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Good morning! I heard you all had some CRAZY weather down there! I am glad it has passed you now!
The Go and RCs are looking good! She is looking ahead REALLY well and that is really important.
You are a bit better at showing the RCs to her right (even though you called the first one a left I think LOL!) because you are getting on the line to the center of the bar sooner and more emphatically. On the left turn RCs, you are running near the line but not quite pushing to the center of the bar then cutting behind her like you did on the right turn RCs, so she is jumping a bit straighter on those. The toy throws on all of them are great, which really helps!
And you are making the Go lines look radically different from the RCs (like at :30) and that is SO helpful to her! Yay!!
Connection overall looks really good (one little blooper at :17 where you didn’t get connection after the wing wrap so she thought it was a spin LOL!) so keep up the good connection!!
>>I’m excited to try the blind crosses again. I am finding that I’m having a tough time keeping my eyes on her.
I have always found it harder to connect with the smaller dogs because they move really fast and are so much harder to see. Those 25 year old tall German handlers at worlds often run scrunched over to make better connection, but since I am more than double that age, running scrunched, being fast, AND being able to stand up again are no longer things I can do HAHA! So with the littles, looking downwards and keeping arms out of the way becomes critical.
Have fun! Great job here!
TracyHi!
I love the idea of the Corgi BBF as her training partner!
>>Mochi loves my friend so the hard part will be keeping Mochi’s focus in her vicinity.>>
No worries about that at all! Top priority is a happy, relaxed Mochi 🙂 And is she is wiggling and happy and feeling social? Fantastic! That actually makes the skills easier to training. The skills are a lower-level priority at this stage.
Keep me posted how it works out!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>Trying to balance show weekends and 5 dogs and it’s hectic.>>
I imagine it is super busy!!! But I am glad you are getting some training time in because this is looking really good!!! Yay!!!
>>Left turns are much smoother and she jumps less. Interesting!
I totally see this: all of the left turn reps were smooth as silk: she was looking forward, wrapping nicely, and not jumping up. Her only question on a left turn was went you got too far ahead of her coming out of the tunnel-replacer wing (like at :48 and 1:06) and looked ahead, so she could only see your back (like the beginning of a blind cross) and that pulled her off the wing. Compare to the rep at 1:11, for example, when you were ahead but very connected and she had no trouble finding the wing.
On the right turn reps, she was ‘stickier’ meaning her responses were ever-so-slightly delayed, plus you got the occasional jump up to grab your wrist. What does that all mean? That she is a lefty 🙂 And, it is also possible that you are more comfortable working her on your right side (where she would be turning to her left).
Side preferences are normal and they all even out over time. You can see by the end of the video, her right turn lines were looking really smooth too – you really emphasized connection and staying close to the wings to help her out on the right turns and that really helped 🙂
This is good info, because you can introduce new concepts on left turns at first, so she can sort them out on her easier side, then move to the right turns and add the harder side.
Great job here!! She is looking strong!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
First up, some geeking out:
>>The distraction of the kids triggered him zombie response. This happened yesterday when we were in our private with Perry. Someone walked into the room and was creating a distraction. He stops moving and needs to be prompted to reset. >>
What you are seeing is how the brain responds to things in the environment that might be startling or anxiety-inducing.
The amygdala (which is in charge of those reflexive emotional responses, to an extent) at the back of the brain drives this, especially in adolescent dogs where the pre-frontal cortex (which is in charge of regulation and executive function in many ways) is simply not all that developed yet.
So back to the amygdala – all the dogs have this response and it presents as one of the five “F”s: Fight, flight, freeze, fawn, fidget. You are seeing the freeze (aka zombie) response. This is not a chosen response, this is just something that the primitive part of our brain makes us do.
For example: some dogs will alarm bark (fight response) at someone randomly and surprisingly appearing. Some dogs run away (flight response). Some freeze (zombie).
