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Good morning!
>>Giving him some more room helped him to turn the correct way. I will say that when he chases toys outside that almost 100% of the time, he turns left after picking up the toy – even if it would be easier to turn right. >>
This is good to know! When you get in to more complex skills, train them going to his left first so he has less to process – then it will be far easier to get them going to his right. And it will even out in both directions, plus the conditioning people can help a lot too!
>Darkness prevented us going out for the driving ahead- so tomorrow!
The early darkness is a bummer!!!
>Question on the cone work. We have worked through all of the baby steps, starting the same way – with bowls. He is now at the point where he does multi wraps of cones, wings, trash cans (I don’t use cones anymore because he’s so big). >
Yay! One thing to consider is *not* doing multi wraps. The main reason is that when the pups are doing multi wraps, after the first approach to the cone (or whatever you are wrapping) they are pulling from their front end and not driving into the wrap with their rear. And what is collection? It is a hind end behavior. So multi wraps end up rehearsing what we do not actually want them to do on wraps, and their earliest neuronal memory is about, you guessed it, approaching tight turns with their mechanics focusing on front end use. That then takes a while to undo, so I prefer to not build those front end neural pathways and stick to the hind end engagement we get with single wraps. More on that coming soon.
Plus a lot of dogs just get bored LOL!! I am not sure if Judge gets bored because I think Mals can work forever and ever, so I am thinking more about getting fatigued and building a behavior in a direction we don’t want. I think multi wraps are popular because it looks like we are producing tight turns… but they are not tight because the dog is driving in with collection, then are tight because the dog is not moving fast. Food for thought!
>He can can that with distractions- me holding food out in my hands. I’m at the point where I’m starting to name the wraps. Should I wait a couple of lessons to do anything or do you want to see any of this now?>
You are welcome to post it if you like! My suggestion is to take what he already knows and use it for the Stealth Self-Control games – the first one is REALLY easy and it is posted in the Week 1 stuff. There is more coming of course and that will include forward focus, etc. And then we add more speed and excitement to it all 🙂
>We did a few forward send with the toy – he got a bit sloppy as his arousal went up so I need to figure out the correct balance of cookies to toy. >
I think he did great with the added arousal of the toy! Yay!!! Don’t avoid that – he was still really super good. As his brain and body get used to working in arousal, you will see the mechanics get crisp again. So yes, it is ok to sacrifice a bit of mechanics as you teach him to do it in arousal – because he is going to need to do it in arousal and these early days will go a long way to helping him be prepared for that.
If the behavior goes all to poo, you can back off the arousal a little but he still had really good hits here and was sorting out his mechanics nicely. His hits were not that different than the hits with the food-rewarded sideways sending. I bet he has slept on it and figured it out and will be very clean and crisp now with the toy!
You can try using toys and food in the same session (he seems to like both a lot, and that is great!) Do the ready dance, send to the prop, mark and play with the toy, deliver a treat by tossing it away, then back to the ready dance for the next rep. Or, you can flip that: reward with food, then a bit of tugging after every rep or two.
>>I need to figure out the correct balance of cookies to toy.>
You won’t really know until you and he are almost through the wild ride of adolescence 😂🤣 You will see subtle shifts back and forth for a while – this is normal and we embrace that and help him out.
For the sideways and backwards sends – he did really well and being further from the prop totally helped him turn to his right. You can be one step further away, almost where the treadmill is here, to give him even more room. And when using the food, remember to dirty up the loop with the ready dance before each rep – the arousal is actually the most important piece here 🙂 You can bring the toy into this game too (and every game :))
>I re-did the decel exercise and circle – trying to make sure he kept his rear in.
He was beautiful with those and had no trouble getting in very tight to you! Yay! Remember to keep your hand lower so his chin is parallel to the ground – it might be easiest to use your knee as your guide and have the treat placement happen down at your knee.
