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Good morning!
>When I first get home, everyone is “excited” so maybe that’s the time to start a training session with play (no food on me)? >
Yes! A quick blast of training is great as long as it doesn’t cause too much madness 🙂
>Or should I mix it up start with exercise & then try toy play with no food on me?>
I like to mix things up a lot because dogs are very quick to catch onto our routines. If I always feed them at 5pm, they will be very demanding at 4:55pm 🙂 And if I always play when I get home, the arousal levels will get really high when I get home and maybe too high (and I don’t always want to play :)) Mixing things up is exciting in a good way and avoids the dogs expecting things to happen at certain times.
>We have been getting unseasonable weather – high 80’s – that’s summer temps not April temps! All the dogs asre feeling it and human too >
Same here – 95 degrees today. What the heck? Hopefully things get more normal soon.
Looking at the video:
She seemed to really love that toy and was very into it at the beginning! She won the toy race but also turned to you to engage with the toy (and didn’t take it on a victory lap): that is awesome! Doing 2 reps was fast and fun. Perfect.
The rocking horses also looked great – nice job with the handling and the verbals, she seemed to have zero questions.
Since the barrel was nearby when you were playing tug, you can do one toy race and if she is into it: run to the barrel and do a bit of turn and burn. Or have 2 barrels nearby to do rocking horses for the toy as the reward.
Well done with the threadle wrap foundations! You nailed the decel – that allowed her to drive directly to you AND be ready for the turn away. Massive click/treat to you!
We build on this in the 9th games package, so you can add running then decelerating into it if you want, or shelve it for now to work on other games 🙂
>I think Sunnie did great despite the weather, we had no wind so no flying leaves to contend with! >
Totally agree! One thing my young dogs have taught me is that heat is a pretty big distraction! Their brains are like WHAT IS THIS so they have to devote a lot of brain energy to regulate body systems that they don’t ordinarily have to regulate when they are in our lovely climate controlled homes LOL! So you might see certain struggles outside in the heat because her brain is dealing with a whole new set of things to process. But it won’t take her long to adjust, especially because her breed & lines are bred to handle different climates and work hard outdoors.
Great job!
TracyGreat job with the games here! The opposite arm stuff can be weird for us humans at first but you did a fantastic job of applying it to help your girls. And I love hearing that you used it successfully at trials already ) Yay! Onwards to blind cross fun!
Tracy
Good morning!
The find-the-line game is off to a great start! Bummer about the video! If it all went as well as this, you can switch to the other side and add in 2 more elements:
– getting closer to the tunnel entry so she has to drive ahead of you to find the jump as you move forward
– sending to the tunnel entry from as far away as possible so you are past the jump when she exits the tunnel, to challenge her to still find the jump and not skip it to chase you 🙂
Aelfraed can add the same concepts to you can both use the same setups 🙂Was the mountain climber game her first introduction to the full teeter board, especially with it going all the way up? Great job rewarding each step of the way at the beginning – it looks like she was a bit doubtful about it on the first rep but then realized it was a super delicious obstacle 😂 By the 3rd rep, her tail was high and wagging as she got on. And you and Kyla were very generous with the yogurt, which made it as high value session. After lifting her off the board, you can also tug a bit to keep her pumped up.
When she sees this a few more times and starts to blast up it, we can place the reward on a target attached to the top of the board, so Kyla can be faded out. Aelfraed is going to get a pie crust holder (duct tape and deep spoons are usually perfect for that) and you can use that too for a yogurt holder 🙂
Nice work here!
Tracy
Good morning!
He did a great job finding the line to the jump on the first video! You can start throwing the reward even earlier – as soon as you see him lock onto the line, you can throw it so he keeps looking forward. When you were closer to the jump, he could easily find it while also looking at you to track the throw 🙂 when you were further from the jump, he had to look forward more because you were too far away from him to find the jump AND watch you. Super!
