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Good morning!
Driving to your side looked really strong here – excellent reward placement, nice and low with such a small pup!
Adding the pivot went great too – it was a little harder to keep your hand low so her front feet came up a little but she turned really well with you!
Because this went so well, you can add more of your motion. After tossing the start cookie, you can start walking the other direction. When she eats the start cookie and is moving toward you, let her see you change from walking to being stopped (decel!) and drive to your side then pivot. I am sure that will be easy for her, so you will be able to go to fast walking and jogging, as long as you show her clear deceleration as soon as she starts running toward you.
The focus forward also went great – she was driving ahead brilliantly with you running, no questions at all! I am impressed with how well she can carry that huge toy back to you LOL!! It is a workout for her LOL!!! Since her retrieve is going really well, be sure to play BIG tug with the toy she brings back and then sometimes let her have it again right away – that will keep bringing it back valuable and so she will keep bringing it back 🙂
One thing to add to this is a “go” verbal: when she is focusing forward, you can starting saying “go go go” then let her go – that will build the foundation for the Go verbal on course in the future! And you can still ay ‘get it’ as she closes in on the toy.
Great job here!
Tracy
Hi!
>Since she was being so mouthy I quit holding on to the harness at the start and worked on getting a connection without holding on to her. >
That was a good decision: keep it fun and teach her the game, without arguing about holding the harness.
>She wears the harness all the time so she should be quite used to it. When she is in the house it has a short (4-5’) light rope attached so that I can manage her behavior better. I’m thinking that the shaking could have been a result of her “tugging” behavior – dragging around belly to the ground on the tug toy.>
That is possible – if she was doing the “Swiffer” move while tugging 😂 then she might shake it off after standing up LOL!
>Her set point jumping doesn’t look that smooth. Do I have the jumps to close/far apart?>
It was a super good introductory session!!! Excellent stay and rewards, and she understood the assignment of bouncing the jumps and going to the reward spot. Super!! She was sorting out what to do with her movement and at 1:23 she was MUCH smoother!
You can do 2 things with the set point: use the bowl or MM, but move it further away.
But ideally, move to the moving target as th reward from the pre-game. You will see that the moving target will work really well to help her power off her hind end and lower her head. Some of the un-smooth parts on the video were because she was sorting out how to stop to get the cookies. The moving target promotes more power/not stopping so you will see a change in her jumping style.Great job!
Tracy
Hi!
>It feels kind of like a high class problem to have but it does likely mean it might be a while before toys are a reinforcer for work.>
It is a similar training puzzle to what you mentioned about the pups who prefer food to toys, or toys to food, so we make the less preferred thing the ‘job’ which we reward with what they want. I think what you describe is more similar to the pups that want work or toys but not food, so we build value for food while acknowledging it is not (yet) the reward.
So for example, a pup that doesn’t want cookies as a reward gets to do a ‘work’ thing (wrap a wing for example) then eat a cookie (still work) then gets the real reward (toy, for those dogs).
What happens is that the food very quickly increases in value until it does indeed become a reinforcement for real. My dog Contraband is a great example of that! Work + frisbees built his love for food, and now he is a true piggie and will work/train/compete for food.
>I feel like I need to figure out how to make the opportunity to work contingent on toy play.>
This is the key! The ‘tug’ is what we are shaping, not what we want to actually shape LOL
Setting this sequence up so the work and the food/more work sandwich the toy play, to increase the value of toy play, will flip things around. Thankfully he does like the toy play already, so I think it will be fun to do this and work very quickly.
So tossing out some ideas, it can be something like this:
Toss a treat, get him to tug, then as a reward for tugging: you can offer a ‘work’ opportunity like going around his cone (he seemed to really like that!). Then as he finishes going around the cone: treat, tug, cone wrap. It becomes a nice loop with the tug as the work for a bit (because ‘work’ is actually the reward, from what it sounds like) Then you will see things shift: the toy will take on a ton of value and can replace the treat in the loop and will become a true reward in the shaping context.
For example, using the Cato board you had in the video:
Treat toss, tug…. Then you put the Cato down. He hops on, treat toss (pick up Cato when he gets off for the treat) then tug… then after tugging, cato goes back down to the ground. If he wants the Cato? He is going to be tugging really hard! And it turns out he is also going to have a grand time doing it (and probably release some good feel good endorphins too :)) and tugging will be the reward on its own then we can flip things to have the tug as the reward.Let me know if that makes sense, or if I need to describe it again (or put it on video) after morning caffeine 🙂
>He has seen the Cato board before but the plastic bin thing he’s never seen before.>
He did interact with that plastic bin like he’d been doing it his whole life LOL!!!! So cute!
