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Hi!
>I executed a lovely rear cross on the first rep. Unfortunately, I wasn’t trying to, and I probably couldn’t do it on purpose. >
Yes – remember the feeling of what you did there! As you were moving up the line, you were converging to the center of the bar of the wrap jump as she was taking the jump before it at :22, so it read perfectly as a rear cross 🙂 It set a really nice line to come back to the tunnel, too!
At 2:03 you had a better line for the left turn wrap- but remember to decelerate for a few steps before you rotate. You were decelerating and rotating at the same time, which pulled her off the jump.
2:46 was the sweet spot though – really nice decel until you saw collection, then you rotated. Nice turn!! Yay!
Seq 5:
She had a little trouble with the lateral distance on the lead out – get job adding moving forward to support the line to the tunnel like at 4:00.Working jump 4 on the landing side is a serpentine, which means she would need to see you passing through the center of the bar there (and relatively close to the bar, to set the line to 5) no later than when she was landing from 3. On the first 2 reps, she was seeing straight line info at 3 (4:04, 4:24) and jumped straight (moved away at 4:24 so she wouldn’t hit you (good girl).
Breaking it down was a good call – at 4:41 it looks like you were too far across the jump, like a backside cue. At 5:07 – looks like your position was definitely more center of the bar but too far from the line so she jumped straight then when you turned your shoulders dropped the bar. Ideally, you would be within an arms’s length of the 4 jump and holding the serp cues (arm back, connection) unit she lands from 4 and turns to 5. Getting there before she lands from 3 will require a more lateral lead out and not going past the wing of 1, but that is all good to play with to build up even more independence.
Great job here!
TracyHi!
At the start here, you can see her telling you what she thinks the release is; You stopped then moved again at :15, which is exactly what the release looks like for the most part. She thought she nailed it then was a bit confused. So be super clear about the lead out and release – I think adding praise to the mix will really help!>she kept going past the jumps in the middle, s>
That was when you were leaving the exit of the 4 tunnel too early, so the line to 5 didn’t get set at 1:32 and 2:09 so the extension sliced her past jump 6. Hanging back to pick her up more from the tunnel exit will help set the line and get your shoulders turned to the straight line.
For the rear crosses – when she is heading to 5, you can be facing the center of the bar of the RC jump. Don’t turn straight at all, so she sees the startof the RC cue sooner. Then as you are moving up the line and she is passing you, there is pressure to the center of the bar the whole time. You can take a leash and lay it on the ground to show you the running line to help set the RCs.
The RCs at 3:52 add 4:19 were better in terms of you showing the RC line! You can definitely be facing the line as she is taking jump 5 – no need to square up and face straight, you can be facing the RC line the whole time.
T
Hi!
Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!>I’ve started to notice this issue creeping up. I try really hard to always hold my criteria for this behavior, but sometimes my brain doesn’t process fast enough. Occasionally she gets up right as I’m about to release, and by the time I realize she was too early, I’m already moving on the next line and giving a cue. That seems like it might be confusing at that point. I’m really working on watching for this.>
Add in praise – lead out, connect, raise your arm, smile, praise…. Then release. That will give you a moment to see if she is moving or not, and it will help her not anticipate the release happening right as you connect or move your arm.
>>She’s not driving to the MM super well on her own; she doesn’t look for it the same way that Nox does. She will always check back in with me, and I have to send her back to it>>
>I was being a bit lazy and not driving past the last jump. Is it just my decel that’s turning her? In that case, I guess it’s good that she’s ignoring the MM since might think I’m trying to turn her? Should she go to it anyway once she hears GO! or Get it!?>I see what you mean about her not driving ahead! I think a couple of things were going on here:
The MM is not super high value, so the value of the MM was not overriding the handling. Good girl!
And yes, you were decelerating – so there was a conflicting indicator and she was reading handling. She should not go to it anyway, because we really do appreciate the feedback about the handling 🙂 So be sure to really drive to the last jump until drives to the last jump in extension too.Seq 2 – nice backside cue on the first 2 runs and the 4th run! At 2:24 you were not as connected and turning forward so she took the front there (just keep going rather than stop & reward)
Stay a little closer to the tunnel exit and make a really big connection – don’t move up the line until you see her making a tight turn on the tunnel exit (she is drifting a bit because she was trying to find the line – at 3:35 for example, you were almost to the next jump with your shoulders forward, so she was trying to figure out which side to be on. You ca be within a couple of feet of the tunnel exit with your dog side arm back to her, your eyes on her eyes (same as exit line connection).
