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Oh crud, I am sorry I missed it!!!! Apologies!! Thanks for the poke to come find it!
You two did a great job with the turn and burn – it was an excellent combination of a super structured session (great setup, short, very successful) and SUPER FUN!!! It is unusual that puppies can generalize the game as well as he did! Your timing, connection, and fun factor were spot on.
He also did a great job with his parallel path game! I love his focus and engagement and even as you added speed, he was still finding the prop. You might notice that when you were going faster, he was leaping over the prop rather than smacking it: for this game, that is perfectly fine! If you want to train a running dog walk, we will use a different target to get him hitting it with back feet.
The pattern game was easy and fun for him too. You can try playing it with more people walking around and maybe a another pup on the floor! He might need to be no leash when another pup is out on the floor, but that is good because it is also a real life scenario.
The handling combo with the blind to decel also looked great. Excellent job keeping things fast and fun, while also being super connected.
> I did a few of those wrong with too much of a turn before the go.>
No worries! Part of the goal of the game is for the pups to stick with us, no matter what happens 🙂
>Got picture of Dublin watching your videos lol. Added picture of Dublin and Brighton doing happy crating>
Adorable!
>We went for a little walk with my friend and her Tri-pod Vizsla and went for lunch at a microbrewery. Dublin did great for both experiences.>
That sounds wonderful!
Fantastic job here, and apologies again for not seeing this sooner!!
Tracy
Good morning!
The collection sandwich videos look great! It looks like the baby level was very easy! He was surprised in a good way when you threw the toy on the first rep of the advanced level! And he did great going from the cookie back to the toy, no problem at all.
The only question was a handling question – how much of at turn to make before you threw the toy for the go go go at the end. You can do a “u-turn” and throw the toy back to where he got the start cookie, I think that will be smoother. You were doing a full circle which was harder to get the toy throw out in front of him.
For the next session, we can add more speed and distance! You can start running away after you send him to his treat, so he sees you moving then decelerating into the turn – that will get the turns even tighter 🙂 And more distance will allow for longer toy throws, which helps get him driving ahead even more. If the weather is good, try it outside! To find the start cookie, you can bring out a towel to toss it onto so he doesn’t lose it in the grass.
>We have been working on the turn and burn for several days as well. He didn’t get it at all initially, but is starting to understand the game.>
He totally is! Yay!
>He does much better on my right side than the left, but it starting to get it. You will see that if he is not properly lined up on that left side he runs behind me. But when I line him up he is about 80% consistent.>
Yes, totally agree that the lineup is a key element here. You can line him up with precision at your side on both sides – a cookie lure is very helpful to get him to come in close to you, and then you can hold his collar/harness until you are ready for the send to the barrel.
When he was on your right and not lined up (kind of off to the side), there was a little hesitation on the send to the barrel. When he was on your left side, the line ups really helped and also you can stay more connected on the send: as you send to the barrel, watch him more with your eyes (instead of looking at the barrel).
That will mean a little less pointing forward with your arm – your hand can be low and giving a gentle ‘swoosh’ to the barrel, and your leg can step to the barrel as you look at him. A good exmaple of that was at :59 on the video – he was lined up and saw the connection so went to the barrel really well! When you pointed and didn’t connect, he showed us his left turn preference: he know it was something with the barrel but went to his stronger side 🙂
As you get more comfy with the line ups and sends on both sides, you can totally add in a wrap verbal (instead of the ‘go) and then add in the line on the ground, because using it will tell you when you can do a FC and run away to reward.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning! Thank you for the seminar snippets 🙂
His pop up ears are just the BEST!Vibe did great in the new environment, might even be easier for him than the busier environments he has trained in. He looked HAPPY and filled with joy to be working with the momma.
Super fun to see him and Rou passing each other and ignoring each other 🙂 And he ignored the big Golden who came out to work too. And then all 3 MaxPuppers were out, I am so proud! Good baby dogs and moms!
His little tail was wagging a mile a minute while you were sitting in the chair while he was on the cot LOL!!! And it was definitely nice start line work.
>Still a great opportunity to work around other dogs in a brand new location and he had fun. 😉>
YES! And I trust you to advocate for your dog and know nothing bad would happen. Just wish you didn’t have to advocate and protect him!