Tracy
Hi! He did well with these games!
It is normal and pretty common that pups will prefer toys or treats at this age (rather than love both :)) but we can help build up the treat love!
One way to do it is to pair the treat with a toy he loves: after each treat or two (depending on the game) you can whip out a tug toy.
So for the bowl game – you can drop a treat in bowl 1, then when he eats it, drop a treat in bowl 2 – then when he eats that treat: toy party time! That can teach the skill and build up the treat love all in the same session (then we can fade out tugging as much when he is loving the treats more).
When you did the wrap shaping w/ toys: very nice session! I think part of the reason he was really into the small toy in your left hand was that it was small and he couldn’t quite get to it LOL! So a bigger toy in both hands will work great!
To help make the transition between toys smoother, you can make the first toy dead’ for a few seconds then activate the 2nd toy by moving it. Also, you can make a big fuss over the 2nd toy by looking at it and directing all your focus to it while making it enticing. That will make going back and forth into more of a pattern, and then you can put a cone or upright in front of you to go around.
>Drive to handler using treats – you will see his energy level is much lower when I use treats instead of toys. >
The skill of driving to you looked good but yes, I see what you mean about him not necessarily being super excited about the treats. So we can totally add in the toy and use both. There are two ways to do it:
– you use a cookie toss to start so you can get ahead of him, then the toy as the reward for driving to you
– you can use a cookie toss to start so you can get ahead of him, then he gets a cookie when he gets to you – then you bring out his favorite toy 🙂
Both of those will keep building the decel/drive to handler skill while pumping up the love of treats in training.
He loved the driving ahead game! Fun! The toy was small so I think he loved getting it but was not sure that it was actually a tug toy 🙂 So a longer toy will help tug – it is a fine balance with such a small pup, to get the right size of toy for throwing, retrieving, AND tugging! He was retrieving it well by the end so you can maybe tie a small light toy to it so you can tug with it more easily?
>Let me know if I was moving too late?
A little bit, yes, but mainly because you were letting him go too son 🙂 Be sure to hold him while you throw, let the toy land, let him look at it for a couple of seconds… then let him go (and you can move too). When you throw and let go of him all in one motion, he is not tracking the toy as well or building the anticipation to drive to it as well as he will if you hold him a little longer.
Great job here! Let me know if the cookie-to-toy ideas make sense!
Tracy
Good morning!
>She has always loved getting on things I accidentally left a kitchen chair and she gets right on the table, or she’ll jump onto a crate to get on the kitchen island.>
Ha! She is a natural goat!!!
The shaping went well. You can use this type of game to add in a couple of things:
– a marker that tells her you have thrown the treat (get it) as well as a marker that tells her when to take it from your hand (something like ‘yes’ or cookie for example :))That way you can fade out the clicker and throw treats or indicate when you want her to take it from your hand (all of which will be super useful!)
– you had a some cookie excitement to raise arousal in the middle, which is great! You can also incorporate a toy because it helps her offer behavior even when she is very pumped up – and when the toy is visible.
The behavior itself being very simple is perfect, because the added stuff like markers, presence of the toy, and more internal arousal will certainly make it harder!
Great job here 🙂 Tracy
Good morning!
>I’m not sure what you mean by this. “ make it stationary then toss a treat when she releases it.” She is NOT letting go of the toy that she wants. So, when do I toss the treat?>
You can get the toy stationary, then present the treat (before she looks at it). Then toss the treat. She is likely to let go of the toy at that point if she hasn’t already let go of it. It primes the pump for the toy going ‘dead’ meaning releasing it to do the next thing, and shifts the focal point away from that toy. And it rewards letting go of it too 🙂 So the treat is basically a bridge to help transition away from toy 1 and towards toy 2 (which she can have after she gets the tossed treat).
Driving ahead looks great! Do you have a taller toy (big hollee roller?) that you can throw far and she can scoop up more easily? The low profile toy makes it harder to stop for it when she is moving that fast.
>You can see she has zero interest in returning to me with the toy.>
Since she is going to beat you to the toy 🙂 you can change the game a bit: throw a good-not-great toy for her to drive to. Then when she is arriving at the toy, you turn and run the other direction while you whip out a GREAT toy from your pocket to call her back to you. She might not always drive ahead as well, but I think shifting gears into returning to you more is good and it doesn’t matter yet if she brings the original toy back 🙂 That will lead us to being able to take off the long line!
Decel to handler:
She is coming immediately on the name call which is great! And by the end, she was driving away from the targets pretty immediately too!
