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Hi! She did really well here!!! She is reading the lines really well – other than a “wait gotta pick up that cookie” moment or two 🤣 she really only had a few questions.
And those questions were all related to exit line connection, meaning she could not see which side of you to be on when exiting a turn.
Here are the 3 questions she had:
Exiting the wrap on 5 at :18, you had your shoulder closed to her so she had a big question about where to be exactly.
At 1:03, the blind cross still going as she is over the bar making it a little late, but the main thing was that as you finished it your dog side shoulder was a bit closed so she had a question about which side to be on.
The timing of starting the front at 1:37 was better! But she had a similar question about the exit as she did at 1:03 – that was because as you finished the FC, the dog side shoulder was closed forward.
The closed shoulder blocks connection, so she doesn’t always see which side of you to be on. Easy fix! Use exit line connection, where the dog-side arm reaches all the way back to her nose and you can exaggerate that by putting the opposite arm across your stomach which also pushes the dog-side shoulder back top open up the connection.
Here are visuals of those spots, so you can see what I mean by a closed shoulder:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/13G9Ci1M-8y7VW6A9l6XsiIcCBCXka1kgqE5ui0jO_HY/edit?usp=sharingNice work here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Hi!
>WOW, the ISC AKC Trial I went to this past weekend had regular Masters courses with 3 backsides in them and close together. One course had a backside after a dog walk to a tunnel under the dog walk to a back side out of the tunnel to one front jump to another backside jump to an A frame. >
Fun! It is the stuff people practice vat probably are not used to seeing in trial. Were those challenges set at regular AKC distances? They are not really meant for AKC distances…
>Alonso did all his backsides but when he had to jump and turn with a wall in front of him, he knocked a bar. We also disconnected due to a pole in the way and a piece of the wall jump came down. I wasn’t quick enough with my cues for one course and he took an off-course jump. We failed 5 runs but then for the last run of the weekend we got it together and he nailed it. He was the only one to qualify in his regular 20” height class. >
Yay for Alonso!!! It sounds like he did great, even in the NQ classes.
>Mookie Q’ed in 5 out of the regular 6 runs we were in but we failed the last run of the weekend because I ran out of gas and lost focus after my great run with Alonso.>
Wow, well done to you and Mookie! Those are hard challenges to get 5 out of 6 Qs on!!
>If I hadn’t been doing camp with you all these years, I don’t think we would have done as well as we did. I always practiced all the skills but never tested them all until now >
Well you’ve certainly done your homework so it is really fun to be able to use your skills at a trial!
>Mookie nailed both of them. After the trial they were easy for Mr. Moo.>
You and Mookie are really such a smooth team now. Well done!!!
>As for Alonso, for course 1 I had set up an off-course jump right after jump 11 9 3 and he took that instead of going into the tunnel after the BS at 3 for his first run. He was fine second time through but I used close close arms so he didn’t take the off-course jump. >
That is good to know – the added arm cues got the collection he needed to get the line and not the off course!
>Course 2”: I am teaching the “close close” cue which I had taught Mookie one summer so he stays on the right path i.e. 5 to 6 and not 5 to tunnel. I need to learn how to cue faster and teach the cue that will take him off a line. I tried calling his name and it seemed to work better than the “close close” verbal. Do you have other suggestions for verbal cues?? >
One thing to consider is putting turning cues on obstacles *before* the threadle obstacles (like tunnel threadles). A directional or a strong name call on the previous jump, for example, can get him turning and into handler focus. My guess is that he didn’t process the ‘close close’ cue in time or your motion supported the incorrect line so added turn cues on the line before it will totally help.
Have fun with the rest of Package 3 and with the herding clinic!!!
Thanks for the update 🙂
Tracy
Good morning!
I am glad Enzo got to play!
Super good boy Casper on pop out 1! His feet seemed to be facing jump 2 but your position was squarely saying to take jump 1, so he did.
He read the turn at 3 really well! The dig verbal helped him and you can also use a threadle wrap verbal. In this context you could easily face him to get it. In other contexts, you might need to be facing your next line so you can keep facing forward and cue it with hands/verbal rather than turning to him.
Nice job getting the backside at 5! You can tell him about 6 sooner (as he is approaching takeoff for 5) so he doesn’t look at you.