>I did try sequence 3 once, but I didn’t execute the rear cross well, so I ended the session there to try again later.>
The RC was a little late – at 4:21 you were straightening up to pass 5, so by the time you got on the RC line it made the info a little late. As she gets more experienced with RCs, I think she will be able to read that pressure even if it is a little late and still make the turn – but this was after multiple straight lines, so she was thinking about going straight. It was good to take a break and start the RC fresh, when she didn’t have as many straight lines on her mind.
Nice job here!
TracyHi!
Oh, I am jealous of the Blue Apron idea! That was smart!!Lots of good work here and great distractions too!
I think she did great on this first run! It was hard to see what was going on outside the ring as you were prepping for it (and I did hear a little barking happening but I don’t think it distracted her) but we can assume the warm up outside the ring went well because she was on fire inside the ring! Yay!
The sequence opening was very connected and smooth!
>Got a jump up when I closed my shoulders after the tunnel>
Yes – she could see you just before the tunnel exit and you were moving literally and not connected so she came towards you. You tried to reconnect at 1:16 but it was too late, so she provided you with the reminder to connect to her at the tunnel exit immediately after she goes in. You can remind yourself to point to the tunnel exit so she sees your connection before she exits (and look for the next line peripherally).
> and she went between the pole and the jump near the end but pretty happy with our first “>
That was because of the big praise at 1:20 – it drew her attention off the line and up to you, and so things got disconnected for a moment. She is definitely an all-business, no sweet talk kind of girl LOL!!
She is also more resilient – she gets right back on the line after a question, and didn’t hold a grudge! Yay! And it looks like she had no trouble ignoring the reward station during the run and also went with you to it at the end.
Run 2 – If you have a long distance from the entry gate to the first jump, you can also jog out to the line – that is a built in volume dial! You started with her here and it made the opening line a little harder because at :30 over jump 1, you were saying tunnel but pulling away so she came with you. The pole is a little in the way too, so you will want to be a few steps ahead to set the line to the tunnel. You kept going and reset in flow, so she kept going too 🙂
Much better connection on the blind and the send to the jump after it (and no praise :)) so she got it nicely there!!!
Doing the other sequence at the end went really well – the short lead out helped you set the line to the tunnel, and clear connection made everything else looked smooth!
3rd run – definitely more distractions happening here! If she found it challenging to have Mochi walk by, you can plan for that and add in more activity outside the ring That will be great for her to experience!
Yes, the eruption from the other dogs was HARD and she was coming to you more than finding the jump on the release. She did get back on the line after that – super!
I don’t think the tunnel miss had a lot to do with the barking dogs, though – at 1:40 you were handling her like she was Kaladin 🙂 – not quite as connected as she needs and turned away from the tunnel too early, so she came off off it to follow your shoulder turn (you were fully turned away while she could still see you pretty clearly and the physical cue did look like a no-tunnel cue 🙂 ). She didn’t leap up there… it was went you tried to send and fix that she had a big mad (that info was not clear because you were rushing it there). Then she held a grudge because you kept trying to fix… So the no fixing rule still applies 🙂 If you can keep her flowing around and then try it again, perfect! That is what you did in the 2nd run. If you stop her and walk back to fix – it needs to be a very clear fix because her big mad clock is ticking 🙂 The best bet is to just keep going and don’t fix on that run.
Nice job getting the goodies out and helping her recover! That was a good moment of resilience and she ended really strong!!
Nice work here!! Enjoy your Blue Apron feast!!
Tracy
Hi! Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!
He did really well with the plank! It was narrow and a little slippery but he really thought about his feet and got all four on! SUPER!!
Yes, you can have it up on a the cato boards. You can also get a yoga mat or something to wrap it in, to provide more grip as he starts jumping on and off, and turning around. And any thicker, heavier board will work too!
Wrap game – I think he was into the treats, which is good! But the bucket of treats in your lap was overriding the 2 empty bowls. We can flip the script! Instead of a bowl of treats, have some in each pocket and a couple of in each hand, so you can play the game with a less distracting treat bucket in the middle 🙂
And then as soon as he has the pattern a little – you can add the upright in the middle. You can also use tiny pieces of something really high value for this (cheese, for example). That can really pump up the value of the bowls and get him running back and forth.