I think the targets to find the cookie might be too small even when they are grouped together – you can introduce the manners minder to this game or use the sit 🙂She is driving in beautifully to the decel and turning really tight with the pivots! Yay!
>Decel was hard with the toy as she swings wide when tugging. Is that a problem?>
Not a problem at all! She was tight to you on the pivots til you marked and offered the tug, so it was perfectly fine to swing in front to play. Super!!!
>I’ll been told she needs to lose weight so pieces are small. She requires kongs and chews at night to settle. Literally, she can eat an entire fidelis chew in one setting. Too many calories so now I’m limiting them.>
How does she feel about veggies? You can try using veggies as treats – bits of broccoli stems might delish? And have you tried freezing the songs/chews so she gets the same chewing outlet but fewer calories because it takes longer to get through them? I can research what veggies people have been using as treats because it is a great low calorie option!
Nice work here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I didn’t know how to engage with her with the food, so the session was a little bit of a hot mess & learning curve for me>
The session was totally NOT a hot mess! You were playfully sorting out the mechanics and she was happy to play with you with the food.
Engaging with food is definitely a little weirder feeling at first LOL!! It is basically about looking at her eyes and dancing around a little with her facing you – then getting quiet as you send to the prop. You were lining her up at your side which helped her see the prop, but it is also good to have her facing you to see if she can switch from focus on you to focus on the prop.
>AND I forgot to set my timer
so it went on about 2.5 min!>No worries, the is close enough to 2 minutes that you don’t need to edit if you go a little over.
She did really well finding the prop! By the end, she was moving pretty directly to it when you sent her with an empty hand. SUPER!!
The next step is going to be getting her to go past your hand to the prop, so you can move a little further away to send her to it. She might ask a few questions at first by trying to stop at your hand 🙂 so you can build value for passing the hand to get to the prop by having a treat in your other (non-send) hand, and when she goes to the prop you can toss the cookie to the prop. It is a way of saying “yes, go to the prop even though there are treats in my hand” 🙂
The wing wrap foundation game went great! She got into the rhythm really well and seemed to have no questions at all when you added the cone. Happy dance! When you added more distance, she didn’t go around the cone as well – was it because she was getting brain tired (it was later in the session) or because it was too hard for that moment? No worries, you can start with the cone right in front of you at the beginning of the next session and inch it out to see how she does.
You can also move the bowls to be a bit more behind your knees so she has more room to wrap the cone/upright (it is another way of building distance). And be sure to break up the cookie sessions with lots of toy play 🙂
> I am using a white board & paper, LOL! I feel if I write down the bullets points it sticks a little better in my head & I can just review before we start the session.>
Yay!!! You can also screenshot the field guides on your phone to look at as you go into the training room – all the little elements help us remember 🙂
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I need to teach him about the collar grab/set up position. >
How does he do when you are going back and forth between treats and the toy? You can get him playing, then use a treat to get the toy back and line him up for a quick gentle collar hold. He didn’t love being reached for at the beginning so a cookie can help him line up without being reached for.
He did well focusing on the toy! I think he needed an extra moment to be able to get his mouth on the toy and fully grab it, so you can move it slowly til he really has a grip on it. He also seemed to like to grip the handle (maybe because it was smaller?) and that is fine too! You can add in throwing the toy further and further so he drives away even more 🙂
Great job with the drive-to-handler! The hardest part is getting slow enough so he doesn’t have jump up to get the treat, and you nailed it! Yay! Super!!! He was driving in really well, so you can move to the next step and add the slow pivots 🙂
Nice work here!
Tracy
Good morning! Sól is so cute!!! And fun!
Video 1 (toy):
>I realized watching back I am possibly telling her to wait too much?>
I don’t think it is a problem to repeat the wait cue – it is keeping you connected and she is successful! It might get her amped up, though, almost like a ‘ready…. Ready…….’ cue so we can make sure you are kind of calm when you say it and not toooooo exciting 🙂
Great job staying low with the toy! She did really well here! You can gradually add in standing up as long as she keeps her gaze focused on the toy. She did really well going over the jump to the toy and not anticipating the release.
Video 2 (treats)
>She thinks toy is much better!>
Ha! Yes, she sure did LOL! That is fine, we will be using a toy a lot for this 🙂 For the treats – you were dropping them on the ground but you can add a dish or target to drop them onto. That will provide a nice focal point for her, even before the release so she doesn’t look up at you. Great job rewarding her for the stay – you can throw a treat back even on the reps where you are using toys!
Video 3:
She did really well with the 2 jumps here!