> (where Vibe was sure the tree stump was a new parallel path prop 🤣)>
PARKOUR!!! He was reminding you that the Parkour Era is not over 🙂
>” it was HEAVY on control, medium on focus, and not much drive work.>
Sadly, “drive” work tends to be all about suppressing/controlling arousal in much of the dog sport world. Too much control is no fun for anyone and not really helpful either.
>Lots of mild to moderate to serious compulsion, coercion, punishment stuff in the explanations and demos. I really don’t like it when frustration and extinction bursts are used as a primary tool for training.>
UGH!!!! The science also doesn’t like it when punishment/frustration/extinction are primary tools (or, in many cases, tools AT ALL). With so much available information out there, I struggle to understand why people still use these tools. And don’t get me started about the social media thing that went around a while back about how we totally should just let the dogs fail repeatedly and let them get frustrated (turns out that was written by AI which explains why the ‘scientific explanations’ were actually not correct). Sigh.
>When a forward focus was demoed with the facility’s owner’s 18 month old dog and the dog repeatedly did the cartoon yoink where the dog bolts to the end of the long line, the instructor steps on it and the dog’s body goes flying forward while their neck jerks back, I don’t really find it funny or instructive.>
I find it sad and upsetting. Ok, horrifying. Poor dog, especially in a critical adolescent age. When I teach in person puppy seminars, I never let people step on the leash for exactly that reason.
> A bit of Serenity prayer mantra on my end.>
Yep, totally understandable and I have done that many many times and still have to whip it out sometimes – but generally I am old and cranky so I can’t keep my mouth shut.
And I am very limited with who I will take working spots with my young dogs anymore here on the East Coast. SO MUCH COMPULSION and punishment! So far there are only 3 instructors that I have worked with relatively recently and am comfortable bringing my baby dogs to for classes/seminars – Casey Keller puts on lovely young dog seminars and I have never seen anything icky from her. And the other 2 are flyball instructors but the concepts are the same for agility foundations 🙂 I think there are more on the West Coast in terms of instructors who are wonderful and safe 🙂 but I am also picky about how they do with non-BCs because not all dog brains are wired the same.Anyway – good job to you for making a fantastic day out of what could have been an icky situation!!!!! Vibe looked amazing!!
Tracy
Good morning! Hope you had a great weekend!
She did really great driving away here! She drove away with speed but then collected brilliantly to hit the prop and turn. BIG YAY!!! That is what we want!
Interestingly, she turned to her left on all the reps here. The reps from :24 to the end (except the last one) should have been left turns (turning towards you). On the other side, from the beginning to :18 and on the last rep, she also turned left – away from you! I scrolled back to see if she had already told us about a left turn side preference or not, but I couldn’t find it (and I can’t remember due to lack of caffeine LOL!)
I love knowing the side preference! It is also possible that she was turning left because the right turn area did not have a lot of room – the wall and the treadmill applied ‘pressure’ on the right turn which might have created the left turns by pressuring both of your lines – it did look like a RC to her!
So, to get more right turns when sending sideways/backwards from your right arm, give yourself more room on that side (the prop can move to a new spot depending on which side you are on) and you can be further away, laterally, (nearer to the wall in this case) to encourage the right turns.
>wow what a difference when I gave her some room to “run” to start. I think this kid will turn on the after burners once we get outside and get to do all these fun running/chase games! 🙂>
It is very exciting! The end result will be a thoughtful, accurate dog who is also incredibly fast 🙂 Patience is the key – the speed comes with understanding so we are in no rush. You will have to ignore all the people on social media rushing their puppies LOL!!
> Maybe it is good thing that we are practicing in a small space first ?! 😀 I am itching & looking forward to when we can really run!!>
It is definitely good to get the understanding in a small space and make it fun. It all comes together really well!!
The beginning of the backing up video was hilarious – 10 seconds of absolute patience… then a reminder to ‘hurry up, human!’ She is so funny!
The session went really well! BIG progress with lots of steps back! She seems to understand the reward placement because even when the treat bounced away, she kept herself in position and moving backwards. That helps a whole lot because you will get more backing up if she knows exactly how/where to get the reward.
