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Good morning!
Oopsie on the blooper, poor Sól! One part of this game is that they learn to ignore the toy in our hand, but she definitely thought that blooper rep was a take the toy rep.
The Part 1 video looked great, she was more than happy to drive to the wing and then to the jump. SUPER!! You can throw the reward even sooner – as soon as she exits the wing wrap and looks at the jump, throw it. She was starting to watch you a bit because the throws were coming when she got to the jump (so she as tracking the throw along with driving forward).
Part 2 had more distance and she did well here too! The placed toy helped her look forward which was fun to see! After a couple of reps of the placed toy, go back to throwing it super early so she doesn’t rely on the placed toy to be part of the indication to drive ahead.
I think you can add even more distance between the wing and the jump, and vary your position a bit: sometimes send to the wing and be WAY ahead to challenge her to find the jump and not just chase you 🙂 And sometimes be right next to the wing and wait for her to exit the wrap, to challenge her to drive way ahead of you.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
The set point went well and yes, she was very good about leaving the toy until released.
What was the distance here? It might be a little too short for her, it looks like she wanted to power more but there was not enough room. Try adding 6 more inches and let’s see what she does.
Also, be consistent about setting her up about six inches away from jump 1 – we don’t want her to take a stride before the jump, we want her to push off her hind end immediately. That gets her on her rear better for the jumping. Sometimes you did set her up in the correct spot, and you can see the difference using her hind end creates!
The next step here is to use the toy as a moving target, not as a stationary target. That will get even more power!
The placed toy for the Wind In Your Hair game was a little harder but cookies helped her ignore it as you went back to the wing. She was looking at you rather than really driving to it, so if you are going to place the toy you can use a higher value toy that she will really drive to – and if you get there first you can play with it, without her LOL! But at this stage, you can switch to throwing the toy when she begins to drive to the jump, because that will likely keep her looking ahead even better.
Great job here!
TracyGood morning!
Looking at the Wind In Your Hair game:
The angle of the camera makes the distance look smaller but 22” feet is great!!!
>s the placement of the wrap wing correct? Not sure if it needs to be pushed more in line with the middle of the jump so his line is directly to the center of the bar?>
The position of the wing was good! His questions were all about your connection to set the line
More connection on rep 1 – you were not really looking at him (you were looking at the jump) so when he exited the wrap, he only really saw your back and didn’t know where to be.
Big difference on rep 2! Great connection as he exited the wrap and he knew exactly where to be. Same on the first rep of the other side: super clear connection!
On some of the other reps, I don’t think your connection was as strong but you threw the toy early so he saved you and took the jump 🙂 Try to make the big connection all the time.
You can vary your position even more:
Get WAY ahead and make connection to see if he can find the jump behind you. Or do the opposite and stay at the wing until he finishes the wrap, then see if he drives way ahead of you.Set point – this is also going well! It looks like he is super organized and really pushing off from his rear when you release him – and keeping his head down to find the moving target. My only suggestion is to use a higher profile toy, so he can scoop it up when he gets to it without having to dive on it as much.
Try to have the toy always in the dog side arm – you were tending to have it in the dog-side arm when you were releasing but in the opposite arm when you were rewarding. Brioche is definitely smart enough to recognize that and I don’t want him to say “here comes a release” and start breaking the stay 🙂
The next step for the set point is to have you moving faster when you release. No need to do this more than maybe twice a week, though, because he is so young. We don’t want to overdo any ‘formal’ jumping.
Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
She definitely understood the structure of the game, which is great! Yay! So now we can refine it to set up even more jumping form:>I initially used a food bowl set at about eight feet away since I thought it would help with keeping Tarot’s head down. It did but she also broke her stay a lot more often, >
I agree, the hardest part was the stay! Since we want you to be out ahead and near the bowl, you can try an empty bowl with you standing next to it – then drop the treat in the bowl after you release her. You can play with this concept away from a jump (stays with a bowl on the ground) and throw a ton of rewards back to her for holding the stay. The treat and train can also work – she can’t access the treats if she breaks the stay, and that will give you lots of opportunities to reward her for not moving until the release.