I see what you mean about him being a toy fiend and not having a quick out of the toy LOL! I love his toy drive! He did eventually drop the toy to go to the next one, so you can totally play with this too – just be patient that it might take a few seconds to get the toy back. For fast reps, though, I think the plan for higher value treats in your pockets with a couple in your hands will be better to get the behavior going.
On the reward markers video, you can see how the cookie bucket in your lap is a major focal point! It got him a little distracted from the first toy throw but then he was great with the toys 🙂 I think taking the cookie bucket out of the wrap foundation game will make a big difference.
You have a lot of really good markers happening! Yay! He was more than happy to play with you and with the various markers! My only suggestion on this session is to say the marker without moving the toy or treat… then present the reward. I try to insert the word “and” between my marker and the delivery. For example, if I have a toy in my hand, I might say “chase” then think “and throw” with the throw happening on the word throw. That has really strengthened the markers, because the verbal precedes the movement – so it predicts the placement of the reward and that is where the pup looks/moves to.
Looking at the backing up:
>He was way more jumpy here than a previous, unfilmed session>
Ha! I can relate – the best way to guarantee a good training session or clean run at a trial is to not video it LOL!
The backing up is off to a good start. I think the extra hippity hop was because of the click – you were trying to click the back end movement, but the click was catching a bit of lifting up and looking up (clicks tend to do that) and then there was a slight delay in delivering the cookie so he was watching it move. Then he was being helpful and jumping up to your hand LOL!!
So the easiest thing to do is to *not* click 🙂 Keep treats in both hands, and keep your hands low (you were definitely lowering your hands to try to get less jumping up). And you can say your cookie toss marker then toss the treat down low between his front feet. The quicker marker and treat toss will help keep his head down and then you will get even more backing up.
Great job on these! He is so fun!!!!
Tracy
Ha! I will totally take the blame for him loving the toy LOL!! For the beloved lotus ball, do you have a long toy that you an tie it to? I have a long, thin bungee that I loop around the lotus ball really tightly, so I can use it and drag it and toss it a little… all while not letting go of it and staying within the AKC rules 🙂
T
Hi! Nice work here!!
Starting with the goat tricks: She did well offering her hind end! It took her a couple of reps to be convinced to step into the big bowl (it is a big step up for a tiny dog :)) but she did it really well!
Hopping onto the blue mat looked great, she was very confident.
At 1:40 she was watching you get a handful of treats so her interaction ith the pink box was delayed. I don’t think she was concerned about it or struggling, I think she was watching the food because she is STARVING hahaha She was happy to put her front feet on the tiny bone (so cute!) but not quite convinced of putting her back feet on it. So you can make a bigger playing field by putting the bone and the pink step or the blie mat next to each other, so she can easily get all four feet on and walk around on it.Stealth self-control is going well! You got the bowl and the toy pretty far around the cone, which is great.
> I had to block more and move the cone closer for the toy or she would dive through (edited).>
For the toy and also the dish, you can add a cue to look at the correct side of the cone which will help her go to it. You can hold her with one hand, and use your other hand to indicate that she should look at the line around the cone (by pointing at the line you want.) Then when she looks at the line you can use your ‘dish’ or ‘toy’ marker and let go of her. That should help her understand to go around the cone and not dive through to the toy or dish 🙂 while developing great forward focus too!
Great job!
Tracy
Hello and welcome! I love that Ginger already has multiple nicknames LOL!!! She is really fun! And your posting skills worked perfectly 🙂
>Ginger loves food but she is also the most interested in toys of any of my shelties. However, I realized that I am a foodie! I am comfortable training with food not toys. So one of my goals is to learn to use toys. I am saying this out loud so hopefully I will stick to it.>
That is very exciting that she really likes toys! You will get more and more comfy with the toys as you use them more and more.
Stealth self-control:
She totally loves that toy! The first part of this game was more about toy to cookie to toy, and she did great. I love it!!! You can make the toy play longer so she can get a really good grip – count to 10 in your head before switching back to the food.What was the novel object in the environment? It was definitely interesting to her, it might fall into the category of exciting and not neutral LOL! She got into the game really well. For the next session, we can try to see if she will ignore the object entirely. You can use something even more boring than the object here. And, start the game with a cookie toss the instant she enters the room, or the instant you open her crate. That can help her process the environment even more.
