Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Hi!
He was great about getting on the bowl and immediately pivoting! Good boy!!! The rest of the pivoting went great – I think he is ready for the next steps here.
There are 2 next steps you can use:– put low bumps or pool noodles on the ground for him to step over as he pivots. Start with one thing and if he is happy with that, add a second thing to step over.
– you can challenge him to pivot by himself without you moving. You can stand squared up to the bowl and toss treats to the side and slightly behind you. He will run to get them, then pivot back around to face you (hopefully :))
Strike a pose also went really well! You can add next steps here too: you can toss your start cookies to different angles so he can come to the target hand from different directions. And you can put the reward on the floor under your reward hand here so you don’t have to turn to it: he can come in and touch the target hand then go directly to the reward.
>I continue to struggle with getting Tribute to switch between food and a toy. If I start with a toy, he is much better. However, as soon as I introduce food, it gets messy.>
This is definitely the hard part! You can do food-only sessions where you use a start cookie and the reward target is a food bowl that you drop a treat into. And you can try to include the toy in other sessions: tug like crazy then toss a boring treat, then drop the toy on the ground as the reward target. It might be awkward and you ight need 3 hands 🙂 but it can help get him pumped up for the toy even when food is present.
Looking at the teeter: I agree, he was pretty confident here! Yay!
The tip of the teeter seemed to be pretty minimal here when he was coming down, but it was still a bit big when he got on it at the end in the unplanned last rep, so you probably need to hold him as you turn the camera off so he doesn’t do anything crazy LOL!And separately from the teeter, you can teach him his end position so you don’t need to be next to him. You can use a cato plank with a target taped to the end of it so he goes to the end of the board and moves into a down on the target. Then it will be really easy to teach the teeter position independently!
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
Very fun to be able to get some training time in with him! I have been following the Invitational from afar and the courses seem, um, challenging LOL!Wow, he did great with all the stuff on the overhang! You got about a zillion short blasts of different games and he was great with all of them. He seemed totally at home in hat loud, weird environment. Out of curiosity, did you feel any difference in how he was taking the treats – harder? Or normal? On there exterior and baed on his responses, he was unbothered by it all LOL!
All of the flatwork looked great – the patterns, the turn aways, I think I saw a bit of strike a pose, backing up – all going well! Pretty much same-as-home, which is fantastic!
Fun to have the rear view of the backing up. He was splaying his back feet a bit, possibly because you were low so he was getting low too. You can try being more upright, maybe bending over to deliver the treats You can also add a target for him to back up onto to he has a destination for the feets – it can even be a low dog bed, something easy to put out there.
I loved his Parkour moment on the weird wobble board that Galican has! I wish the vendor area was not so slippery for the dogs but it was smart to use Galican’s stuff 🙂 He was hilarious, pulling you back to it after a little break 🙂 The pattern game looked strong too! He just really seems so at home in that environment. Yay!
He seemed very comfy down on the competition floor too. How convenient that they set up the trap barrels for the rocking horse game 😂 😆 As soon as he recognized the barrels: GAME ON! And all the people wandering around/talking to you provided a fantastic distraction. It always cracks me up when people are working their puppy and someone starts talking to them LOL! And a nearby puppy blasting into a recall – he totally stayed engaged through it all. Did you see the puppy doing recalls while he was doing rocking horses towards the end? Good boy Vibe!
If there is a quiet time tomorrow on the turf… try a long crazy toy with small parts that he can fit in his mouth 🙂 Maybe someone can hold him for a recall, if he is comfy with that? It would be fun to see if he can chase a toy. And if he says “no” you can go back to food.
Great job here! Hope your runs are going great! I saw one yesterday and Ripley showed so many amazing skills!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I really loved your lecture on Resilience Game: Decompression & Completing the Stress Cycle. During our training session I’ll end an exercise with a scatter and often give Sunnie a break to just wander in the room. Sometimes we play a little fetch or personal play and then lately I have been ending the training session with a snuffle ball.>
I am so glad you liked it and that you are already incorporating so much!! Another thing to consider as she enters adolescence is that if you have a particularly intense period of training or activity in general, giving her a day or two off of anything formal or structured is great for resilience. Wandering and sniffing, romping in the yard… all of that is a great way for her nervous system to regulate and reset. My 2 year old dog is going to have an intense training weekend today and tomorrow, so Monday and Tuesday will be recovery days where he can go on walks with me, sniff, chew, etc.
Sunnie did a GREAT job working outside in these sessions!
Strike a pose went really well! One of the goals of taking the games outdoors is to see if it looks the same as it does indoor, and it did! Yay!