Because she is growing a whole lot, you can keep this at just a few steps back for now and revisit it once or twice a week. The reason for that is because she is basically waking up with new legs evrey day and will have to re-learn how to organize them at the start of every session 🙂 So each session can start with a reminder followed by adding another step or two to build up distance.
>s I didn’t want to load her up on charlie bears either, unless I just do like 5 or so C.B. “reps”?>
Yes, you can limit reps of break the CBs in half. Also, I think they are super low in calories and light in the belly, so she can have a decent amount (8 or 10 reps or so, depending on how much else you are doing in terms of training that day) without overloading her.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning! She did really well here!!! It is fun when they are a little wild and amped up 🙂 And that actually helps the RCs because you get more forward motion 🙂 You can add in more go go go straight line reps, to keep her really driving forward which gives you more time for the RCs.
The first couple of reps were all about sorting out the timing but then you locked in at 1:27 and after that, for a bunch of lovely RCs in a row! There was one blooper at 2:19 where you got a little too far ahead but the rest were really strong!
The reps at 3:09 and 3:32 were particularly great examples of acceleration through the RC line!
If turning the left is harder, you can get her driving straight first, then tart adding the RC info by putting a lot of pressure on the line to the center of the bar and see how she does.
>but I ended up spending a lot of time getting the toy from her because I didn’t bring treats out>
The extra time was totally worth it 🙂 She was on fire and was looking great!
Nice work here!
TracyGood morning!
>cuz right now I’m not understanding what she is trying to tell me with the release stall outs.>
Yep, it is information from her… but it is a puzzle we have not solved yet. There are two of us trying, we will gt it sorted toon!!
Looking at the video – her form is good so we don’t really need to need to worry about any of that. Yay! She was lovely on the straight grid and on the angled grid.
If I counted right, the first freeze up was after 5 reps. Then would not release to the toy. But released to food at the end!
>I could not get her to tug on that toy after that, but she was happy to chase her “flying squirrel”. >
Good observation – tugging a toy and chasing a disc-like toy are two different behaviors, using different mechanics. Tugging has a different grip & pull in the mouth/neck/shoulders, plus a different shift into the hind end to tug. Chasing the squirrel toy might be more about running and catching, which is different body parts than tugging. Have you taken a look in her mouth? Maybe she has a tooth issue or something in her gums, where catching is fine but tugging hurts?
From a purely-behavior standpoint, try a session with only food. Do exactly what you did with this session – but no tugging at all at the beginning, no tugging as a reward…. Food food great food only 🙂 No toy in the picture. Let’s see what happens! That will help us narrow things down more.
Because we don’t need to work on her jumping form, we can use this stay-then-release setup to see how she answers our questions 🙂
Keep me posted! Nice work here!
Also, have you ever tapped down her back to see if there are any twitchy spots? I take 2 fingers and start at the base of her neck, then gently tap a finger on each side of her spine, inch by inch all the way down to her tail. You can often see little spasms! I can make a video if the written word makes no sense 🙂
Tracy
Good morning!
The RCs are off to a strong start! The first Go and first RC to the right were super good! Check out how at :09-:10 you had acceleration into the RC so he went forward nicely!
>At the end he didn’t want to go in front of me and decided to stay by me for the tasty treats lol!>
I think what happened here was that you ddi a FC at the tunnel exit to get him on your left, then had to hit the brakes – the FC then brakes then RC didn’t show the acceleration onto the RC line so he looked at you there. That kind of got him thinking about what you wanted so he was watching more – at :41 and :49 you were a little too far ahead and not showing acceleration, so he was not sure if he should drive to the jump or not.
So for the right turn RCs, you can get nice and close to the tunnel and acceleration into them like you did at the beginning of the session here.
>I will redo the lefts and have the same setup as the rights. The Aframe was where I needed to put my jump. I think that will help him on that side.>
Darned a-frame 😂 Yes, setting up so you don’t have to do the FC will make a lot more sense when you do the RC.
The ladder grid is looking good! I am happy with how he is stepping in, really working his rear into it. And his form is consistent (and fast, but consistent is more important). And NOT biting you is GREAT 🙂 👍😊. If you want to hold the toy a tiny bit higher maybe a foot off the ground, then his head position will be perfect.