In those moments, the thinking/learning part of the brain is not in control (ESPECIALLY in adolescents) so you can bring things back into balance and help to reduce the anxiety with pattern games. We did the back and forth game in MaxPup 1:
Practice those games at home in the house until he is incredibly fluent and finds them incredibly easy. Then you can bring them to new places. And if there is an anxiety-inducing or surprising distraction that appears, immediately go into the pattern game (don’t even wait for him to freeze, just start the game).
>>In the session, the first time this happened I pulled out the tug and that worked well. The second time when we were working the other side I used food to get a mental reset. I don’t really want the session to end in zombie mode and if I can get one or two good performance behaviors I will end the session.>>
Add the pattern game before you bring the tug out or try to continue to work – the pattern game resets the dog’s internal state and allows the dog to assess the environment, and will generally allow you to continue the session as planned. Bringing the tug out or trying to continue training before he has finished assessing the environment or dealing with the anxiety could bring pressure into the training which we do not want. You can see at :58, for example, he was not ready to continue training because he had not yet dealt with the environmental struggles. The pattern game will be perfect for those moments – you will see him tell you when he is ready to continue training (he was not ready at the :58 – 1:16 section of the video).
On the serps – the serps are going well! Your serp position of the fully rotated upper body is dramatically better when you are serving dog-on-right (second half of the video) from :44 to the end. That is when you were fully opening up your shoulders to face the jump, and his line was a lot better, he came in perfectly, and turned away to the MM really well without looking at you as much. YAY!
When you were serving dog-on-left at the beginning, I think you might be (subconsciously?) trying to draw the line with your hand but that ends up rotating your shoulders forward like a post turn, so he comes in over the jump but looks at you (correctly, because the post turn doesn’t cue the 2nd turn of a serp) rather than turns away to the MM. You can see this at :08 for example. So remind your shoulders to fully rotate, use your waist 🙂 when he is on your left for serps.
Now if you want to add more of your speed to build up to running you will need to angle the jump significantly as you jog through the serp lines. The angle here was still really hard when you tried to run early in the session, so he went past it. The angle can be a full 90 degrees to get things started, so the jump bar is fully visible. Then you can quickly angle it back so it is 45 degrees from being fully flat on the serp line.
The driving ahead and rears are going well!!
For the driving ahead, remember that ideally you both go on a completely straight line. On the reps where you both had a straight line to the jump, you both nailed it.
When you had too much motion towards the jump, it was too much pressure and pushed him off the line (2nd rep). Being part BC and also working for the ball helped create that 🙂 When you switched to the other side, the wing was ia bit too offset so you would have to push him back to find the line to the jump but that can cause too much pressure into the jump or make it look like a rear cross. So the fine art is place the start wing so that he has a straight line to the jump and you have a straight line past it.
I feel that even with the ball, he is able to drive ahead AND watch you at the same time (talent!) so we can really focus on getting him to look ahead more. We can split the difference between the MM as giant target, and the toy throw when he looks at the jump by having you throw the toy as soon as you say go and then race him to it. If you get there first because he is looking at you? YOUR TOY, not his LOL!!! That can help him look forward sooner because if he realizes that when you accelerate and start yelling GO GO GO, the reward placement is out ahead for him to look for (and not watch you throw the toy).
I mean, theoretically, you should throw the ball as soon as he looks at the jump but there were definitely more than a couple of reps where he looked at you the entire time LOL!!! So, throw it as soon as you accelerate and say go, and let’s see if this shifts the behavior to get him looking ahead more.
The RCs are DEFINITELY going well and interestingly, he looks at the jump a lot more on these. Yes, he looks at you a bit (looking at the cue to process it) but then turns and looks at the jump, good boy. You can throw the reward in the new direction as soon as you see him look at the jump, even if the turn is not perfect (because sometimes the cue is late, like at 1:01).
Nice work here!! Let me know how he does with you throwing the ball a lot sooner!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>I feel so uncoordinated, Tracy!
