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Good morning!
>the first word I said was the wrong direction but quickly caught myself.>
You caught yourself before you even let him go, so there was no issue at all!
This session went really well – he seems to really love this little game LOL! Lots of running but he is bending really well in collection here. Super!!! You can probably add a little more distance between the bars, maybe just 6 inches more so he can be a little more extended in the bounce.
The backyard stays looked really strong – excellent choice of toy at the beginning, and great job getting him playing and doing tricks! All of that helps to overcome the challenges of outdoor distractions. And he didn’t go too far away with the toy when you tossed it back to him – that is great because he had all the freedom in the world to take off with it 🙂
Nice long lead out and release to the jump – and your party for the reward is long and happy! He had a little trouble lining up when you changed directions to come towards the camera – harder visuals of distractions? Brain tired because it was taking a lot more energy than he was letting on? Both? You adjusted by rewarding sooner and that was an excellent choice.
You might not be able to get a 4 minute session outside yet (4 minutes is no problem for him indoors). I’d say he was mentally done by about 3 minutes (you can see at about 3.5. minutes he was really looking around, not giving up the toy as well, etc. So you can go to shorter sessions outdoors for now (get one great rep on each side and be finished, resist temptation to do one more :)) and you can also bring some good treats out to reward lining up. That will help extend his ability to work in the more intense outdoor distractions and then it will all be even easier.
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
She did great with the minny pinny! Good girlie!!!!
>Today she did well to the right, but not the left. I’ve been working on walking on my left side and I’ll start balancing out the right side as that may be part of the issue.>
It is possible that it is not a left side or right side question, it might be a first side – second side question. One thing I have noticed is that she often has questions when changing sides mid-session – almost always goes the original way, which results in a hard moment where you stop her to get her to the side you want.
So to be able to get the 2nd side as strong as the first, you can make it into 2 mini sessions: get the first side for a couple of reps and rather than change sides to go into the next rep, you can break it off for a nice long play with a toy, a bit of sniffing around… then come back and start on the other side as if it is a brand new session.
>Also, I ran out of food, left her and ran into the house to reload. She STOOD by the set up the entire time! That’s huge.>
Wow, good girl! She is liking the game for sure!
>We are having an issue going back into the potty yard towards the house. She’s like…nope I don’t wanna do that.>
Based on what you mention about her potty habits, it is possible that she finds certain substrates to be more ‘ick’ than others. And the potty yard after rain might be very icky (smells, etc) so that is something to consider in terms of getting her through it fast or walking around it or even carrying her. Also be sure that going into the potty yard is not always paired with going back into the house and going in a crate or x-pen – that might be punishing in contrast to being out in the yard, so she is avoiding it. You can adjust that by going in the house then right back out again for a few minutes, or going in the house and hanging out with a chew or toppl, and mixing it up so going to the potty yard/towards the house is not always paired with anything specific.
Nice job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Lots of good work here!!
1st video – this went well! Good challenges from different angles for sure. The placement of the wing at 1:02 (and the same angle on the other side) was best for both obstacles being fully visible. When it was more centered between them, the jump became harder because she would have to cut in and take it so it might not have been a jump to her (more of a threadle).
When the wing got really recessed, it was a little harder to find the obstacle on the other side but you had a little extra motion pressure and she was able to read that and find the correct obstacle. She is not 100% on verbal only quite yet, but she is definitely improving and doesn’t need nearly as much help with the physical cues! Yay!
Video 2: it is on setups like this where we can see all the verbal-only games paying off! This was pretty perfect (perhaps a few months ago we would have lost Muso into a tunnel when you wanted the jump!)
Send to Tunnel – great
The blind to threadle – great
Send Backside not tunnel – no problem at all
Send to tunnel and turn on exit to the threadle – great3rd video –
Blind to backside. – this went great too! You can keep moving rather than stand still to step her to it. Your connection and line were really good, so keep repeating the backside cue as you move away
She was VERY zippy coming in for the threadle there! Good girl! As the spacing gets compressed, you can use a soft turn cue (like a left and even brake arms) when she exits the wing so she collects before the jump a little more, making the threadle even easier.
Excellent! So the next challenge on this setup is to move it all closer together. A very recent trend in European discriminations is that the obstacles are only about a meter apart. So if they were 2 meters apart here, start to squish them up to maybe 1.5 meters then 1 meter. And if that all goes well – less than a meter. This can be done over the course of the next month or so, depending on how much training time you get.
Great job on these!!