Start her closer to the first bump so that after the release, she pushed from her rear and doesn’t tap her front feet down again on the takeoff side of jump 1. I think your best start position for her was at 1:03.She was closer to the jump there and did not tap her feet on the takeoff side. Yay!The next step is to add the moving target game from the pre-games. You ca show that to her on the flat first, then we can add it to the set point. I think the distance here will be a little too short when you add the moving target (and as she matures), so you can add another 6 inches or so between the bumps for now 🙂
Great job!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I have started him in a competition puppy group class for obedience. There are no puppy agility classes going on around here and he will learn good skills from the obedience class. He has never worked in a group so it’s all good.>
That is really interesting that there are no puppy agility classes local to you – you live in a busy agility area! The obedience class will be fun too and most importantly, it gets him into a group setting during adolescence. Perfect!
Looking at the videos:
Set point –
>The hardest part was getting Brioche to sit close to the bar.>It is weird at first! The pups think being that close to the jump is weird. You can face him and lure him into position rather than try to line him up at your side. For example, at jump 1, you can be on the landing side facing him to get him to line up where you want him to be. That can also promote a tucked sit and not a rollback sit, plus he will be straight. I don’t think he liked being pulled into position so facing him as if it was a ‘front’ will be effective for getting the exact spot.
His stay looked really good – great job continuing to reward it! And his form is looking good too!
>Also, I stopped using the remote for the MM after the first time because it wouldn’t stop (I had no food inside of it).>
Yes, the MM is definitely a pain because it misfires so often. Do you think he will hold the stay while you put a treat down, so he can look at it even before the release?
And we can also begin to incorporate the moving target – start with the toy on a line placed stationary where the MM was here. Then if he is happy with that, we can start moving it 🙂 That will help get the ideal head position and hind end power.
Wind In Your Hair:
>I am going to try to use “tight” for left wrap and “wrap” for right wrap. We’ll see how that goes.>
Perfect! One thing that helps remember the verbals is if you remind yourself of which direction and which word before every rep…then it becomes second nature and you won’t have to think about it at all 🙂
He did really well here on both sides.
In the small space, you can angle the jump a bit so he still drives straight, but you have more room to get around the jump.He was not looking back as he drove ahead you threw the toy, which is GREAT! You can totally reward him with treats for leaving it on the ground as a good skill to teach him, but If it is easy to throw the toy (short enough distance, heavy toy) you don’t need to place the toy because we would have to fade that lure anyway. Your timing of throwing the reward here was basically as soon as you saw him locked onto the line to the jump (but before he arrived at the jump) and it was spot on!
On the 2nd video, he had no trouble with the added distance and the placed toy – super! So now we want to be sure he can do it without the placed toy. If you are ever training with other people around, you can have them throw the toy for you as long as you tell them to throw it when he is looking at the jump instead of when he arrives at the jump.
The next steps here are to keep adding distance – if it is safe to take this game outside, it will be easy to add distance! Or you can try it in a new location like a ring rental, which is also good for getting his skills into new places.
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
Wowza, he was a super good boy here!!!! This is definitely a session to be totally over the moon about!!!
The stay looked great, your line up spot was lovely, and most importantly, his form is wonderful especially considering he is a 9 month old male teenager!! Large dogs at this age are not known for being naturally gifted n the coordination department, but he jumped this set point as if he was a mature adult. HAPPY DANCE!!!!
For the next session, see how he does with a stationary toy (like a hollee roller tied to a long toy that he can easily scoop up) in the same spot as the manner minders was in this session. We will be working our way towards adding the moving target, so that he learns to maintain this lovely form with you moving and with a stimulating reward 🙂
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
He did GREAT with his stay as the toy was on the ground and moving too! What a good boy! There were a couple of reps where he was maybe moving a little early (the last couple reps before you added the jump) so you can mix in throwing treats back or throwing the toy back to reward the stay. He was perfect with all the reps with the jump!
>Looks like I want to hold the toy in my right hand – which puts me in strange positions when I’m to the dog’s right.>
Yes you will want to have it in the dog-side arm so you don’t get rotated moving the toy. Also, you can tie another toy to it so it is double the length – that way you can drag it without having to lean over to get it to reach the ground. Leaning over puts your physical cue into a bit of a ‘ready set GO!” position which might be too exciting as we add the jump grids 🙂
Interestingly, even with the long toy and the fun hollee roller, he wants to come up and grab the toy near your hand LOL!! He keeps his head low until right before he does that, so I am not too concerned about it 🙂 but you can try stuffing it with a tennis ball or fuzzy toy inside of it to get the bottom of the toy more interesting for grabbing. It cut a small slice into one of the ‘strands’ of the hollee roller to make an opening to be able to add a toy to the inside 🙂
You can start the set point – first with a stationary reward (toy or food bowl) to show him the concept, and then you can add the moving target to it.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
She did really well with the wrap proofing game here!! It is a hard game and she did great 🙂
>1) On her sends to the tunnel she has some hesitation when my motion to the tunnel stops. Need to work on sending her from more of a distance and with me being still.>
Yes – she needed a bit of motion support here, which is perfectly fine as we start the crazy proofing games 🙂 Then you can work on fading out your movement as you revisit the game here and there.
