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Good morning!
It is so interesting that she will happily move to the empty right hand but not the left hand as much. You were spot on to go to luring her in with a treat and then you used both hands which was also helpful. Excellent adjustment to get her happy on that side and she was much happier by the end of the session.
The other thing you can add to the left hand is hand touches where she just boops your left palm with her nose then gets a reward. That can build up the left hand love too.
She worked most of the Fold It In game on your left side with no concerns about being on your left so maybe try the collar grabs in a different location and see if there is something about the location that made the left hand hard?
Her face on the first rep of the Fold It In game was so cute! She looked at the bowl, looked at you, then looked at the line to the cone. She was calculating what she needed to do to get the cookie! Excellent patience on your part to let her work it out and get it right.
After that, she was quite lovely with looking at the line immediately. She was also terrific on the other side, and you got the bowl all the way around the cone. Brilliant!!! You can get the cone all the way around the wing on the other side too, and also try it with a toy.
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
>Love this! I am learning so much from you! Breaking down the behavior like this!
>I am so glad you are enjoying being a bit nerdy with me 🙂 It is fun to understand how their brains work!
>My “cooperative” little puppy went feral at class last night LOL! >
Ha! I love it! She was the life of the party!
>I brought a bully stick for when the instructor was talking, but that backfired this time. She was all about the bully or just wanted check out everything else, including her neighbors.>
You can use the bully stick as a tug toy, especially if she might be tugging.
> We went on a bunch of objects again, this time a play tunnel came out. She was GAME ON! She knows a tunnel from when she was just a wee one. Sunnie – tunnel= in & out by herself back & forth, then we jump on the tunnel>
Hilarious! Be sure to get video even if it is silly – you will cherish how cute she is!
The prop game went really well!
>My YES marker is run to me for reward. I don’t think she knows it yet & I think I needed to add movement to myself to drive her back to me.>
I agree, she is still learning that yes involves running back to you, but you were adding hand movement and a TON of praise which helped her come back. Reaching into your pocket drove her to you immediately 🙂 You can also add in shaking your cookie hand. I figure she will figure out that ‘yes’ has a ton of value before she wakes up tomorrow morning 🙂
Her plankrobatics look great! He is very confident getting on it and was really good about turning around while keeping all 4 feet on it! Very coordinated for a baby dog! Her down was also very balanced. All of that is also a great foundation for future fitness work.
This plank is a perfect size for her current size, so you can maybe put a folded towel under one end of it to make it wobble the tiniest bit. Then you can repeat the challenges you showed her here: can she still do it while the board is moving a little?>I have a teeter plank buried under the snow. One day we’ll be able to use it! lol!>
Ha! This winter has been way too long already.
Her barrel wraps are going great! She is speed and confident. No trouble when you were standing up, no trouble when you moved the barrel away. SUPER! We add to this game in the next set of games. To prepare for that, you can start to fade out the bowls by putting them behind you even more. And you can also try this with a toy in your hand – tug before you start, then have the toy in your hand either as the reward to replace the cookie, or while you still drop cookies in the bowls. The toy can be in your armpit if you are rewarding with treats so you can enough hands to get the treats out.
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Hi!
>I don’t even know where I am anymore, I don’t think it is Florida!!!! Do.Not.Like!>
I know! WHAT THE HECK, FLORIDA haha
>All my dogs choke with treats & training. Brachy dangers!>
You might have to make slower transitions, or use treats that just slide down. When I had a tiny 2 lb Papillon, I would use tiny strings of shredded cheese. No choking!
> He is better about his harness being held than a real collar. Maybe the collar has hands going closer to his face? >
This is entirely possible! Many small dogs are sensitive to that, especially because it is right near their eyes.
>I need to try that again and make sure to touch the collar from above & behind vs from the front & next to his face.>
Try lining him up next to you or between your feet, then come in from the side/behind and see how he feels.
>We did Plankrobatics! He liked it!
It looked great! His Meerkat is the cutest thing ever and also – nice strength there in his legs and core!
His plank work went really well too. You can elevate the plank a bit. Or, if you have access to a longer plank, get him running across it to see how feels with the wind in his hair 🙂
>Folding It in (sniff, so sad & now such an epic tribute)>
SO SAD! She was way too young. I need to go watch Best In Show and sing along with God Loves A Terrier in her honor.
I admit to snorting in laughter when he almost feel over driving to the bowl when you were letting go of his harness LOL! I guess he likes treats LOL! He did great! You can keep moving the bowl around the cone til he passes it.