Tracy
Good morning! This was a really fun session to watch, she is really doing well with the handling!!! And good for you to carve out the time to do this even with all the stress of packing to get on the road.
>That opening jump was DIRECTLY into sunlight for me (some good practice for me at the Open for early morning runs in those outdoor rings!) so we ran 1-2 where I was completely blind to what she was doing on all of these.>
Wow! Looked great! I never would have guessed you couldn’t see her! Definitely (unfortunately 😂) good practice for the Open.
You can use a sit and forward focus on this first jump in both sequences and if she is fine with it – raise the bar 2 inches because she can sit there and look at it before moving to it.
First sequence – the hardest part is getting the right amount of turn on the pinwheel jump (#4).
I liked your brake arms at :14 – just be sure to keep turning rather than face forward – that caused her to continue forward.
On the 2nd run – your cues were too fast at :39 so she hit the bar trying to turn. On the 3rd rep, at 1:02 you had your brake arms AND kept moving (turning your shoulders to the 5 jump) – best one of the 3 for sure! Really nice!!!On the ending line: Gorgeous blind after the tunnel – nice connection! The Serp ending looked good too, very nice getting the connection to turn her. And the RC was good too – it is the hardest one because you have to decelerate then get her to drive past you and she did. Super! As she is driving ahead, be sure you keep driving to and past the last jump. The bar came down because you were decelerating/turning/praising/reaching for toy so her head came up.
2nd sequence: this one gave us good insight into what she will need as turn cues!!
Looking at the side change needed on the 4-5 section:
Good timing of starting the blind (1:24)
And you did get the reconnection before takeoff but also – line of motion was parallel instead of towards 5 to she stayed on the line.When you revisited it at the end – the timing of starting it was a stride later (3:10) so the reconnection was late (after she was already jumping 4).
But even with the good timing – I think she is getting a conflicting indicator on where the line is based on your lower body. The first steps through the blind were supporting the wider line – were those first steps wrong? Nope! But for her, it is possible that a rotation (front cross) will show her the motion to 5 better than the BC will. So maybe after the Open try it with a FC and see how she turns!
The RC is really hard there – setting it up line requires a big decel/turn/brake arms that actually start when she is finishing 3, to set the line – with you as close to 4 as possible then driving to the center of the bar of 5. That will be another one we can play with to get the turn on 4 – some baby dogs actually need a spin on 4 to get the turn then the RC. It is a good way to teach them that a RC on this line could actually exist! And then of course we fade the spin out because we don’t want to use a zillion spins everywhere 🙂
On the 5 jump:
At 1:27 – you were already rotated when cueing 5 so you can finish with a spin and take off. Opening back up to a post turn cued her to go wide. You did the spin on 5 at 3:12 and it was GREAT!!! Super nice turn even from the harder angle as she was sorting out the turn at 4.
>I wouldn’t be able to cross her line before she took off for 5, but I think the motion is better. Would be interested if she would still be able to commit to 5 with that amount of pressure but probably won’t get the chance to try it.>
An experienced dog would likely be able to read that pressure – and it would good to see if she would too! It is on the list of things we can revisit after the Open, because Mother Nature promised us good weather for another 6 weeks LOL!!
Really nice last line, driving ahead brilliantly! More driving ahead work coming up soon too.
Great job here! Safe travels to Florida!
Tracy
>I’ll swap over to the other recalls. We talked about building confidence with him doing the recalls and eventually going between legs. He finds that game fun except with someone he barely knows so I’ll make the switch>
Good to know about his preferences – if he is not comfy with someone he doesn’t really know, then you can work it as SSC and see how it goes. It is pretty normal for adolescent dogs to have shifting interests in other people: some days he will love strangers, some days they will give him the ick, some days it is all neutral. Totally normal!
>Same with the toy. Running around there was too much stuff and I didn’t want to run toward the pile of stuff bc it holds more value.>
For the toy, you can run into the ring to play then back out to the pile. And being near the pile but making the toy super active is also fine, because it helps the pups understand what is being asked in each moment. If I am quiet in body language and near the pile? That is generally a cue to offer on the pile of stuff. If I am swinging the toy for him to chase and saying ‘get it’ or making other noises – that is totally a play-with-toy moment. This is critical for agility because it is actually the basis for discriminating obstacle and handler focus, but we are using play and offering here.
