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Good morning!
Rotated sends: He has a ton of value for the barrel, which is great!! Yay! And he had no trouble with the rotated sending – super great! Nice job adding your verbals!
Be sure to connect with your arm back and eye contact on the exit of the barrel – on the first rep, he saw no connection (your toy hand was at your side, so he could not see your face, and the toy is not the cue because we don’t want the pups just focusing on the toy). I want you to assume errors are handling errors and reward him even if he ends up on the ‘wrong’ side of you – he was not wrong there! And you made a big adjustment on the second rep, so he saw big connection and came to the side you wanted 🙂 Same with the exits pf spins – make the big connection. That is on more of a natural line, so he will go there without connection but then that rehearses you not connecting 🙂For the stays – look how NOT twitchy he was and how far you could move away!! SUPER!!! He is so funny, leaning back to see you after the sit cue 🙂 I think you did a great job with your mechanics: clear sit cues, praise, moving away, marker, reward. YAY!! You can fade out a little of the praise so he doesn’t need it the whole time – you can praise when he sit, then be quiet as you lead out, then if you stop: praise, then reward.
>I mentioned to Jessica about what she is looking for as far as hitting the mat. I have a lesson today so I guess we will go over that.>
Perfect!!
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
She is doing really well with these games! A couple of suggestions to help smooth things out and then head to the next level:
Handling combos:
She did well with the handling game here! I was not always sure if she was on the side of you that you wanted her to be on – it was hard to tell if you were doing a spin or FC.She was correct on all of these based on what she saw (your back and a lot of motion), so give her more connection with direct eye contact so she knows where to be. So if she gets the toy even if it is not on the side you wanted? Party and praise so she don’t think she is wrong and take the toy and leave. You getting quiet and moving towards her or not interacting is a definite “that was not right” marker, so assume it was handler error and reward her 🙂
You can also have a second toy in your pocket so after she gets the first toy, you can move away and call her back for the 2nd toy.
2nd part of the video had better connection on the FC after the barrel and I liked how you walked her away with treats to the barrel! But also – when you get to the barrel, hold her collar, connect, start the verbal… then release and step to the barrel. You surprised her with the send at 2:48 (she was looking at the toy) and before she had a chance to look at the barrel, you moved away so she went to the toy. Keep your mechanics clean and smooth, more like the last rep!
Backing up: She is off to a good start with this! Only one reward needed if she is standing still after backing up- otherwise you are rewarding standing still 🙂 So you can add more steps by using the mat as the target by increasing your distance from it, bit by bit it.
She and I were both surprised that it because the front foot target at :50! I think you should use separate targets because they are very different behaviors (front foot versus backing up to it).
For the rear crosses – you can start a little further back now and see if she can move ahead of you to the target without the search marker – then reward the turn. The search basically signals “end of rep” so she didn’t turn to the left side, which is why we don’t need that marker.Also, to get the left turns: keep moving forward on those so you are past her/ahead of her and more visible on the new side. You were stopping behind her, so she really could not see your line to the left turn side and turned right to where she could see you. (The last video is the same as the end of this video).
Novel exciting:
You made this a little harder than we want it 🙂
She did well with the pattern game at the beginning and ignoring the toy… until your motion set a line to the toy and she grabbed it. You got quiet (marks it as wrong) so off she went.Remember that the distractions on thee just exist off to the side, they aren’t intended to be something she has to walk over 🙂 She did better when the toy was next to your foot – but still that can be a little muddy at this stage, about which to focus on. So if you are using the toy as the distraction – the same toy that is the reward – have if further away. I prefer a distraction that is not also the reward, as that can be a little confusing at this point for a puppy if you step towards it.
Nice work here!!
Tracy
Hi!
