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Hi!
Hind end awareness is hard for any pups! At the beginning of the first video, I was not sure what you were looking for – he had lots of offered behavior but you didn’t click a lot. I think it was all 4 feet on the bowl? I figured it out based on you saying it LOL!! But there was not enough reinforcement early on, so you can see that he was confused and kind of wandered off. Compare it to the 2nd half of this session and the 2nd video, where you had a lot more reinforcement and he stayed really engaged. Nice!!You totally caught yourself about talking too much LOL! You can talk all you want during the tugging but then be quite during shaping so he looks at you less. When you were quieter after the tug break, he offered more getting on the bowl.
Good transition from the tugging into the shaping on the 2nd video here! Then be quiet when you want him to offer LOL Verbal encouragement draws him into looking at you, so you can be silent during the shaping part and stare at the bowl (not at his cute face).
So with the goal of all 4 feet on – to help him out, you can make a bigger playing field for him. That way it is easier to get all 4 feet on rather than squish himself onto the smaller bowl 🙂 If you have 2 bowls you can put next to each other, you can have him spread himself out on the 2 bowls (my guess is you will get more back feet on the bowls that way). Or, if you don’t have 2 bowls, you can use a couple of different things all touching each other, so he can get his whole body on easily (and gets used to touching different surfaces too!)
Great job here!
TracyHi!
He is touching the target really well! It was fine that he was trying to nibble on it a bit LOL!
One suggestion here is to have the cookies in your hand before you show him the target, so the reinforcement comes really quickly. By clicking then reaching over to get the cookie, he is watching the cookie hand and you can see him migrating over to it.For the next session, you can click the target hit then toss a treat (using a ‘get it’ marker). That way he can then drive back to the target. That will move you into the strike a pose game, which is the game that uses the target 🙂
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>>See that a small piece of someone’s fur got him every time!!
HA! But it could have been cheese hahahahahaha. Good job just leaving it there for him to work through.
Nice tugging here! You can run away into the blind with more connection, more like what you did on the 2nd rep – make sure you have your toy ready before you hand him to his auntie so that you can make an immediate transition.
He is reading the blind crosses perfectly, so when you have this much room to run, you can do two blinds: start the first one as soon as he starts moving towards you. That will give you plenty of time to get the 2nd one in.
I love the amount of space you had – you can move some of the jumps out of the way so he is not learning to run past jumps at this stage. He doesn’t know what they are, but we will want him to commit to them later in life, so we don’t want him learning to ignore them now. We only want him ignoring little fuzz pieces on the ground LOL!
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>>You can hear a little click as his teeth hit the tupperware lid>>
That is hilarious! He is clicking himself LOL! He drove right into the target hand and it is fine that he is tooth-hugging it for now because we fade out the actually target touching pretty soon 🙂
>>I tried to switch him to a nose touch for a few days, then decided to give up on that and move on.>>
That was smart! There are ways to get just the nose and not the teeth… but it is unimportant to do so and with so many other fun things to do, I agree: better to move on and have fun!
>>although I think I wasn’t supposed to move at all until he grabbed the toy. >>
Correct, you can move less and use your markers for the toy in your hand versus the toy on the ground (I use “bite” for toy in hand when I get to this stage, and ‘get it’ for the toy on the ground, both of which replace ‘yes’).
Keeping your shoulders and feet stationary for now gives him the fuller serp & threadle picture and trains you to keep your shoulders open on these 🙂
>>Also, the toy on the ground was really, really hard, lol.>>
Hard, yes, but not mind-blowing! He veered towards the toy then caught himself and changed path to the target. Super good boy! So it was a good level of challenge. You can shake the target hand a little to help him lock onto it sooner.
Also, he did a great job going back and forth from the food to the toy!
Great job here! We build on this game in the next week or two, so you can revisit it with less motion or put it away til then 🙂
TracyGood morning!
>>I feel like this is finally coming together! He didn’t try to bite me or hump me once!!! >>
This is the most exciting part! The arousal regulation is definitely a “learned” behavior, but not in the operant sense 🙂 You will see him continue to get better with arousal regulation, with some days where he cannot do it mixed in too (adolescence is HARD lol!!)
Video 1: Nice tugging!! Nice mechanics!! Great job with the treat scatter mixed in there too to continue to regulate the arousal.