>But it makes me ask what happens when we don’t have space. Places like sotc. It’s tight if you’re not alone doing OT. Maybe target bowls ?>
Nope! Treat tosses on or near the pile, or delivering from hand – but then toy play near the pile if needed. The toy can be really long and moving away – but also near the pile. The demo with Plot Twist was in a small room so you can see the difference in mechanics when I wanted the pile versus when I wanted to play. The toy can be a squirrel even in a small space 🙂
>Side note we have been working on how to exist peacefully inside the training building during a seminar.>
Yes! That is sooooo valuable (and hard!)
Serp video –
>Trendie toy from like 10 years ago bought at petsmart was like crack to him so when I do revisit I may try just food or a lower value toy.>
Don’t change to food or a lower value toy! This was perfect to work through!!!! The challenge is that there is something high value that they learn to ignore.
This was hard at first with the stay because you didn’t get a snappy sit response and then he tried to move. But he quickly figured it out and you had a great stay!
1st rep was spot on – in and out to the toy.
Things got harder when you put the toy on the ground… I think part of it was how you put it there. You dropped the toy *after* you got into position and that is all he could see. Letting the toy drop like that rally drew his attention, especially with it being the last thing that happened before the release: it really enhanced the toy.
So make the toy less of a focal point: put it down in a less interesting way (bending over to just place it on the floor) then get into serp position – then watch his eyes. If he is staring at the toy, shake the target like you did at 2:06 and the last rep – and if you get an eye twitch towards the target hand, you can release him. Releasing him while he was staring at the toy is basically permission to go get the toy 🙂 I think being less interesting as you put the toy down and doing it first before getting into position will also make a big difference for him.
The first serp rep of the 2nd video was HILARIOUS! Watch his face: you had the toy slowly lowering (enticing!) at the same time the target hand came out – he was looking back and forth 😂
Also, another session after the first session might have been too much – he might have needed to sleep on it because he was breaking the stay here and having a lot of trouble turning to his right (usually he doesn’t have a massive side preference). There is a TON of self-control required to ignore the toy and drive into the pressure of the handling position (for a Border Collie!) and so he might have just been depleted in the 2nd session – he had trouble even when you put the toy away at the end.
The other thing that might have been happening in session2:
You were so close to the jump, there was no way he could have fit between you and the bar on the landing side, so he totally read it as ‘don’t come across the bar’. That is a lot of pressure on his line! You were not quite as close and a little further over on the other side, but being so close might have played a role in the misses on that video too. You should be about an arm’s length away from the jump so there is room for him.The threadle wrap – this kind of affirms that he was a lefty that day, which might also be why the 2nd serp session was hard (those were right turns)! The left turn reps at the beginning were really good! When you switched to the right, he first tried to wrap left and then he hit the barrel trying to turn right. You moved him a little further forward which helped him be able to turn away – but there was still a lot of steam coming out of his ears as he processed the right turns. Good boy!!!!
Being better when working off your left side *might* also indicate that you work him on your left side too much 🙂 so if you are doing obedience or rally which are both left-side-heavy, you can add extra dog-on-right reps for the agility games.
On the left turn side (when he is on your left) you can give less swoosh (arm movement) with the hands and see if he will turn himself away. And you can add motion with you moving forward. He might need another session without motion and lots of hand movement on the right turns – or he might sleep on it and be perfect next time LOL!
Great job! Have fun at the seminar!!
Tracy
Good morning! All going great here!!
>I keep forgetting to ask you if I should add the word “wait” before I lead out, like I use with Benni which I use with him in obedience along with the flat palm cue towards his face. Or even just the verbal or whatever.>
You can add an additional verbal if you like – as you can see, he doesn’t really need it right now (maybe never!), but it can help support the stay when things get even more exciting.
To be honest, I am not sure we ever really need it 😂 but it makes us humans feel better and keeps us more connected, so that is good! I use a stay word (not sure if my dogs need it at all) but it makes me feel better to say stay, then if I need to change position or something, I say stay again… it might be more for me than for the dog but everyone is happy. And it kind of forces me to breathe while leading out, which is always a good thing 🙂
I don’t use a hand in front of the face because that is definitely not needed and I have seen a lot of agility dogs in high arousal, ready to run, actually flinch when the handler does that.
Minny Pinny:
He figured this out immediately! ! Super! You were using your arm/shoulder to kind of trace his path and you don’t need to at all – once he started moving, his commitment as great so you can even do a FC and run away!