Backing up is off to a great start!! To get more distance on it (getting her to back up further) – start off exactly like you did here, in terms of being just in front of the wall and dropping the cookie between your feet.
But, you can get rid of the clicker so you can have multiple treats in both of your hands – and lean over a bit, so as she backs up you can immediately toss the treat straight back between her front feet, so she backs up more to get it 🙂 The quickness of that treat delivery will help her back up more. The click and then having to get the cookie into the throwing hand delays the reward placement, so she looks at you and stands still. Having multiple treats ready will make it fast, so you can get it thrown before she looks at you or stops moving.
It is easiest is you keep your hands low, by your knees. If this will hurt your back, you can do it sitting on the couch so you can keep your hands low more easily (and give her a little room to get the cookies between your feet :))
The parallel path on the prop looked great! You can get rid of the clicker here too – she looks at you when you click, so you can use your ‘get it’ marker and cookie toss to keep her looking ahead. I think she is ready for more parallel/lateral distance on this game!
For the sending – nice job with the read dance! She wants to start without you so you don’t need to reward her if you haven’t cued the behavior 🙂 She was turning to her left on some of the reps where she should have turned to her right, so you can be a little further away from the prop (to the side) when you send her – she might have been seeing a bit of a rear cross cue and she might be a lefty!
Her prop value looks very high and so I think she is ready for the next step on both of these: rear crosses and countermotion!
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Good morning! Sounds like a really fun Thanksgiving!!
She of course did great with the baby level with the bowl and with the toy – the bowl and toy can move a bit further around the cone on each rep because the baby level is soooooo easy for her. She also seemed happy to be held for the line up which is of course an important part of this too! Super!! She had one question where she went to the other side of the cone, but more on that below:
So to answer your question and move to the advanced level:
> If you are using “get it” (“dish” or “toy toy” for me here depending on if it’s a food bowl or toy) if there is a direct line to the reinforcer why wouldn’t you expect them to skip the obstacle and take the reinforcer?>
The marker is coming when I see the pup has looked at the correct line around the wing (it is not a release, it marks looking in the spot I want). At first the bowl or toy is in such an easy position that they go around the cone to get it. Then as the bowl/toy moves, the neural pathway of staying on the line you are looking at starts to develop (because it is really so efficient for the dog to do it) and the reward is better when they do (in terms of our response).
So we almost never see the puppy cut in and skip the cone. Maybe once, but it is not a regular thing. And if needed, we can release the puppy to move when she looks at the correct line, but delay the marker until she gets to the correct line (which is goinbg to come into play more as the position of the bowl/toy gets more challenging and they have to go past it to get to the cone).
– we can also delay the marker>> Is this why you were using your hand to mark the line you wanted? I feel like without some sort of cue to take the “obstacle” I wouldn’t want the dog to be rehearsing grabbing obstacles that aren’t cued, or when something else is cued. At this stage can we just rely on that free hand indicating the line to BE the cue to take the obstacle/cone since the obstacle/cone does not have a verbal cue yet?>
Exactly! The hand cue to was the cue to look at the line. And when the pup looked at it, I used my marker for the bowl/toy. They totally don’t know what the heck it means yet, but they sure do know how to look at a bowl or toy 🙂 so we can get the behavior very easily.
I agree that some kind of cue is needed and yes, we can rely on the hand point to indicate the line as the physical cue. And if I wanted a different behavior on the cone, I would cue something different, even if the bowl or toy was in the same spot.
Looking at where she had her question in the video, at 3:13 – she is lined up directly on the line she took, and you had a finger point but not a clear indication to the line you wanted. Watch where she is looking before you released her: directly at the line she took 🙂
But then compare to the next 2 reps: at 3:27 you had a little arm cue and she looked at the toy really well. Then 3:56 was the best rep: a clearer arm cue and you waited for her to look at the line you wanted. When she did, you gave the toy toy marker and she nailed it. YAY!!
I think that was a big moment for her because it started to solidify the concept of ‘look at the line then stay on the line’. Then we will gradually increase challenge by moving the bowl/toy (and delay the marker as needed) while cuing the line we want her to take. You can make your arm cue even more obvious to help her out.