Since his stay and form are developing beautifully, you can start adding moving faster – you were calmly walking here which was perfect, so you can go to a fast walk! That brings in the challenge of maintaining form while he sees more motion from you.
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
The photos on your title card are aways so cute! Did she have her Fetch event this weekend?The parallel path game is looking really good here! She was most definitely making the decision to go between the uprights! The reps on your left side were really strong and you were able to add more distance. The reps on your right side were where she had misses. So on the left side reps, you can be further away. And for now on the right side reps, tuck yourself in right next to the wing to help her find the line more consistently on that side. We will add distance to that soon too.
You can also do this with a ball or thrown toy – you won’t get as many reps in because of the play and retrieves, but she will really love it!
Nice shaping session here on the mat! She is very good at offering the behavior already. The next step is to have your treats in your hand already, so you can toss them immediately after the click. You were getting more and more looking at you because after the click, you had to get the cookie out – in that time, she was turning to look at you and that was when the cookie was delivered. So she thought: aha! Hit the mat and look at the mom!
So when you moved further away from the mat, you could see she was trying to sort out how to look at you AND hit the mat 🙂 So the best way to help her is to click then immediately throw the cookie before she looks at you. You can also drop the clicker and use a ‘get it’ marker, which will mark precisely and also tell her to look forward and not at you 🙂
For the wraps – she is looking for the barrel really well and we can see her commitment growing! Yay! She had some questions: on the sideways sending, you were having her turn to her left away from you (getting between you and the barrel) but actually for this game, it is ok for her to go to the other side of the barrel and turn towards you. She had some questions about it which is why she didn’t always find the barrel. Same on the other side, she can go to the other side of the barrel and turn to her left towards you instead of her right away from you. That will smooth out the questions she had.
There is still value to having her turn away (threadle wraps), and we will be adding that later in the class! Stay tuned 🙂
Working on the barrel alone might be a weird visual about where she should go, so you can picture a jump bar extending from the opposite side of the barrel and that is where you want her to go. You can also lay an actual bar on the ground too!
>We had some extra distractions again today with blow dryers going as my friend and training buddy is getting dogs ready for tomorrow’s show, but Ingy did a good job blocking it out for the most part.>
I agree, she was fabulous about blocking it out! Great job!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>But thinking it through, if I get her to walk away and engage with me, she’ll send better! >
Yes, for sure! And it is a great prep of elf-control for things tin the environment that you don’t see (but she does :)) If you think she might take off to grab it, you can have a leash on her to be able to get rewards in as you walk away.
>Here is some of the resilience game moving with a bag of charlee bears. We also did this out front with food on my hand vs pocket and she did great. I’m still learning my new camera and it didn’t record that session>
This looks fabulous! You were moving and she was still engaging really well. Super!!! You can play this game with exciting things in the environment, on leash walks in the neighborhood (if that is something you do). It is fine if you don’t, because I don’t do it either – too many loose dogs and animals floating around. And you can take this game on the road to trials, etc. You might need better treats than Charlee Bears but maybe not? She definitely liked them!
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
Sorry about the weather! Hopefully it goes back to being good soon!
>I have previously done a couple of sessions on back up without much success.>
Have you tried it with a target mat? That can be vey clarifying for some dogs.
He did well here – sitting on the stool was helpful because it saved your knee 🙂 and also kept his head in a natural position for moving back, o you got a lot of really good reps! You can toss the treats even further back so he keeps moving backwards to get it (or he can turn to get it, that is fine too). If the treat is too close, he will stop too close to you 🙂 I try to fling it between the pup’s front feet as if I am shooting a goal past a hockey goalie 🙂
Great job here!!
Tracy
Those are fun! I think you should keep the one-leg-on-arm barfly trick, that would be hilarious!!!!!!!! And good boy, ignoring a BIS!!!!
Good morning!
The wing wrap game is going really well! The only hard part was the chewing factor 🙂 On the first few reps of each video, he had to chew the treat before he could think about going to the next bowl. You slowed things down to let him chew and then he got it really well.