Ha! After reading this, I thought the session would look messy but it did NOT! The handling in this game is dramatic and ‘extra’ at first, because we need to convince the pups to do the behavior. You were good! I think the feeling of being uncoordinated or awkward was more about the ‘bigness’ of the cues. Hopefully it felt smoother and easier at the end!
>> I wish I’d taken dance lessons as a kid – lol!>>
I wish I had taken dance classes too, or joined a sports team as a kid… but I was in the band sitting on my butt hahahaha
Overall this went really well and accomplished the goal of getting him to change leads side-to-side, back and forth. He did well with that and was incredibly responsive, doing everyone you cued. That includes :45 where he ended up on the other side of the wing (because you cued him to go there, probably by accident 🙂 ) So if he ends up on the other side, you can reward him because you probably cued it – and if you aren’t sure, you can reward then watch the video in slow motion to see what sent him there.
As you got more comfy, you started to get earlier on the cues (plus he was sorting it out really nicely! On the 3rd to last rep and the last rep, you were definitely smoother and earlier – love it! You can keep trying to get earlier, and to add even more quickness, you can move the wings together by a foot or so. The goal is to eventually have the wings 4 feet apart and see if he can use quick feet to do the side-to-side lead changing.
Great job!
TracyGood morning!
>>Amy is totally on the same page as you are, and studies all your scientific information. She’s very smart. 😎>>
Totally agree – Amy is AWESOME!!
>>We worked P first and M and a really hard time, barking and carrying on. She was way over the top, from even walking in from the car. I think Posh passes on her anxiety to Mochi.>>
Yes, it sounds like having to wait and watch from the x-pen was just too hard for her so she was pretty over-aroused by the time it was her turn. Starting with the pattern games on the cot was an excellent choice!
>> Of course P was there making a fuss when I was working M.
In all fairness to Mochi, the distraction of Posh fussing was probably too much as well.
>>We are in agreement that next time, if I’m going to switch dogs in and out, I bring my oldest, most agility mature dog, Paris. She’s like a stable pony, very stable, best people/dog manners of all my dogs. She doesn’t need the private lesson but that may be best for Mochi.>>
Yes – bring a dog that won’t fuss or show any over-arousal, because social learning is really helpful for puppies!
>>Other than that I can leave one dog in the car for 30 min, and take our time with Mochi giving her rest periods while we discuss things…giving Mochi all my attention and not stressing her by leaving her in an expen while I work my adult dog.>>
Yes, I think that sets up a better environment for her even if you switch dogs every 5 or 10 minutes instead of 30 minutes. One can be crated away from the environment while the other trains. And if the adult dog(s) will fuss when it is Mochi’s turn, then the adult has to be crated elsewhere so Mochi can concentrate.
>>So along those lines. Mochi as been hyper-vigilant ever since our 2 out-of-town trips, staying in hotels. I try to walk her just with Paris for the good example. But there were times when I had to walk all 4 at once and I think my other two’s behavior rubbed off on her…. Barking at other people, dogs, being scared of a big plastic trash bag that the wind blew up in the air. Ugh. When things would happen I’d get as much distance as possible.>>
Hotels can be SCARY!!! Can you carry Mochi instead of have her on the ground? Or will she be happy in an airplane bag that you can carry on your shoulder? That can help her feel safer and more protected in a weird environment.
>> But the hyper-vigilance has stuck with her. I believe you said before this is normal teenage behavior?>>
Yes, to an extent, adolescent dogs can have bigger emotional reactions to strange or scary things. That gives us a framework to help them in advance, knowing that things might be weird or scary in certain situations. That is why I try to set things up to be comfortable in advance – so my small dogs all have been carried in airplane bags at hotels, because there is comfort in the enclosed environment and not walking near or towards scary things.