You can add some toy place to this one too – he seems to have a great head and handles arousal well! So you can tug a little before every rep or two, then do the game with food like you did it here. That brings in the arousal bit by bit – so useful for the future, especially if we can help him sort it out *before* adolescence hits hard 🙂 We add more to this game soon.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
I am glad you are turning your rage into action! I am still mostly in rage mode LOL!! Sigh.
And it also sounds like he is getting a lot of good class and seminar experience!!
>>I don’t have specific video of this, but we have been doing the ’empty hands’ for a while, mainly because I am not good at running with a toy in my hand. So it gets put elsewhere (and I really need to switch to smaller toys because his giant holee roller octopus thing makes my pants fall down). But he’s pretty solid at running without seeing the toy at this point, so I’m not sure if we need to do anything else with that.>>
Great! You might find that his version of “Just Like Home” is the empty hands level, because it is his normal, and that is great!
>>Question for you. I have the opportunity to enter him FEO in a trial in January. My thought was to try that and to just work on some of these A.R.E toolbox exercises. Would that make sense?>>
Totally do it! He likes toys and he has probably been to the trial site, so go for it!
>> I have zero interest in trying to actually run a course at a trial, I just want to play with startlines and whatnot. Too soon? Or do you think he’s ready to test some of these behaviors in a trial environment?>>
Start lines are a real buzzkill and also are the easiest thing to go wrong… so I never ask for them in the first FEO. Tricks, tugging, simple fun sequences – heck yeah! Hold off on the stays til you know he is very comfortable in the trial ring. Then the stays will be easy. Putting stays in too early can lead to a lot of errors and frustration, because the dog is working in a higher arousal state and with more distractions than ever.
>>we’re going to work on the send-ahead stuff because he tried to unalive me at class the other day – he’s speeding up, but then he’s turning around to see where I am and coming to a dead stop out of a tunnel. >>
Placed rewards will be your friend here, or actual real human friends who can throw the rewards for you – that way looking at you is not something he will want to do.
On the video: his leash off, engagement on looked great! That is another reason why FEO should be fine to do – he can play this engagement game even with another dog right there at the practice jump and lots of distractions around, as well as in class in the big ring. Yay! You can make this a remote reinforcement game by leaving your toy outside the ring while you do this – see if he can engage when the leash comes off, line up, take the jump, the mark and you go to the reward.
Great job here!!
Tracy
Hi!
>>That makes total sense to only “mess up” once when playing this game. I would imagine this isn’t a game you’d want to play super often so as not to build in too much frustration??>>
Yes – there is a lot of arousal regulation, and we don’t want the pups to slide into overarousal.
>>I definitely practiced them, but I think because I walked all of the sequences at one time before I brought her outside with me, I got the verbals mixed up.>
That could definitely be why. You can refresh each sequence before you run it, by jogging through it with the verbals. That will also build in more break time for her (but not for you, sorry LOL!!!)
>>she was pretty quick to come back to work for most reps.>>
Herding dogs will generally come back quickly to work even if they are exhausted LOL So don’t let her drive your decision on that because herding dogs will go and go and go and go…
>> Doing a working spot keeps me motivated to get the work done, but I also feel the pressure of “deadlines.”
That is why there are two weeks between sequences, so folks can battle the daylight issues and poopy weather and still get everything done.
On the video – this went well!!
The warm up went well. She did better on the full sequence when you gave a turn cue on the jump before the tunnel threadle. At 2:03 she jumped long (no turn cue) but at 2:29 and after that, you were cuing a left turn so she turned really well, making the tunnel threadle easier 🙂
I think her only question here was on Seq 3 on jump 5, where she needed to turn left to get the jum and not take either side of the tunnel. At 3:36 she came off the jump – you were turning a bit too soon, which brought you to a stop and you disconnected a bit. On the next 2 reps, the left verbal was timing but your shoulders were facing foward til she took off – it was a conflicting indicator (turn or go straight?) so the bar came down on those. At 5:47, she got it – you can turn your shoulders sooner there – it is a fine line between turning your shoulders away no later than halfway between the 2 jumps and also maintaining connection so she maintains her commitment.
It was really good to end where you did – look at how ginormous her tongue is LOL! And she was very successful, so stopping was a good call.