When you added the bars – remember to keep rewarding him in for sliding in between you and the wings front of you (some of the rewards here were more straight then turning)When adding the verbals: hold him at your side, say the verbals 3 or 4 times… then let go and don’t move 🙂 Let him go do it without you as you keep saying the verbals 🙂 The verbals get repeated because he is turning left/right 3 times. We use this setup to help create a ton of independence on these verbals (including turning away) so the first step is to getting him to do it without you moving at all.
Stay video:
Great job working the stay in higher arousal with all the toy play and tricks!! He was wonderful 🙂He only had one question, at :20 when you moved the toy away and asked for the sit at the same time he couldn’t quite process it (so he ended up in a play bow, CUTE!!!). It all happened too fast 🙂 Separating the toy removal from the sit cue makes a big difference so you can move the toy away, stand up, then cue the sit so it is very clear.
You can put barrels or even wings on each side of the bump now, so it looks like a real jump 🙂
Also, if you have opportunity to work the stay skill in a different environment, go for it! It can be off to the side in class, or if Brioche is still sharing a lesson with Benni, or even in your yard (you can have him on a long line if you are worried about puppy shenanigans). In new places, assume it will be a lot harder and make the stay a lot easier (shorter duration with you closer). I would rather be surprised by his brilliance because it is easy than ask for too much and have him fail.
Great job!!
Tracy
Good morning! I am glad the rain stopped for a bit!
>My timing is off with her as I don’t think I completely trust her commitment so I’m hesitating which makes me late for the front and/or blind crosses.>
That is normal and relatable – we are not really sure what the puppies will do, so we kind of have to delay the next thing until we see commitment. So it is perfectly fine if you are a little late for now! And as you saw with Jack – his experience made it much easier for you to have earlier timing. Plus, with him, I bet it all just feels more natural and comfy because you’ve got so much time under your belt working as a team 🙂 Very fun to have tried it with him too!
The session went great overall and Jazz is really figuring out the commitment!!
>Still working on the turns to the left>
Yes – the right turns were all spot on and it took a moment to get the left turns going, but then she got them brilliantly! One on of the first left turns, just as she was deciding about the left turn at :16 – a car turned on and she got distracted. Normal adolescent brain to not quite be able to process the left turn AND the car starting.
But after that, the left turns were sooooo good!!!!
She was really zipping around the barrels on the rep from :26 – :33.She got several in a row but you asked for one barrel too many, got a little hesitant, so she was not sure what to do and things came off the rails. So for now, stick to 2 or 3 barrels then reward.
Speaking of timing – as you got more comfy with her commitment, the blind cross element of the spin got earlier and earlier. The spin on the last rep was especially good – and that was to her left! Super!
One suggestion here:
You can have the toy or cookies in your hand… but don’t switch them from hand to hand. That switch happens in the pivotal connection moment, so it delays connection and also draws her attention to your hands. You might not even realize it is happening 🙂
So either leave the reward in one hand, no switches – or tuck it into a pocket. We don’t need a precision reward here, so you can always pull the reward out when you are ready to reward.She did GREAT with the toy so having it in a pocket will make things even smoother!
Great job!! Fingers crossed for good weather ahead!
Tracy
Good morning!
>. I fell over my own feet just doing this exercise. No I didn’t send u that part of the video lol. But after that I was quite sore.>
Oh no! Hope the soreness is gone!! Do you remember if you got tripped up doing a FC? On those, decelerating before rotating prevents us from tripping, it is possible you were going too fast?
But the session you posted here was lovely!!!
She is looking GREAT – super fast with great commitment and also turning tight. And tons of play in between reps. Love it! Really wonderful!
You did a regular blind at :27 (turning away from her to change sides) – she read it but it might have felt weird and a little wider than the others. You did spins (the FC/BC combo) and those worked great. She is doing super well with her countermotion commitment!
One tiny moment where you looked ahead of her too soon, which led to broken connection at 1:38 so she didn’t know which side to be on.
But you immediately fixed it on the next rep and gave clear connection at 1:45. Yay!The racetrack at the end was fabulous – I always find the to be the hardest to maintain connection because of the should return, and you nailed it.
Great job here! You can spread the barrels out a little more so you can send more and she can go even faster 🙂
Tracy
Hi!
Reducing the high arms definitely helped you set the parallel path line of motion that propels him past the tunnel to find the jump. The parallel path is key here and the high arms turn your shoulders away from that – the shoulder turn ends up looking like you want the tunnel.When you were keeping the arm low but also turning too much – that is when you saw him still glance at the tunnel. But then at :29-:31, you had the parallel path line of motion – lovely! And so did the last rep – yay! You can test the theory by cueing some tunnel reps in there, so we know if he is responding to cues or if he has learned that you want the jump.
