and right session also looked very similar to my session with Contraband – genetics are a real thing!!!! It was samrt training to work it more on the right turns, where he is clearly more comfortable on these. The left turns were super hard then he pulled the fancy move of going behind you to turn right (I swear, they are truly related LOL!!!!) So keep doing what you are doing on the right, that was working pretty well with the gentle angles and such. To get the left rolling, make it easier and the gradually change your position: start him on a few reps of easy left turns, with motion and handling to help. He will be starting in a position that pretty much faces the first bar. Then, leave him in the same starting position (so it is obvious that the left turn is the one we want) then gradually change your position: be a little behind him, then work to the other side so he is turning away. And the instant he turns away to the first jump – throw a reward and have a party. That should get the ball rolling. I have found that with Contraband, I need to treat left turns and right turns as two separate behaviors: the left turns are easy for him, so I can do the harder challenges (like you can do with Lazlo’s right turns). And the right turns are REALLY hard (like Lazlo’s left turns) so I break those way down and proceed slowly. It will all even out 🙂Nice job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