On the 2nd pop out – nice threadle slice on 3 on the first run! You can make it look more different from the threadle wrap cues by reaching back with the dog side arm rather than pulling downwards with it – that is similar to a forward facing threadle wrap cue.
That will also help at :44 where you closed your shoulders forward and he (correctly) thought it was a serp to the other side of 3 and not a threadle, and splatted the jump trying to adjust.
You started to get further and further from 3, so he was asking questions. The line on the 1st run was correct, just needed more a bit more upper body rotation back towards him with a threadle arm extended back.
He didn’t quite use his rear at :29 for the backside wrap. He was better at 1:04 and 1:24 but still not really pushing from the rear so he was a bit wide. You can help him by cueing the backside there with 2 hands to ask for more collection. And do you remember with Enzo we had Enzo sit before taking off for this kind of wrap? That would be a good one for Casper now!!
And for the 6-7 line, brake arms to ask for a little bit of collection can smooth that out too.
>As you can see, my lead out at an angle is not very good. He understands “look” but if the angle gets too steep, then he won’t stay in the proper position. I suppose I really should go back and re-teach his stay.
> Yes, a don’t move your feet stay is easiest for this, but also him reading the line when you are facing the first jump is great like he did in pop out 1.
Nice work here!
TracyGood morning!
>Ok, so backside slice I can say back and then do the blind that doesn’t need a separate command? >
If you are pushing to the backside slice and then doing a blind, the back verbal is all you need (the handling cues the blind). The only need for an additional blind there would be if you were so far away that you could not show any handling.
The backside circle would be the different verbal to push to the backside where she enters and exits on the same wing.
>Backside threadle with dog starting on left needs a separate command? Correct? I will use “me me”>
The threadle slice and threadle wraps should have separate verbals, yes – for me, I look at it in terms of which wing the dog enters and exits on: enter and exit on different wings? Threadle slice verbal. Enter and exit on the same wing? Threadle wrap verbal.
You’ll end up with 4 verbals for the backside – 2 for when you are handling from landing side and 2 for when you are threadling to takeoff side.
>What is the move called where dog is on your right and you threadle wrap them to the backside with off side arm? I say “choo choo” for that. Our last show had at least one to three of these in each class. Was designed by British Judge Neils and he did AKC classes as well as ISC classes and his AKC had backsides and those moves in them. You can imagine the regular AKC people, they weren’t happy, ISC courses were great.>
I think you mean a threadle wrap here, where she would enter and exit on the same wing.
I am surprised that people were surprised that a British judge would have more international courses LOL!! The premier course here was nice!
This was a really great run on a challenging course! She only had 2 questions:
At :17, you stepped forward into the FC as she was landing, so it looked like your right foot indicated the tunnel.At the end, going past that jump… it looks like the line after the double was to the backside of that jump, so you would need to be calling her before the double to get the turn. This happened in one of the courses earlier this summer, where she needed a strong name call to get that last line. Plus she was running into visual “clutter” of the pole, the ring wall, ring exit, etc, which can draw her attention off the jump. So definitely look for lines like this at the end so you can be calling her to get the jumps that look obvious but might not be.
Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
I agree, he was great with ALL the things on this video! Yay!!
He was a good boy on that teeter! He totally noticed that the board had different movement to it – it looks like it is lighter than other teeters so probably ‘whips’ differently. But then on the 2nd rep he was fast again, so exposing him to all the different teeters is definitely helpful.
The handling game is looking GOOD!!!!!!
When you are quiet, he looks at you on the tunnel exit (good boy) so right before he goes into the tunnel, you can use a ‘go’ to get a straight exit, then switch to your wrap cue for the wing before he exits (or the soft turn cue, I think you were saying ‘whoa’ here). He was responding perfectly so the only thing to smooth out is getting him looking straight on the tunnel exit.
He was a lazy game superstar here too! No toy obsessing 🙂 Your connection was clear and he is getting used to the bigger distances, so he found his lines with no problem. Toy in hand or toy on the ground were both easy for him. Super!!!
You can move into the handling sequences using this setup.
Great job!
TracyHi!
He did great here! You totally did it right.The hardest part for us humans is to not change motion – when you were staying at the exact same level of motion, he was not as sure and he would stop but not sit as quickly.
When you slowed down a tiny bit, he sat quickly. So to fade out slowing down at all, you can be walking sooooo slooowwwwllllly the whole time, almost shuffling along – and when you say sit, don’t change anything 🙂 When he gets very snappy with that, you can add more and more motion (eventually you can build it up to running!)