She had one blooper of going directly to the reward hand so you made the target hand more obvious after that and she had no questions except for the rep where she released right before you released (1:29) and so it was not as smooth for you both.
You did just enough stay to get it going outside, then it was smart to move to the cookie tosses before her brain got tired of staying 🙂
The next step is to have the reward on the ground (empty for bowl to drop the treat into, or a Manners Minder, or a toy) so that you can keep your shoulders in strike a pose position and she goes to the next line without you turning your shoulders forward at all.
The rocking horses also went well – did you stuff uprights in them so they wouldn’t blow away? Clever!
Connection is key on these –
The single wraps went really well when you were connected before the send.In the moments when she didn’t zip right to the barrel, it was because she didn’t see the connection clearly. When you did a touch then sent to the barrel, the connection was not as clear so she was not sure of what to do (:32). One some of the reps where you sent to barrel #2, she needed to see more connection before the send. At 1:42, for example, you turned forward before connecting so she looked up at you for more info. When she found the barrels easily, you looked at her eyes as she caught up to you then sent her.
>At :40 sec I had cookies in my hand so I distracted her a little >
Some of this was a connection question, but some of her questions were about when the cookies were available for eating 🙂
I think clarifying markers will help her know where to look: you said ‘yes’ at :38 and the cookie hand was moving, so she thought it was cookie time. This is a good place to use your cookie markers (like ‘snacks’) which indicate that you are rewarding and not continuing.>About half way thru I used my verbal wrap cues – hope that was OK!>
Yes! That was great – it also added more connection and she knew it was the barrels not the cookie. Super!
She also did a great job with finding the jump on the parallel path game!!! Yay!
>However after watching my video I see why a clicker would have been better than me just tossing cheese for her Get It, along with my movement or non movememt! She looked at me alot, my mechanics need to be better- eeek!>
Now that she is fully focused outside, we can get her looking forward more. The click tends to get the pups looking at us a lot so keep going with the get it marker. But, you can now do it sooner: when she looks at the jump and begins moving towards it, say get it and throw the reward. That marks looking at the line and then the reward will land before she looks back at you.
The markers were happening here when she arrived at the jump, which is the way we start to get the pups knowing what we want. And since there is nothing else to look at when she gets to the jump, she looks at you 🙂 So since she is finding the jump easily now, we shift the timing to mark & throw when we see commitment to the jump (it will feel EARLY but that is correct :)) You can also throw something bigger like a toy or giant food chunk – fewer reps will happen but they will be super high quality because she can see the reward better.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Good boy, he got right into the wrapping of the new cones! Was this the first time he had wrapped them?>Sorry not the best video since missing my face.>
We can tell from his responses where you are looking. I think you had great connection in general, he had almost zero questions.
The only real question he had was at :30. We can’t see your face but we can see your shoulders & feet, which are turned away from the cone because you were looking forward at the cone and not at him.
Compare to 1:09, for example , and all of the successful reps- the connection was clear even though we couldn’t see your eyes – we could see your shoulders pointed clearly to the line.
>but then I lost him after he hit the cone.>
This moment at 1:38 was actually just as important as all the other reps, in terms of resilience and recovery from the unexpected! He slipped, hit his foot, the cone made a loud noise, it distracted him, then he found fun stuff in the garbage 🙂
The handler response in these moments is what makes or breaks the learning. You did a GREAT job whipping out the pattern game then getting back into the cone wraps, and playing tug as the reward. Then ending the session. SUPER! Smart training moments like that make a big difference and are more important than just wrapping the cones. High five to you!!
For the backing up – he does best when he starts on the object, then comes forward, then back up onto it. The first rep on the cato board was set up like that and he was great, only needing one step back up onto the board! Then when he was sorting out how high to lift his back feet, he was not on it & further away so he kind of lost the plan 🙂
To get more distance nd stepping a little higher added, a two-pronged approach:
– Since the Catos are a little higher, you can reward with his back feet on them then only lure him one step off. Keeping him closer to the taller object for now should make it easier for him to step back up onto it.. And sitting might also help, so the picture will be the same as he is used to and the only variable that changes will be the height of the target behind him.– For more distance, using the purple pads like you did at the end will be easier! You can keep moving your seat further and further away.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>The barrels are now 12 feet apart and I am standing more upright.>
He did really well with the added distance! And you being more upright hopefully felt easier for you too 🙂 You can add more distance, bit by bit, and send more (run to the barrels less).
>Rusty is still a bit too interested in the whereabouts of the food. >
I think there were a couple of things in play here when he was looking at your hands:
On the reps where there was a lot of connection in the form of eye contact as you were sending him, he went to the barrels really well, no stopping to look at your hands.