>>When we were at a station inside, near a common wall between apartment/indoor trading room, a large dog started barking from in the apartment. Mochi stopped work, looked at the apartment door and her tail went down. I was able to tug with her and get her back on track and happy.>
>>Then at our last station, outside and at the end of class, a big neighborhood dog started barking. She did the same thing. We went as far away as possible and I tried to get her to just take treats or tug, but no go for either, wouldn’t even take pnut butter. So we walked back inside and went on her cot and I treated her on her cot and she would eat. >>
She is definitely sensitive to large dogs barking – I think you have mentioned that she notices that at home too. And she is not wrong, necessarily – that is scary stuff to a small dog!!
I am glad she can eat on her cot. And I imagine her cot is relatively small 🙂 So I would bring it with you to her training stations and while waiting on line – if you hear a large dog bark, just go over to the cot with her (stop whatever else you are doing) and make cookies rain from the sky onto the cot. That can provide some associative learning in the form of big loud dog bark = safety on the cot and cookies cookies cookies 🙂
Or, you can throw a ball around if she loves balls.
And definitely do this at home when a neighbor dog barks, so the offending noise can be paired with really good things happening everywhere.
>>I apologize for this being so long, and not necessarily apply to our games.
But I’m concerned Mochi will end up having the same issues as Posh.>>It is good to talk about these things, so feel free to ask these questions at any time. And because social learning is so powerful. Mochi and Posh should probably not get paired up in any situation where Posh my display anxiety. If Paris is completely stable and relaxed in every situation, then Mochi can be paired with Paris. Are there any dogs in your class that Mochi loves and that are completely relaxed when big dogs bark? Maybe Mochi can stand next to those dogs, or work at the same station? For example, a friend of mine has a teenage BC puppy who is uncomfortable around men and when entering new buildings. So when we are at a trial together, I pair her puppy with my whippet puppy for the social learning aspect, because the whippet is happy to see everyone and go everywhere. It is fascinating to see the BC pup say “ok, I guess this is cool!”. I do not pair her BC pup with my BC mix pup, who is also a bit tentative in new locations – I don’t want them to affirm to each other that being tentative is how they should feel.
Let me know if this makes sense.
Tracy
Hi!
This is looking good! Most of the reps had really lovely connection to her as you cued the backside and then a really lovely shift of connection to the landing spot as you moved forward. That totally helped with commitment and the countermotion needed for this skill. The first rep on each side was the hardest for her, so on the first rep you can slow down your motion and exaggerate the shift of connection to looking at the backside.
>>When I rewatched this it looks like I’m blocking the wing a lot.>>
Yes – you were over-helping LOL!!! For the circle wraps, the positional cue is where the wing and bar meet so she can see the entire wing. If you push her past the wing like you were doing here, it will start to look like the beginning of the cue for the backside rear cross slice.
You can also use your dog-side arm a little less, to help this cue look different from the rear cross cue. If you have the dog-side arm come across your body, it will rotate your shoulders to the slice line. So for the circle wraps, you can cue her with the dog-side arm but don’t let the arm across you – the other arm can help with commitment as you shift your connection to the landing spot.
It sounded like you were saying “back” here – adding the verbal is great! Question: is this a different verbal from your backside slice verbal? I highly suggest an entirely different verbal for backside wrap versus backside slice because they are entirely different behaviors. She is fast and will need to get the info as early as possible and the different verbals will help with that.
She is bending really nicely here – I am really excited to see how well she is setting up the turn!!
Nice work! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
Great camera angle for the serps!!! You can be closer to the jump or the serp and rotated more so the center of your chest points to the center of the jump. From this camera angle, we should be able to see both of your shoulders.
And you can be super close to the jump, close enough to touch it so she gets the cue to come in and go back out for the serp (which is a positional cue very close to the bar).
>>I think I need to still release at the same spot (or at least just as I am passing the first wing – but not before it – even though I may lead out less or more as described above?>>
Yes – releasing in serp position (somewhere across the bar) will definitely help! And, being connected the whole time will make a big difference: partially because she won’t release until the verbal happens, and partially because she will see the line better.
At :20 and :31 you got threadles mainly I think because you were leading out without connection and releasing almost simultaneously with the connection – so she was watching you and came directly towards you. Having connection before the release will help her look at the line and not at you as much.