He did really well reading the turn aways here! And the stays were an added bonus!! Good boy!Lap turns:
Your hand cue was great, nice and low and slow for him to follow – the only thing to add is using your leg too. As your hand moves back, your leg can also move back to pull him forward then the hand turns him away. He was pushing to the side a bit and jumping up because he didn’t have a ton of room to turn with your feet togetherFor the tandems – these also went well and you sorted out the hand position and timing beautifully. It might feel easier for you to use both hands and not just the outside hand? Totally up to you – it is whatever he can read and feels super comfy for you both 🙂
For both of these turns – you can move to the next level of adding the prop for the advanced level.
Great job!
TracyHi!
It sounds like a crazy week for you!! Hopefully the workload and weather are better this week 🙂He did well with the novel-exciting game here! For the next session, you can be more stealthy about adding the toy to the environment by having it already on the ground when you enter the area to start the game.
He had a little trouble playing with the toy after all the cookies for ignoring it (several of the pups have the same question about that!) – he was like “wait, I thought we were ignoring it?” so you can have a different toy to play with that way he won’t ask if he was still supposed to ignore it.
Nice work!!
TracyGood morning!
>I didn’t hold her collar/harness for these as she is still biting/resisting when held back, especially when excited. >
You can revisit the line up game where you line her up hold the collar for half a second, then throw a cookie or toy. You can do that randomly throughout the day so you can build up the behavior in a less stimulating environment which will make it easier when you are in a more stimulating environment 🙂
>Using food helped when I left the toy behind. >
Yes! It definitely helped! You can feed her the cookie at the barrel before you send her to it, so your hand is empty when you run to the toy. She was not sure if you were indicting food or toy when you also had the treat in your hand. An empty food bowl can be the destination for cookie rewards, and the toy will work better with empty hands (or the cookie can be in the opposite hand instead of dog side hand).
You might notice that on the sends to the barrel, she sometimes doesn’t move immediately or she jumps up at your hand. What is happening there is that you are pointing at the barrel and not connecting to her eyes as much, so she is less sure of what to do. On the reps where you used your hands only a little and were very connected, she did great! So before each send, make eye contact with her and then maintain it as you step to the barrel with your foot and a low hand. That should make her sending even sooner 🙂
>And the BC was horribly late… need to have more distance before sending so that there is enough space/time to get a timely blind in. >
Yes it was late but your connection after it was great, so she found the correct side and was happy to do it! Yay! And I agree that more distance will give you more time to get it – she is fast!!
Great job!!
TracyGood morning!
>When I first started teaching him things, whatever reward I used to start the behaviour was the only reward he wanted. So, certain things were associated with toys and other things with food. He has become more flexible overall now about accepting different types of rewards but he still has strong opinions, which is usually totally hilarious.
>Really interesting! I do know plenty of high level sports dogs who attach a specific reward to a behavior and that is the reward for the rest of their lives LOL!! It helps us plan rewards more carefully in advance. And I am glad you have already worked on getting more flexibility with him, that will be really helpful!
Looking at the stays – that park is absolutely gorgeous!!
I love that you allow him choice of which position. I totally support giving the dog a voice in what the start line position should be (plus it gives us insight into how they feel or think in any given moment). That choice provides a lot of agency to the dog, which is great for resilience and building in confidence and joy in the behavior. He held the down really well here and seemed very happy to play the stay game – and that is exactly what we are looking for. You were able to get a lot of distance and duration, in an environment with a LOT of options available! Good boy!!! And great rewarding from you. I couldn’t really hear the markers but baed on his responses, it all looked pretty clean!! Click treat to you both.
You can play with a stand stay by using a plank like a cato plank or something low where standing is easy.