Let me know what you think! Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
>Happy Thanksgiving! or, National Day of Washing Dishes.>
Happy Thanksgiving back to you, and I also did far too much dish washing (and have more to do hahahaha)
Looking at the video:
> I have always used a prop for backing up. This method was what worked for him – it was a hard skill for him to learn.>
This is definitely one of the great ways to teach it – it is still a shaped behavior, but the mat provides a destination for him. We will be using that target concept soon, but to give you a jump on it – you can start making your target less stable (pile up a couple of towels or mats at first, then if he finds that easy, use an under-inflated fitness thing so it is very easy to back up onto and moves only a little bit).
And with the ‘normal’ targets, keep adding distance for him to back up further and further.
> I’ve started using the word back, but I know that he does not know it. If there’s no target, he struggles.>
Keep the word with the target for now, and you can also start to fade the target into small and smaller targets so he is eventually backing up to a piece of duct tape on the floor 🙂 and then eventually backing up to no target. It is not a huge priority right now but certainly fun to do!! The targets keep him straight and balanced which is a super high priority with an adolescent dog.
The prop games are going well!
The parallel path game is a bit of a loop with cookies, so you can vary your position on each rep as he goes back and forth: sometimes as soon as he is getting to the treat, you can turn and move past the prop so you are way ahead when he is moving to it. Sometimes go all the way to the treat with him and wait til he eats it – then turn and move forward so he drives ahead of you. And sometimes split the difference, sending him past you to the treat then waiting there, so you are parallel to him a bit more . Mix it up!The sending is going really well!!! He turned the correct direction towards you on both sides – that is GREAT!!! Remember that this is not a looped behavior, so call him to you and get him engaged and excited before each send. That will get even more drive to the prop so your countermotion can be even more exaggerated 🙂 At this point, I think the best way to do that is to use a toy instead of treats 🙂 The toy can be rewarded from your hands or tossed past you, then he tugs with you, then you do the next rep. And if he drives away to the prop with more conviction because the send is really exciting, you will be able to move the opposite direction as soon as he leaves you to go to the prop.
>Then the RC were just a hilarious blooper reel.>
The rear crosses are super hard and based on your blooper reel comment, I was expecting it to have gone wrong a whole lot. But you nailed it on the 2nd rep!!!! At 1:17 you got to the new side early enough that he turned left. YES! At 1:29 he was watching you a bit more but still got it.
The others were all a little late (1:17 was the best one in terms of timing) but at 1:40 and the reps after it he had figured it out: when da momma puts pressure in towards the center of the prop, you turned away. SUPER!!! Very smart dog 🙂
To make it even easier and to keep him looking ahead more, mix in lots of reps of the parallel path where he does not turn away (you go to the cookie with him on the reps where you are setting up the RC). Overall, though, this is one of the best first RC sessions that I have ever seen, especially since he got it in both directions! Click/treat to you!
Great job on these!
Tracy
Good morning! Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!!
>I’m working on remembering to tug lower, though I’m super sore from my workout yesterday and that made it … tricky. >
You can totally tie a few toys together to create a 6 foot long toy – it is harder to carry by definitely easier on the back or hamstrings or any place you might be sore.
>Hard for me to adjust to tugging with him versus Pattern and Phoenix, but both of us will keep adapting>
I can relate – different sizes of dogs, different ages… makes for slightly different mechanics at first. But it will get easier and then you won’t have to think about the mechanics as much.
The videos are looking good!!!
Driving ahead: You can throw it further and start to add your motion (walking forward, then jogging, then running then racing!). His response to your motion will tell you how much to move: if he continues to move in a direct line to the toy, you can add mroe motion. If he starts to bubble out and push off the pressure and is on more of a curved line to the toy – dial back the motion to where he can remain on the straight line to the toy.
In between reps, use a line up with a cookie to get him to your side and in position before you reach for him. When you tried to reach for him and move him into position in between the reps on the video, he was avoiding/moving away a bit. He is doing great about switching between food and toys, so you can use a cookie to line up, and to reward him for letting you hold him – this is especially important if you aren’t using a collar or harness, since we want him to be very comfy being touched.