You can hold your hand point a little longer before you let him go – at this point it is to pair the hand point as the cue for the forward focus. As the bowl gets to harder spots, the hand will actually cue him to focus forward (so hold him until you see where he is looking).
He did well with the toy! One thing you can do is hold the other end of the toy and when he is moving towards it, you can start sliding it for him to chase. That will be more exciting as a reward than the dead toy.
Great job here!
TracyHi! The wing wrapping looks fabulous! I agree – he loves it!! Not a lot of feedback needed here because it looks so great!
He is ready for the next level which is coming next Monday. In the meantime, a couple of higher level things you can do:
– we can fade out his targets by making them smaller (maybe just 2 inches big) or just use a piece of duct tape on the ground on either side 🙂
– you can break this up with toy play and see if he can still go wrap while you are holding a toy.
Have you decided on what you’d like your wrap verbals to be ?
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
He did great on the teeter here! Brave little pup!! He can totally keep doing plankrobatics with the teeter nice and low like this.
Only one suggestion –
Try not to lure him with a cookie hand, for two reasons:
– luring prevents offering behavior so he is not thinking about his body as much
– luring brings his head up really high, which changes his balance.So you can have cookies available but let him move around freely on it, slam it, jump on and off, and do a sit or turn around when cued (then get rewarded with his chin lower.
Great job!
TracyHi!
He is so cute, his markings make it look like he is wearing pants 🙂
Yes, the plank was easy! Yay! You can elevate it – maybe put some books under it? – to add a bit of challenge for hopping on it and hopping off of it.
He is definitely getting the barrel wraps!! He appears to be a lefty – he found it pretty easy to go to his left (towards your left) around the barrel. But it was harder to go to his right – he either had a small blooper or had to really think about it. So you can keep the barrel in closer when he is turning to his right (heading to your right hand) and move it further away when he is turning to his left.
Sitting didn’t seem to bother him at all so for the next session: begin sitting like you were here and then when he has had a few successful reps, change to standing up. Since we are changing your position, you don’t need to also move the barrel further away.
Skipping ahead to wrapping the step stool – he did great here too! We also see this left side preference: every time he had to go to his left he was perfect. The right turn reps were harder but he was consistently getting it right (maybe only one blooper where slid in between you and the stool, and you were great about not reacting at all).
When we get to the turn and burn game, we will want him to start with left turns (starting on your right side).
I think he really like the ‘folding it in’ game with the cone! He was slippery!! You can add in a hand cue to point at the cone, to help indicate that he should look at it. He was looking at it anyway here in this session (good boy!) but the hand cue will help for the next session where you can totally keep moving the cookie target around the cone so he eventually has to pass it to get to the cone.
>I tried to do our toy races first but he already knew I had a bag of treats so he had no interest in the toy, I even put the treats away and he kept looking for them.>
You can do toy races before you even take out the food to get him happy with the toy. You can also play it with a lotus ball!
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>I’m definitely not a stealthy thrower or even good at throwing >
Ha! I scrutinized the video because I couldn’t really see the placed toy, but I couldn’t see you throw it. It was magically there 😂😝
>I think a lot of things are playing into mainly adolescence!!! >
Yep, adolescence is a beast. Impulse control behaviors? Nope! Risk taking grabby behaviors? Yep. We will get him through it though 🙂
> He’s starting to amp the arousal up so that’s playing into all of this. >
Yes, but it could also be a frustration from not understanding how to get the toy and why your demeanor changes after he grabs your flesh. I think sorting out the play stuff will go a LONG way to balancing and optimizing arousal. The little red puppy in the sit-tug-sit video is about to turn 2 years old and I have not had bitey arousal issues because he understands the toy play parameters. And he is half Malinois and they are BITEY 😂 I feel that Quill will be the same: a relaxed, happy 2 year old because we are going to sort it out here at 10 months old.
>Just like my human teens!>
Human teen brains undergo the same crazy changes that dog teen brains undergo 🙂
>Today I did the serp and sends and just used food. It wasn’t lost on me that just using food persevered my limbs>
Food and toys that don’t require tugging (balls, hollee roller, etc) are powerful motivators for Quill!! You’ve built a vast toolbox of motivators so you don’t need to use tugging right now if you are getting chomped.
>If I do use a toy for training it can’t be furmania lol!!!>
Yes, you can use boring toys 🙂
>He did great on the Serps. No questions going to left. The right he first had questions, broke it down and by the end he was equal both directions!!!>
Yes, nice job breaking it down for him! He looked great and is ready for you to move faster now 🙂 When you do add more speed, you should start with the jump angled a bit to face him so he can see the bar fairly well. That was he can be successful with the added challenge of you jogging or running. When he is successful with that, you can flatten it back out.
