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What a stunning place to let the dogs have a run! Wow! Alaska is simply amazing. The dogs looked like they were all having a grand time ❤️
Have a fantastic Christmas 🎄 and happy New Year!!!!
Tracy
Hi! This went great!
On the first run without the toy: Nice teeter! Nice sequence! Nice job praising her at the end of the run (with the sequence curling back into the course) and *then* running back to the toy. Perfect!
It was very cool to see that the teeter behavior was the same without the ball as it was with the ball. She drove brilliantly to the end. She is releasing from the teeter at the same time every time… sometimes you say th release word at the same time, sometimes he is already in motion when you say it. So be sure to be consistent so she doesn’t end up learning that the slam is the release, not the verbal.
Only one suggestion for the start of the sequence when you were working the remote reinforcement:
If you are going to work trial behavior… add the leash in because it will be part of the picture and can also change the context entirely. The leash will always be in the picture at trials, so ideally it is at least regularly in the picture at home too 🙂 especially when working remote reinforcement. That way there is no huge contextual leap at trials when the leash is involved. Plus, if the leash is mainly used at trials going into the ring, it can become associated with the higher arousal levels and possibly stress. Using it at home will help keep it neutralized 🙂 plus it helps both of you be able to work the pre-run plan with the mechanics of dealing with the leash 🙂
Great job here!
TracyHi!
Dean was a perfect leash runner LOL! We owe him!!! He was trying to act pretty invisible and not be a distraction, but that is different from normal human behavior so it ends up being distracting. Note how she shook it off both times the leash came off.
The nicely done babe moment was hilarious!!!
I was going to suggest he be a pushy leash runner and you did that on the 2nd run. Perfect!! She did well on both of these. And she was great about getting the leash on too, even with the treats *rightthere* on the 2nd rep.
This is something you can have Khamsin and Kristen do this weekend with you – everyone is a stalker leash runner 🙂 or walking around the ring like ring crew, judge, etc. It is great exposure for the pups (you can have food in the ring with you because the other people might be a significant challenge.
Nice work here!!
Tracy
Hi!
>He does know the 1,2,3 pattern, that would be a good one for moving him from A to B>
Definitely! That is a good option. Or moving hand touches! He likes those a lot and he can leap around while doing them (which he also likes a lot LOL!)
>OK, no more foot stomping.
Yea, I’m pretty good at ignoring unsolicited advice. Got a great one from the judge this past weekend – I should arm the ring crew with squirt bottles when we train LOL.>Unsolicited advice is usually the WORST. Maybe one time out of every 1000 times, someone offers something useful. But otherwise, it is not helpful LOL!! I think squirt bottles fall into the same category as foot stomping – it is weird and punishing, so he is going to associate ring crew people with being weird and punishing… and therefore need to be investigated before he can ignore them. He ignores people he knows because he has already investigated them, great! The goal is to make ring crew people into boring things: not fun, but also not weird/scary, so he won’t feel the need to check them out.
> she does accept me as her flaky student>
You are the opposite of flaky! You are always looking to expand your knowledge and help your dogs. That is great!
> For the near future class runs will be all about rewarding passing ring crew instead of rewarding performance – he goes by I mark with praise and toss his lotus ball – yes?>
Yes, perfect!
>As far as the ring crew placement, I put out the chairs when I build the course and I generally pick “in his face” locations. Should I make it a bit easier for a while?>
Great question – I think you can keep the really prominent placement on jump/tunnel lines, he is ready for that. But not yet for weaves or contacts, that might cause errors. When he is able to ignore any ring crew shenanigans with jumps & tunnels, then you can add back the weaves & contacts.
Keep me posted!
Tracy
OMG! She did great! She is already fast and going to get faster 🙂 YAY!!!!! To add a little challenge, you can angle the jumps so she sees a slightly different ‘look’ to them. Her line will be the same (straight) but you can show her this parallel path concept on slightly angles jumps too 🙂
Nice work!
TracyHi!
The first session with the bowl seemed to really clarify things for him about the left turns. My only suggestion is to have multiple treats in each hand, so you can do very quick reinforcement – things happen very fast with Checkers! LOL!
