[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

He was very happy to do the leash off engagement on game with the cookies! He was bouncy and having fun 🙂

Because this went so well, you can move to doing this without the reward in your pocket – let him see you place it on a table or chair about 10 feet away so you can move away and play the game. You had a container of treats up on the deck here, but you can turn that into a reward station – that can be something that you bring to trials and he can see where it is, to help make the reinforcement more predictable (which is great for reducing stress). I use a cheap folding chair as my reward station.

And for the next session, you can start immediately with the remote reinforcement/reward station rather than warm up with treats in your pockets. I think he will be fine with that 🙂

He did great with driving ahead on the 3 jumps! Great job back chaining it! You can start to move the reward even further away from the 3rd jump (this is the first step in fading it). When you are in class, you can either have it placed in advance of a big line, or ask your instructor or classmate to throw it.

When you added the wrap then the straight line, he didn’t see the lien as well – so this is a spot where you can totally throw the reward when he is looking forward on the line (and before he gets to the last jump, so he doesn’t look back at you).

Looking at the Rally class videos: he did great! Yes, he left the start line early on the first video but he might have been expecting a release instead of another ready verbal. He was perfect on the 2nd video. And it looks like the reward was outside the ring, which is great!

>forgot though to just take the collar off and run him. Going to try that in class this Wednesday. >

You can take the leash off, gently hold his collar, and then do a ready-set-go start! Collars are legal in UKI and it will help you hold onto him to make the start fun 🙂

>I had the leash with me and when he jumped I just put the leash down for him chase it and he decided to tug it.>

Super!!!!

>All the times before I went into the ring I did pattern games and had him bounce and spin. For my second turn I just chilled watching the person in the ring. Knight just laid down in front of me.
Finally when we were exiting the ring, each time I told him lets go after I put the collar on. This is what I have always done.>

This is all great!! Sounds like he was really excellent and happy, even when all the people were added in. And it sounds like this was a lot of people but no other dogs in the environment. Maybe it is the proximity to the other dogs that makes it challenging for him? So the next steps would be to add one dog in (a calm dog :)) and see how he does. Then keep adding them in – at trials, they will be milling about near the entry/exit, barking, staring, eating, tugging, etc, so we can address that and see what he says.

Great job!!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

>With treats in a container. I’m trying to do more without instant rewards, but at her age, I’m inclined to treat more often as she is still learning.>

I agree! I think of training this delayed reward/remote reinforcement skill that same as training weave pole: it is necessary to teach the dogs, but we don’t do weaves for everything all the time 🙂 So yes, she should still get lots of rewards in the moment and in the sequences.

>Fortunately she, unlike what people constantly say about Whippets, can take plenty of reps, and still happy at the end. >

I have learned that people say all sorts of weird things about whippets! Maybe I will write a book of all the strange things people say about my 2 year old whippet when they learn I have a whippet…. Then how quickly they shut up when they see him work LOL! Same with the Lurchers – very serious working dogs who are also lovely to live with. I have found that whippets can take as many reps as we want to do, provided we are owning the errors as OURS (because they are) and not getting mad at them. This is how you train her, lots of reward, and she is happy to play for as long as you want.

>. It also occurs to me, I guess I don’t even have another threadle verbal, other than, “here”. I’ll ponder this.>

Yes, eventually you will want a threadle verbal that is different from the other verbals – but it is a lower priority for now, unless your main goal is to do UKI Masters Series soon (probably not your main goal, and it is not my main goal either :))

Looking at the videos:

She did great ignoring your leash on the ground at the start! That was hard for her previously and now she is finding it easy.

Finding the jump after the tunnel is hard, so you can use the beloved Manners Minder to help her learn the concept of focusing ahead on the tunnel exit (and you can use a GO cue before she enters the tunnel. Getting in closer to it helped but that also requires trying to outrun a whippet, so I think we can teach her the layering skill so she can work independently and you can move to your next spot on course.