On the blind cross video:
You can make these more agility-style by emphasizing connection so he can make the side change very immediately. You were doing them more flyball-style with the toy being the mainly visible thing and not that much connection, so you can see there is a delay in the side change as he processes where to be. So to get the super fast snappy blinds, have the toy scrunched up in the dog side hand – then as you do the blind, connect to him on the new side, new arm pointing back to him, and the toy from the original hand stays in that hand and is resting on the dog side hip. He will see the connection change very quickly and make some snappy side changes!! It is the more European way of training blinds (if anyone asks 🙂 ) The hard part of us is to keep the toy in the original hand and not change hands, but the results are worth it.It looks like this (ignore the jump for now :)):
>>On the blind cross reps, he seemed better at grabbing the tug when it was on my right. I was holding the food in my left hand (no pockets), and I wonder if that contributed?>>
I think that was probably it – he would look at the toy then at your hand on that side. You can separately get a bit of tugging while you hold one boring cookie 🙂 and see how he does.
Also, if you are right-handed, there might just be a stronger response to tugging on your right. The left might be a little harder, especially with food. So you can get a bait bag or stick them down your shirt for now, or use one cookie to throw to start (the rest are stashed on a wall or something) so you can reward the blind without cookie interference 🙂
He was a lovely goat on the last video! Great job bringing him in with the tugging so he could think about proprioception while he was definitely more aroused! And nice transitions from the toy to the object/treats/back to the toy. A treat dropped but no worries, he got right back into the tugging. He did great – good foot hits while he was definitely more stimulated by the tugging annd the presence of the toy.
The object is a little small so you didn’t get any hind end offering. He is ready for hind end offering for sure, so you can make a biggr ‘playing field’ by getting 4 or 5 objects and placing them next to each other, so he has a several things to walk across and get his back feet on. This will of course be pretty impossible to carry with you and place down while tuggin LOL! So you can have it set up in advance, get tugging before you go over to it, then run over and let him off. Then when you break off for more tugging, you can move away from the objects so he doesn’t keep trying to offer behavior on them.
Great job here!!!!
Tracy
Good morning! Having a big field all to yourself is great! Hope you had a fun Thanksgiving!
He did well with the pre-game (hardest part for him might have been finding the treats in the grass :))
To make the mechanics easier, you can drop the clicker and the ‘yes’ – and just use your ‘get it’ before tossing the treat. ‘Get it’ means both ‘you are correct (making the click and the yes unnecessary) and ‘the treat is tossed’ (which is better info than the click or yes). That way it is easier for you!He is ready for you to start the week 1 sending to the prop – you can give him a quick warm up with rewarding for touching it to refresh the value, then move into the sends 🙂
Excellent start to the forward focus (and I almost snorted coffee through my nose when you said “I know, it should be on a leash” hahahaha) He brought it back pretty quickly, no worries 🙂 I don’t think it needed to be on a leash unless the victory lap turned into a lengthy victory parade. And he brought it back really fast when you started moving away!
Great job with your connection on the release. He is definitely ready for the toy races where you run forward and try to beat him to the toy (good luck haha) to increase speed even more while adding handler pressure and the acceleration cue. If he is fine with that, you can also add the GO verbal.
>>BTW, I have the broken retriever, LOL! He often drops the toy on the way back….I added in motion to entice him but definitely need to work on this. He doesn’t seem to do it when field training.>>
He did well here! It is possible he drops it early if you pull out cookies too early – so let him get all the way back to you before you even reach for your pocket 🙂 And if he drops it, you can go grab it and dance around and tease him a little before the next rep, so he has regrets about dropping it 🙂
He did great with his food bowls in this new environment! YAY!!! I also love your chair, it is the perfect height. Since he has seen movement puzzles which share the same back-and-forth concept, you can fast track this game to put a barrel or large cone in between the bowls to go around. When he can do that (should take about 15 seconds haha) then you can change your position to standing up. And if you can get a session or two of you standing and he is wrapping a barrel or big cone? Cool! Onwards to turn and burn which was added last Tuesday 🙂
Great job here!! Have fun!
TracyGood morning! Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!!
> He has dreams to compete at Invitationals he just doesn’t know it yet. >
I can totally see him at the Invitationals!!!!