Using the toy can work too but we want the toy to be fully on the ground and stationary before you release her for now – if you are holding it and moving, she is going to look up at you and have a more head-up jump approach. It is another good concept to work on the flat with lots of rewards tossed back to her for holding the stay even with the toy on the ground 🙂
>In addition, should both jumps be winged jumps? If I use a combination of winged and wingless, does the order of the jumps matter?>
They can both be winged, but doesn’t have to be. When using a combination, I like to put the wingless first so the wing is easier to see.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>My wing jumps have a very defined jump side vs back side. I’ve been trying to set these up so that she will be wrapping from the “front” vs a back side wrap. Some set ups work better for this – wondered if it makes a difference at this stage of our training.>
It is possible! You can use a cone or barrel instead of a wing if you like, t avoid any potential confusion.
The session went really well! She was driving ahead on your right side pretty perfectly and the driving ahead on your left side was looking really strong too! Super!! Keep exaggerating the connection when she is on your left, and it might also help to move the wing over a tiny bit to be almost in line with the wing you are running past. Adding the GO verbals also went really well here, and I agree that the toy is a great choice for this game: it is easy for her to see/drive toy, and great fun 🙂
>Review of the video it looks like I need to throw the reward sooner,>
This will get easier to do as she locks onto the jump sooner, especially on the dog-on-left reps. Your throws were still timely – she was not looking back at you.
> and miss the wing when I throw!>
Ha! It is amazing how well we all hit the wing when our only job is to NOT hit the wing LOL!!!
>Still working on her lack of retrieve (left video in for one of the tosses so you could get a sense of what she does).>
Was this the section from :54 – 1:06? It was definitely not a retrieve but also not a bg long keep away – more of a quick scamper then she waited for you to come get it to give her a treat to trade.
You can encourage more driving back to you by turning and running the other way as soon as her mouth is on the toy, and whip out cookies or another toy to make it really enticing to come back to you.
>JFYI – I submitted the private lesson form this morning and got an email confirmation. >
Terrific! You should be getting an email before the end of the day.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>The beauty of video is we catch everything. >
This is so true! During training, our field of view is limited. But the video shows us everything 🙂 Plus, it is fun to have all of these puppy videos to look back on when she is all grown up 🙂
>We ran off leash today and yesterday so we won’t be training per se. It’s a good day to work on play skills.
>We ran off leash today and yesterday so we won’t be training per se. >
Fun! And a great balance for all of the training.
Stealth Self-control video:
Really nice session here! She did well ignoring the object to play the game with you. Super!
We can ramp things up a bit to get her ignoring it even more. Putting the novel-neutral object down in front of her encouraged her to look at it and check it out at the very beginning and she might have even thought you wanted her to offer behavior on it (shaping).So for the next session, have the object off to the side in the training area before you bring her into it – so it is present by not enhanced by your interaction with it. Then as soon as she enters the environment, play the game as if the object doesn’t exist. That will challenge her brain to process it and ignore it.
The blind cross game is a great game for the stealth self-control too! It challenges her to ignore the thing in the environment AND process the relatively subtle upper body change to create the blind. She was pretty perfect here! You can try throwing the cookie further away so you can be further ahead for the blinds and possibly get 2 blinds in (she is fast so you will want to do the first blind immediately as she starts moving towards you, then the 2nd blind quickly after that).
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I need to become an octopus!>
Yes – multiple arms would make it all so much easier!
She did well with the game here – it might actually have been a slightly long session, because you can see her not quite getting on the tug as much at the end. It was only 2 minutes, but impulse control processing might be so hard for her brain at this age that even 2 minutes can be depleting! So let’s keep these impulse control games to 1 minute for now (at 6 months old, we are entering the fantastic voyage of early adolescence LOL!!)