The FC balance reps were lovely too – fabulous connection really helped hm!
>Ignore my frustration with my treat n train! It seems it can’t do its job correctly! Ugh!!! Will be long for other disc so maybe it can actually dispense a cookie.>
Ha! I have given up on my TnT. It just lives on my front porch like a garden gnome now because it was making me so mad LOL!
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>YT was a real bugger today. Hours to upload videos.>
Yes, YouTube sometimes gets weird! Drives me nuts sometimes!
The zig zags went well! He is holding his stay beautifully and seems to have no trouble doing it to both sides. Yay!
Agreed – the 4 wings was too hard for now, no worries though. The quickness of doing the zig zag is more important than the # of wings. How far apart were the wings here? You can move them together even more and challenge him (and you!) to see how fast you can do them 🙂 If they were at 4 feet apart, try them at 2 feet apart.
Sends and serps –
This went really well! On the dog on left rep, you were pulling away from the jump rather than staying parallel to the bar. Dog on right (2nd side) was very parallel to the bar and he did great! So stay parallel to the jump on the dog-on-left side too. I think having the toy on the ground gave you a visual spot to move to.
You can start adding more speed to your motion to build up to running. When you do this, angle the jump on the first couple of reps so he can see it well and get it right because motion can be very distracting!
>Even after watching the demo video again, I still feel like I’m not doing something right on the FC part.>
On the FC wraps, you are moving to the other side of the jump. To do the proofing challenge here, you will stay on the same side of the jump as the serp – but you do a FC to get him on your other side. So the direct of your motion is basically identical on all reps but on the FC rep, you rotate your feet to pick him up on the other side (non serp side) of you.
Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi!
>Did some more discrim and I’ve decided she really has no clue what those verbals mean. Should I separate them or help physically so she’ll be more correct?>
Nice job with the verbals sounding so different on a lot of the reps! That really helps her learn to discriminate – it is partially the word, partially the sound that she is responding to.
The bloopers here might be due to the context: It is possible that she does not recognize the wrap exists with the tunnel right there. Moving the wing away is a possibility and also having it closer and using handling is a possibility.
If she fails twice, add the handling help after you use the verbal. That can help her understand that yes, we might wrap a wing with a tunnel right there, or drive to the tunnel with the wing right there.
After a blooper, though, line her up with a reset cookie. You can see she was getting frustrated and the reset cookies help keep her in the game.
The pillbug game went great! Nice job with your connection and she knew exactly where to go! You can add in the blind crosses and the 2nd tunnel setup to the advanced games!
Looking at the set point: This is going well too! Nice job mixing in stay rewards! And she did well with the moving target.
Small detail: That first bar can stay at 4” so there is an upward view of the 2nd bar.
Overall, no changes needed other than to try to be further away from the 2nd jump when you release her. If you are too close, she is not powering into the grid (1:10) but when you were further ahead (last rep) her form was great! So being at least 10 feet past jump 2 when you release should work really well.
On the minny pinny: She is moving through it really well on the angles where she turns towards you. And she did really well turning away in both directions! Yay!
To help prep for the neutral position where she really has to listen to the verbals with no physical cues: say the verbal 3 or 4 times before you let her go. You were saying it and letting go at the same time – it was not a problem on the easier challenges but we do want her to hear and process the verbals before she moves on the harder challenges.
Great job!!
Tracy
Hi! She did really well here!
The serps are going really well overall – you were able to get further ahead which definitely set the line to the serp. You can mix in throwing rewards for sending to the wing, so the value of the send remains high.And if something goes sideways on the send to the wing for whatever reason (like at 1:25), it is better to reset her at your side with a cookie and send again. Trying to send from where she had stopped will not be as clean as resetting then sending again.
>Took her a bit to clue into the wrap rather than the SERP. >
Part of that was it was hard for her to see the connection when you switched to the serp – for example at :19 & :25 your shoulders were closed forward (arms at your side will close your shoulders and block connection). So she didn’t see the new connection and only saw motion to the serp line.
Staying in the gap between the wing and the jump definitely helped! More connection directly to her eyes will help too. We got a really good view of it at 1:15 on the other side – you were looking at her and in the gap which helped! Note how your left hand is next to your leg – you will get better connection (and better responses from her) if you point your left hand to her face to open up your shoulder more
>Had a couple of MM bloopers,>
I think on some of the successful reps you might have been clicking it early so you wait until she is landing from the bump to click it.