He did do well with the toy on the one rep you posted – if he was turning it down, it might have been too much food association with the bowl in the picture before the toy came out, so he was not as interested in the toy. Or maybe he is teething. Or both 🙂
On the 3rd video – he still had a cookie in his mouth from lining up so when you presented the toy, he was still actually eating. I bet he would have played after that, you would need to let him swallow the treat before sending him to the barrel.
Be super connected on the send, making sure he is ready by making eye contact then maintaining eye contact through the send. At :45 he was eating (cookie hand in front of his face) and then suddenly you sent – so he didn’t really see connection and went around the barrel to his right. That is still a rewardable response, because at this stage we are entering the Handler Error Era LOL!! Based on what he saw (the rotation of the shoulders without connection looks like a natural blind cross cue) so he was correct. So you can call him back and reset him with a cookie, then make a bigger connection so he knows which side of you to be on.
When you were connected on the other left turns, he did them really well! Those looked great!
Looking at the running contact box:
>I am very impressed with my puppy’s ability to canter through the box while staring at me the whole time.>
Yes, impressive LOL!!!! I think part of it was because of your position – right next to the box. He could easily do the box and look at you 🙂 So you can change your position and make it harder to do the box AND look at you: put yourself on one side of the box, and send him through it to the bowl on the other side of it. That way he has to look forward 🙂 You can make it easy: put the bowl in the box at first. Then put it just on the other side of it. Then get it further and further away. This will be a good game to noodle around with while you pump up the value of the T&T.
Adding the handling combo with the dish:
>We played this way too long- I didn’t set a timer and lost track of time trying to figure out the food bowl and line up stuff.>
I think that might be the #1 homework: set a timer every single time 🙂 This is especially important if you are doing multiple games because then you can end up training for 15 minutes… which is not helpful for puppy brains. Put a post it on your camera that says “timer!” 😁. Or take 10 treats with you and leave the rest in the house, that is another good way to keep sessions shorter.
To get him to leave the dish, the empty dish was the definite right choice – it has value but not so much value that he couldn’t take his eyes off of it. He did really well! Getting him to leave a treat in the bowl will probably be easier when he has his collar on and you can hold and feed him while walking away from it.
>You’ll see we had some issues actually getting the front cross, some was me forgetting it, some was him blasting behind me.>
The ending up on the other side of you was a disconnection question – he couldn’t always see enough connection to know which side to be on. Ideally, your arm is pointing back to him rather than at your side, which will allow him to see the front of your chest and your eyes. On a couple of those moments (2:54 for example) he is exiting the barrel and you are looking down at your side with your arm at your side – so that rotates your shoulders forward and looks like a blind cross cue so he went back to your left side. On a couple of the other reps (3:13 for example) you were definitely looking back at him, but your arm was at your side so he didn’t quite see the connection. Compare to 4:06 for example when your arm was further back, so he saw the side info very easily. Yay! The further back towards him your arm is, the easier it is for him to see the side info 🙂
You can see a side info question on the last video too! He was great about going to his toy! At 1:07 and 1:35 you had your hand really low but next to you, which blocked the connection so he only had motion as the cue – so he stayed on his line to the toy. Try being more upright and running forward, but having the dog-side arm pointing all the way back and downwards to his cute little nose (while looking at him, of course 🙂 That will help him see the connection because they cue off of our eyes & shoulders much better than off of our hands when they finish crosses.
>He’s having some big feelings lately, more alert barking to noises and he burst out of the house (on leash!) barking at my neighbor’s young child across the street, even though he’s met that child and loves her. So we’re just working on keeping the brain calm and happy and not asking for anything too stressful in everyday life right now, and getting more rest>
Ah, sounds like adolescence is arriving! Those are typical adolescent behaviors. I am glad you are adding rest in – lots of rest really helps. And you can also take a look at the decompression stuff added this week! And getting those pattern games to be super fluent will help too, because you can use them to help with arousal regulation especially in new places or when unexpected things happen.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi! It works now! Youtube is weird 🤣
I first need to admit my admiration for a camping spot big enough that you can do the wrap game in it!!! Nice!!!