>In all fairness she came off the cot to check it out before I had released her to the game.>
That can actually be a good application of the game here: novel object in the environment and she gets released off the cot to come to you and NOT explore options of things to grab in the room 🙂 Seems like a good real life application for her! That first rep is the big important rep – have a BIG jackpot party for when she does not go to the object.
Also, what she does depends on what your release word means and the context, but you can have it be a ‘check in’ with you before going on her own way – but it sounds like she is not fully ready to be free on her own yet there.
Great job here!
TracyGood morning! Sounds like a fun but busy weekend!
>During the break we worked on some “tricks”, so I now have a half-dozen, half-trained tricks hehe. But I was super proud toda when I let him off the lead, I got a nose touch, a sit, and a spin, then gave him a treat, then he didn’t run off until i cued “off you go” — super proud of that.>
YAY! Tricks are great. And the ‘off you go’ can also be the cue to take the toy on a run!
And yes, he is getting so big! Baby boy is growing up!
It was fun to revisit the prop game at this stage – he did really well!! The sideways and backwards sending was much more natural too him, and you were able to maintain criteria at a higher level. You were asking him to really hit it so when he didn’t get rewarded for almost touching it, he went back and smacked it LOL! He was also resilient to errors and didn’t get frustrated. Super!
He did well with the two toy game too – it was really energetic and engaging, so it shifted him from his party-of-one to wanting to engage more with you 🙂
>I took your advice about putting a cue on him getting to win the toy- “winner winner chicken dinner”>
This seemed more like ‘Let’s switch toys’ marker and not as much as a go for a run moment for him? And that is fine – he can have a toy switch marker and it is fun marker too 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>we started outside to see if he’d drive ahead- he was only interested in doing a few reps… it was pretty cold for his tiny body.>
It is definitely cold for all of us! Even one rep outside is great then you can run inside and get warm 🙂
He was on fire and drove away really well! I think you got 4 excellent reps and that is GREAT!! He was backing off a little when you were very close to him, so you can left him win more by moving after he is already 3 or 4 steps ahead of you 🙂
The box shaping was great! He totally offered lots of feet in the box here! The next steps here are to get him offering getting in or getting on as many different things you can find: boxes, boards, pillows, etc.
The wrap shopping is looking fabulous! Interesting to hear that he didn’t get it when you tried it originally – a combination of latent learning and letting his brain grown up a tiny bit has made a difference! You can move the 2 bowls to be behind your knees now, so he has a little more room to wrap.
There was a bit of distance between you and the cone, so we can add 2 more things:
– do you have a barrel or a larger cone or laundry basked that he can go around? Bigger things to wrap will add a good challenge.
– We are going to start to change your position so you are eventually standing. Because he is so small, you can start the next session kneeling (where you ended here) and move to sitting on a chair. We will see how he feels about that then eventually get you standing.Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>Last week we had a few nice days of 40’s and no snow. That all changed yesterday & today, we have over 6″ now!>
Oh no! I hope it melts fast!! I am ready for spring weather 🙂
Looking at the stealth self-control game:
The hardest part at the beginning was when she had trouble tugging with food in your hand. That is normal, and we can work through it: after she eats the tossed cookie, you can call her back to the longest, wildest toy you have swinging on the ground and empty hands. When she gets into the rhythm of that, it will be easy to add a (boring) cookie into your hand while she is tugging 🙂She did well with the novel-neutral object! It might have been a bit too much on her path so she investigated it on the way back to her on the first rep, but then she was able to ignore it with no problem. Super!! For the next session, you can already have a novel-neutral object off to the side in the room when you bring her in. As soon as she comes into the room, start the game and see how she does! If she appears to not notice the object: GREAT! Her brain is away of it and it processing it, but regulating her impulses to investigate it.
Drive to handler went great! She really loved it! Great job with the very low cookie hand to keep her head low. If you pivot a little more slowly, she will be able to keep her hind end lined up more and not swing out at all.
