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Good morning! The mosquitos are the WORST at this time of year!
>He’s learning the layering, as I’m seeing some improvement there. >
YES! He did great and that makes all the mosquito bites worth it 🙂
The course work looked really good!
On the first run, I think he didn’t take the #1 jump and was convinced the first jump was 2 is because your hips/shoulders were facing the 2nd jump more. I think he was looking to his left too! So you can angle yourself to be facing #1 more and see how he does (and see if he will glance at it before the release).
Showing him the jump at 1:21 really helped and it looked like you were ever-so-slightly more angled towards it in your shoulders, so he took it beautifully on the release there.
Even without a lot of momentum, he layered 2-3-4 really well on run 1, which allowed you to show the backside at 6 easily and then the line to the weaves look great! He was great again with the layered line on the 2nd run!
On run 2 at 1:43, on the 7 jump he considered turning to his right for a rear cross for a moment. He ended up turning to his left but he had a question. It was because you decelerated and rotated at the same time, which could look like a RC but your position looked like a FC so he watched you for more info. You rewarded there which was great!
The next rep at 2:02 was a definite rear cross/tandem turn with clear cues, and he had no questions. Fast and tight! Nice!
At 2:04 it looks like you were trying to layer the line to the weaves, but you were decelerated and trying to send without connection, so he was not sure about the first jump on the line but went and took the next jump which was about 6 miles away. Good boy! Good reward there!
He has made a lot of progress with the distance work! More connection and less arm will help him find the first jump too. And strategically, you can stay closer to the jump before the layering so you can accelerate him into the line, rather than decelerate and send. On the last rep, you did stay closer so you can start the go go go verbal as he lands and accelerate towards the line.
The weaves are looking like he is feeling good again: fast and snappy!
You can set a better line to the backside after the weaves by using a German turn at :40 (not quite enough connection on the 2nd to the backside on the 2nd run he ended up on the front, the skeeters were probably being by then) On the German, you can push to the backside like you did, then run forward past the exit wing with countermotion and do a blind cross. That gets you ahead more easily to handle the jump after the tunnel. You did a FC on the landing side which put you in his way a little on the first run (you can see he went wide around you to the tunnel entry) and a lot at the end of the session, so he ended up off course! But I love off courses with Reacher – it means he is driving his lines and going for it. SUPER!
So if you use the German turn instead and by getting ahead more, you can do a blind on the tunnel exit and send him to the slice line on the jump. I think you were trying to do a RC slice there, but you were decelerated for too long so he read it as a wrap before you moved across for a rear. Nice job continuing though!
You got a little disconnected at :50 so he didn’t take the jump – you were a little far from it to support it without connection, so he looked at you with a question. He was also probably not expected MORE on the course, it is a long course LOL!
And for what might be the first time in his young life, he saved your bacon at :56 and went out to find the layering jump!!!!!!! WOW!!!! At :52 you sent to the jump but pulled away sharply to get the layering. That would ordinarily pull a dog off the layering line due to the motion. But At :53 you urgently said “JUMP!” So he went back out and found the jump. HAPPY DANCE! TRIPLE COOKIES FOR REACHER! Young dogs really don’t save us, ever, so I was super proud of him there!
Overall, a really great session and he worked hard through it all. Huge progress in the distance work! And yes, the heat and bugs make the sessions harder but even if you ended the course work after about 2 minutes, you still made big progress!
Great job!
TracyHi!
>Sure did matter which direction my feet were pointing!
>This is SO TRUE, especially with younger dogs.
She did really well here! The first couple of reps with the threadles wraps both looked good! The backside slice and backside circle wrap also looked really good!
When you put together the bigger sequence:
This is where setting the line to the threadle wrap made a big difference. At :44, you were pointing your feet to the front of the bar, so she took the front. Your feet ended up pointing to the front of the bar because you opened up back to her too much when you reconnected after the blind which rotated you to the bar too much.