When you back chained it, did you have a placed reward? If so, you can leave it there for the sequence. If not, try the placed reward (MM or Paul can throw something as soon as she exits the tunnel) and when we get the behavior, it will be easy to fade.

It will make more sense for the line to turn her to her left over 6 so she lands facing 7. Turning to her right pulled her off the line to 7 on the first 2 videos – on the 3rd video, you did turn her to the left and that made it a lot easier! It will be even easier if you don’t have to help with 4 – then you can be on the other side of 5 and just do a cross to get her on your right side to show the line to 6. So definitely work that drive ahead after the tunnel and it will all be easier!

Overall, you are running with lower hands and a lot of connection, which is great! She is driving away to the tunnel brilliantly, so I think it won’t take long to teach her to stay on her line to the 4 jump.

Great job here!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!
Hooray for bringing the frizzers back!
The markers are going well! Just remember to avoid the biggest error we all make with the markers: moving the reward *then* saying it. So remember to be perfectly stationary, say your bite or get it marker, then move the reward.

You caught yourself with the other error we all make: saying ‘yes’ too often 😁. You were saying ‘yes get it’ a few times but caught yourself, and went to the get it only. Yay!!

About the prop thing:

The goal of the prop games is to hash out all of the mechanics and dog questions before getting into wings and jumps, so I think we are on the right track!!

>On my right she just walks over it not actually touching it. >

Probably a left side-right side imbalance in training – but her side preference and *your* side preference. This is totally normal. The right hand stuff from you might be lots of throwing things and not offering behavior, like throwing frisbees and exciting stuff like you had here (that was all right hand)… and the left side might be more commonly used for tight work and shaping. She is showing you that with the different behaviors she produces on your left side versus your right side.

So try to flip the script on that: do a lot of right side tight work, shaping work, and limit the right side party things like frisbees tosses (use your left hand for that). We humans all have that side preference and the dogs learn that – so be sure to watch your sides when you are training. And force yourself to do shaping on your right side and frisbees throughs on your left side. It will be hard on your brain so make sure you are fully caffeinated 🤣😂

To get the right side shaping going on the prop, being closer to it when she is on your right helps, and move more slowly. You can go with her more to the tossed cookie and then be moving up the line a little with her, to add motion but not a lot of motion.

I think you will see it even out pretty quickly! Great job here!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning! Nice work on these games! He is really fun 🙂

Toy races:
He did great about coming back with the toy! A small tiny arc when he got it but then he drove right back. Yay!
Stay parallel, try not to cut behind him or get close because he reads that (correctly) as a rear cross. Since he is probably always going to win the race, you can work the element of drive back with the toy like you did here – but we want him turning towards you like a FC. He was turning to his left (away from you) like a RC, so moving yourself more laterally away will help, even if you peel away on a 90 degree angle towards the direction you want him to turn to.

If he was a little too aroused with the toy retrieves, you can mix in some food: race to the toy, call back for food, then play tug again. It seemed like he was tugging really hard when he got bak to you (and you were mentioning it on the video) so you can add in some food to help balance that arousal level.

For the decel: he is a big speedy dude, so you can be moving away as soon as he starts to move to the cookie. That way you are further away and can show the decel sooner when he turns to chase you. On he first couple, you were waiting til got the cookie and turned to you before running, which made the decel a little late. At :50, though, you were moving before he turned to you which made the decel earlier – so he read it really well and was able to drive into your side straight and tight! Yay!

On the prop sends, good job adding the toy and arousal! At the beginning, he was saying that he is a lefty and turning to his right is hard. So when he turned to his right and didn’t get rewarded at the beginning because he didn’t quite touch… he got frustrated. On the previous reps he had turned away to his left, so being a little more laterally away from the prop will really help get the turns in the correct direction

Try not to dial back the arousal element of the game if he has a question 🙂 Dial back distance away from the prop (or one of the other variables) but keep the arousal element in – I think he needs the arousal regulation to get built in, so moving close to the prop (especially on the right turns) will really help. The further away you got, the more failures he had – so remember the 2 failure rule (no more than 2 total failures in the session so you will want to make it easier if he is failing). Part of the sending is handler connection, so remember to look at him directly on the sends – that can really help him find the line to the prop because it points your shoulders to it.