Note the connection at :45 when you cued the tunnel, and she got the tunnel 🙂 She doesn’t need a ton of connection, but she needs to see your face 🙂
The rep at :53 had good connection by not enough rotation. so she was not sure if it was tunnel or serp – adding more twist at the waist and even looking at your serp hand will help.
On the last couple of reps she came in over the jump nicely – good position for the release! Because you were further from the jump and moving away from it, you can see she came in over it towards you, but didn’t also turn back out like a serp. So stick nice and close to it like you did when you cued the tunnel.
On the ladder grid, she totally had some latent learning kick in and didn’t touch the noodles 🙂 Super!!! Her form is very powerful, so I agree with your assessment – the distance is a little too tight, so she couldn’t fit herself into it. Try expanding it by 6 inches or so and see if that is more comfy for her (if it is still too tight, you can expand it more!)
The tight blinds are percolating nicely! On the reps you did on one wing, you were really focused on mechanics and so they looked good. No worries about the timing because that will all get better when you don’t have to think about the mechanics as much. When you went back to them at the end of the video
Adding the tunnel does make it spicy! The hardest part of getting the connection on the tunnel exit to get her to commit to the wing: you were looking a little too far ahead and your arm was up blocking connection, so she exited the tunnel looking at you (like at :47). Then when you started the blind, she was not committed to the wing so changed sides on the flat.
So to be able to get it from the tunnel, you can ramp up the connection by dropping your arm back to her and looking down to her eyes, and watching where she is looking. You will see her look at the wing and get close to it… that is her ‘cue’ to you to start the blind. If you don’t see her look at the wing, you can’t start the blind 🙂
And this is MUCH harder with small dogs because it is much harder to see where they are looking! But it is great practice to be able to really connect and see her by looking downwards and pointing down to the ground – and that will make the blinds so much easier. You will be late at first, and that is fine 🙂 It will get easier and easier as the connection becomes second nature.
>>During these reps, I’m working on letting her tug, offering a treat as a trade & then presenting the toy again to “get it” & not just doing the next rep so that I’m not always taking the toy away from her. I just have to make sure she eats the dang treat & doesn’t choke on it! BOSTONS!>>
The tugging looked GREAT! She was really into the toy and I am glad she was able to go back and forth from the toy to the treat to the toy! And yes, she needs to SWALLOW the treat and not choke on it!
Great job here!
TracyHi! I am glad you posted, no worries if there were oopsies 🙂
Because of all the verbals, definitely give yourself a walk through before you try it with him, to make sure the left/right/wrap verbals are correct. And you can even video the handling without him, so you can be sure the physical cues are clear too.
And the serps – Your serp arm is back but your shoulders are rotating too far forward, almost like a post turn, with some motion away from the bar. Ideally you would keep your shoulders facing the bar and you moving parallel to it (and pretty close to it) until after he lands and turns to the reward. He did come in and take the jump when you were doing it as a post turn for most of them and he got it when you were moving away from the jump, but did not know what to do when you stayed on the serp line next to the jump and went past it, like at :56 and :59 or if you closed your shoulders too soon (like at 1:19)
So think of it as pointing the center of your chest to the center of the bar the whole time, even when you are past the center of the bar. You will feel the twist at your waist 🙂
And because it is such a hard skill, you can rotate the jump a bit so he can see the bar more easily. Your line will be the same – from the wing to the MM, not moving away – but seeing more of the bar will help him get it each time.
>>Did he start missing later in the session because of body language or changing the game and then going back made it less clear? And poor guy hit the bar -he was a little surprised because that hasn’t happened before.>>
I think he was confused by the cues and just started heading to the MM especially at the end. Be sure to live by the 2 failure rule: if you have 2 errors in the session (not even in a row, just in the session), you need to either make it easier to get success or stop and watch the video to see what is happening. The bar down at 1:01 was because you stopped moving and that surprised him, so he kind of landed on the bar.