>Also tried the more advanced – had to angle the jump for her to be successful. >
She was great about going to the backside!! Angling the jump helped her get the complete behavior (backside AND take the jump) so leave it angled when you revisit it again.
>Started with harness hold for release, she got a bit bitey after about 4 of these so I decided not to fit her and just send from where we were.>
The video didn’t show the line ups – were you able to line her up with a cookie, then deliver another cookie for the collar hold? All the cookies LOL!!!
>Afterwards we played tunnel send – not on video. No hesitation – even sending her past a wing to the tunnel — no hesitation.>
Excellent!! Sounds like fun!!
Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi!
>Pattern games are so helpful for keeping her focused and working far enough away when a dog turns a corner, etc., so she can stay engaged and not worry.>
I agree, pattern games are helpful for that plus also great for outside the ring at trials!
>I currently use dig dig to mean left or right wrap. But I swear with this dog, I am actually going to teach left/right and transition that into our turn and burn games, etc.>
Perfect! Ideally, you will want a wrap-left, wrap-right, soft-left, soft-right for the front side of the jump.
>Back is a backside wrap.Do you also have a backslide slice verbal?
>Spot will be her 2o2o dog walk, aframe Bang will be 4 on teeter.>
Perfect!
>I still need to pick a forward focus word and start teaching it. I will probably use look.>
>Tunnel soft turn – soft name call (not taught yet) Tunnel tight turn HEY HEY (not taught yet)>I have found that with tunnels, I can use the same verbals as jumps (such as left or right) and the dogs totally understand it. As long as they hear it before they go into the tunnel, they know exactly what to do. And that means one less set of verbals to train!
>We don’t do too many threadles in AKC trials since I don’t do Premier but we atually do quite a few in my seminars. I haven’t named them as I don’t use them that often but I keep saying I want to do more UKI.>
We start naming them here and it is easy enough, but they are not a super high priority for now.
Strike a pose is going really well! She is driving in to the target hand nicely – you can look at it (instead of her :)) to get even more direct drive. You had your “X” marker going too which is great – just try to say it before you move the hand. You can also move to a toy as the reward, and if she is happy with that you can work on getting the toy to the ground as the reward.
>I can’t see on the first side but on the second side I’m clearly moving my arm towards her instead of staying stationary. Video catching me again.>
Video sees everything LOL!! Yes, keep that left hand stationary 🙂 I think your right hand (first side here) was stationary.
Nice work!
Tracy
Hi!
I think the game changer in the potty department is going to be doing first-thing-in-the-morning walks: out of the crate and into a long walk to potty elsewhere. It might be a pain in the butt but will be worth it! And you might even want to take her on an overnight trip where you can do the first thing in the morning walk in an entirely new location. Hotels might be challenging but maybe someone has a guest room you can stay in?
T
Hi!
He worked beautifully here in the snow! Eek!
He was definitely working to sort out the rear crosses. You can start the session by having him go straight past the prop (no RC) just to get him driving ahead, which makes the RC easier (and mix in some straight reps throughout the session to maintain the driving ahead).
When adding the RCs: You can get the info to him sooner by staying closer to him at the beginning (no need to step away laterally because it puts you further from the line). Then as he starts moving forward to the prop, you can cut behind him and keep moving forward. That way he sees you on the new side before he arrives at the prop. On the early reps here, you were waiting til he was at the prop before cutting over. But on the last few reps you were staying closer and cutting in behind him a lot sooner – that last rep in particular was spot on and he got it! Yay!!!!
Nice work here!
Tracy
Hi! The turn and burn game is off to a great start here! For this game, you can use his toy (or frisbee) to get him really excite to chase you when you do the FC.
For the next session, add the line on the ground (can be a leash or something similar) at the exit of the wrap – when he gets to the line, you can do the FC and run 🙂 Then the line and progressively move bit-by-bit around the barrel back towards his starting point, which means you can do the FC earlier and earlier.
Nice work here!
Tracy
Excellent question! The easiest way to do it will be to get you low enough to the ground that Briny can touch your hand then go to the toy. But we don’t want you to be bending over to do this (so your back doesn’t get angry 🙂 ) The easiest thing to do might be to get something low and comfy to sit on. I have used things like a low ottoman, or one of those inflatable balance donuts, or a hard plastic cooler that carries my snacks and drinks to trials LOL! Eventually you will be standing without having to bend over, but for now we don’t want the jumping up so a comfy sitting position is the best bet.
Tracy