>I think the sit is physically challenging for him. He actually quite likes sitting and offers it frequently, but not for duration. His sit position has become tighter than it used to be though so it seems he is building up more muscle strength.>
It is entirely possible that he still has puppy butt and sitting for a while is hard. I am glad that he offers it frequently in everyday life! Have you started teaching him any tight sit games on a small platform? You can do short reps of tuck sit and roll back sits to build him up – by very very short reps because he is still so young 🙂 It looks like this (the dog here was recovering from surgery so you can see that she didn’t have a lot of strength):
He also did well with the handling game! If he had trouble finding the start cookie in the grass, you can use a towel as a target to throw it to so you know when you can start to run 🙂 And then after the pivot, that towel can be the go go go destination. Or, a Manners Minder can be the start cookie and end cookie too!
Your decel into the pivot looked great and he was tight to you as you turned. Yes, dragging the leash might have slowed him down a little but it looks like the session was still super fun for him!
You had the toy toss after the pivot which worked really well – remember that the toss is actually a toy race, so throw it as far as you can then try to beat him to it 🙂
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning –
Hopefully last night went better in terms of sleep!The resilience pattern game looked good! It is a great way for puppies to explore the world 🙂 You can add in slowly walking back and forth, to both add motion and expand her exploration area.
She was in a little bit of a ‘hang out and chew the toy” mode during the retrieving, so tossing it a little further helped her orient it back toward you. I am not sure it was a retrieve when you did that as much of a swinging back to hang out with you and chew the toy 🙂 but we will take it! And it is something to revisit when she is feeling spicy and more interested in running around. It could be something as simple as a different time of day.
>But, outdoors she snags the toy, runs away and has a party of one. Should I add a leash to the toy outdoors?>
Yes – add the leash. When she is retrieving it really well at home, you can also play the basic retrieve game sitting on the grass outside. At some point, she can have a ‘go for a run’ cue added to be able to run around with the toy, but that can be after she will bring it back 🙂
>Line ups are the bane of my existence. I rarely get it right!>
A game you can practice throughout the day without any formal session is the line up, collar hold, toss something:
It builds her love for it and allows you to practice the mechanics.
Nice work!
TracyHi!
He did well on his games here!Yes – the marker/throw can come sooner. Think of it as marking for commitment to the jump (not arriving at the jump). That way the treat is landing before he arrive at the jump setup. He started looking at you more partially because the markers were late, and partially because you gave him a “hey!” when he couldn’t find the treat. But that is on the human side of things (treats bouncing or crumbling or hard to see) so a white treat that doesn’t crumble would be better, or use the toy 🙂
Since he did so well, this game doesn’t need to be played much at all because he is still very young and we don’t want to add anything that resembles formal jumping.
>What is up with YouTube? It does not copy if I do two in a row and then I end up sending a repeat video.>
YouTube was having a hard day! It sometimes upgrades its code and then things take a minute to catch up. It seems to be working fine now thankfully, and the parallel path video showed up twice.
He is making HUGE progress on his stays!!! Super! He was great to respond to the first sit cue because you were walking and suddenly said “sit!” He and I both were like WHOA! Hahaha!! And he turned completely sideways to face you – then did a big shake off (yes, it was hard!) So you don’t need to be walking before the sit cue. You can be stationary and give him a casual line up cue so he expects it and doesn’t turn to face you as much – plus is simulates the line up at a jump.
You did a nice rewarding while staying in motion and I think he is really starting to figure out what catch means – he turns and looked behind him at the end. Yay!! You can add in stopping, praising, then rewarding with the ‘catch’. And sometimes mix in releasing him forward to come to you.
Looking at the retrieve video:
He is on to you for the 2 toy game… if he has the better toy, he knows not to bring it back for the less favorite toy LOL! Smart 🙂 So throw the less favorite toy as the reward – then the favorite lambs wool toy can be the reward. That worked GREAT!!! Eventually it all evens out and he will bring it all back. And you can get a bunch of fun/different toys (have you tried real fur toys?) because he might love those too!Great job on these!
Tracy
Hi –
>do I stop my movement and then say “catch”/throw food OR do I keep moving (obviously in slow motion) while saying “catch” and throw food?>Both! If you stop, be sure to praise, pause, then mark/throw. If you keep moving, be sure to stay connected then mark/throw. Or, re-connect if you look away, praise, then mark/throw. We don’t want any change in your motion or change in connection to be associated with the release 🙂
T
Hi!