He is reading the blind crosses really well – so to get him to turn to his right on the reps that start on your left, run away more towards that right turn side so you are very visible and that should help encourage the right turns. Let to his own devices, with you running straight back, he always turns left regardless of which side you start on. That will be great for flyball 🙂 but we want to get the balance for the right turns as well in agility, so exaggerating the right turns by having your run off to the side (rather than straight back) will really help.

The cookie toss recalls were easy for him in the SSC game 🙂 He even turned to his right a couple of times! Yay! For a novel-neutral thing to add to the environment, maybe a random book off to the side? A shoe? Sunglasses? Anything you have around that is not a dog toy or treats or prop or anything he would have shaped behavior on will work great!

He is doing great with his parallel line prop game! You can start to add more motion (jogging). That will cue more extension over the prop, so he might not always have great collected foot hits – and that is fine. You can reward trotting/galloping over it, as long as he is really looking forward to it and not running past it.

I think he is also ready for the rear cross game! You start him on your left and rear cross so he is turning to his left, to make it easier at first and get the concept across before trying it on his harder side.

Good job with the collection sandwich! The blinds looked really clear!

With his speed and giant stride length, you can decelerate as soon as you do the blind, so he sees it early and can prepare himself more. And then keep the pivot slow and connected – if you pivot really fast, he will lose the connection and end up on the other side of you, thinking it is a blind cross cue. He is ready for you to add the acceleration ahead after the pivot now, so you can pivot slowly then throw the toy and race him to it.

Great job here! Stay warm!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

For real, it is so cold already! Maybe it will be a short winter…

Turn and burn is looking great! 2 ideas to bring this forward even more:
– hold his collar before the send, so both of you are perfectly stationary and you say the check or dig verbals 4 or 5 times before there is any movement. Right now the verbals are coinciding with your movement, so the movement is taking priority (which slows the learning of the verbals because he is really cuing off the movement). So holding him gives you time to really get the verbals attached because you cannot move before/during the verbals 🙂

– and by attaching the verbals like this, he will explode away to the barrel even more, which allows you to then start your FC even sooner! Most of the FCs here were starting as he was halfway around the barrel, so you can start them sooner: start them when he is a quarter of the way around, then if that is fine (and it will be :)) you can start just as he arrives at the barrel… then just before he arrives at the barrel. The goal is that he sees you moving the other direction before he gets into the turn, so he learns to maintain his commitment. The easiest way to tell if you are leaving early enough is to put a line on the ground to mark the spot he needs to be at when you do the FC. And since he is big and fast, you can start a step or two further back so you have time to do the FC at those earlier points.

The prop game is going really well! It was well worth a couple of frozen fingers 🙂 The parallel line work is going great, so you can use that to flow into the rear crosses. Starting from a stay takes out the momentum, then you were pointing ahead which turned your shoulders to the ‘turn-towards-me-line’ so he has some questions.

To smooth that out, you can start the session by getting n the flow of the parallel lines, going back and forth – but you can be pretty close to his line. And then when he is in the flow, you can get close to the cookie drop from the previous rep then when he eats it, go right into the RC. He will be more ready to move forward and looking at you less, making it easier than starting from the stay.

One other detail: After the RCs, you can keep moving forward towards the prop so he hits it after he turns the new direction, so help cement the concept of “do the obstacle even when there is a RC cue”.