He offered really well, and was more explosive when you cued it. Great job adding the verbal too! You can add in throwing the toy rather than rewarding from hand (which opens up whether we need to work on retrieving or not :))
Since we are looking at arousal regulation with all the pups, you can look for signs that he uses to say he needs a break: he did one here at 2:15 approx, where he stopped playing and just stood still for a moment. That was a pretty long time into a high energy session, so he was asking for a break/decompression moment where he can go sniff or run around or something away from the structure of the session.
He did continue the session, but you can see how lining up was harder and also the tugging dropped off. So if he asks for a break, you can finish that rep but then give him a break. And to avoid him asking for a break, you can
Set a timer for 90 seconds total on the session – my mantra is “quality over quantity”! This is also important to remember when you are working in an in-person class or seminar: be sure to give lots of brain breaks!>>I felt like I was “man-handling” him too much to get him into position, so I stopped so I could go back and watch your video again.>>
Yes, a bit of man-handling LOL!!! Border Collies will tolerate it (because it is followed by action) but I think it will be easier & better for you both if you line him up with a cookie, then hold his collar and tart the game. He doesn’t need to be perfectly straight in the line up or anything, just straight-ish and generally pointing the correct direction LOL!
Video 2:
The angles and threadles all looked really good! This type of session is less likely to be mentally “expensive” because the food is not as high energy as the tugging.
He seemed perfectly happy to find the tunnel from the angles and from either side of you, so you can add your tunnel threadle verbal for when he is starting on the treadle side. So a food-heavy session doesn’t need a 90 second timer because it doesn’t deplete him as much.
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>Do you think I shouldn’t train at all for a day or two because it was tough for her yesterday? Or just move onto other things and try again on yesterday’s items in a day or two?>>
You can skip a training day or do something really easy. She doesn’t need to do things that involve new learning every day – sometimes rehearsal of what she already knows is perfect!
>>I off-leash walk her in nature 6 or 7 days a week, so she gets time to run and zoom and sniff. She loves it! And we also play just for fun several times a day too. I think she’s getting sufficient exercise outside of training.>>
Yes, that is great! That also burns glucose and oxygen in her brain, so it might require rest to balance it all (as you describe by how much she sleeps :)). And so you can try changing the schedule of training versus the exercise, or add in more alternating now that she is an adolescent.
>>I’m also amazed by how much she sleeps lol! She sleeps at least 9 hours at night. Then she’ll be up for an hour or two and then sleep for 4 to 5 hours. Wild! Then she’ll be up for 2 to 3 hours and want to nap again. That’s the life lol.>>
I am jealous, I would love that sleep schedule LOL!!! I think human children/adolescents sleep like that too, during major periods like growth and brain development.
>>I usually do her training in the late afternoon/evening. Maybe I’ll try a morning session and see how that goes for her.>>
We are learning more and more about how the body cycles during the day, and certain hormones/neurotransmitters are lower in the evening (like cortisol, if my memory is correct) so you might see a big difference in the morning, when these are at higher levels.
There are also cycles during the day where the levels of hormones/neurotransmitters vary (I think in humans it is 90 minute cycles – really interesting stuff!)
The morning session went well! You had added some good distance and she had a really high success rate! Just one blooper and she adjusted on the next rep. Nice! And the rear crosses at the end of the session looked good too!
Turn and burn is looking good too! You were clear about verbal-then-motion and she had no trouble going to the barrel and driving around it, with more movement from you (and she didn’t hit the box).
Now, the parallel path and the turn and burn and the rear crosses are all challenging games in terms of having to do things that are not necessarily natural to her. So you can structure your sessions so that you mix in easier, more intuitive things (like blind crosses or toy races) so she is not doing only hard stuff. The harder the stuff, the more expensive it is for the brain, and the more we deplete teenage brains 🙂 so adding in stuff that is easier makes for great rehearsal and maintenance of those skills without depleting the brain.
>>I can see that her developing brain might be toast by evening time.>>
My non-developing brain is totally toast by evening, so I can totally relate LOL! Keep track of it and see how she does!
>>I made a DIY jump bump by cutting a wrapping paper cardboard roll. >>.
That was clever, it works perfectly as a jump bar! Do you have wings you can use? That can also help transfer the concept.
>>I’m not sure if my marker timing was good so let me know.>>
My only suggestion here is to mark sooner and throw sooner, so she doesn’t look back at you. You were marking when she arrived at the jump, which was great for the first session. What was happening was that she was looking at you as she arrived at the jump (nothing else to look at LOL!) so to keep her looking ahead, you can mark her intent to go to the jump – this would be when she is still several feet away from it, but definitely moving towards it. Then throw the treat so it lands before she arrives at the jump 🙂 That can help her look ahead and not at you.Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
>>I need to go back and look at engaged chill so I can add that as well as decompression.>>
Perfect! It all helps with recovery.