Great job here!
Tracy
HI!
>> First video is a dead toy.>>
I think this video is missing? Or I need a lot more caffeine 🙂
The MM runs looked really good! You can click the MM as soon as she looks ahead (no need to wait until she is over the last bar), closer to what you did at :43.
On the sequence video – she did great finding that big long line!!! On the first run, she wasn’t controlling her jumping as much but the 2nd run and 3rd run were great! Her hind end comes up a little as she decelerates to get to the MM, so you can move it further away so she has more room.
My only suggestion on the 2nd sequence is to tell her about the backside on 3 sooner – as soon as she exits the tunnel, you can let her know about the backside. You didn’t really cue it til she was past the halfway mark, so she had some questions there.
She also did well with the forward focus games! Yes, the left side is stronger – mainly because her stay is stronger on your left.
So keep working on building value for the stay on your right and releasing her when she looks at it. The magic sparkle ball can be close for now, or you can use a food bowl.
On your left, you can add in an arm cue (bring it up slowly so she doesn’t think it is a release) to help add more to the forward focus cue. And then I bet you can do this with a jump between you and the ball, adding lateral position to get her focusing forward on the jump! Her understanding on your right side will catch up pretty quickly, she was already getting the idea in this one session.Great job!
TracyHi!
Nice work on the sequences! The exit line connection looked great on the exits of the jump wraps. You don’t need to do it on the tunnel exits unless there is a side change – regular connection is fine there.
Looking at the Go lines – she had a little trouble finding that last jump when you placed the reward out past it. It is possible that it wingless jump was a harder visual for her to pick up, or that the toy was too close to her landing spot so she was not sure how to get it. So, you can back chain it jump on that last jump first, with the toy about 12 feet or so past it.
She did really well when you were moving up the line. You can start that a little closer to the end of the line there too to back chain the progress, but she was definitely sorting it out better with more of your motion and the thrown reward.
She had a lightbulb moment and was finding the line really well!!!There was a little blooper at 2:14 when you had a big disconnect sending to tunnel and turning your back on her, so she thought you wanted a blind and changed sides. Much better at 2:36 and the reps after it!
Sorting out the RC took a few reps – the key is what cue she sees as she is over the bar of the yellow jump after the tunnel.
When you faced straight at 3:25 – she thought that cued the straight line, and facing straight for a step or two there made the RC info late so she stayed on the “go” line.
Compare to 3:59 where you never faced straight (you faced the center of the bar of the next jump more) and you were showing the RC info as she landed from the yellow jump – better response for sure! She had slightly delayed processing of it (it was a little late showing the RC line) but she got it!
Then she totally had it by 4:29 – you were showing the RC info the whole time and you were driving up the RC diagonal sooner, which really helped.
I grabbed some screenshots of those moments so you can see the subtle differences that she reads as big cues:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1koJCQedymSUavEyXcqQjAJDaUvK6XegVDN9tgWg48sc/edit?usp=sharing
You can mix in straight lines there, to be sure she is reading all the cues correctly.
One other thing: all the backsides looked good but you had a REALLY nice long distance backside at 3:53!!
Great job here!!
Tracy
Hi!
I still love watching her FEO run! I loved her engagement when the leash came off and how focused she was in the run. Did I mention I thought it was a brilliant decision to do the tunnel double whammy at the begining? So fun!!!! And you had really excellent connection too.>>As gung-ho as she was, she was very happy to spend that evening & Monday on the couch with me after her big day. I feel like she was extra cuddley and smiling in her sleep.>>
She was probably enjoying some good endorphin feelings 🙂 And also her work in the ring was probably ‘expensive’, meaning that her brain expended a LOT of energy to process the environment, run fast, stay engaged so she was probably legit tired 🙂
> I did hide the toy and I realize now I probably wasn’t supposed to, but I run like that at home to doscourage her from jumping up & grabbing it.>
It went well, because she was used to it from the home training and I think you did it at the league training too. When is her next adventure in the ring at a trial?