Also, this game adds a layering element because she has to pass the wing to go to the tunnel – she was definitely working that puzzle out in her brain! You can build more speed to the tunnel by curving the tunnel entry a bit so as she goes around the wing, the tunnel entry is directly facing her.
>2) She went wide on some of the wraps; I think that is because I was throwing my arm up and she thought I had tossed a treat. Need to work on low arms/hands.>Low arms and connection are always good, but I also think she was processing the challenge and the wideness came from thinking it through. No worries at all!! Also, was the harness new or something she was not used to running in? She did a couple of full body shakes so I think the harness might have been a small distraction but she will get used to it.
>So… in terms of the bitey behavior I wanted to schedule a private lesson to work on some of the behavior patterns that are developing. I sent in the online private lesson request (from your FB post) in late December. When I didn’t hear back I figured you were on break and I’d hold off till class started up.>
Weird! I don’t think the request came through – sometimes the forms don’t hold the info. I have an office person who replies to all the requests really quickly so if you didn’t hear back – se didn’t get it 🙂 The link is here, if you don’t mind filling it out again so we can get started!
https://forms.gle/LXAh75KQa9xH19KQ7I saw a tiny bit of the bitey behavior on the video – you can leave the transition into the harness hold in the video, no need to edit it out, so we can see ways to help her be less bitey about being held.
Nice work here! I am excited about how well she did with such a hard game!!
Tracy
Good morning! Nice work here!
Set point: Super nice session to get this started! The 5 foot distance works for now, I am betting as she matures she will be a 6 foot distance for her grids.
Her stay looked strong, which really helps as you put the cookie in the bowl 🙂 For her starting point, put her a bit closer to jump 1 – probably less than a foot away from it. She was a shade too far from jump 1 so while she was pushing from her rear, she is landing a little close to jump 1. Starting her closer to jump 1 will help her center more between the jumps.
The next step here would be to add the moving target from the pre-games. The stationary bowl is good to teach her the concept, and since she did so well we can add the (slowly :)) moving target which will get her head position ideal and even more hind end power 🙂 You can show her the moving target on the flat and on one jump first, then we can add it to the set point.
For the Wind In Your Hair game – her question about the toy was not about the toy, actually, it was about connection and knowing which side to be on.
Looking :02 (first rep) with treats, you were very connected as she exited the wing with your arm back and eye contact. On the other treat reps, the eye contact/connection was not as clear so you can see her looking up at you to get more info.
The treats were not as visible or as exciting as the toy, which is why the connection was more important with the toy in your hand. At :34 (1st toy rep) – as she exits the wing, your dog side arm moves forward which closes the shoulder and blocks her view of connection – and engages the other shoulder (like a blind cross) and the toy becomes visible.
So Bokeh says “nailed it!” does the blind, and went to the toy on that rep (and a couple of the following reps). As she was exiting the wing, she was seeing info that indicated the side with the toy.
When you took out the wing wrap, your connection was in place as she started moving so she knew exactly where to go. Super!
When you added back the wing wrap: Check out 1:01 where you kept your dog side arm back to show more connection and she got it really well!
You can also see the connection really clearly at 1:21 and 1:28 for example when you were on the other side: as she exited the wing, you had your dog-side arm back and you were making great eye contact. It is like that “Hallmark moment” from the rocking horse games where you keep the big connection to her eyes as she figures out which side to be on. -and that will help her ignore the toy.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
Hi!
>Yes, the gold was for her name – her registered name is actually All That Glitters Is Gold! 🙂 We love Taylor & Life of a Showgirl, too!>
Perfect! Love it!!!!!
>I will work on getting her back to the start line without the collar, then hold.>
She was so focused and engaged here that I think she will happily move with you!
>I see now why she was confused on that send….I gave too many different signals. >
I don’t think she was confused, and she didn’t look frustrated. It was more that she was double checking the info 🙂 Good girl!!!
Have fun!
Tracy