Compare to 1:00 where you set the line to the threadle wrap perfectly, so she had no questions about which side of the jump to go to.You had a similar question on the bigger sequence at 1:58 (where you rotated back to her too much and ended up pointing your feet to the front of the bar). Compare that to 2:18 where you set the line really well with your feet pointing to the parallel line to the threadle side of the the jump. and she knew exactly where to be 🙂
For the threadle wrap: You can call her name sooner (before she enters the tunnel, as you start the blind) but then switch to your treadle wrap verbal when she exits the tunnel so she hear that sooner.
She did have a question about continuing to the bar there as you moved forward at 1:02. You can look at the landing spot as you keep moving past it but more importantly: throw the reward for it to the landing spot behind you, rather than reward her from your hand. Throwing it behind you will get even more commitment to help her commit even as you keep running through 🙂
Great job here!
TracyHi!
> I am currently not emotionally committed enough to agility to justify buying a teeter. I have lost some of my passion for agility over the last couple of years. Trying to find my joy and motivation again.>
That makes total sense! Ellie is a fantastic dog, so I am sure you two will excel in whichever sport you choose! Hopefully agility will come back to a joyous place for you but also there are so many fun sports to do with a versatile and talented dog like Ellie 🙂
Looking at the video:
This was a lovely session! I agree that she had no questions. In fact, by moving that middle jump out and sending, she had fantastic turns in both directions there. Yay! And you were beautifully connected on both your left and right side, so she had no questions. That was great to see especially on your right side – those reps looked super!We build on this with the next games on Tuesday, so you can add more distance and more running too if you wanted to do another session with it.
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
He definitely liked this one more – running AND frisbee! Yay!He did really well with the commitments here. Your connection looked great, both on the sending and on the exits of the FCs. When doing the baby level and sending to the single wing, you can try it from even closer to the tunnel exit, we well as move the wing even further away. When you are using the 2 wings before the FC, you don’t need the big send to the first wing – you can support it with connection and motion, doing the send to the 2nd wing as part of getting the FC started.
You can add more distance between the wings and tunnel to challenge his commitment more. And you can add your verbals! I heard the tunnel verbals, but you can also add the wrap verbals as well as the soft turn verbals for when you are doing the FC on the middle wing.
Great job!
TracyHi!
Nice job spreading this out! The sending looked good, no problem. Yay! He really has strong commitment. And he was also super when you added running – he stayed on his line AND went faster too 🙂 I am loving how well he is driving out the middle jump!We build on this setup a lot on Tuesday. If you want to play with it again before then, you can spread it out to bigger distances. That will be a great challenge for the little guy 🙂
Great work here!
TracyHi! He is doing really well here too 🙂 Having the food at the end on the target for a LOT of drive the end of the board. He seems very confident!
When wrapping the wing before the teeter, make sure the wing exits to a pretty straight line to the teeter – some of the angles looked like you wanted a different line 🙂
For this game, keep gradually add more drop to the board. It looks like he has no problem with you running past the board. Super! Have you been able to run past and do a FC or BC while he is on it? If not, you can definitely try that. You can also start very close to the wrap wing and do a rear cross between the wing and teeter.
How is he doing with the bang game? We add that game later in this class, but I figured I’d ask to see if you have started it already.
Great job!
TracyHi! This went great!
Starting with food was good because it really solidified his independence. Then adding the toy got both the independence and the speed 🙂 Yay!You can add more distance between the jumps here to challenge him more – how far apart can the jumps be and he still takes them. You can work up to 28 feet or more!
Great job!
TracyGood morning (or is it afternoon there?)
The pinwheel worked looked fabulous, he is looking at his line and driving around with speed! He seems to have no questions at all. So you can move to the 2nd and 3rd levels which have more sending so you don’t move into the pinwheel as much. And, you can mix up the distances: some longer, some shorter. That way he is challenged to regulate his stride a bit too.