Your run through practice here looked. He seemed just fine and dandy to run the sequences without treats in your hands or pocket – it is possible that he is beginning to find running agility to be intrinsically rewarding? And that is great, so now we just need to transfer that to the trial environment. You can still use treats and toys in the harder environments as well as when training at home, of course, but it is really cool to see how well he did withut them 🙂
My only suggestion about it is to interact more as you come in to jump 1and get set up – you can talk to him a bit and use you tricks! You played with your hands a bit but he didn’t get engaged with that (he looked away). But he certainly likes his tricks so you can do a little of that as you move to the start line. That will also help in case he finds the trial environment more challenging than home or class.
He had great engagement when the leash came off and was all business after that 🙂
The first course went really well.
Nice start to the sequence with the tunnel! The rest of the first run was edited out and it looks like he was happy to get his leash on at the end.
2nd run was a much longer sequence and he was impressive!!! NICE! He ran it like an adult dog there, not a youngster. Fabulous conenction and verbals from you!
2nd course went really well too – he has a great start line and the lead out to get the backside of 3 worked great! You had super nice connection there and then there was a tiny drop of connection at 2:26 so he went past the jump. Good job continuing and reconnected so he got right back on the line.
And he was happy to get leashed up and run out to the rewards on these. Really super practice!!
Great job here!! For his trial next weekend – if there a toy you can bring in that he will like? A furry (empty) lotus ball attached to a leash, or a tuggie he likes?
Tracy
Good morning! Hope you had a good Thanksgiving!
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Looking at the power patten game: She did great! Yay!
>. I only used the leash once and then we did a back & forth. To really replicate the AKC experience, I think I need to start with leash on, go to the jump, remove the leash, engage (take the jump when we get to that point) then I think you mentioned that we can add a verbal for getting the leash before the “let’s go” to get the remote reinforcement. Should I do that every time, or just some of the time to keep it simple & fun in the beginning?>
I think I should add in recommending people leave a leash at each station, so it is easier to flow through it and not worry about where the leash it. Or maybe throw the leash to the next station, like we throw it away to a leash runner LOL!! That way you can use the leash to bring her to the course, then AKC-style get it back on when you are ‘exiting’. The more we use the leash as part of the game, the better 🙂
She did really well here! You don’t need to use ‘yes’, you can just ues your ‘let’s go’ (so the ‘yes’ doesn’t accidentally become the marker to go to the rewards 🙂 )
The line up was great! She learned that fast!!! All of the other tricks looked good too. You can add the stay in sooner – that way she gets used to you asking for a stay and a short lead out, mixed in with the tricks and stuff too.
On the 2nd video:
The engagement after the leash came off was great. She didn’t want to play with the first toy – maybe because she could smell treats? Or the toy needed to be more ‘alive’ so she could chase it? Either way it is good info about what she feels is a reward/motivator in the moment 🙂
But she DID want to tug on the fancy rainbow leash!!! So you can let her tug on it then slip over her head then tug on it more 🙂 Does she like being picked up? You can tug on it, pick her up, put it over her head, then tug more. The mechanics might feel a little messy at first as she gets used to the ritual of it.
> She was stiffening when I was clipping on the leash. Can I give her a treat after I clip the leash on for this game?>
Yes – if she is showing concern about the clip then yes, cookies are good! Maybe she doesn’t like the click of the clip right near her face or ears?
>So like this: clip leash on, treat, walk to our spot, leash off, engage & play/treat.>
Absolutely! I didn’t see any of the issue with the slip leash (other than her wanting to tug on it LOL) so you can also skip the clip leash altogether and use the slip leash!
>>We have a trial this weekend. It is a busier location with 2 alternating rings under cover at an equestrian center on dirt. She has been there several times as a spectator and has used the practice jump there. I’ll be there with her Friday & she is entered for Saturday morning so I can get a feel for how she is feeling about the place and take her some some long sniffy walkson Friday to get used to it. If she seems up for it, I’ll keep it very simple.>
FUN! Keep me posted!!!
>> Do you think I should keep the toy visible?
If my memory is correct: she practices without the visible toy at home and in league, and her previous FEO had the hidden toy… so if that is correct, no need to keep the toy visible *unless she is really having a struggle in the environment*. You can do Empty Hands. And depending on how many runs she does: if all goes well, you can even try a quick step 3 in and out with no toy in the ring (super easy fast line then right out to the leash then the toy).
>I can put the bowls outside the ring even though we just got started with the power pattern.>>
Yes, try it! I think she will recognize them pretty quickly.
Great job here and keep me posted about how the weekend goes!
Tracy