And you can also add doing this with a toy, but you might have to start with really boring motion, such as marching in place 🙂 because the toy is more exciting than the food 🙂
Great job here!
TracyGood morning!
>First using more than one ball worked perfectly with Max. >
Great! It helps to think of it all as coming to an agreement with the dog rather than fighting with the dog 🙂
>. And instead of doing the teeter foundations I just included a video of the things we’re working on in your independent teeter class.>
That is perfect! The teeter work is going well!
On the mountain climbers (uphill game), he especially loves it when you run too :). You can keep adding more and more tip to the board. Have you added any rear crosses – stay close to the wing wrap and as he exits the wrap, you cue the teeter but rear cross it as he passes you.
On the elevator game – I like how he starts shifting his weight when you say feet, even before you drop the board. Yay!
after yo say ‘feet’ and drop the board, you can start adding motion by slowing walking forward, staying in motion until the board has landed and he has decided to remain in position.Great job!
TracyHi!
Very nice session here, she was looking for the backside more without you needing to step to it or be near the wing! You were very quickly able to get the angle of the jump back to the original position to make it a true backside, while continuing to reward on the landing side. Super!!!
> My hand cues are far from subtle but I think that is what she needs to change her trajectory, lol. Maybe they can be more subtle over time?>
The don’t ever need to be subtle 🙂 They can be big and loud forever! It will make the cues look very different if the front side of the jump is subtle and calm, and the backside is big, loud, and more intense.
Remember to look at her eyes very intensely for the backside cue, almost as if you are mad LOL If you looked at her normally, she didn’t go to the backside as well.
>It is pretty obvious she has made her mind up as she goes in the tunnel >
Yes – before she enters the tunnel, tell her how you would like her to exit. In this case you don’t need wait til you see her exit the tunnel before starting the backside cues. You can already have your arm up and be saying the verbal right before she enters, so it is happened as she exits. The last 3 reps had you showing the info well before she exited, so she went to the backside brilliantly with you all the way across the bar! Super!
For the next session, you can do a similar setup but switch sides, to work this on your right side. That way we can be more sure that she is going to the backside on cue and no because she remembered the setup 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
> Took a few days break with her she had a three day dog show some days with 5 runs and a seminar. We weren’t super successful at the show.>You’ve been busy! If you have videos for the show, post them so we can see where the questions were and how to fix them, to get more success at the next show 🙂
Looking at the backside video:
This was a really good session!!! Keep throwing the reward to the landing side as you add more and more speed and independence (and blind cross exits) so she continues to look for the bar and not as you as you run through.
The wrap seemed to be harder as you added more motion. I think there were 2 reasons for that:
– I think part of the reason she was slicing or not taking it was that the jumping effort of taking the bar in collection without extra help from you is REALLY hard. So as you add more and more speed and bigger sequences with the backside wrap, the bar on the backside wrap jump can be a little lower especially on the first approach to it, to make the jumping effort easier for now.
– It sounds like your verbal for both approaches to the backside is ‘back’ and for the wrap you were adding ‘check’ but the check verbal was happening after she was having to make a takeoff decision. So she was having to wait to see physical cues, which will definitely impact the backside wraps on full courses. Rather than stack the cues (“Back check”) it is better to have separate cues 🙂 The backside wrap and the backside slice are very different behaviors, so we treat them accordingly with different cues. And that way you can deliver the info earlier: when she is at the previous jump, you can be telling her if it is a slice or wrap on the backside, so she can set herself up independently without waiting for more info.I know it is a pain to add another verbal 🙂 but it will be totally worth it!!
Nice job here!
Tracy
Good morning! This went really well!! And it was perfectly fine to start with course 2 🙂 The walk through and the runs were pretty similar plus there was some useful info from him.
>and I never quite know what speed of dog I’m going to get but usually slower than I think), then run 2x.>
It is good to be able to run the walk through faster than the actual speed as long as you can keep the connection and timing and handling and verbals 🙂 It is important to remember that he has a lot of yardage to do when you send and takeoff to the next line, which is why is feels different or slower. More on that below!
Good job working the connection and verbals in the walk through! The verbals can be done in the same energy/pitch/volume as the real run, even in your slow walk. We do this to begin to program ourselves for the real run 🙂 I loved your connection to the invisible dog at the exit of the first tunnel 🙂 You can make the exit of the 2nd tunnel just as connected, it looked a little less connected in the walk through and that is a critical spot to be able to get him to the backside.