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
These are looking really good!!Run 1 went great, nice conencted backside push!
> My set up didn’t have a clear threadle side for sequence 2, and I don’t think it did here either, but we did get a lovely line in this redo.>
The threadle was run 2 and it also went well. Because the natural line around the wing does put him on the line to the backside, it is a threadle to get the front. Decel and rotation at the wing set the line, but that will end up putting you behind him on the line. With his speed, staying ahead and staying in motion is a good thing so you can also see if he will read the threadle cues without you having to decel or rotate towards him as much at the wing. Instead, you can turn and run forward like you did on the backside push, but the verbal is different of course 🙂 and you can be swinging your threadle arm back too to cue the line change.
run 3 – blind after backside – very nice! The clear connection makes it very easy 🙂
Great job trusting his commitment!Nice work!
TracyGood morning!
This was hard! She was definitely getting it by the end, but we can definitely look at why it was so hard. Two things might have been happening to get the extra jumps and not enough tunnels:
But first, a question: did the first session also use a frisbee as the reward?
Frisbees (and tennis balls) elicit a response that involves accelerating away on a big run out while tracking the frisbee throw. That would explain why the tunnel was so hard for her at first, because the presence of the frisbee was eliciting a specific response that would cause her to not naturally even consider the tunnel (which was tighter and also blocks the visual of tracking the frisbee).
I have seen this a lot of frisbees and tennis balls too – the elicited response overrode the processing of the cue.
So try it with a tug toy not a disc for a session or two (tug toys elicit an entirely different response). That way she can process the cues better in a slightly lower state of arousal. When she is closer to 90% successful? Then heck yes, we go back to the frisbee! We do need her to be able to process cues in that higher state of arousal, but it is not necessarily the starting point 🙂
The other thing that might help is different cues on the start wing: in this setup, a wrap cue on the wing before the tunnel cue can help. And a ‘soft’ turn cue on the wing before the jump cue can help (because it is not a real wrap when you are going to cue the jump). That can definitely help with the processing!
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I tried introducing bowls on the gravel parking lot at class Tuesday. Ven could not focus on them nor eat cheese out of them. >
This is really interesting! First order of business is going to be getting him to eat anywhere 🙂 Not being able to eat is a sign of overarousal/struggling with regulation, so there are a couple of options you can try to help that:
>I’ve booked another field rental for tomorrow (Fri) evening to see if by ourselves he can focus and play the game. I’m also going to work the game in the back yard after work today.>
Yes, good plan! Work it at home first so the game has value, then take it to the field and play it in a variety of places: parking lot, in the ring, by the crating area, etc.
And bring a variety of food – just because *we* think cheese is great, doesn’t mean he agrees LOL!! So you can try cheese, chicken, salmon treats, etc – basically we are asking him “what can you eat” and “where can you eat it”. Getting a handling on him eating will help in two ways:
– it will help his nervous system self-regulate
– it will help us be able to assist with arousal regulation and reward behavior.>Of course Mr. Social finds it hard to focus when there are people and dog friends he wants to go greet even though I rarely allow him to do so.>
That is probably part of what tips him into overarousal: the huge challenge of having to ignore people and dogs. The pattern games will help him ignore them happily without stress (which is why we want him to eat) and also, you can allow visiting! You can put it on cue: I have a ‘go see’ cue for my social dogs which means they can go say him to the person or dog I am pointing at. Being able to know when he is allowed to socialize can be a lot less stressful and overarousing 🙂
>Do you see any other things I need to work based on these 2 turns?>
A couple of ideas for you!
– It looks like you had the lotus ball in the 2nd run but not the first? He definitely did better with the lotus ball. You can even have someone holding a 2nd lotus ball, to throw as a reward on the bigger harder lines.
– he seemed to have trouble lining up to start when the food was not visible in run 1. You can see if you can get a hand touch or a simple trick without the food in your hand, then bring the food out for the line up.