Great job here! Fingers crossed for warmer weather ahead!!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

>I will likely use a forward focus cue… Roots especially needs one to help with his start line stress (worries about the dogs behind him, but giving him a job to do and focusing on the jump REALLY helps). Not sure Beat will have that same need, but it was easy to teach.>

This is perfect! And even if she doesn’t have the same need, it is still a great skill to have so it is certainly worthwhile. The goal is that she does not have the same need, of course, but we want to be supporting her at every step 🙂

Looking at the prop video – she just needed a jump start of you getting low to the prop and enhance it for her. It was on the ground as you moved her into the session from what I could see, making it a little invisible – so you can also enhance it by holding it til you are ready then putting it down. And you can do that after every tug break too.

Thinking about the lost cookie is fine, I would be thinking about it too 🙂 She looked super interested in the food here, and it was adorable to see her work through the inner conflict of lost cookie versus wanting to hit the prop. She was great!

Good job breaking it off to tug! The sending went well too! She is very tuned into your movement, so for the ready dance I think it worked best with what you did at about 1:59- 2:04 – muscle tension, bent knees, exciting chatter, but not rocking back and forth. On some of the reps, the she was thinking that that subtle back and forth movement was the cue to hit the prop (it did look somewhat similar). But when you didn’t move during the engagement, you got all of the excitement and arousal and no accidental offering to go to the prop – but a very snappy response when you cued it! Super!!

When she is working in high arousal, you can toss a cookie away to buy time to get the toy out, when transitioning to the toy. She was jumping up at the end in that transition moment so we can help direct her arousal in that moment without rehearsing jumping up (I am a big fan of not letting our pointy dogs jump up because that can bubble over into bitey).

>She struggled to recognize the prop when it was her first time seeing it outside last time, and I worried that she hadn’t seen it in weeks, but after a brief reminder she was all about it. It’s that whippet latent learning you keep talking about!>

It is wild! I love it! It is possible that she was not struggling last time, and that she was indeed learning… and just needed to process it and sleep on it. Whippet latent learning is crazy! My young whippet ran a bit of NFC at a trial yesterday and despite not having done any sequence work since October (other than 2 minutes in the USO practice ring) – somehow he knew how to get on giant lines and drive ahead/stay lateral at a new gear of speed. What? LOL!

Her plank work looked great! Her size and structure makes it easy for her to balance here, plus all of the natural objects you had her on during your trick really seemed to have helped. Adding the arousal of the tugging did not seem to change her proprioception abilities at all, and that is GREAT – agility will require her to do high level proprioception things while really aroused, but she had no trouble here.

She turned both directions when cued, and it seemed like she would turn to her right when she was on her own (turning without handler input).

If you want a little more high arousal action, you can do a session of hop on, balance, hop off in the center of the plank using a toy only. This is a safe set up to help her learn to balance on the plank in higher arousal, especially if you are planning a running dog walk.

Great job here!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

It sounds like a super fun Thanksgiving! Yay!!! I knew he would be a rockstar, that is how he always is 🙂

>Up close is a little hard because FRIENDS!!!!! But after he says hello to people then he’s all eyes for mama (or mama’s treat pouch)>

It is great that he loves people! When you get a moment, take a look at the pattern game from this past Tuesday’s games package. We can use that to help him learn to ignore up-close friends 🙂 You can also use a cue to let him visit his friends (I use “go see”) so he still gets socializing and we can use visiting as a reward! It is easy to teach – first he learns to ignore them, then we say “go see!” and encourage him to visit. Pups learn this very quickly 🙂

The new training location looked great! Different area, some more space, and a tiny bit of distraction and pressure (in a good way!) being folded in, thanks to your very polite audience on the other side of the gate.

He is getting GREAT at the toy races – letting you line him up without fuss, looking at the toy immediately, driving directly to it. He didn’t seem to have any questions about your motion. Super! And then trading for the treat at the end – brilliant!