You can add a little more motion here: as she is getting the start cookie, you can start moving forward then as she starts coming to you – let her see you decelerate into the stop before the pivot.
The goat trick game also went well! She is a quick learner: you had a couple of clicks right at the beginning for putting her front feet I the box then you rewarded in position… so she was happy to do exactly that : ) To get her offering back feet too, you can change the reward placement: instead of dropping the treats in the box, you can mark her interaction with a ‘get it’ and toss the treat to the side for her to go get. That will keep her moving more, so she is more likely to step in with her back feet too!
With the drive to handler and goat tricks going so well, you can add in tug breaks here too!
Great job on these!
Tracy
Good morning!
>Latent learning always surprises me! Interaction with the prop (jacket) wasn’t clicking with her in the pre-games, but the second I dropped it this week she was good to go.>
I KNOW!!! It always blows my mind. I might leave a training session with a puppy thinking that the puppy learned nothing and I was terrible. But then the next time, the puppy knows what we did and has figured out the next steps.
That is pretty much what happened here with Macklynn. Super!! When you added the sends, she had a little trouble going past the cookie in your hand at first (even when it was empty because the hand as a lot of value to interact with), but then figured it out really quickly and had a lot of good reps. Clever girlie!!!
And she did well with the sends on both sides – normally we see a stronger side and a harder side but she seemed very balanced here. Even with the prop not fully visible, it was still easy to see when she hit it because she was making it pretty clear with her movement.
The only thing to add is a bit of the ready ready dance to engage her with you before each send, to let her practice shifting from handler focus (engaging with you) to obstacle focus when you send. You can also play this with a toy 🙂
For the next session, you can add the sideways ends and if she is happy with that, add backwards sending!
Looking at the wrap sessions:
First video – She might have needed a warm up at the beginning of the first video of seeing you put the treats in the bowls, to get her into the rhythm – then yo can shift to letting her offer it more. Once she got going, she did great!
One other thing worth noting: a week ago, you were getting more offers of sits and down but she did not do that here – she kept moving. Yay! And you can break it up with tugging too.
Second video – The warm up where she gets into the rhythm by seeing you placing the treats for the first few reps will help here too! And keep the cone very close to you at first so the option of sliding in between you and the bowl is not a possibility at the beginning.
Then once she is in that back and forth rhythm, you can let her offer more of it but n need to move the cone out yet. Because she is so young, you can increase the challenge by one factor at a time – in this case, the first factor to increase would be letting her offer (coming around the cone before you put the treat in the bowl). You can stay at that stage for a session of about 2 minutes, then give her a break and let her sleep on it.
Then the next session in a day or two can start where you left off (quick warm up of back and forth with the cone, then let her offer back and forth around the cone before you drop the cookie in). If she is zipping back and forth around the cone – then you can move it out away from you by a couple of inches.
>Pt 2 is where things got a little comical. She goes to my left side far more easily than she does my right. The cone isn’t an issue when going to my left, but she has decided it’s much easier to cut behind the cone to go to my right.>
Aha! The side preference we didn’t see in the prop sends is visible here. This is totally normal and will balance out. When you do start moving the cone away, it cane move away on the strong side first (then slide it back in on the harder side). That way she can be correct in both directions.
Looking at the resilience walk:
>It seemed that the lack of direction made her more nervous. We’ve done fun walks in the past (at trials, the bike trails, etc) and she is much more confident. >
You can definitely move more, heading to a certain spot and also letting her lead the way if she has a destination in mind that is safe Also, being on pavement for part of it was hard because it did not provide an opportunity for sniffing. When you got to the dirt/leaves/etc on the 2nd half, she was sniffing and much more active in investigating the environment. This is probably what you’ve seen in other environments, so yo can keep these walks to places where she has good outlets for sniffing too!
>She does have a tendency to bark at concerning things that are at a distance (bikes, people, dogs) >
We will be teaching her some games that give her a framework to process weird things tar appear or move fast. For now, you can scatter some treats in the grass to let her snuffle around when something weird appears.