Looking at the tunnel discrimination video: good job keeping it fun even though she was not getting the tunnel discrimination! I watched it and watched it to see what the handling was doing differently between the first rep at :20 where she got it and the others where she did not… I didn’t see a big enough difference, the handling looked strong on all of them. So my guess is her arousal level came up there and so processing the cues became harder after the first rep.
So try this: as she exits the pinwheel jump and is heading to the jump before the tunnel, give her a turn cue for that jump before starting the threadle cue. It can be a ‘left’ verbal if you think that is powerful in the face of a yummy tunnel straight out ahead. Or it can be her name (“BAZINGA MARIE!”) to get her attention. That can help let her know that there is a turn cue coming all before she takes off for the jump.
She had a little trouble with the pinwheel jump (those are hard for her!) so you can randomly throw a reward out past it when she takes it to keep the value high. And you can revisit the lazy game to be able to toss rewards for it, so she takes it without requiring perfection in the handling. I thought your handling was good there, so putting more value on the pinwheel jump will really help.
>>I loved that you said in the zoom chat about decompression that there is the active decompression (like shredding) and the calming decompression (like chewing or a snuffle mat). Do you need to determine which kind your dog needs or do they need both?>>
The dogs let us know which helps them – they don’t need both. In fact it would be GREAT if they didn’t shred because that gets expensive LOL!! And the more passive decompressions are easier to do at home. But if the dog needs to shred? We let her shred 🙂 Both the active and passive decompression have the same result.
>> It seems like sctive decompression like shredding lets them get their energy out so they can relax after & a snuffle mat would encourage them to focus & calm down.>>
In theory, yes, but it is very individual. My little Hot Sauce terrier doesn’t calm down after a snuffle mat at all – she eats all the treats as fast as she can then is ready to be wild again LOL!
>>I have been thinking about Bazinga these are my ideas:
Calm Decompression:
frozen kong
licky mat
topple with kibble>>These are great!
>>Snuffle mat? Maybe. I have not tried this yet but scatters in the grass make her focus on getting the treats>>
The mat would definitely make it easier to find the treats
>>long walks away from the busy area at a trial?
Yes – long sniffy walks are great!
>>beach walks – scheduled decompression
Perfect! Count me in LOL!!
>Active decompression:
Kill the towel (she loves to steal laundry)
Tug where she can kill the toy ($$$$)
Shred something? I’m thinking I can save paper towel rolls and put kibble inside & roll the ends & let her shred them. I have to WATCH her because of her histoy of eating stuff. I haven’t let her shred cardboard for that reason, but I bet she would LOVE it.>These are probably all good (but expensive LOL) decompressions and yes, they need to be supervised so she doesn’t eat anything inappropriate.
>>Would fetch at the trial site count?
That would befun for her but probably not decompressing – letting her run around with the toy (victory laps!) might be decompressing but that doesn’t really work at a trial. You can try it at home, though.
With all of the decompression stuff, observe her while she is doing it then after she does it – does she seeme relaxed? Is her next run really good?
>>I’m thinking about this question: Is Bazinga Volume dial or business?
As crazy as I feel typing this, I think she is all business. The look she gives me when we do a start line stay, is very serious. She really seems to take that part seriosuly. But she seems to be able to handle all the action tricks and still stay focused when we play them at the start line.>>It is too soon to tell – she might be all business, but she liked doing her tricks at the start line! She might be the perfect combo of both 🙂
>>Engaged chill.
I REALLY need to learn how to encourage this. We do not have this skill. It is either 100% attention on each other or she is looking for crumbs. She snaps out of the crumb search when it is time to play, but some engaged chill would be better. I’m not sure what to cultivate as engaged chill.>Slowing down the up and down pattern game using the 2 snuffle mats will help cultivate this!
>> I love Electra with her paws up on you. Can I shape that with treats & slow the treats down?>>
For the paws up, you can have her stand up on you and lick something (a lickimat is great) – that will encourage the behavior but also give her some decompressing licking to do.