>I tried to add in a retrieve but the furry toy was too fun to pluck at to bring back to tug today!>

We have been seeing the fur plucking as a decompression behavior for a lot of dogs, meaning they are working at high intensity and ‘need a moment’ to balance their arousal (and often then can’t really retrieve in that moment). We’ve been calling it ‘active decompression’ as opposed to the passive decompression of a long sniffy walk. That is great that he can decompress himself when he feels the need to balance arousal! Many dogs cannot do that. So, we let them do it for about 10 to 15 seconds – under supervision, so they don’t ingest any parts of the toy.

Also, if he is truly plucking it and potentially destroying it, it becomes an expensive habit! Those toys are expensive! So I direct the decompression by scattering treats in the grass or a snuffle mat, or give the pup a bully stick instead. My sighthounds will shred/pluck when decompressing but those toys cost a small fortune LOL!!

(Nerdy side note: neuroscience tells us that repeated mouth movements can be great for resilience and arousal regulation – chewing, licking, and yes – shredding/plucking :))

Back to toy races – he is ready for more, so whenever the weather cooperates, take it outside 🙂 And in the great outdoors you might need to reward him for bringing the toy back, so it is totally cool to use treats or toys to reward him.

Looking at the backing up: VERY cool to see how quickly the placement of reinforcement changed the behavior and how you are getting more backing up already! YAY!! Nice session! We will be building on it shortly to get even more distance but keep using these mechanics to revisit this even couple of days. Since he is small and so quick on his feet, you can leave your cookie hand in position: let the hand hang out by your knees and just use wrist flicks to place the cookie and toss it for the backing up. That will make you even faster! The hardest thing about training small dogs is how quick we have to be with markers and reinforcement: the smalls are FAST on their feet! I have a lot more time with my big dogs than I do with my littles 🙂

Great job here!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>The ring crew running out while he was on the line was hard for him, should have probably used a bit more volume dial work here.>

That is definitely hard for young dogs! I think using the leash like you did on the 2nd ring entrance helps, – you can keep him close and do some volume dial while he is still on leash.

On the first run, you were being exciting on the start line and I think he liked it! He was twitchy but held the stay, then was really fast when you release to start the run!

>lso threw in a bit more volume dial mid run when he noticed the near corner ring crew.>

Was that at the end of the dog walk? That was a great training opportunity! Definitely keep having your classmates out there – ring crew, barking dogs, etc – all things that he needs to be exposed to and learn to ignore 🙂

One thing I notice here is that he has gotten even faster recently! This is exciting!

>I have him entered into a UKI trial this Saturday – a new facility neither of us has been to – another horse barn with dirt footing, so he should love that. Plan is to work our in and out here – 2-1/2 hour drive for 2 or 3 jumps LOL, but hey, I’m thinking long term here>

I am crazy like you, I would totally drive 2.5 hours for short NFC runs 🙂 UKI has a lot more flexibility – you can throw toys, you can have ‘helpers’, etc. So bring lots of things you think he might like, including an empty lotus ball!

Nice work here 🙂
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

The beginning of the go versus RC sequence looked really good!!

After the 2nd tunnel – the angle of the sequence means he is slicing the 5 jump so he needs a bit of a turn cue. The Run cue sent him straight so he almost went past the next jump, then came back and got it but had trouble with the last one. So a name call to straighten up his line before using your run cue will smooth that out!

Compare it to the straight line ‘run’ where he was exiting the tunnel straight, and he easily got the straight line. Yay!

>tried to rear him to the left, guess who would only turn right?? Somehow I’m cuing opposite rears only.>

He was giving good feedback 🙂 The RC cue was happening after he as taking off for the jump, which is why he turned the wrap direction instead of the RC direction. Here are screenshots of where you were when he was taking off:
https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1ZhzfDoUyvFuu5jnNT-gtv_yRJTIC27fNbm2pdhdLII8/edit?usp=sharing

Ideally, you would be driving the yellow line so he sees all of this happening before he makes a takeoff decision and you are on the other side of him before he takes off. That will mean starting to converge to the RC line as soon as he commits to the tunnel, rather than curving with the tunnel and facing forward on the next jump – you can run all of that converging on the RC line to the center of the RC bar.