He did great with the plank work. Back and forth with straight entries was no problem. Yay! With the plank still on the ground, you can add in tossing the cookies out to the side so he enters from all sorts of different angles. Think of all the terrible angles we never want to see on a dog walk or teeter… and show them to him here so he learns how to balance 🙂 You can also do that with the board slightly elevated, so he has to get on it and balance before moving across it.
He did well turning around on the board, no problem! You can add 2 challenges:
– have him hop off in the middle of the board, so he is moving across it then you call him off of it from the middle. That will help him balance if he ever needs to jump off rather than fall– in the center of the board, you can ask for position changes such as down to stand to sit to stand to down 🙂 That requires a lot of balance! A cookie lure is fine to help him with that, so he doesn’t try to jump off to change positions 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Hello and welcome back!
Let me just say that it is GREAT that you post the places where things are harder – that way we can sort that out and everything gets easier.
I see what you mean about the food being NOT motivating in this game. It is not unusual for a Border Collie to think food is not a motivator or reward during work.
He was finding the jumps, and he did see you throw the food (but it was not worth the effort to find it when jumps, your motion, and a toy were in play). It seemed like he was able to think about what he needed to do… but the food was not a motivator or reward at all. This is pretty normal LOL
Two ideas for you:
We can use this framework to be able to get more food value going: throw a BIG GIANT VISIBLE chunk of something, like a piece of string cheese. Then when he gets it and eats it (stop the game til he does) – you can have a ginormous party with the toy then back into the work on the jumps.
So mainly eating food becomes part of the ‘work’, as we build it up into a motivator.
Separately from using food, when we are working on getting bigger commitment from him: use the toy 🙂 He definitely finds it motivating and rewarding, so for now you can throw the toy out on the line. For efficiency, you can have a 2nd toy with you to help convince hm to come right back with the first toy, for the next rep 🙂
One other thing to consider – at the end you did a nose touch hold then the toy. I’ve talked to a bunch of behavior vets about the sustained nose touches and chin rests, and what we are all seeing is that while the intention is to calm the dog, it has the opposite effect: there is muscle tension when they do this and they either are not breathing or they are breathing fast through their noses… all of which can increase the heart rate which increases arousal 🙂 So a quick hand touch is great so he can open his mouth, move, and breath more will be better for a quick behavior to get him the toy.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Good morning!
She brings a lot of joy to the lazy game! She is DEFINITELY not lazy in her approach to this LOL and was very happy to go over the jumps to eat the treat. Best game ever according to Millie!! Super fun to watch her.
And when you asked for more than one jump? No problem, she said. She ended up driving to all 3 jumps with speed and independence, not needing much help from you. SUPER!
Since this went perfectly, you can spread the distances out, and you can also proceed to games 2 and 3!
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>I did notice her zig zag on that tunnel approach and she did it more than once. I’m a little concerned we are also developing some weakness with “dog on right.” >
It might be that you are a little more naturally connected with her on your left, thanks to the value of the obedience work. So when she is on your right, you can really emphasize the connection to her eyes (and tell your arms to stay out of the picture :)) and I bet the connection on your right clicks into place there too.
>What do you suggest if we don’t have a way to start with one end on the ground and one in the air? I know this would be the ideal way to get a fast, confident teeter. So maybe I need to invest in the teeter trainer? I don’t own a teeter but have access to one.>
If you have access to one, you can play this game when you are able to go train on the one you have access to. You can of course invest in a teeter trainer, but it seems like it would cost too much for the amount of time you would need it (not a lot of time). You could invest in a teeter, which would make more sense because it gets used a lot, but you can also train a fantastic teeter without owning one.
Another way to begin the mountain climber game is to use a normal plank so she can run up it and get rewarded at the top – it doesn’t need to move at the early stages, so a regular plank would be fine for now.
>On the plank exercise, what if we have already introduced the 2o2o end behavior?>
For the angled entries, you can have her start on the angled entry and end in the 2o2o on the other side of the plank. She would be getting on in one direction only (no back and forth) but that will still help her find the angles of entry. And for the turning around in the middle, you can have her hop on in the middle, turn around, hop off – this is all to prepare her for if she ever loses her balance and needs to jump off rather than fall off.