It is possible she will like being touched during engaged chill and also possible she will NOT want to be touched. My dogs are divided: 3 like to be touched during engaged chill, 3 dog NOT want to be touched, it gives them the ICK haha! So the 3 that don’t want to be touched have learned the pattern game version of it, and they just stand next to or in front of me while chilling.
Great job here! Let me know what you think of the decompression ideas!
Tracy
Good morning!
These sequences went really well!
Nice job bringing her into the session with a pattern game then a bit of volume dial (she has mastered the bark on cue!)She drove ahead really well to the dish all the way from the tunnel! Yay! She totally smoked you on the last run and that was a great place to end the session. Click/treat to you!
I agree that she was enjoying driving to the dish! And also yes… her jumping form was a little interesting especially as she had the big long line. But not worrisome at all! I can’t remember ever exposing her to a line that long while asking for that much speed with you behind her. So she was almost perfect and I am sure she will sort out her jumping form because her jump form has never been an issue. We cna help her if she needs help, of course, but you can repeat this session in a couple of days (or after the Open :)) and see what latent learning has locked in.
And you can also repeat the session (back chaining) with the thrown Toppl – that might be easier for the jumping form, but it is definitely harder to throw when you are doing the full sequence.>> I was starting to run out of yard!). I didn’t drop enough treats for a better snuffle in the grass when I was done and she started jumping up at me as we were walking back into the house while on leash (side note – she will just jump up on regular walks too and not always because of over-arousal – sometimes it’s because we stopped (like to pick up poop) and she thought it took too long, but other times there is nothing going on and we’re just walking down an empty trail and she’ll start boinging. It’s like she just gets bored with staying on the ground!)>>
I have been thinking about this… I agree that jumping up is not always a frustration behavior and sometimes it might actually be an “OMG THIS IS AWESOME” or even an arousal regulation behavior. So in the OMG THIS IS AWESOME moments, or when she is regulating her arousal (like before a run or after a run), something to consider is that it might be perfectly fine to let her do it 🙂 It is a nice release and can even be an expression of joy. We can look for where it might be frustration and help resolve that, or look at where the expression of joy is really annoying (like if you are trying to prepare dog meals and she is boinging all around) and give her other things to do. That way all boinging is not something to be concerned about, because the boinging likely has different functions. And you can focus on the boinging that communicates frustration or is annoying to household life 🙂
>>I experimented it a bit with what she might like for engaged chill (jury is out but one possibility is that she likes to volunteer to pop into my lap as I am crouched down and just sits there on my thighs as I scritch her chest. This settles her but is obviously not the most comfortable chilling position for me!).>>
It is nice that she has some chill just being next to you! You can try carrying her sometimes to see if that works too (saves your knees from crouching) and also bring a chair that she can hop into so you can interact a bit while standing?
The one and done run looked great!
>> I got the front of the jump out of the tunnel instead of the back and am pretty sure I started rotating in too soon (hard to tell at a distance)>>
It was a little hard to see but you might have been a little too far across the bar and looked ahead too early? She was not expecting a backside cue there so needed a bigger physical cue. But the rest was great!! Great job throwing the toppl but I am also really excited that she was already driving ahead and looking ahead before you threw it. Super!!!!
Great job here! See you in Jacksonville!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>I got a bigger prop for him since he’s already pretty big (“we’re gonna need a bigger boat!”).
Ha! A tiny boat for a tiny Maligator, that is all you need 🙂
Prop sending is going well! He has great value and was hitting it really well!
You can add a little more room away from his line, maybe one or two steps away – you were pretty close and that might be what caused him to turn left away from you at :13. And he might be a lefty 🙂 So to help him want to turn to his right, being a little further away will to your right (when sending from your left) will help draw him to the right turn.Since this went so well, add a toy to these forward sends – we want him to start learning the arousal regulation right away because, well, Malinois 🙂 You can use the toy to get him excited before the ready dance and send – and a cookie as a reward if you feel he might get over-aroused, or the toy as the reward if you feel he is balancing his arousal nicely.