>>Start lines continue to be vexing, so I opted to not fight that battle today.>

You can use a cato board or something when you are focusing on sequences! Ot handle with a very short lead out if he is struggling to do longer ones.

These sequences went really well!!

On the first sequence, a longer lead out will help him find the 2nd jump for sure! Or, you can do a stay between 1 and 2 to be able to set up success. Sending to the backside of 1 worked but we can also add in easy stays 🙂

For the BC at 1:23 – nice job supporting the jump after the tunnel AND getting the blind! You can tighten it up a little by keeping your arms in tighter and using more exit line connection (opposite arm across your body so you can really show him connection).

He dropped the bar at 1:26 because you went a little too deep past it and praised him – then turned so he had to come back to get it.

On the second sequence – he did hold that stay! Super! Will he let you face forward? Being able to release facing forward will help smooth out the line to the tunnel. I think it is worth it to try a cato board to help with the stay, especially with the excitement of the other dogs around.

At 2:27 he read the threadle as a wrap – that was because your physical cues were an all with a bit of foot rotation then and outside arm flip. If you wanted the threadle slice, you can keep your feet moving forward and your dog side arm swinging back instead of the outside arm.

On sequence 3 – he had a little question about the rear cross at 1:24 and 1:56 – you can make a bigger physical cue by serving across the jump and using your outside arm to flip him away. You turned to the tunnel on both of those before start it, so he thought it was the tunnel 🙂

Good adjustment to support the line to the tunnel better at 2:02! And then you can call him sooner to get a tighter turn to the backside jump- he read that line really well!!

Noce work here!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

I think the home edition of the pattern game went well! He seemed to recognize what was going to happen LOL! You can make the line up moment clearer by adding a leash to the process. Without the leash, any step to the jump looked like a cue to take the jump. But you can bring him to the jump on leash and the leash is a cue to NOT take the jump 🙂 That can make the line up even easier.

The rest looked really strong! He was very happy to leave the reward stations to do the jump, then come back to it with your ‘let’s go’ marker. Super!

The second session at the ring rental also went well! Ronin’s musical stylings were a good level of distraction 🙂 The setup worked well – my only suggestion is that you can add little sequences that don’t always end at the last station. He can go past it, go away from it, etc, so he is not trying to always drive lines to it.

>On Monday in class I had some Engaged Chill / TSA work kind of go awry and then went better the second round.>

He did get a little sensitized when the other dog came over. So you can go into the pattern game to help him process the big distraction, center his arousal, and recover quicker. As soon as the treats came out, he made a fast recovery 🙂 Note how he did a bit shake-off and then he was back to normal.

So it was a definite “well, that was unexpected” moment but great for resilience and also great for changing plans in the moment. Your engaged chill plan had an interruption, so going to a pattern game to help him reset would be perfect.

On the 2nd turn, he had recovered and did not seem sensitized to the other dog at all. Yay!
The chill looked good, he likes the butt rubs LOL! Then you got into the tricks and he was ready to play! Love it!

Looking at the sequences: On both of these, you can add a little lead out to get even more explosion off the start line! When you did that on the 2nd run of the 2nd video, he was SUPER fast off the line. He does well running with you but I think the short lead out for now gets the chase going and even more speed!

Video 1:
He had a little trouble processing the barking at the beginning – pattern games are great for this too!
Nice job getting him jazzed up to run – the run looked great! I think that for the threadle, the way it was set, it was a true American style-threadle (very severe angle). The rotation of your feet helped! You can use a single arm swinging back as the threadle arm if you want, but these cues certainly helped! To make it more of a feet-forward threadle, the threadle jump would have to be pushed closer to the camera so the line would not be as abrupt.

Video 2:
Nice work on this one too! Great connection!