Super nice session, his stays are going REALLY WELL!! Yay!
One suggestion when you line him up – have his feet facing the direction you will walk away, so he does not get tempted to move his feet or break the stay to face you. He was perfect here but I want to help him stay perfect 🙂
Also, you did lots of rewarding while you were still moving away (that is great!) When staying in motion – if you look away from him (which is perfectly fine) just be sure that you don’t re-connect AND say catch/throw all in one motion. That might cause him to think the re-connection is the release.
Since this calm version of stays AND the ball version went so well, try it with a tug toy! You might need to make the stays shorter because he is more excited when you do a lot of tugging before and after the stays 🙂 But it will simulate his future trial-excitement 🙂
Great job!
TracyHi!
She did well here! One thing that will help is to have the bag appear in the environment without her seeing it appear – she would see you putting the bag down on when you introduced it, which totally enhanced it. So she was pretty convinced that the bag was something to interact with for the rest for the session.
So you can have it already on the ottoman or couch, for example, whence comes into the room and start playing the game as if it is not there. Then if you want to move it to a new spot, toss a cookie for her t ago chase on the other side of the room and then when she turns to come back to you: the distraction is in place 🙂
If she does pick it up – you can totally interrupt that. And if she keeps interacting with it, you can put it on something higher so it is still present but easier to ignore.
One more thought – when marking the behavior you like, you don’t need ‘yes’ and ‘get it’ – the ‘get it’ plays both roles of telling her she is correct and where to find it. So the get it will be all she needs 🙂
> As I waited her out she got it – could almost see the wheels turning in her brain>
Yes! She was thinking so hard!! What a good girl!
Great job!
TracyHi!
>To clarify, if she walks BESIDE the prop I still don’t reward? If she leaps over it and doesn’t touch it, then I do reward?>
Yes – but if she goes past it once, dial back your speed so she can hit it successfully so there are no more failures.
>One of yesterday’s videos was lured around the barrel. Let me know if I should try the cone or the wingless. >
Yes, she did well with the lure! Try the wingless, it will be easier for her to see.
>Do I go back to the two bowl game first if it’s a new prop?>
Since we are using the toy as an aid, I don’t think you need to go back to the bowls.
She was super happy to chase the toy around in the barrel in the video here and you were able to get lots of nice wraps! The hardest part for her was lining up – you can put the toy on the ground or under your arm so both hands are free. That way you can use one hand to cue the line up, the other to feed, and the first time can reach for her collar.
Do one more session like this in a day or two on the wingless upright, and then we will add the next steps 🙂
>Dot was extra cranky last night for an unknown reason. She barked in her crate on and off all night which is a first for her. Prior she has slept all night quietly. Took her out several times and she didn’t necessarily have to potty. She just couldn’t settle for some reason. So, I suspect she’ll be tired today.>
She might just need a day to decompress, for whatever reason. Remember, she doesn’t need to do structured things every day 🙂
Backing up to the mat is looking great! She was curling a little but that might have had to do with the rewards all coming from you right hand – you can see her lock onto that and move away from it rather than move backwards on a centered path. So alternate with hand delivers the treat: sometimes left, sometimes right, to help her stay straight.
Nice work!
TracyGood morning!
>but it didn’t seem to me like he ever didn’t want to do the activity.>
It is possible that he has a reward hierarchy of work then food/toys. So we can use ‘work’ as a reward for eating 🙂 depending the context and if he gets super choosey about when to eat treats. It is something to watch as he grows up and gets all of his teeth in 🙂
>Apparently we need to start training with linguine because he was quite excited about that.>
OMG!!! That is so funny!!!! He was actually quite graceful, slurping it down. I mean, linguine is DELISH and maybe you can let him watch you eat, then go do a training session using a bit of whatever you ate 🙂 I have used pasta in training because dogs do love it!