>One thing I observed in general this week is that she prefers to look for direction. With the Wing Wrap Game – she would stop/stare at me, Resilience Walk – hide behind me at loud noises, poke me if I wasn’t moving, etc.>
It makes sense that a Border Collie would look at the human for direction (as opposed to a terrier, for example) because they are wired to work with us. She is doing great with the shaping games where she is starting to offer without you needing to help her out – that will be great for her future sports where she will work independently and we combine her understanding of working independently AND paying attention to the info you are giving.
For being behind you when there is a loud noise, for example, that is her learning about the world or telling you she is not comfy. For now, you can set up her walks to be in quieter areas that are easier to process.
Also, do you have another dog that is super confident in the world, or maybe a friend’s dog? One of my favorite things to do with puppies is use social support of another dog. The puppy goes on walks alongside a confident adult who models behavior. It is amazing to see how well it works!
For example, my Jitterbug (small black BC mix pup in some of the demos) was very concerned about the environment when he was a baby dog – he would bark or back away from weird things and be worried about all people in general. I paired him with Ramen the whippet who is about a year older and completely confident/neutral in the world. Their leash walks were together, they crated next to each other on trips, I took Ramen along when Jitterbug had vet appointments, etc. Jitterbug learned a whole lot by watching Ramen and now Jitterbug is completely confident in the great big world – and he is the confident adult model for my younger pup. Dog brains are wired for social learning so it is a great tool!
If you don’t have an adult dog who can be Macklynn’s partner, you can ask friends/dog sport acquaintances to help out!
>We’ve worked the Drive Forward game a few times, but I’m realizing that my indoor spaces are pretty small for us to get up drive or speed so it all looks lack-luster. Would it be worth trying in the backyard? Or would the risk of distraction outweigh the potential drive/speed?>
Excellent question! You can test the waters by taking her out to the backyard on leash and playing tug with her highest value toy. If she is very engaged? Then you can start with the very first step of putting down the toy for her to focus on, then gradually moving through the other steps. You might not get through as many steps outside because it is much more tiring on the brain, but just getting some tugging and baby steps of the game outside, even if she is on a leash or long line, would be very helpful!!
>More videos forthcoming, but I felt I had waited too long to post as it is >
I am glad you posted! She is doing really well! Looking forward to more!
Tracy
Good morning!
Using the clicker mat is VERY clever! Love it! It really lets you and him know if he has hit it or not!
The forward and sideways sending looked really good and I think the clarity of the prop actually clicking made for some really strong hits.
Backwards sending was hard, so great job getting closer to the prop, refreshing the value, then he got a really strong hit right at the end of the session. Super! On the next session, you can start nice and close to it on the backwards sending. And when you send backwards, you can shift your gaze to look at the prop even more because following your gaze might help support the send even more.
Remember to also do the ready dance of getting him engaged before the send, so he can practice shifting from handler focus in the ready dance to obstacle focus on the send.
You can also play this game with tugging as a reward, instead of treats!
>The target did slide around a bit so, maybe, not the best for this surface. I bet if I placed it on top of an anti-slip rug mat>
Yes – you can attach a rubber mat to the bottom. Maybe cutting a yoga mat to the right size would do it? You can even get fancy and attach it with velcro on the bottom 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>He mainly got his food for the training yesterday and that seemed to help his tummy. I will have to check into maybe just using some chicken for training. He will work for kibble but it isn’t enough for some training.>
I am glad his belly is feeling better! A little boiled chicken might be easier on his belly, and also spreading out the sessions will help too. He can still do lots of toy sessions 🙂
>The little guy is three months old today so maybe he is in sensitive period. He is very different than my other goldens lol.>
3 months is a little young for true adolescence so it might be that his belly is bothering him. We will be teaching him ways to process weird things in coming weeks and that will help him through the sensitive periods ahead.