Keep me posted!
Tracy
Good morning!
She did well here! The cot stationing might have helped, hard to know, but she did seem less bouncy/barky on t he way to the first jump at the beginning.
Run 1 – this went well! One thing to try is a spin on 4 after the blind, instead of a post turn. The spin turns your feet the new direction sooner (she had a nice turn but you can get more speed out of it if she chases you rather than follows a post turn. That can also get you a few steps further ahead so you can then send to 5 and get to the blind on the tunnel exit sooner. The blind was a little late so she had a question there (but didn’t get mad! Yay!)
Run 2 – this also went well! I don’t think she needs an arm send or step to the backside on 3 – I believe she will get it with parallel path motion and verbals. Sending (and toy hand switching) made the FC a little late at 1:07. Or you can do a blind because that will get you up the line even better and then she won’t have a question on the tunnel exit.
Run 3 –
Great focus forward to 1 at 1:40! Her line up and the step out of it read RC to her, so more of an angle on her start position will help so she is facing the left turn.
Great job on the last line and layering the tree AND driving ahead! She is getting really good at the distance lines!!!
>I can try to rotate treats more but she’s still not into non food-stuffed toys for agility so kinda hard to mix up toys very much. >
Keep rotating treats, and you can also rotate the food toys – food stuffed frizz, lotus ball, treat hugger, etc.
>Lately I’ve felt like the agility training has been going well, but her general house manners have regressed.>
Could be a burst of adolescence brain development happening, could be less activity due to heat, or anything. You can give her indoor puzzles to solve, like indoor scent work in the form of hiding food or hiding a kong toy or something to give her a brain workout 🙂
Sounds like a great weekend ahead! Have fun hiking and at the trial, fingers crossed for great weather!
Tracy
Hi!
> I never REALLY know where he’s going and handling becomes reactive instead of proactive. >
This is a HUGE point! On the runs you posted, the handling was 95% proactive and looked fabulous! It was the 5% where it was a little reactive where you had the one darned error. (That is probably frustrating – I would be frustrated! Argh!)
>So in addition to tunnel exit challenges, will need teeter exit challenges (and even start line scenarios, since similar things happen off of start lines, like that opening from that first class course I posted of Roots).>
That is a great plan – and the plan only focuses on 2 things, making it much easier to execute and complete! I am not as concerned about the start line openings, because those are already in progress plus you are slapping on the verbals which will help enormously.
So for the tunnel exits and teeter exits: When you are training, grab the handling skills sequences or pop outs or parts of the big courses that have those 2 exits, and work them as written and also with an ‘either – or’ approach, showing him a variety of different exits. if you only show one exit, he will learn the sequence and then it won’t matter what the handling is after the second rep LOL!
Then for the ISC trial, maybe look at the courses from the perspective of working on those 3 things (start line exits, tunnel exits, teeter exits). It will mainly be tunnel exits because there will be several of those in each course, and tell him what the exit is (before he enters) on every tunnel whether you think he needs it or not :). Thankfully there is only one start line on each course, and only one teeter exit on each standard course, so that requires less focus at a trial.
Have a great weekend!!
Tracy
Good morning!
I love games where we can sit! Cricket added nice musical accompaniment too!
She did really well here – I think her success was a combination of processing the cues before she moved, and latent learning from the previous session. Super! It is still a hard processing game so she sometimes came directly to the toy (there is a self-control element in play here too). She had a stretch in the middle where she got several wrong – my guess is arousal came up more which made the processing harder. But you kept things in a very centered state and she worked through the puzzle, finishing super strong!
For the next session (in a couple of days, so latent learning has time to work its magic :)), try it standing then try it with adding that ‘neutral motion’ from coming around a wing. It is fun to sort see her sort it out.
Nice work!
Tracy