It went really really super well – nice commitment!!! My only suggestions are small details that will move you forward to the advanced level:
– as he is exiting the barrel, you can open up your shoulder and your connection to him more by pointing your hand all the way back to him. You were looking for him with your eyes really well – but your arm was a little bent and next to you, which blocks his view of your connection
– you can repeat your ‘wrap’ verbal several times, to blanket the distance to the barrel (and future jump) to support him as you add more distance. You might also want to consider different verbals for when he is wrapping left versus wrapping right.
– add the toy now! It can be before the game starts, then do a couple of reps for treat, then back to the toy. And if he is good with that in terms of arousal regulation, then you can do the whole game for the toy.
>seemed pretty focused on the game (and not jumping up on me – Yeah! Maybe the 30 minute run on the beach took the edge off him! LOL!)>
Yes! He had no arousal questions at all, which is great! That is why we can gradually bring the toy in – maybe do the 30 minute run on the beach again before using the toy 🙂
You can apply these and move forward to the advanced level 🙂
>he jumped up on the picnic table bench….so I just went along but he seems a lot more balanced on it!>
That was amazing!! I guess that is latent learning/sleep dependent plasticity in action LOL!!! And it actually created a bit of a handling discrimination: barrel versus plank! You switched sides and made it a lot easier for him.
Great job!
TracyI am glad you got this first shpile on video! It is definitely an arousal regulation game and often this first session is comedy with feets going every which way LOL!
Your shpile was diverse in terms of all sorts of texture and movement! The arousal brought more speed to her movement which was fine everything except the white rectangular thing – that was slippery! So she was trying to move over it fast (hopping over it a bit) to avoid slipping. The other objects had better grip so she didn’t try to rush over them.
> I noticed at the beginning though she actually left food to go to her toy. I don’t think she was actually avoiding the shpile, or apprehensive about putting her feet on the things, but just working out managing her arousal in order to do so?>
Do you mean at about :38, when she went over to the stairs? I think it was arousal regulation, like you mentioned. She was having a grand time tugging and was keenly away of the toy being up there (watch her look lovingly at it at :27 as you transitioned into using food) – so she was just pursuing more toy play. I didn’t see any avoidance or concern. It might just have been that the toy was higher value than the food in that moment.
> She certainly improved through the session, so I’m not worried.>
Yes! She did great! The only change for the next session would be to let her go fast on the disc/bone/plank/couch cushion, but use a cookie to slow her down on the white thing so she doesn’t slip as much.
Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
>I like the reset cookie for handling errors. I will definitely try that!>
The more I watch videos over the years, the easier it gets to spot all of the human errors… and how rare it is for the dogs make mistakes, even the puppies LOL!! So I reward anything that could possibly be my fault, or give reset cookies if things have come to a halt. My dogs are very tolerant of my handling errors and there is no BIG MADZ happening 🙂
> If nothing else it will give me time to process while not causing BIG MAD feelings! >
Yes! It totally buys you time to reset – I find that if we try again immediately, we are more likely to mess up the cue (mainly because the dog is not always ready for it) so the reset is better for dog and human.
>>I knew it was a long session, but there was that pressure of “we’re several weeks behind” and good weather days are few and far between so I wanted to feel like maybe we at least made a little progress from our one turn and burn session a week or so ago. >>
She has only done one turn and burn session? Then she has made significant progress! She was wrapping the obstacle like a pro!!!
And it can definitely feel like things pile up – next week is a quiet week in terms of new games, and we have plenty of time later in the class for folks to catch up or complete the games.
>Then add in it was just a rough day on many fronts and I probably should have just not trained a dog that day!>
Totally understandable! It seems like all of December counts as a ‘rough day’ LOL!!!
>As for the noises, yes there were some gun shots, but also there was an agility class going on inside the barn so there was also a teeter banging, which I think sounds much louder on the video than it was in real life.>
Cool! I noticed it mainly because she was unphased by it. It was great to see her not change her behavior. I am sure her brain was processing the noise but she was able to stay super engaged.
Tracy
Hi! The video shows as still processing, which is weird! You might want to check that it loaded?
Thanks!
THi!