When you switch to the other side, you can add 2 things:
– going in closer to the tunnel so he drives ahead of you to the jump
– Sending to the tunnel more so you are past the jump as he exits the tunnel: will he still find it, or will he skip it to chase da momma?The mountain climber went really well! As soon as he realized that he could blast up the teeter for pie crust, he was a very happy camper! I think he was decelerating a bit because of the pressure of Auntie Pie Crust there holding the treats, so you can play with attaching something to the end of the board to hold the pie crust (or any bread reward LOL): a serving spoon duct taped to the end of the board so it sticks out just enough that he runs to the end and grabs his snack might be ideal!
He did well with the motion override game! He figured out very quickly that is had something to do with a stopped position – you can isolate the specifics of the position by moving very slowly, almost marching in place, and saying sit, down, or stand.
Using a ‘wait’ cue to let him choose his position is great. I use this concept at the start line: a stay cue and the dog gets to choose the position. It is very successful and gives the dogs a lot of agency in that moment. He was great with his stand here!! You can add more motion to this game using the wait cue.
>He was pretty confused as to why we weren’t doing equipment and ran away to do obstacles a couple of times.>
Motion towards the obstacle generally cues commitment, so I can see his argument here especially after the lazy games 🙂 He did well when you were moving but not towards any obstacle.
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
>should probably revisit it occasionally.>
I revisit the find my face game a lot – it is a fun goofy game in isolation 🙂 Also as the sequences get bigger and as the pups get closer to trial age, they begin to understand that it is the human side of things that is messing up and this game gives them a way to be patient with my screw ups haha!
>Words and I are often not friends, which is why I tend to end up with minimal words. I’m trying though! >
Yes, all the verbals are the hardest part of agility (soooo many words!). Most of the mess ups with verbals are because we switch to the other side in the middle of a session, or don’t plan before the dog comes into the session – and random words come out of our mouths. Oops! I am guilty of this for sure.
One thing you can do is give yourself a walk through before you run the sequences with her, and video it 🙂 Pretend you are handling the invisible Bokeh, and be connected and use your verbals. This is a game we do in the CAMP class because it helps the handling and verbals, and I have been playing with the possibility of having the MaxPup 3 crew do it too 🙂
On the Timing & Connection video: lovely work! Your connection was spot on which helped you nail the timing. Super!! Your motion was lovely too – she seems to have zero questions at all, zipping around it really well.
>Jumps are at 10″.>
She is about 13 months now? And probably 20 inches tall, approx? You can put one of the ‘easy’ bars at 12” and see how she does. An easy bar is a relatively straight line, like the jump after the tunnel here.
On the wrap video:
One thing that is important to note here and on the other videos is how you are working to be sure the stay releases are not paired with arm movement or re-connection on the lead out. You are very consistent with that and it is helping to support a solid stay. Click/treat to you 🙂
This session went great! I agree that she did really well here. Your timing was spot on again! The decel and verbal were well-timed (starting as she was at the previous jump) so she was able to set up the collection for the wrap easily. Super nice!
One small detail – as you decel into the wrap, keep your connection back to her (rather than facing forward and connecting peripherally). When you were connected back to her more, you had the best turn and she didn’t need to even glance at you (like at :32). When you were a facing forward a bit too much, your shoulders closed forward and that blocked connection. That caused her to look at you and tick the bar at 1:00.Great job here!!! You can add in the sends and blinds too!
Tracy
Good morning!
>Gave him a break in between each one. Pretty hot today so we waited until after 5:00!>
Ugh! What a weird spring we are all having. It will be 95 degrees here today… then back into the 40s next week.
The motion override game went really well. This is also a good obedience game! He did a great job.
That first response to the sit cue at the beginning was impressive! It was pretty immediate! I think you were moving faster n the 2nd rep so he didn’t sit: but then you were a shade slower on your movement on the next reps and he sat really well.