When you were not quite connected because you were looking ahead and pointing ahead to the barrel – that is when he was looking up at your hand more. On those reps, you could probably see him peripherally but because you were pointing ahead to the barrel, your shoulder was closed forward and blocking the connection (also subtly turns out shoulders away from the line we want). And that causes dogs to look up at us. Young dogs are really sensitive to that!
So to show connection more, you can handle with your eyes more than your hands 🙂 As you are sending him to a barrel, look pretty directly to his eyes and point your hands to his nose, letting your hand travel with his nose. That shows the line to the barrel and he will find the barrel on his own.
As you work out the connection (which gets easier as he gets more experienced):
– We don’t need precision rewards for this game, so you can handle with empty hands and pull out the reward after a good rep!
– When the food is in your hand, you can clarify when the reward is actually available with a marker specifically for that 🙂 If it is general praise, he might keep looking at the cookie because the delivery might happen at any moment 🙂 because the hand position looks similar. But if you have a marker such as “snacks!” then he will look at the ‘work’ better and not look at the food until he hears the magic marker word 🙂>I think the trial where I was saying ‘Go go go’ went more smoothly. I do think he responds well to verbal cues. What verbal cue should I be using most advantageously in this situation?>
The go go go rep also had more motion to the barrel, which helped support commitment. A wrap verbal will be a good choice there – it will help commit him and build up the wrap verbal understanding. The go verbal will mea straight line so we can save that for the parallel path games.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>Outside should be in quotes! Given the extended snow cover this winter (there are still two small piles in the driveway), this was Rusty’s intro to working outside. >
I think it was really brilliant that you split it into smaller pieces by starting kinda outside and not in the middle of a field 🙂 He did great with the inside the garage reps, and also did really well with the reps at the garage door!
He was not as crisp with his footwork on those reps – his back feet had a harder time precisely finding the cato board. Was it the new environment? Was it that the cato board did not have a wall behind it for the first time? This is a possibility too! But still it was a great session 🙂 and I bet next time he has more precision. When young dog brains are processing several things, their footwork might be less crisp the first time but then they sort it out with latent learning.
>I also inserted a Resilience Game (scatter) near the end. The two reps after that are notable!>
Yes! He loved the scatter and then was super pumped up for the last 2 reps. You can start the next outdoor session (for any game, not just backing up) with a quick pattern game/resilience game as that can set him into a great state of focus before going into the game.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>Me and Baz have a seminar this weekend. Eep>
Fun opportunity!!!
> instructor is a top nz handler and we’re in a group with someone who has made up a supreme champ and who is sequencing with their slightly older pup. Eeeep.>
No worries! The top handler is hopefully also a top instructor – and if not, you can set things up the way you want them to be 🙂 And Baby Baz is too young for real sequencing anyway – it is entirely possible that the other handler started waaaaay too soon! Letting your pup grow up and learn foundations about life, arousal, *retrieves*, etc are far more important than sequencing. The sequences will be EASY for him when we add them, no problem and no rush needed.
>I keep telling myself that comparison is the thief of joy and barry isn’t a borderpap.>
And the borderpap is not a poodle 🙂 If you wanted a borderpap, you would have gotten one LOL! And poodles are incredible agility dogs who often beat the borderpaps. Plus – Baz is too young for real sequencing, did I mention that already? So it will be fun to see the other dogs but you don’t need to be doing the same things.
I have an 11 month old puppy, and dogs his age are sequencing in agility AND also doing full flyball runs. But you know what? That is absolutely ludracris! Everything we know about their brains and bodies at this age tell us to slow down and they should not be doing anything ‘real’.
So any time those feelings of comparison creep into your head (because brains are annoying like that) just tell yourself that you are doing all the right things at the right life stages for your precious pup! And if anyone questions you about it, smile and tell them the exact same thing 🙂
> But you know how it is, my brain is dumb.>
Brains are so smart but also SO DUMB. I totally get it. Feel free to message me over the weekend if you need help telling your brain to behave itself LOL
>It is at club so a familiar environment and I’ll go down nice and early and do all the things you suggested from the videos with high arousal. Thank you for the reminders about pattern games..>
Perfect! And communicate with the instructor about his needs and what he knows/doesn’t know. If something feels like it will set him up for failure? Break it down. The main goal of the day is that he has a grand time in a challenging setting. All other things are less important than that! And if other really young dogs are running sequences already? I wish them well and hope their bodies and brains don’t burn out young. Bring his favorite toys, mind-blowing treats, and have fun!