You threw in a couple of threadles, like at :29, but hold off on those in this game for now – having the movement into them was a little over his paygrade for now. You can add them to the advanced level of the serp-tunnel proofing game, which will make more sense to him.
>> I think my body language was closed and he was reading it correctly based on what I was telling him.>>
Yes, so hopefully he got reset cookies in the moment. That will help keep him motivated as you sort out the handling he needs to see.
When you revisit this, try it was more of the upper body rotation and also looking at your serp hand (not at his cute face :)) and see if that helps him come over the jump, even with you staying nice and close to it 🙂 Let me know how it goes!
Tracy
Good morning!
>>>Here is my nemesis: rear crosses. I’ve always had a really rough time executing these.
One thing I firmly believe about rear crosses is that they are a trained cue (like threadles) and NOT a natural cue (like front crosses). So if you feel like they are hard? It is because they are hard LOL!!! No worries, we will get you and Lu happy with them because they are super useful (and were used successfully at the AWC this past weekend, including by Jessica Ajoux in her mind-blowing gold medal run!)
She definitely is a Border Collie in her responses to cues and pressure (in case you were wondering hahaha)
On the first GO at :06 and :14 you were looking a little too far ahead (not connected enough) and you were very close to the line, so she pushed away to the backside. BCs do this moving away to expand their field of vision to better see the cue, and also because the pressure of your proximity and speed naturally causes them to push away (other breeds just jump up and bite the handler haha so I am happy with the moving away :))
Good adjustment on rep 3 – you moved a little further from the jump and ran less, so there was less pressure (and the toy placed ahead helped too).
Then when you revisited the GO at :44 and 1:06 on the other side, she nailed it with the pressure, speed, and without the placed toy. Yay!
Looking at the RCs – if you place the toy, you can tuck it in next to the wing so she doesn’t run past the wing to it like at :50 🙂
This was a good RC session – it took you a couple of reps to lock into the timing of getting on the RC line and to the other side, so the first couple of reps were just a little late. Then you adjusted the timing and she sorted it out too (nice placement of reward from you!) so the last reps were spot on.
I think pictures of RC timing might be better than written descriptions, so I grabbed some screenshots so you can see what was late and what was timely 🙂 Here is a link to it:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jFjtiHTBXP02C5zNebPxTc8k3QlMm8VpQrr67fyjK44/edit?usp=sharing
So you are well on your way to RCs! Two things that can help her read them even better:
Don’t say Go 🙂 That is confusing because that always means straight line extension, and we don’t want to dilute that. Eventually the verbal can be a directional that matches the turn.
Shorten the distance a little and give yourself the tiniest head start (she is SPEEDY :)) so as she comes around the wing, you are a step or two ahead and she sees you moving to the center of the bar. Then as she passes you, you can keep applying the pressure to the line and get to the other side more easily, before she takes off.
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Hi!
I hope you are feeling better! Darn Covid 🙁 Hope you still had fun before you got sick.>>In Week 3 on the sends and serps the advanced level starts to move the wing so that we are sending to a backside. I dont remember introducing a backside verbal in a previous foundation session. Where did I miss that?>>
It is here in MaxPup 1 week 8:
A good warm up would be to review this game then add the backside to the send & serp game. The serps are hard so you can angle the serp jump to face him so he can see the bar more, if he struggles to come in for the serp as you move forward.
Keep me posted! Feel better!
TracyVery fun!!!
I think the first thing would be to make sure she is comfortable in a new environment: can she play tug? Can she eat treats? If so, you can train some skills. If not – that is the highest priority, so you will want to move away from anything she might have concerns about and see what motivates her in a new environment.Private lessons with a puppy can be tricky because it is very easy to over-work the puppy. So a couple of things:
– set a timer for every time the puppy is out to train something. I recommend 90 seconds. Then be finished and give her a break (and discuss what happened or review the video with Amy).