>>I’ll try letting him be when I remove the leash until I’m ready to line him up. >>
Keep track of how long it takes him to line up. If it is pretty immediate, then letting him move around before the line up cue is fine.
>>I went to a stand at the start line because his sit is awful :-). >>
Got it! The other option is the down 🙂 Have you tried it? The stand is not terrible at all, but you will want to get lots of reward in for NOT moving his feet.
>> I’m thinking that he is always going to want to reset his front legs but don’t know how to let him do that without it bleeding into constant movement. >>
He might not even know he is moving in that moment. His brain might be so focused on the agility in that moment that he might not realize his feet are moving. We humans also have these small movements we do when we are focused and in a high arousal state.
>>But not to the point where I feel I can led out without constantly looking at him. >>
He is early in his career, so you will probably be able to soften that connection over time.
Keep me posted!
TracyGood morning! Great job with this session, Annalise!!
Prytania did really well moving away from the toy on the ground – you had her by the collar by she moved away easily and was completely engaged.
The first couple of “go” lines looked great – well done running hard until she landed!!!! I love how she was able to catch up and drive past you even when you were ahead of her. I think she bounced the distance at :45 – very powerful jumping!!!
On the last rep, you had a really good push to the backside of 3. Great job just continuing to the Go line 🙂 I thought maybe you wanted the other end of the tunnel, but you carried on smooth smoothly that maybe she took the entry you wanted? LOL!! If you did want the other end of the tunnel from the one she took: On the FC, you ended up stepping too far across the bar so she thought you wanted the line to the other end of the tunnel. And that’s where she went, very fast LOL! To get the turn over 3 tighter and set up the line to the tunnel entry, you can stay closer to the entry wing of the backside – almost on the landing spot. Then as she is getting to the backside, you would finish the FC and get out of her way 🙂 heading towards the tunnel. But the most important part was staying in motion and to keep going, which you did perfectly. YAY!!!
Great job here!!
TracyOh dang, somehow I missed this! Sorry!!!
SUPER nice job getting her ready for her run! The opening looked great! You over-helped a bit on the threadle at 1:03 – good timing to start it, but I don’t think she needed as much (or any) foot rotation towards her. That caused her to over-turn on the threadle jump.
Great job praising and rewarding!
So in that spot you can call her and use your upper body, but don’t turn your feet to her (rotate at the waist as you cue the threadle_ and keep moving along the line to the exit wing. You were much closer to that at 2:08 and she got it really well! You can experiment with seeing if she needs any foot rotation at all for the threadles, or just upper body rotation and arm cues.Your connection on both of these runs looked terrific!
>>**Oops I didn’t do the whole course! Sorry!>>
No worries, you worked the threadle section and it all looked good!
>>At class last night she ran away on the first run – I have video. It wasn’t our best performance for sure even though she seemed to enjoy running fast everywhere searching for critters>>
Post up the video! We will make the most progress if we track what helped her, and what might contribute to her running off on that first run.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
These are hard sequences for sure! How is your knee feeling? It looked like maybe you were still in pain so not running as fast as normal, so you ended up disconnecting which pulled him off the line in a couple of places.First video –
It looks like he was following your line really well here, just needed more support to the line after the tunnel on the first rep and to the tunnel on the 2nd rep (you were trying to leave early to get to the jump, so he followed your shoulders as you moved away).2nd video –
The opening looked good here!!
Very nice long lead out (I love how he wags his tail the whole time 🙂 )For the threadle: you can call his name before he takes off for jump 4 (the jump before the threadle) so he is already turning towards you, then sue your threadle slice verbal and upper body arm cues (dog side arm back, shoulders rotating towards him, feet moving forward). That should be very smooth! You rotated towards him and he did a big zig zag, because the cue was more than he needed (it ended up being almost like 2 RCs on the flat). So less foot rotation and just using your upper body should work well.
To get the layering on the line after the 2nd tunnel, you can try saying your GO GO GO cue before he enters the tunnel so he stays on the line.
On the 2nd rep here – at 1:18 as he landed from 1, you looked forward and that shoulder rotation totally looked like the start of a blind cross… so that is what he did (good boy!). You can keep going in that moment, so he doesn’t think he is wrong and so you can practice thinking on your feet 🙂
3rd video:
It is a little hard to see the line from the 1st jump to the tunnel from this camera angle, but he definitely needed a couple of extra steps of support here to get into it. It might be slightly offset so you can’t turn away to jump 3 until he is moving towards it.