T
Yay! He is actually retrieving it! Sometimes it is too heavy to bring back, darned gravity 🤣but most of the time he is bringing it directly back. Well done to you for making the retrieve into a super fun game!! And now we have video evidence 🙂 Thanks for catching it on video!
T
Hi! He was such a good boy here!!
> Once he locked in the toy on the stool want an issue…>
He was super good about not going over to it, but it was totally on his mind – the toy on the stool was definitely hard and you can see his brain was split! You can really see it on the barrel sends to his left that were both closer to the toy and turning towards the toy,
On those, be extra sure to connect to give very clear info. For example at 1:23 and 1:41, you didn’t have enough connection to him (too much arm pointing with a cookie possibly in the pointing hand, not enough eye contact) so that combined with the toy on the stool was causing errors. I am not sure is there actually was a cookie in the hand but he definitely thought there was – it was much easier for him when you had the open hands on the sideways/backwards sending. And more eye contact willl turn your shoulders directly towards the line you want, while pointing tends to turn our shoulders away from the line (and towards the toy in thise case). Starting closer to the barrel can help too!He had a much easier time committing on your left side, turning to his right. You had better connection on that side too – looked really good!
At one point you said to him “get used to shitty handling” 🤣😂 and the way to do that is to use a lot of reset cookies. It is basically our way of saying: oops, my bad, here is a cookie, let’s try again 🙂
Nice work here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>she still likes to back up a bit sideways so we took a couple steps back to basics before we tackle the added steps for this week>
She is coming along very nicely with the backing up!! It is pretty normal to get a bit of sideways movement as they learn this skill – it mainly happens because we humans almost always use the same hand to reward. So the pups learn to lock onto that hand. They end up backing up straight from that hand, which looks sideways to us 🙂 That is what was happening here in the beginning – your left hand was delivering all the rewards, so smartie Macklynn was backing up straight from that hand 🙂
2 ways to get her going straighter:
– you can make the mat a little smaller so she has less room to get on it. Folding it in half might be perfect!
– reward from both hands, alternating, keeping both hands down in front of you. Let her back up then just use a flick of the wrist to toss the treat rather than move your hand to her. Your hands should stay as motionless as possible.
> I found that just a very light hand/arm under her belly (no pulling, pressure, directing…just light touch/support- if that makes sense…) helped her back a straight line. Hopefully I didn’t make a poor choice in that….>
I dn’t think it was a poor choice, but it might not have helped as much – she was sometimes hopping back or going sideways the other direction, thinking more about your hand than about her feet. Try the smaller target and using both hands to reward and I bet you get the straighter backing up.
Looking at the rocking horses:
>You will likely watch me correct my errors in real time on this video. As we progressed through repetitions I would catch myself – “Too much hand direction,” “No connection,”…etc. 🙂 I’m learning! LOL>
Good for you! Analyzing handling while also rewarding her is hard but you did a great job!
At the very beginning, you didn’t have as much connection – as the session went allong your connection got clearer and clearer. I think the connection will be espeically important on the right barrels – that is her harder side so if you look at her more as you send from your left side, she will find those right turns better. You can really see the difference when you added the connection at 1:55 and 2:20 and after that: she had no questions on those left turn barrels!
The left turns (dog on right) looked great on each rep – they ae her easier side and you also had lovely connection on that side too! Super!
You can keep adding distance between the barrels and also check out the Advanced level 🙂
The strike a pose session went great! Your cues were very clear and she understood the assignment 🙂 She understood is so well, actually, that she was side swiping the target a bit. That is actually a good thing for the next steps – it means that your placement of reward has been consistently showing her that it is an ‘in-then-out’ behavior. We need to fade the actual touch anyway so this is the first part of that. And it gives you one less thing to have to carry during training 🙂
So in the next steps, add a reward on the ground in the same spot where you are throwing your treats here. It can be an empty food bowl, a manners minder, or the tug toy. Any of those will add a nice element of self-control and also get more of the serp behavior. What you will start to see with the reward on the ground is that she will not be touching your hand as much and that is GREAT as long as she does the in-then-out behavior.
The only other suggestion is to put pool noodles on the inside of the upright here, so they cover the jump cups. She is likely to start going faster and faster (especially with toys involved) and there are turns right near the upright – so a pool noodle will protect her from making contact with the metal jump cups.
>We are trialing this weekend, so I’m hoping to spend some time with her between runs working on resilience games. She’s been successful there before, and there are options for varying levels of intensity. I’m optimistic, but a little nervous to be honest.>
FUN! It will go well – remember to bring her favorite toys, mind-blowing treats (does she enjoy rotisserie chicken? Or perhaps an Egg McMuffin? Small amounts will keep her belly from getting upset. ) and start as far from the ring as needed to get success. Keep me posted!