>I like having two ways practiced to do that skill but since he’s not super fast, I think the blind cross vs. serp was smoother (even though I went a little wide maybe).>

I liked the blind! It was fast and snappy and really drove him through the line. I think it also got you to a better position for the next line. And he did well with the let’s go at the end as well – super!

Great job on these. When is his next NFC/FEO possibility?

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>The furry lotus I bought doesn’t have a loop on it so that it can be attached to anything. >

I have tied another toy to mine, which also doesn’t have a loop. It doesn’t look great but the dog loves it! I will get a photo of it tomorrow (it is at the trial site tonight).

>The first sequence I threw the leash & he ran to it. So I stuffed it in my pocket after that. >

That was funny! He totally thought it was party time 🙂 Putting it in your pocket worked great, and you can also work on placing on the ground near you.

I tried playing with him before taking the leash off to get him amped up.>

It was a little hard to see – how did he like it? He ran with great engagement and a ton of speed! And yes, it looks like it was easier to get the leash back on each time, almost like he was realizing it was part of the game. Yay!

> I wasn’t supporting him enough at first but once I got my act together he did really well.>

Yes – you were running but not really connected at first, so he was trying to figure out the line. Rather than stop and re-start, keep going and finish the sequence, so he could get a reward. He was very good about letting you re-start, but we don’t want to build in frustration at all. Then plan for extra support on the lines – this will be super important as he starts going int the trial ring because he will have so many more distractions that the handling needs to be really clear. It is almost a bit of over-handling at first to get him comfy.

And yes, when you were super connected and showing the lines? You two looked fabulous!! So fun!!! I am loving his confidence and speed on the lines, and he is committing really well!

He is getting really good at running with rewards outside the ring! Of course, you can still do plenty of sequences where you bring the rewards in the ring with you. That will keep things nicely balanced in terms of rewarding skills in training but also being able to run courses at trials.

Great job!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

OMG! That was my fault, I was totally under-caffeinated. I saw it, read it, answered in my head…. but never actually answered it. SORRY!! I posted some thoughts above 🙂

T

[Tracy Sklenar]

Hi!

>his time I moved further away laterally, and I slowed my pace down to a walk. I thought the parallel path exercise went OK, >

Yes! The parallel path looked great! On the one rep where he missed and you didn’t reward – you don’t need to stop so he fixes it, you can keep moving forward, turn around, and do the next rep. A no reward moment like that can be very informational!

>during the Counter motion game, I think I inadvertently taught him to target my hand before hitting the prop with his paw – thus on my send cue, he jumped up to hit my hand, and then ran to the prop. I think this was probably b/c I have previously taught him to touch my hand with his nose, and so he sees my raised hand as a cue to nose-touch it. So I tried sending him with just a step forward, which was better, but he went more slowly – I think b/c he was unsure – so I only got a couple of reps in with counter motion.>

I think a couple of things were going on here – yes, there is value on touching your hand. And your hand was the more obvious thing, because the target was further away (kind of tucked into the ring fencing) and as you started to point ahead of him more (like at 1:17 and after that), the clarity of where to go, exactly, was getting a little lost. So he jumped up at you hand 🙂 because it was the big obvious thing and he was getting a little overaroused when he was not sure. Plus, he was getting tired and had done a lot of reps in a row (26 in this session) so he continued to work til the end but was definitely slowing down and not moving as well.

So to help smooth this out, start him closer to the prop – and reward from your hand. I bet he would like the toy for this! Then do the quick ready ready, then a clear send. That will make it more obvious to him. And when you were throwing the cookie, the timing of the send was not as clear so he was not as sure.

Also, do fewer reps, maybe 10 total for the session – then take a break, play tug, do something else for a bit, so it doesn’t get too repetitive. Using a toy will make that easier, so you can have the tug breaks built in!

The rear crosses are going well, especially to the right! You don’t need to point ahead, you can just move up the line and then yes, cross to the new side as soon as he passes you. Since left was a little harder, you can try to throw sooner or you can even leave a bowl to the left of the prop to help guide him to it.