He did well finding the jump after it both times through here!
For the threadle, he is reading the pull-push cues with the switch but I don’t think he needs all of that. Try it with just the verbals and upper body rotation and we can smooth out the line there.4th video:
The extra handling on the threadle almost got a left turn at :30, good job continuing to go even though it wasn’t perfect! And you ended up with spin at :46 and a backside at 1:23 there. I bet you will have an easier time with the simpler handling 🙂The extra threadle handling caused you to end up behind him at :34, so he didn’t know which line to be on and took the jump in front of you. That might be a good place for a ‘get out’ on the line to shift him away to the tunnel, although on the next rep he found that line really well! He just needs that bit of connection to find the line there and also on the jump after it at 1:18.
Another thing to play around with is NOT running super fast, but when yo are not running fast you can triple the level of connection 🙂 The challenge there would be to see if he can stay on the line with you at a bit of a distance, so then you can support the lines easily without having to rush and disconnect to get to the next one. You can do it as walking agility LOL! And reward him for getting on the lines.
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Oops, too much caffeine and typing too fast 🙂
>>This was after. So by “play engaged chill” I assume you mean the pattern game with a delay and NOT the stand by my leg version? >>
You can use the opportunity to pretend you are getting ready to run in a trial, and rehearsing the stuff you’d do outside the ring.
So for engage chill, work on both the pattern delay version, and the stand by your leg version – and she will give feedback about which works better to be chill-ish.
>>She won’t chew a chewie in this environment.>>
Good to know, so cross it off the list. Will she lick a Kong or lickimat? Repetitive mouth movements are very decompressing.
>> Also, “short snuffle mat blasts” means what exactly? She snuffles in her down or just have her out snuffling why the dogs run?>>
She can snuffle in any position of her choosing. And by short blast, I meant just maybe 2 minutes tops (no need for 10 minutes of snuffling :))
>>There is a dog park near me where we can go and be safe. It’s pretty far from the action.>>
That might be very useful!!!
>>We may or may not have class tonight depending on the predicted rain. I’ll try to bring my tripod.>>
Keep me posted!
TracyHi!
It was great that she was able to be close to the ring while other dogs were running! Yay! She did well holding her down. Based on her whining and muscle tension, you can give her more to do (which will help with the arousal regulation):
– short snuffle mat blasts
– chewing a bully stick
– having her move around a bit and play/do tricks/do patterns. Being able to move would be great and also is a good rehearsal for trials. But it might be tricky if the other dog is distracted by it, so you’ll want to do it on the other side of a fence and as far as needed.– play some engaged chill! A down stay is not the same (you’ll see she will be able to watch without whining with more chill practice 🙂
Sounds like the runs went really well! It is great that the class adds those types of challenges and also that you can add in playing the pre-run and start line games 🙂
Keep me posted on how the next classes go!!
Another good rehearsal option is outside of a dog park, if there are any in the area. Definitely do NOT bring her into the dog park, but you can maybe be in the parking lot using the dog park chaos to rehearse the games because it is similar to trial chaos 🙂 But safety first – if there is no safe way to have a dog park visible without having any potential interactions, then you can skip it 🙂
Have fun!
TracyHi!
Driving ahead looks awesome! He has a TON of toy drive and he was very happy to outrun you as you raced to it 🙂 Yay! One thing you can add here is when he arrives at the toy, you turn and go the other way to try to encourage him to bring the toy back to you. You can pick up the other end of the line you have on the toy to avoid him scooting away with it as you encourage him to come back to you with it.If you have had a chance to do the decel to handler (that will be really easy for him), you can move this game to the collection sandwich 🙂
Great job on all of these! He is so fun!
TracyGood morning and it is totally OK to post videos when you can!
Good job with the prop pre-game! You read the situation really well and quickly moved to the thrown reinforcement. That got her coming back and interacting with the prop beautifully. Super!!!! He got a little distracted by a big bark but then got back into the game.
It looks like he has good value for his prop, so you can now move to the first prop game (sending).
The nose touch looked lovely too! Yo can move this to the strike a pose game too!
Based on the toy drive you have in the video below, you can incorporate more toy play into the foodie games 🙂 A little tugging before the game starts will get him pumped up, then you can add in some tugging after every 4 or 5 treats – that will keep him pumped up through the session. With the food-only as the reward, you can see he was more engaged in the beginning than at the end, so adding more tugging in between will help keep him engaged the whole time.
Nice work!!
Tracy