– if it is a handling game that requires precise skills, run it with one of your other dogs once or twice to make sure you have the handling correct, then bring baby Mochi out and try it
– because it is a new environment, start any skill at a criteria that is 50% easier than what she can do at home. If she is successful, then you can quickly ramp up the challenge. I would rather start with success and make it harder, than start with failure and have to dial it back.As for skills? Anything fast and fun! Tunnel/wing games, etc. I am sure Amy has a ton of super fun games 🙂
>>How young is too young to start Contact training?
She is a good age to do plank confidence work (like running across new planks in new places). If you are planning on running contacts, you can start shaping her to run across the mat. And you can also start the wobble board to get teeter confidence. As far as anything more challenging or involving real contacts? She is a bit too young for a whole lot yet, but she can start it soon!!
Keep me posted on how it goes!
TracyHi!
Nice session here with the ladder! She did really well – stays looked great, backchaining looked terrific and her form was really good!>>. I angled the jumps, but maybe when I did it, they were too far apart for her or she was tired. She got 1 jump & 2 jumps but for the 3 jumps she took all the pool noodles with her! Poor girl! (not that she cared – haha). >>
The straight line stuff was pretty perfect. On the first rep of the angled jumps, note the tiny delay in her response to the release, almost as if she was saying “wait, I gotta think about this” hahaha!! She had that tiny delay on both reps of the 2 jumps. She did not have that delay when you went to 3 jumps, but she plastered them LOL!!!
I agree, she didn’t seem sad about it and you were the best momma and gave her treats – so if that happens, you can ask for one more rep. That way you can try to sort out if it was a processing question and she can fix it, or if it is fatigue. And if you are pretty convinced it is fatigue or too hard, then that last rep can be on the 2 jumps again instead of all 3. Although I bet latent learning will kick in and she will be perfect next time!
>>I don’t want to muddy my “break” in the agility ring, so I don’t use it as a release for other things like a sit & or leave it. For those, I use “ok” which isn’t the best since I say “ok” a lot in day-to-day life, but I’m not doing competition obedience either, so I think I can get by with it. But what about “wait”? I think that should only be for agility too. Is there an alternate verbal that I can teach for day-to-day stuff instead? Like waiting at the door or when I put the food bowl down? I don’t like “stay” because it is too loaded a word for me – hahaha. Also, I have always taught that “wait” means hold until I release you and “stay” means wait until I come back to you and give you a reward. But to be honest, I never use “stay” and haven’t taught it to Bazinga.>>
I might need more caffeine to answer this properly hahaha!!! Yes, you are welcome to add different release verbals – for example, the formal “wait” can be for your agility start lines and tables. And you can do something like “hold on” that is less formal for the day-to-day stuff like putting food bowls down.
But another side of it is that dogs are absolutely brilliant at sorting out context so you can use the same verbals in different context, as long as you maintain criteria. For example, I use ‘stay’ on the start lines. And I also use it at home, when I am want the dogs to stay in a sit when I open a door. They seem to recognize the difference in contexts but also recognize that stay means ‘don’t move til the crazy momma says the next cue’.
So that next cue can be ‘break’ to go outside, or ‘get it’ to pick something up, or ‘go in your crate’ when they come into the house with muddy feet LOL!!! And ‘break’ in the agility ring has the very clear context cues of my position and the obstacles. The dogs don’t seem to have any questions and are not stressed at all, so I haven’t felt the need to add more verbals. So, it is not wrong to add more verbals, but it might not be necessary since we have so many verbals to remember anyway 🙂
Let me know what you think. Great job here!
Tracy
Hi! Really strong session here! She is so fun and so clever!
The rep at :56 – 1:00 was hilarious thanks for leaving it in – she started to come in for the serp, ended up in the tunnel and came back out when she realized you had said “get it” hahaha! Good girl!