These were all dog-on-left so of course I will now bug you to also do dog-on-right 🙂
Adding tugging in between the reps will all be useful – it will help hold his attention on the game even with all of the interesting things in the environment, and it will keep him in higher arousal so he learns to stop and stay even when he is a bit wilder, internally 🙂
Countermotion on wings:
Your mechanics of indicating the wing behind you were very clear so his commitment looked lovely!Another really good moment was when he got distracted by something in the environment at 1:22, so he was trying to respond and ignore the distraction but couldn’t find the wing. In that moment, you did a couple of tricks to get him re-focused. PERFECT! That helped raise his arousal in a way that focused him and helped him tune out the distraction. Then he finished with a perfect rep – lovely!!!
On the 2nd video:
You picked up where you left off and he was great. Adding your motion of running away for the reward moment was great and then doing 2 wraps in a row really pumped him up. You had really clear connection plus his commitment looks good, so the wraps were lovely in both directions.The motion and tugging helped him stay engaged in those in-between moments where you were getting the toy set up, moving to the next wing, etc for most of the video.
At 2:30ish, he checked out to chase a distraction. Was it because he had reached his brain limit (adolescent dogs most definitely have a brain limit and his brain was doing hard work here!). Or was it because you were petting him a lot in that moment and we already know that petting is not his favorite thing (especially when he is in higher arousal). So he took a break to chase but then came back pretty quickly then finished strong. Good job ended the session pretty quickly after that.
To help get rid of the break-to-chase moments, you can do 3 reps then take a 20 second break in the middle: take him off to the side, toss some treats in the grass, let him sniff to clear his brain… then back to the training.
Also, we will keep track of whether petting him during tugging is correlated to any checking out. I am not against petting during tugging, but only if the dog likes it. It equate it to being ready to go into the ring and I am all pumped up and focused… and someone comes over and gives me a hug. ICK! I don’t like that at all (there are a couple of people in my area who do that and I avoid them at all costs LOL!) so I can see Brioche’s view on that too 🙂 Even the dogs that are very cuddly outside of training might get the ick from being petted during training, so it is something to watch for.
You can move on to the next steps on this game – more running (he will like that), earlier rotation, and of course the race tracks around the outside.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi! This also went well!
He had a little trouble with the middle jump here at the beginning but found everything else really well. It took him a moment to settle into the sequence. Excitement plus the bombardment of stimuli in the great outdoors plus handler motion is HARD! But he did really well. So fun 🙂
One of the reasons he was going around past it was likely because he was trying to widen his field of vision to be able to see your cues and the sequence (easier to do from a distance). Being able to throw the toy on the line will help him understand that he doesn’t need to watch you directly – he can watch the jumps.
You were throwing the toy here towards the end and he was pretty good about not going too far with it! You can throw it then call him back to you for another reward, then set up for the next rep.
When he was finding the lines, the wraps were easy. It is hard to find the timing when you were probably thinking about letting him commit, so it will get even easier as he gets more experience. The timing will be earlier as the bars get higher, but for now we want the commitment first and foremost so working this with low bars was ideal! You can always start a session with a quick lazy game commitment warm up, which will make getting the timing of the other cues even easier.
Well done here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Omg! Outdoors on grass!! Love it! He seemed super happy to be outdoors and this session was mostly about showing him that agility is also an outdoor game!He was trying to balance the outdoor environment, going faster (grass is GREAT footing!), reading cues AND finding jumps. I could see his brain doing all the calculations 🙂 and he was 10000% engaged with you. Yay!
As he sorts out his commitment in new environments, try to look at him as he exits the tunnel rather than try to handle the line or jump. When you were trying to handle the jump, the accelerated motion when he was on your right was pushing him past it. And the shoulder turn when he was on your left was pulling him off it on the inside.
You were able to get him on the jump by rotating into him then sending him back out, but I think dialing back the motion will make it easier. Motion can ‘cloud’ the cues for dogs that are sensitive to motion cues. And being sensitive to motion cues is a GOOD thing in a sport that requires so many motion cues 🙂
At the beginning of the session, a quick re-visit of the lazy game is a good warm up: you can walk up the line (for now, a casual springtime stroll :)) and look at him – then throw a reward when he finds the jump.
He was really starting to lock in on the lines at about 5:20. It was definitely easier for him to go to his right (your left side) but I did a happy dance when he got it on your right (to his left) as well at the end! SUPER!