You can also move to the sideways sends (start with food first, then add the toy). And if that goes well (and it probably will), move to the backwards sending 🙂
The drive to handler is going well too!
You can present your reward hand sooner (when he is still 4 feet or so away from you) and lower, so he comes in straighter and his butt doesn’t curve away – by waiting for him to get all the way to you, he is looking up and swinging wide. Keeping your hand lower (even when pivoting) will help keep his chin parallel to the ground, which will make collection into the hind end even easier.He did well with the pivoting, just remember to pivot slowly so he doesn’t swing wide. And you can totally add this toy to this game too!
>>He has done quite a bit of the driving ahead for the toy, including with my motion, so I won’t go all the way back to the very first baby steps. Which means I need to go outside to give him enough room – will do that later today.>>
Super!! Show me what you have and we can add extra spicy things for him to do 🙂
>> Full disclosure – he has been working through another online program, so this is not his first class. But I like how everyone has different skills and approaches and I know this class has a lot of things I can do in a small space as winter approaches here (sad face).>>
That is great (well, not the winter part LOL!) At 7 months old, I figure most folks have started foundation so we can build on what he knows, add different skills, etc, so everything comes together into an expansive foundation.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
I agree, the shaping element was not a challenge for her. Adding the pressure and arousal of the toy moving was a bit of a challenge and she worked through it really well with the bowls!
It was harder when the cone came out – you can start that part of the session with the cone very close to you as a bit of a refresher, then move it out when she gets it smoothly going
I agree, adding the 2 cones and mat and toy in the picture was tooooo hard according to 10 here 🙂 You did a good job dialing back the toy challenge so it was present but not moving – she had some success but it was still a little hard. You can take this level of challenge and add the excitement of the toy in a little differently: get the behavior rolling (2 cones close to you and close together and the mat behind them). When she tells you that she has it by zipping back and forth a few times – then you can bring the toy into the picture, and if that is easy, you can start moving it. Then as one variable gets harder (like adding more distance between you and the cones), you can dial back the challenge of the toy til she is zipping back and forth. That approach of getting the behavior first will also help you survive canine adolescence, where behaviors they knew perfectly well on a Wednesday might be totally gone on a Thursday (but they come back on a Friday LOL!!)
Since I obsessively try to figure out the pup’s side preferences… she looks like a righty here when you put the cone out. I say that because when challenged with the toy distraction, she was able to wrap it going to her right very easily and smoothly. Wrapping to the left was harder (but she was able to do it – super!!!)
To get more curve on her line, you can slides the bowls back behind your knees , to get more in line with your hips – that will also give her more room to turn around and be ready for the next wrap.
If you haven’t already done so, you can also work this standing up because we are doing to build it up pretty quickly.
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
I am looking forward to seeing you at the US Open!>> I leave tomorrow for the US Open, so I won’t be able to get to all of them.>>
No worries, you will have plenty of time to catch up when you get back.
The drive to handler is going well.
>>In baby mode, should I ask for her to be closer. Coming to heel and side “close” has been an ongoing struggle with us.>>
She was in a good location on these, coming in pretty tight to your leg when you were decelerated. She was a bit wider and slipping a little when you were doing fast circles, so you can flip the script a bit: Be moving forward as you release her from the stay (or use a cookie toss start). Then before she is even halfway to you, decelerate into the pivot, so she gets the cue to collect.
Then stay a decelerated as you do the pivot, for two reasons:
– the cheat moments might actually have been her correctly responding to the physical cues of a blind cross starting (it was hard to see your shoulders on these). When you were pivoting fast, if you were breaking connection – then she was seeing your outside shoulder start to engage back to her with connection moving to the other side. That is a natural physical cue for a blind 🙂 So keeping the pivot decelerated will maintain the shoulders and a little bit of connection so she stays on that side.– the super fast pivots caused her to accelerate too, which resulted in going wider on the turn and slipping a little. So adding the decel before and during the pivot will prevent that, then you can throw a treat or toy out ahead of her so she can accelerate forward too.