She had just enough errors on the tunnel when you wanted the serp that we can help her out a bit more – the first step of helping out can be shifting your connection to your serp hand and shaking the hand a bit. You can also place the toy on the ground past the landing of the jump on the serp line so help give her a visual destination 🙂
If she is still wanting the tunnel, you can make the tunnel entry a little bit harder to find by moving the jump further away from it, or angling the tunnel entry so it is less visible.
She did have a bit of confusion about which end of the tunnel in the 2nd half of the session, probably because the curve of tunnel was confusing. She was correct at 1:10 and 1:18 to take the far end of it because that was more on the line based on your shoulder position and the closer entry is more of a threadle entry. Smart girlie! So having the jump on the other side of the tunnel so the tunnel curls towards you will make that clearer for her.
Nice work here!
TracyHi! Lots of good work here – it is really cool to see him reading the handling so well!
Super nice session with the tunnel versus serp! You did a great job making the verbals sound really different and also making the upper body look really different. He is totally paying attention to all that and responding beautifully. The last rep was interesting – you had your dog-side arm dropped back as if you were going to do a serp… then after you said “tunnel” you closed it forward. So you will see him read the serp arm for a heartbeat and come towards you, then read the closed shoulder and process the verbal and get the tunnel. Good boy!!!!
One adjustment on the serps – try to be a lot closer to the bar, close enough to touch it with a slightly bent arm. And as you move, stay parallel to the bar rather than move away from it. That will add challenge by keeping the lower body looking pretty identical for both cues (serp and tunnel) and ask him to jump into the pressure of you being close to the bar on the serp.
You can also add the advanced level of the threadle cue with you standing still for now – the verbal, position and arm cue will be different 🙂
Looking at the tunnel handling video – he definitely is showing strong commitment for a baby dog! You will find it easier if you spread it out more, so you can move more. That way you can time the verbal and physical cues sooner (things happen way too fast when it is close together LOL!)
>> I wasn’t always getting out the right verbals but he always seemed to go in the right direction
Yes, he was reading the physical cues even when the verbal was not right. To be able to spit out all the verbals, you can do a walk through without him or even run Skipper through it make sure you have the verbals and timing.
You were working to get the verbals out on time and most of the time you did it really well! Having thing spread out (the wings can be 20 feet or so from the tunnel) will buy you time. For example, as he rounds the wing, you will have time to say tunnel then switch to the left/right or GO, and match the physical cue to it. He was moving fast here so you barely had time to breathe (high quality problem haha!)
>> and it’s pretty obvious when our connection was off.>>
Yes, but in general your connection was lovely. If it gets off and he ends up not being sure of where to be, you can try to keep going even if it means just cuing the tunnel then rewarding 🙂 And if you spit out the wrong verbal and he still tries to find the line like at :40, you can totally reward right away (there was a delay there).
It looks like he really liked the ball too! Was he bringing it back pretty quickly?
Looking at the rear cross video:
>>. I used the manners minder but still caught his checking in with me as drove across the jump. I am guessing that is normal? >>
He actually was asking a very good question 🙂 The checking in was as he was exiting the wing wrap – you were not really moving yet and not saying anything, so he looked at you because he needed more info. As soon as you started moving – he stopped looking at you. Yay! So, definitely move sooner so he gets the info as he is exiting the wing.
To give him time to get past you, adding distance between the wing and jump here will be helpful too – that way you can move sooner and also he will have room to get past you to the jump. Try it at a 20 foot distance.
Using the manners minder is something that he likes, but without balancing with the Go reps (where he would go straight and not towards the MM), I think the MM was creating the behavior and not letting you get feedback on the timing 🙂 For example, on the last 3 reps (:46, :54, 1:00), the RC info was late (you ran straight then cut in towards him as he go to the bar) so without the MM, he probably would not have read the cross. So for the next session, you can try one of these 2 things –
– the MM can be there, but also do GO reps so he doesn’t anticipate that it is always to the MM
– do the reps with the thrown the reward, so he will let you know if the timing is clear or not 🙂Overall, it is really exciting that things are going really well so we are only looking at timing and verbals and little details of handling. Great job with these! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