>I had thought maybe doing a couple of sessions 3-4 hours apart might be ok.>
I think it was probably just too many cookies and he is really young, so his brain got tired 🙂 As he grows, you will find that the sessions can get longer and he can do more of them.
>He loves to climb. It actually gets him into trouble 😂. I have not stacked things but will give that a try.>
Ha! He sounds like a natural goat! Low stacks with different objects leaning on each other will be great fun for him.
>So you can do recalls where you are moving away from him and have the object further away so it is not potentially something he thinks we want him to offer behavior on.
>How far away? To side more or maybe behind me?4 or 5 feet to the side or anywhere not near you when you stop moving. If there is something next to your near you when you are facing hi, it looks similar to shaping sessions where you are wanting him to interact with the object. So having it to the side and you aren’t near it when you stop moving and reward him, I think it will be something he ignores more easily 🙂
Keep me posted!
Tracy
Hi!
>I’ll have to ponder what hand to hold the toy in though. I always have to think about it with the reward across the body.>
I do mini walk throughs to figure out where to put the toy LOL!! It goes in the correct hand for the 2nd blind.
The goat game went great!
She did really well with getting right up onto the board! She is starting to get her and end up on things which will really help as we add more hide end awareness games.
My only suggestion is a small change in mechanics: grab some treats as you get the toy back and before the plank goes down, so you can get the rewards in pretty immediately after the click. You clicked here and then reached for the treats, which allows room for more behavior to get offered – everything between the click and the reward delivery gets reinforced, so getting those cookies in as fast as possible is great practice for when we are shaping more precise behaviors.
Nice work!
Tracy
Good morning!
She did really well with the Feel The Wind game! Good girl! You can take off and run more – adding more of your motion will cue her to add more of her speed 🙂 You can see that starting at approximately:54 – you ran more and so she really accelerated 🙂
To get a little more drive to the start wing, you can step to it with the dog side leg to indicate that she should go to it. When you didn’t step to it, she was a little slow probably because she was making sure she was allowed to do it. On the last rep, you stepped forward to the wing and she blasted to it. Super!!!
You can add more distance between the wing and the jump now too!!
>She was a little distracted and slow, and my coordination was off. >
One thing I have noticed with my whippets is that the first session is often a little distracted and slow – but then the next session is great. And when they have slept on it or a day or two? They are fantastic! So my guess is that they are processing new information in that first session and they don’t tend to throw themselves blindly into things (unless it is chasing a bunny haha).
>First, she seemed uncomfortable sitting close to the jump. >
You can let her stand! As long as she can hold a stay, she can pick her position. A stand is perfectly fine too and she did tell us here that the sit was weird LOL!
>Then she was very slow and didn’t want to drive to me and mostly stepped over the bars. >
It was hard to see the reward on the video, but was it the stationary reward? If it was mot moving, she probably thought the whole game was stoooooopid. Ha! Stationary rewards are boring, she says, especially if she is not hungry. So, add in the moving target reward (dragging a toy instead of a stationary reward) and I bet she finds it a lot more fun 🙂
>I’m wondering if I should go ahead and add motion since I know that will motivate her? I do want to work with her on driving from a stay though. Maybe with no jumps, then through wings with no bars, and then with the bars?>
Yes, add motion in the form of the moving target and I think it will change her opinion of the game. The pre-game introduces the moving concept without jumps, so that is a great warm up! Then you can add one jump then two jumps (and lots of reward for the stays :))
>I’m so happy to hear you say you think chasing and letting them run with the toy is part of the reward for the hounds! In the past I’ve run into people who didn’t understand that. But then I always went home and let them do it anyway!>
Yay for you, letting the hounds run around and chase a lure as part of the reward! I think sighthounds are generally misunderstood by dog sport trainers – I for sure did not understand them when I got my first lurchers! They taught me a lot and the whippets taught me even more. I love every moment of it!
Have fun here and keep me posted!
Tracy