– he had a lot of trouble with the weaves so for now as you get him more engaged in this challenging environment, don’t ask for weaving at all (make up a sequence that doesn’t go anywhere near them). The reason you want to avoid them is because either he fails and you fix then he checks out, or he fails and you reward. But that can ultimately be confusing about what correct weaving is, so better to just skip them entirely for now until he is better engaged and then it will be much easier to get correct weaving. Same with the contacts – he checked out a lot before or after the contacts, so skip them for now. Just stick to jumps and tunnels 🙂
With the jumps and tunnels – lots of rewards for doing them closer to the center of the ring, which is a little further from the super challenging distraction of the edges of the ring where the critters are. And if something goes wrong – the no fixing rule still applies because he checks out a lot when you stop to fix. Just keep going and add more connection, throwing the lotus ball when he gets on a line of jumps.
People and dogs being nearby are very challenging, so you can ask people to sit in a chair around the edges of the course to introduce rewarding when he does jumps/tunnels and ignores ring crew 🙂
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!!
Tracy
Good morning!
Good job working the stays in arousal! He is totally into the volume dial tricks. I LVOE how he was wild and tugging and then you said sit… boom right into the sit at 1:32 (and other reps too). That will serve you well in his agility future. You were able to praise and lead out, with a nice mix of throwing the toy back and releasing forward.
When you just cue the sit, he wa sa little sideways to look up at you. He was able to line up nicely at your side with the hand cue. I also think that when he understands that he will be released to a jump, he is likely to line up facing the jump more so we don’t have to worry about getting a perfect line up for now.
Since he was a rockstar here, you can take your parallel path jump setup and do stay games in front of it. So basically it is a stay in front of a jump with a pool noodle or something easy as the bar. Fun times with grown up stuff!!!!
For the wraps:
>Maybe for now I should just send and say nothing or make a sound that is motivating. >
That is how I ended up with one of my wrap cues – just a motivational noise because I couldn’t think of anything else at the time. Then I just kept it LOL!
This went well overall, his commitment is strong!
>When I try to send him with the hand that is holding the toy, he is slower to commit but hopefully this gets better with time.>
Yes, a little stickier because it was hard to ignore the toy but he was able to do it really well! He was using a lot of brain bandwidth to NOT try to grab the toy when it was in your send hand which is why he was not as fast on that side. But we will take accurate for now, rather than jumping at your hand!!
One thing that will help is if you use a toy marker for when he is able to grab the toy in your hand – you were using praise words, but a specific marker (like ‘bite!’) will clarify for him that the toy should be ignored until you say the magic word 🙂
And you can also tuck the toy into a pocket and whip it out when you are ready to reward (it doesn’t have to be a super precise reward for this game). That will allow him to go really fast without having to think hard about ignoring the toy 🙂
You were thinking hard about which move to do 🙂 You can either do a FC of a spin, both of which start with rotation towards him like a FC, but for the spin you then do a blind. You were doing some true blinds (turning away) which work but might have felt weird here and also promote a slightly wider turn in this context.
>I didn’t get to the post turns…that should really throw me for a loop!>
Disclaimer – they are actually kind of hard for us humans LOL!! But they are fun for the pups and get them learning to stay out on line. Have fun!
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
The remote reinforcement game looked really strong, with both food and the toy! He was definitely aware of the reward station but was fabulous about moving away and responding to cues. And it looks like the responses were crisp and accurate, no drop-off in quality or slower responses (that is normal but it is great that you didn’t see any of that). Since this went well, you can expand the distance by putting the food or toy in one room, going to another room to do a quick trick, then mark and come back to the reward.
Good job with the stays too – you lined him up and let him do the stay in a stand even on an angle, and that allowed you to get a ton of reward in with zero conflict about where he was facing or which position he was in. I love how he got ALL the toys at the end LOL!
Since this established a really fun baseline, you can ask for more in one variable: more distance (which brings more duration with it automatically). Or, you can ask for a sit but reduce the duration/distance. Or you can ask him to line up straighter (hand cue even with a cookie lure is useful, if needed).
And you can bring this game to different locations – and make it easier if you feel it is hard with new distractions/environments.
Find my face was great too! I think he was potentially wondering if he should offer something (like getting on the bed) but with you moving a bit, he looked into finding you. Yay! So this is also a good game to take on the road, even if he is on leash: start with getting the back and forth pattern game going really well, then add in a little find my face.
>Our snow has gone away for now. It all washed away in the rain while we were gone during the day. We came home and Aelfraed was so excited to go out into the yard, got out the door, and looked around with utter disappointment. His little face was so sad! I’m ok with the snow being gone for now but I was a little sad for him.>
Yay for being able to work outdoors again without snow (maybe some mud LOL!) But also, poor little Aelfraed who was clearly a sled dog in his past life! No worries, he will get plenty of snow this winter 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