Great job here!!
Tracy
Hi!
You can mix in the non-out reps earlier in the session, maybe even start that way, before he gets locked into focusing on the prop. I think mixing it up will help him see which cue is for which behavior. I bet he sleeps on it and is perfect next time 🙂
T
Hi!
>I found it interesting how much he lost focus when toy around>
For the shpile game – yes, there will be changes in how he moves when he is more stimulated and that is good! We want him to think about how he is moving even when he is stimulated. After tugging, though – help him less 🙂 You were trying to move around too much so he was not sure of what you wanted. Let him offer behavior and you just drop a cookie in. You can have the toy tucked into a pocket or armpit in those moments – putting it on a chair or behind you added a self-control element that he was not ready for yet.
So with the pile: get him tugging then after a few seconds, tuck the toy away and just stand next to the pile. Reward anything he offers. Then after a couple of treats, go back to a bit more tugging. Do this back and forth a few times – it will help him think about his body. And it is also good for going back and forth between food and toys!
Backing up – he is sitting because of the reward placement/hand movement. On those reps, he saw your hand get high as you moved into give him the treat, so he sat. That also happened during the in-between moments when your hand got high to reset or reload, so he sat.
On the reps where he did not sit as he backed up (:33 and :55 for example) the reward hand was nice and low. He saw after those rewards, because your hand got high and he was patiently waiting for the next cue. So keeping your hand nice and low to deliver the rewards will help. And if sits while you re-load, no worries: you can cue him to come forward towards you (off the mat) then start the next rep.
Nice work here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I had time to look at the video in slow mo.>
Slow motion video is sooo helpful!
On the sends, I think you were tossing the treats too early so she was stopping short which was making some of the sending a bit harder
>I was also thinking am I creating too much emphasis on my hands by showing her they are empty after I set her up?>
She was not really looking at your hands here after you started the send. But what was delaying things was that you were keeping yoursend arm up until she arrived at the prop… so even as you hustled to the new side, your shoulders were still cueing a turn in the previous direction if you were a shade late.
On the reps where you got it? You got the send arm out of the way pretty quickly. On the reps where she didn’t read the rear cross? You were late getting to the new side. So you can step and send… but then bring your send arm back to your side so you can get your shoulders to the new line. You can see that in particular on the left side videos (how long the send arm stayed up which effected how quickly you can get up the line).
>is she turning the correct way because she is looking at my hand reaching for the pocket?>
I think it was mainly she was turning the correct way in both videos because she could see you on the new side, but yes – don’t put your hand in your pocket that early 🙂 to test out what is getting the correct lines.
>I was thinking – should I try this with a dead food toy instead? Like a tree hugger, that will give me time to get up there & cross while she’s eating or is that cheating on my part?>
It is not cheating 🙂 and it will definitely get you there sooner! The prop gives better feedback on timing so you can alternate the too!
Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi!
Strike a pose concept transfer went great too!
>. I have to say that your course design makes him look brilliant when really it’s the step by step process of your exercises that build from week to week.>
Well, he is quite brilliant! And yes, we try to make it a step-by-step progression but he figures things out really quickly.
One handling suggestion: After you get into position – show your hand then after a heartbeat or two, say the release word. You were using his name at the same time as moving your hand, which can get tricky (he was starting to leave the stay when your hand began moving, before you said anything) so I think ‘break’ or ‘ok’ after you will work better.
The next step here is to have the reward on the ground – it can be an empty food bowl that you drop the treat into as he turns to get to it. You will see that he starts to side-swipe the hand target and that is perfectly fine 🙂 We will be fading out the actual touch very soon by getting the reward on the ground.
Nice work!
Tracy
Good morning!
He definitely seemed very confident climbing on the pile!
And since he was so confident, we can make an adjustment so he is more precise with his feet 🙂 You were getting him really pumped up while he was n the pile, so switch that to getting him pumped up when he is on the flat. You can do recalls on the flat, throw his ball, throw treats, all away from the pile. Then when he is pumped up, move over to the pile and quiet your body language to let him think about where to put his feet on the pile. If there was too much pumping up while he was on the pile itself, he was tripping on the objects. So you can be stationary and quiet while he is offering behavior on the pile, and to reward place the cookie on the pile near him so he doesn’t leap off anything to get it 🙂 Then after a couple of rewards, you can call him away from the pile and pump up the arousal again, before going back to the pile.
Great job!
Tracy