He did really well wrapping the object in the 2nd video. Yay! We saw a bit of a turn preference: he might be a lefty! This is based on him going behind you a couple of times, because it is possible that turning to his left there felt more natural that turning to his right. This is good to know for future game. You responded really well by making the bowl more visible for him. You can also it with your back up against something to take out the option of going behind you.
Since this went so well, you can start the next session where you left off there, but with the object pulled in close to you again as a reminder. Then if he does well, you cn dlay the timing of the cookie drop to see if he will go back to the other bowl on his own (then drop the cookie in). Once he can do that you can move the object out again and also change your position to kneeling or sitting on something low.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
Looking at the toy-barrel game: I agree, ignoring the toy on the ground was HARD!
Since he is food-driven too, have you tried rewarding him for walking away from the toy on the ground, without you holding him or picking him up? That will be very useful and then you can line him up and send to the barrel. His commitment is looking good, so teaching him to ignore the toy on the ground with food rewards will be very helpful.He did well with the food rewards in the 2nd video while there was a toy on the ground. This makes me more sure that the food in the barrel game will help a lot. The toy was a little too close, though – so when you were not using food, he was pouncing on the toy. Have it further away so he can ignore it entirely.
On the BC video – these went well! The first one was great! The othersneeded you to throw the start cookie a lot further away so you had a chance to get the blind in. You can also do the blind earlier: start it the instant you see him take a step towards you. He was reading the side change really well.
>. I did try previously with a toy but couldnt get away from him. he just chased me because I had the toy.>
Do you mean he was skipping the start cookie because you had a toy? You can hide the toy under your shirt or something so it is less enticing 🙂
For the treat tosses – wait a bit longer before you toss them, be sure he is really looking at you. On a some of the reps, yo were a too early so he didn’t look at you. The last rep was perfect! Do them all with that delay to be sure he had really turned his head to look at you.
Prop video:
He has a lot of value of the prop! Yay!
For the parallel path games:He is finding it really well, so you can keep him looking forward even more by using a ‘get it marker. Have the treats ready in your hand and a soon as he hits it (or even just before!) say ‘get it’ then throw the reward. That will help him look forward more, so you can add even more lateral distance. You don’t need a sit for this because I think the releases were a little muddy – the cookie toss will work better for the start.
The sideways and backwards sending is looking really good!
The reps where you sent with your hand AND your foot were super! If you only sent with your hand, he was not as sure, so definitely keep using your foot too.He was finding it hard to go past your hand on some of the reps here! So be sure there are no cookies in it, and you can mark and reward for when he passes it (even if the prop hit is not perfect).
Nice work here!
TracyHi!
I watched it a couple of times to see if he was losing enthusiasm of the pouncing – he was actually really happy to play on all of these reps of parallel path and the other 2 games as well. Good boy!I think what you were seeing about less pounce was because of 2 things:
– he was realizing that the parallel path is not a pounce/stop behavior, but instead it is a ‘keep moving’ behavior. So he adjusted his striding accordingly. He still had a lovely pounce on the countermotion sends!
– the other thing was that the reward was coming while he was looking at you for a few steps, so he was looking at you more on all of the games.
So for all of these games, let’s get the reward thrown ealier so he looks at you less and at the line more. You can do this by having the treat already in your hand, then mark with a ‘get it’ and throw it as earlier as possible. That will tell him where to look and he will look his line more.
>He did do a few of the rears ending on the proper side without the spin but I got the sense that he thought the prop was his cue to spin. What is the best way to address this issue?>
I agree that by the end he ws really figuring out the RC!! What was happening was that he was looking at you a lot by then, which made it hard for you to get to the new side early enough to show the turn before he got to the spot (that is when he spun the wrong way at first).
So the RCs will really benefit from having the treat already in your hand and then throwing the treat early before he looks at you. That will get him driving ahead more, so you can get to the other side before he gets to the prop, which means you will get the correct turns.
This might mean he doesn’t actually hit the prop all that well, but that is perfectly fine! We are starting to shift away from the prop and onto lines/baby jump concepts, so hitting the prop is not that important – but looking forward and fast rewards are very helpful.
Great job here! Let me know what you think.
Tracy