Since you mentioned coming in close to you has been hard (BCs might not naturally drive to our leg), you can add arousal to this game. She was really strong here so in the next session, get her all pumped up with her toy so she is VERY excited – then ask for the drive to handler. Be sure to show her the decel cues nice and early because she will be moving really fast 🙂
>>When I get back I’ll take her to our training building where she can really get moving.>>
Yay! And the upcoming variation on this combines drive to handler with driving ahead, to really balance the skills.
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>>I wasn’t sure if I should video more on the foot/nose target games, but I’ll be working on those over the weeks before we get to the games that really need them.>>
You can bring the foot target game into the send game we added on Tuesday. The hand target came doesn’t turn into anything else for a couple more weeks, so we will refresh it when we are getting ready to use it 🙂
>>We worked a little bit on driving forward and forward focus before the sun went down (darn time change).
He is so cute and this is such a fun session! And I agree, the time change stinks 🙁
The field work and the driving ahead here will really work together to build a lot of confidence and independence. He was great here, pretty perfect forward focus, and you were fantastic about looking at him to see where he was looking then releasing him forward to the toy. He was fantastic about driving to the toy and even better, bringing it back! Yay! You kept the retrieve fun by running away from him and it all looked really strong.
He was perfectly happy with you adding motion. When you added distance plus motion (when the angle of the camera change on the video) you can let go of him and let him move first, so he gets the feel of driving even more ahead of you. You can let him take a couple of steps before you start moving.
>> A lot of it is working away from me, so he took to this game like a fish to water. He’s also starting to teeth, so despite his strong grip and urge to tug, he did have an ouchie moment during our tug session>>
Yes, that was a big ouchie at :38 but he was resilient and stayed in the game. He probably just caught a tooth as you said in the video – you can try for really soft toys for a while, and keeping the toy even lower (letting him pull back on it but you don’t move your hands a whole lot) can also help while he is teething.
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning! These are looking great! Is he coming to the USO with you? I am not going to HJJ because I have to be in Jacksonville on Monday (yay, course building….. LOL!)
He is off to a great start with the wrap shaping!
2 mechanics suggestions here that will make things even easier:– Have the treats ready in your hands before the bowls go down, so you can drop the treat in the very instant he goes to the bowl in that first heartbeat
– use both hands for this, so each hand drops a treat into the bowl near it rather than one hand crossing back and forth. Using both hands makes it easier to stealthily add a treat to the bowl when he is eating from the other bowl.
After a few warm up reps, where he sees each hand drop the treat into the bowl, you can move to the stealthy step where, as he is eating one cookie, the other hand drops the next cookie in the other bowl… and we wait til he goes over to it. That bridges the gap from dropping the cookies before the behavior, to getting him to offer the behavior without seeing the cookies first 🙂
And when he can move back and forth very easily, you can move bowls back behind your knees a bit to add more curve to his line.Decel and driving to you looks great! He drove right back, collected to your side, and was nice and tight to you. Yay!!! And the pivots at your side are looking really good too!
For now, have your magic cookie hand lower (probably just at your knee is the right height) so he doesn’t have to lift his head up – the goal is that his chin stays parallel to the ground.
You added a ‘toss’ marker for the cookie toss on some of the reps – that is great, so keep adding it on all the cookie toss reps (so many words LOL!!!)His nose bop to the target is the CUTEST thing ever! He built value for this very quickly. Super! Remember to use your toss marker for when you are tossing the treat away – and if you have a cookie-in-hand marker you can use that for when you were delivering the treat from your hand. If you don’t have that yet, no worries, we will add it later 🙂 This game can go on hiatus for a couple of weeks, we start using it in week 3 🙂
I love how he got right back on the toy at the end of this sesssion! Super!
He did great focusing forward on his toy! Remember to hold him before you toss the toy, that was when he did best and you were able to add more distance. You had a marker going for the toy here (I couldn’t really tell what it was, sounded like Pax LOL!) and that is good – as he is learning it, you can mark it then get in and play with him if he feels hesitant about grabbing the toy when he gets there.