One thing I noticed on those super successful reps was that you were not trying to move fast – you were just showing great connection and turning. That worked beautifully. You probably don’t even need to use your arm as much – that made it harder to see the connection on the middle jump when he was working further away.
Try not to mark misses – just keep going and toss rewards when he finds a jump, in the lazy game style 🙂 Marking and stopping was hard for him to process and teenage boys need to keep moving to keep processing 🙂 You can see he was actually moving more after a misses were marked and you were like “dude, stop moving” LOL!!!
For the rewards: It might be hard for him to find the treats in the grass – you can try a couple of reps with giant cheeseballs that are easy to see. Treats are more efficient to throw if he can find them. You can also throw a toy (a hollee roller is perfect for this) – how quickly will he bring it back? A 2 second romp then coming back to you for another toy or treat can be really helpful: he gets rewards out on the line and you don’t spend too much time trying to get him to come back to you for the next rep 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning! Lots of lovely work here! I really like how you get rewards to her all the time, when things go perfectly AND when there is a blooper (there were very few bloopers but she still got rewards and happy engagement). It is strong dog training to do that and very motivating! Click/treat to you 🙂
Looking ahead video:
This went great! She was happily running to the jump without needing a lot of help from you. Your toy throws were spot on: early enough to reward the commitment and landing before she looked back at you.You can add in more motion now, especially with you getting way ahead of her: can she still find the jump when you are ahead and going fast?
The rep on the wrap video also went great! The timing of your decel was really good and it was really clear too – her collection was lovely! She had a little question (looked at you) on the jump after the tunnel – I think it was because you were moving forward but decelerated, so she was looking to see if you wanted a tight turn. You can add more acceleration on that line and that will keep her looking forward.
Straight line combos:
The first video was the 2 jump warm up.
The wrap can have a bit more decel to it but I think that will happen when the GO is more solid on the bigger sequences.The RC was good here! Nice job driving to the center of the bar.
The backside push can have more connection all the way through to when she gets to the backside wing. Keep your dog-side arm back, and deliver the push cue directly to her eyeballs as you run to where the wing and bar meet. That will help her find the backside more easily.
Adding the tunnel:
The wrap was super good!She had a question on t he rear cross: you can run straight to the middle of he bar until she is passed you and locked onto the bar. At 1:34 you cut your feet across to the RC line before she passed you which pushed her off the jump. You ran more to the center of the bar at 2:17 and she got it nicely – on that rep, you were actually a little too far ahead. You can start close to the tunnel so you can accelerate of the line and not need to decel at all to let her get ahead of you.
She was looking at you on the GO rep at the end and the GO rep on the 2nd video and straight reps of the 3rd video, maybe because you had one a bunch of turns in a row? Your line and connection all looked good, so you can add in more GO reps in the session mixed in with the turns to keep the Go lines strong too 🙂 The wrap rep in the 3rd video went well – she was looking at you so responded really well. The Go reps were definitely harder for her on that setup.
You can also place the toy at the end of the Go line to race her to it – if you get there first, you win (toy races!). That will also help keep her looking forward.
On more thought on the 3rd video: When adding the jump before the tunnel – when you add the jump, look for the shortest, fastest line back to the tunnel after the wrap. In this case, wrapping her to the left puts her on a straight line to the tunnel so it is the faster line. And it sets up easier handling, because you don’t need to stay near 1 to step her back to the tunnel.
When you turned her to her left at :58, you were past the jump after the tunnel as she exited the tunnel. That was a couple of steps ahead of where you were on the previous reps – s0 turning to the left also gives you a positional advantage on course! She is super speedy so we will definitely want any positional advantage we can get.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Good job sorting out the mechanics of getting him close to your leg then turning him away! It was easier on your left side at first but then he had a lightbulb moment and was able to get it on your right side too. I think the hard part was getting him close enough to your leg to set up the turn away – when he was close to your leg, he was perfect every time after that.