>I had felt he was adding the couch to his obstacles as opposed to leaving the activity.>
Yes – totally agree and the couch was easier than the other stuff, so he was offering that! Note how on the setup in the video below, he did not offer any couch reps LOL!
Looking at strike a pose:
>We did the strike a pose again to experiment with rewards and he really does not think that a toy is an acceptable reward for this game. He will play between reps but will not go for the toy if he has not received his cookie. He did think the cookie dish was perfectly acceptable.>I love the feedback from the dogs about what THEY think the appropriate reinforcement is LOL!! Maybe he thinks this kind of stationary game where you are facing him is like shaping, where food is the correct reward. Then in between, obviously we play with toys LOL! I just love his opinions and communication. The session itself went really well so we can certainly incorporate his feedback into the training: strike a pose has food rewards and play breaks in between. He might change that when you start moving, and that is fine too 🙂
The chase the anti game looked great – the helper here is getting a great work out LOL!! He is driving directly to her and straight and they will be super useful when you are adding in big lines on jumps in the future. He seemed to have no change in behavior when you were running, so you can run even sooner to add more racing to it. I am not sure you will win without cheating LOL but he did great!
Rear crosses:
Good job getting further and further from the prop as your starting point – he was locking onto the toy at first so you were not far enough behind to get the RC. But then at 1:04 he was driving ahead and you got the RC really well! I like how you made a big fuss over the RCs with toys and treats for a long, fun reward, then went back to the parallel path for a bunch of reps because he was starting to watch you a bit.The RC at 2:13 was a little late in terms of you getting to the new side before he got to the prop, but you immediately adjusted that on the last rep so he was able to turn correctly.
I am doing a happy dance about how well he can find the turn in both directions when you show it to him. SUPER!! Most puppies have a hard time with that and he says it is easy 🙂
He is definitely turning around really well on the plank! In both directions! It is really fun to see his coordination developing. Another happy dance here. It seems a little stronger/more fluid to the left and he chose the left turn (even though it was turning away) on one of the reps so he might be a lefty. But he is pretty balanced with no strong side preference and no limitations, and able to control his mechanics really well. Yay!
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Most (all?) conditioning classes use lures or food as a guide, and that is great. This platform might have been good a few weeks/months ago, but it is a little too narrow for him now – parts of his legs are hanging off the side so he is not comfortably sitting and is going past a tight sit into a squished sit, which is why he had so much trouble. He just needs a slightly bigger perch to be able to get on and move easily into a tight sit.
For the sit – yes, you can lure him into the position but I also urge you to not worry about it too much for now 🙂 You can either focus on the sit position, or the stay – but if you try to do BOTH at the same time at this point, you will end up focusing on the exact position and not reward him when he responds correctly (like at :33). That can lead to confusion and stress, so at this stage it is one or the other not both. He was able to follow the cookie lure to be relatively at your side and I am glad you didn’t mess around with him being a bit off to the side – being tight to your leg is easy to shape, to make the stay very happy and fun!
Looking at the retrieve:
He brought it right back really well on the first rep… then seemed to realize that the game was not that fun with you sitting so he was less enthusiastic about it. Clapping didn’t seem to really get him into it but standing was definitely better! Tugging is more fun with you standing! So keep standing and mix in exciting things like you running away (fun!) and whipping out a fun different toy to surprise him with for bringing back the first toy.The running contact work is very similar, just starting him from a different angle and rewarding near you to the next look. Are you looking to reward front feet or back feet? You were sometimes giving the yes marker for back feet (rep 1, rep 4, rep 5, rep 6), sometimes for front feet(rep 2, rep 3). If it is back feet, the first back foot or 2nd back foot? This is all the stuff to work out now on the mat, and stare at the mat to really see it.
Great job here!!
Tracy