>I am terrible at using different reward marker cues consistently, especially when we’re doing something new. >

Totally understandable!! You did have your markers going, and that is GREAT!! You can drop the “yes” marker before using a ‘get it’. That You can just use a ‘get it’ or a ‘take it’ – both of those also replace the click and indicate where the reward is.
Side note: It is SO HARD to stop saying yes LOL!!! I have to make a conscious effort not to use “yes” for everything 🙂

Great job here!
Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

I thought the first 30 seconds of her run here were really strong – she recovered really well when you pulled her off the tunnel (great job staying in motion!) and was able to play.

Then it started getting too hard for her – what made it hard?

I think it was a combination of things:

– she is acting like the footing was weird (probably a weird texture and weird smell). Her movement was more up and down than usual, and less forward. That might be have contributed to why she didn’t take the first tunnel (along with you disconnecting and running away).
– the oopsie at the tunnel at the very beginning (disconnection as you ran to the jump) was hard – she had to process that and it does draw bandwidth from being able to handle other things.
– there is a lot of pressure right at the front of the ring, near the tunnel. People, dogs, change in lighting, etc. She could handle it once, but not twice.
– I think she has very limited experience in this kind of arena (covered arena, artificial lights, etc. And what time of day was it? That might have been a factor too.

So any one of these factors would have probably been fine. Put them all together? She could only do 30 seconds. But 30 seconds is a long time! Adolescent dog brains are not great at processing all the things they are bombarded with, so these things can stack up and then tip over into stress (which is what was happening towards the end).

So keep that in mind for the next run – short short short plan, move her away from the pressure at the start area as fast as possible, and run with the toy visible to help override the other factors. And if she has a great start? Cool! Get out of the ring LOL! The hardest part with young dogs is to not be greedy and to get out fast while things are going well 🙂

>Walked her around. Asked for for tricks for treats. Did a brief couple practice jumps for the toy. >

Did you add any pattern games in? Those are the absolute best to help dogs process pressure and environment! You can do those right outside the ring to help her learn about the environment.

Keep me posted about today!!

Tracy

[Tracy Sklenar]

Good morning!

>I started off this game with a similar set up to your demo (not in video), but I found that it wasn’t “neutral” to Arrow, as I guess it has high value from all the pivot work he has done on the feed bowls >>

Ah yes – sometimes we think something is “boring” but the pups are like “OMG THIS IS FUN” haha!! Good job switching to something a lot more neutral.

He did super well with this session! He had a couple of small questions about the tunnel bag and bag of treats, but I think that had more to do with your position and cookie tosses. I think you were a little too close to the tunnel bag in terms of you position and tosses so he was asking if he should offer behavior on the tunnel bag at the beginning of:) So you can be further away from it for pattern games (so the cookie tosses are not towards it, which could indicate you are using it to shape something) and also asking for specific behaviors (like chasing you for a recall, or even adding it to going around a cone :))

You can switch the cookie bag out for a toy a the novel-exciting object! You can adjust your position to add more distance away from it if he finds it really exciting 🙂

Turn and burn is going well! I think your mechanics looks good here (and yes, it is hard to keep the toy in the opposite hand to show the big connection, but you were working it!!)

He had good commitment and your front crosses looked really good! I think you were making it harder on yourself by changing your starting point and direction each time – so with the goal of wanting to do the FC earlier and earlier, start in the same spot each time, but do the FC sooner each time. You were doing it when he was about halfway around the barrel here, which is great! So you can add in doing it halfway, then only a 1/3rd of the way around, then just as he arrives at the barrel, then just before he arrives at it. I use the line on the ground to give me a visual of when to do the FC, otherwise we humans end up doing it at the same time on each rep 🙂 You can work one side all the way to being able to do the FC just as he arrives at the barrel then switch sides – I think his commitment is strong enough that you can do it in one session!

Great job here!
Tracy

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