He is ready for more distance (doing this outdoors will make that easier too) and when you have some more distance, you can also add your motion! Yay! When you do add more motion, keep the sessions shorter – it is a really high energy game and you can see by the end of these 2 minutes here that he was tired and not engaging as much. You can do 3 reps, perhaps, then end the session even if he wants more 🙂Great job on these!! See you at the Open!
Tracy
Good morning!
Driving ahead: I totally see what you mean by him *not* loving the holding portion of this game. His forward focus to the toy looks good, and he loves the toy, and he brings it back! Super! So let’s not bring the collar holding into this game yet, since both of you don’t like it 🙂 And we don’t want this dislike to get paired into the game and have him start avoiding it. So, we will separate the game from the collar hold, and build them up individually for now. This is pretty normal 🙂
To keep building this forward focus game, you can do a cookie toss away so he is a little behind you. Then when he eats the cookie and looks back at you: throw the toy and tell him to get it, to develop the forward focus. You will be able to add motion to this as well, as soon as he is driving past you to the toy.
To build up some collar grab love, a couple of ideas:
– using really high value food, can stick a finger on his collar (on top of it, not restraining him at all) then toss a treat that he can go get. Do several reps of that, then be done with the session. The next session can be a finger gently under his collar, then an immediate cookie toss. Then over multiple sessions, you can go to a couple of fingers, adding a slight delay before releasing to the cookie, etc. But start off easy so that he feels you gently touch the collar before you quickly toss the treat, so he is really comfy.You can also add in some line up fun – a cookie lure to get the pups at your side or between your feet, gently touch the collar, then immediately release forward to a treat or toy. I thought I had video of this but I can’t find it, so it is on my list to video today 🙂
Drive to handler looked great! Fabulous response to his name. He drove right to your side and collected so he wouldn’t shoot past you. Your hand position was spot on! And nice job decelerating into the turn when you added the pivot. And hooray for him getting back on he toy at the end!!!!
I think his only question here was finding the initial tossed cookie – you can use a mat or bowl to get the cookie in or on, so he has more of a target and doesn’t get lost in interesting smells 🙂
Great job!!
Tracy
Good morning!
Driving ahead looks great – she sure does love her toy!
She is focusing forward to it most the instant it first lands, so you can be prepared to release almost immediately. If you wait too long, she looks back at you – so watch her as you throw it so you can release her to it sooner.>>Who knew that a working dog didn’t come with a natural retrieve like most of the Spaniels 😆>
Ha! She retrieved it…. eventually. LOL!
You can work the retrieve into this: as soon as she goes to the toy, you can turn and run the other way. And then you can reward her for bringing it back towards you by offering a different toy or a cookie.She told us in this session that she didn’t necessarily love the collar holding, so we can help her out. A couple of ideas:
– it looks like she was able to go from a treat to the toy pretty easily here, so you can line her up at your side with a treat then put your hand on her collar. That way there is no moving her by the collar, which might be what she doesn’t like.-Also, be ready with the toy so that the collar grab lasts for a really short time and you can release to the toy very quickly. That will help her pair the collar grab with the fun of the game.
– if you are holding her collar and she is kind of sideways to you, you can adjust your position and toy throw so that she is more relaxed next to you (rather than moving her)
– you can do a number of short fast reps with cookies! Cookie lineup, collar hold, throw a cookie, let go of her to go get it 🙂
The prop shaping is looking good! I love how she is generalizing the ‘hit the thing’ with her feet. It will be easy to move to a bigger prop when you find the sun hat 🙂
But even if you stick with the baseball hat, she was 100% ready to go to the first prop game – sending! When sending, remember that they start with the engagement and handler focus of the ready dance. This brings us the arousal regulation element as well as the shifting from handler focus to line focus element. Then when you send, use your arm and your leg in big gestures. You were using a small footstep but we want the big arm movement involved too. And on the sideways sends, you can step to the prop with the leg closer to it – you were using the opposite leg which will make it harder to move away when we add countermotion.
Great job here!!
Tracy