>. He does not have any type of cue that looks like this or mean to go behind me. But he does like to make circles as a thing. Usually it happens when he is confused and needs to just move (frustration circle). >
Interesting! He didn’t look frustrated here and nothing had happened to frustrate him. So he just thought it was correct LOL! Doing it with the jump and with a wall behind you can fix that question.
>That session yesterday was 15 min, including set up, play time between reps, etc. Today we did 12 minutes. He had 45 minute off leash walk today at lunch, chewed on a beef cheek for 2.5 hrs. until this training session, trained and now he is thinking about dozing off, but it’s probably too close to dinner time. So, yeah… I need to retire to entertain my dog. Thanks for the tips on extra exercise and chewing while girls are in season. Makes sense.>
OMG! You need a racing whippet. There are currently 2 in my house, so the baby Maligator gets about 20 minutes a day of racing one of them. That is all he needs LOL!! Then he is happy to chill out. I will send you a racing whippet to borrow til Judge is through adolescence LOL!!!!
The backwards sending to the barrel looks good! You were tending to start moving at the same time each time – when he was arriving at the barrel. I think using a line on the ground will help you leave sooner: place the line on the ground a few inches before the barrel, and start moving away when he gets to the line. Then if that is fine and dandy, move the line so it is a foot in before the barrel, and start moving away when he gets to it. Then keep moving the line forward, to give you that distinct “move now” moment 🙂
>We started the rocking horse. I moved it along given the impending snow – barrels are more than 6′ apart – he is already bigger than all of the adult female Mals that I know (and a couple of males), so we needed some room. I also added a couple of turn and burns at the end.>
Perfect! In the large class last night, we had everyone move their barrels out more because it went so well. The Border Collie ended up at about 15 feet apart, no problem 🙂 The trick is to balance moving them further and further apart to keep things interesting, but not progressing too quickly and ending up with too much failure.
On the first few reps, you did a FC on barrel 1 (and 2 if you did more than 2) and a post turn on last barrel. Ending on a FC or a turn and burn makes things more exciting, so do that on the last barrel 🙂
You can definitely add more room between the barrels now – as you add more room, remember to stay exactly in the center when doing the FCs. On some of the reps you were drifting out a little so he had to go around you to find the barrels. You can see that at :49 and 1:00 for example.
You can also add your wrap verbals here too! I don’t think you were saying them.
There will be some good indoor stuff here in week 6 and also next week is a chill week, so maybe the weather will get civilized again after this brief bout of snow!
>And a real life win – I called him off a rabbit in the yard that he was starting to chase!
That is impressive! WOW!!
Nice work here 🙂
Tracy
Hi!
She is really good about committing to the barrels!
>I’m wondering about her going so wide on her wraps. Should I be encouraging a tighter wrap?>
The right turn wraps (barrel further from the camera) were really good, pretty tight! The only thing I would add to that side is more direct connection and keeping your dog-side arm back to her and not at your side, so it is very clear where to be (closed shoulders/ softer connection make young dogs drift wide waiting for more info).
On the left turn side (closer to the camera), she wasn’t turning wide, necessarily………. she was looking at the tunnel 🙂 So you can be more distinct in the FC with clearer rotation and big conenction and moving directly away, so it is more obvious to her that you want the wrap and not the tunnel 🙂 She was much tigher on that wrap when you were closer to the barrel, because the info was clearer for her.
The other thing you can do is add in turn and burn so she chases you around the barrel more – add it in after every 2 or 3 barrel wraps. That unexpected countermotion is fun and also it keeps her paying attention to the turn, because you might take off and run away at any moment 🙂
Great job!
TracyYay! I am glad they enjoyed it LOL! It is a bit less serious than the other games but still useful 🙂 She was definitely pumped up and had more challenging climbing around! That was a pretty impressive shpile LOL!!!
She seemed to find the bigger things to be the hardest: the donut and the peanut, for example. The lower and more stable things looked pretty easy 🙂
You can break things off to get tugging involved more frequently to keep her arousal level high and if you can set this up at the club with other people around, you can do the restrained recalls – that incorporates the arousal from running into the proprioception!Nice work!
Tracy