The runs went really well!
Going back to the concept of him having a lot more yardage than you do so the speed of the run feeling different from the walk through: on the opening line where you both ran the same yardage, I think your walk through and real run speed basically matched! The send to 3 and distance to 4 is where it might have felt different – you could send and go directly to 5 there, but he had to run all of that yardage to meet you at 5. Plan for that, which will mean you can get ahead pretty easily using your sends!
That is what bit you at the end of the first run – you were able to send him to the 6-7 line which puts you way ahead on the tunnel exit, and that I where you lost a little connection and he didn’t know where to be. On the 2nd run you adjusted so you didn’t get as far ahead and got the connection to the backside after the tunnel. Yay! I think he prefers when you are a shade closer to the line there anyway – when he is working the 6-7 line and you are way ahead, I think he was having to think harder than needed about staying on the line and knowing where you were going. When you were a little closer on run 2, he seems to be able to devote more resources to running fast and didn’t have to think about where you went as much 🙂
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
Hooray for good weather and feeling good all happening at the same time!! MUCH to be happy with here!This was a really challenging session here but I think it went really well! Casper really seems to enjoy this type of ‘work’ and you did a great job breaking things down (giving hints😁) when things were really hard. The right turn away from the weave/tunnel setup was probably the hardest part!
He did well with the weave and tunnel cues coming from the DW. Being able to do weaves while layering a tunnel is a BIG win – this skill is getting super popular and I know you will able to use it in AKC JWW and Standard too!
The timing of the cues can come one stride sooner: you were giving them as he landed, but I think giving the weave or tunnel cue as he is taking off will give him that extra stride to process the verbal. The discrimination can be especially challenging in the heat of the moment on a big course, so the earlier info can be helpful.
>I also did a bit of one jump discrimination work. In theory, all of these should be “in play” on a verbal: 90 degree left, 90 degree right, wrap left, wrap right, switch (turn away), backside wrap, backside slice, threadle wrap, threadle slice>
Totally agree that these are all in play! And doing it with the tunnel-weave setup made it a bit harder (he was primed to go into the discrimination). The right turn away from it all was SUPER hard (I can see his point that it makes no sense to turn away from all of the obstacles!). And he needed help on the wrap: He collected like a wrap but then possibly assumed tunnel based on context? You can revisit the wing-tunnel proofing games from MaxPup 2 to refresh that skill of wrapping even with a tunnel visible.
He could get the backsides with you closer to the jump, but had trouble from the dog walk exits.
From that far away – you can try to push to the backside with the outside arm because dog-side arm as the cue opens up the possibility of you turning to the front by a fraction, so he comes into the front of the jump. But the outside arm exaggerates the shoulder position and is more visible when distance is added. And it is easy to fade once he has the skill. It would look like you connecting to his eyes to cue the verbal, and your outside arm pointing to the entry wing (as you move forward up the line).
Great job!
TracyHi!
Yes, gloriously cool here!!! Hope you’re enjoying your vacation!
>>How do I find the balance between running parallel on big lines and layering, and moving to the new line on a more extreme angle and trusting her to hold the line?>>
Part of it is running courses and analyzing 🙂 and part of it is just gaining experience. The verbals and line understanding will start to lock in more and more, so you’ll have a better sense of how early you can leave for the next line. You are 100000% on the right track, it will continue to get better and better!!! You’ve made enormous strides so quickly!
Have fun!
TracyHi!
I totally see what you mean here: if your connection and position aren’t perfect and you don’t step to the backside line, she’s likely to take the front. And we need to get her to commit to going to the backside before we work on taking the jump bar!So 2 ideas for you:
– you can angle the jump a bit, pulling the backside entry wing towards the previous jump and the exit wing further away. That way the line to the backside is easier to see (and the line to the front side is harder to see 🙂 )– she will probably do really well with a very intense connection as part of the backside cue. Have you ever tried using an outside arm to cue the backside instead if dog side arm? That would be looking right at her with the big connection as you say the backside cue, with your outside arm pointing to the backside wing. I’ll see if I can find a video of it!
I think if we can convince her to go to the backside, then everything else will lock into place. I’ll go find a video of the outside arm cue for ya!
Tracy