You can add in motion with you moving forward then decelerating as you start the cues for him to lock onto your hand. I think you will have to be leaning over for now so he really sees your hand down low. Maybe the easiest thing so your back doesn’t get angry is to move forward upright, then decelerate and drop your hand down low to lock him into the beginning of the cues.
We will be adding the barrel soon which will hopefully make it easier for you to not have to lean down so far 🙂
>I feel like I finally really understand threadle wrap vs threadle slice from your video – thank you! I made everybody do this game. Maybe we can get all get fluent with these. >
Awesome! I think you will be seeing the threadle wraps in AKC more regularly in coming years, so we want all the dogs to be prepared!
Great job here 🙂
Tracy
Hi!
It was a good morph, to shift to stay rewards and not worry about the serp. That way he learned to hold his position as you got to your position and put your hand cue in place – and then he still got really good serps 🙂
I think part of the stay question was that he was really excited at the beginning 🙂 and also that he was relatively convinced that the hand moving to serp position was the release.
You can be more consistent about putting your hand in position then waiting for a couple of seconds, then releasing him – when the hand and release come relatively together, he will think the hand is the release cue (which is what happened at :26).Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
The threadle wrap foundations went great! The warm up without you moving was perfect, easy peasy. Maybe too easy when he was offering his line up behavior LOL! Great job adding your movement.
>The hard part was keeping him from leaping!>
He seemed really good about not leaping when your hands were low! And when we add the barrel, he will not be leaping because he will have more of a destination.
When you started moving faster at around 2:08, he had a question – moving too fast makes it hard for him to read the turn away cues. So adding a bit of deceleration as he got to you was really helpful and he was able to respond correctly each time. YAY! Threadle wraps do have an element of decel, so keep that decel in mind when we add the next steps on Monday 🙂
Great job!
Tracy
That is great news about Georgia! Congrats!! A small dog going sub-8 is fantastic!!! Wow!!!! Speedy little girlie!!!
I am glad you got to watch the agility – the higher levels that get livestreamed are super experienced dogs so definitely don’t worry about that stuff for now 🙂 You are totally on the right track with Ingot!
T
Hi!
Nice work on this session – the lazy game was a good review and the blinds went really well! Your timing at :34 was spot on! It helped that you didn’t need to go to the middle jump at all, so you were in a great spot to easily get the blind. You were a little closer to the middle jump at :49, which made it harder to get back up the line so the blind timing was a little late compared to the previous rep.
>I did beat him to his reward one time and he was very unhappy about it and then decided he wasn’t going to do the tunnel so I didn’t try that again.>
When I read this I was thinking maybe he got worried about it… turns out he was simply cheating LOL!! Clever 🙂 he figured out how to win haha He did great with the placed rewards and was not looking at you on the way to the tunnel on the last few reps.
> He said that it was worth it for pie crust>
PIE CRUST omg I would also back up the teeter LOL! You always have the best, most creative rewards!
Backing up went really well – he was totally ‘looking’ for the board with his back feet. Good boy!! The movement of the board didn’t seem to be a problem and he was definitely figuring out the coordination he needed to get his hind end on. Yay! It was a little harder as there was more tip, but pie crust was clearly making it worthwhile 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
He did really well with backing onto the board!! He figured it out pretty quickly – great job to you for adjusting by starting with the toy then going to the treats, and changing your position. He didn’t seem concerned about the movement of the board at all!When you revisit this, the next step is to get him to put his front feet on the board too when he is backing up, so he ends up in the 4-on position. You can sit closer or move the bowl closer to the board, then wait til he offers front feet too. He is a little too small to do a 2on, 2off behavior so we will be aiming for him keeping all 4 feet on the end of the board.
I think the wrap session went GREAT! He was just about perfect, which means you were pretty perfect too! Baby dogs really rely on the handler so you nailed it! He had a little question on your left side where he slowed down, but he still got it. And for most fo the reps, he was really zipping around. YAY!!!! Doing it without the tunnel was actually a little harder but he still did great.
I hope your back feels better! Great job here!
Tracy
