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Hi!
On the independent backsides: both dogs are getting the idea of being more independent on these!
For Veloz – try to be moving forward the whole time and not helping at all by stepping in or doing a lot of handling. When you were trying to help, sometimes it worked and sometimes you were rotated or bringing him to the other side for the backside wraps. So, start closer to the start wing and just move forward – he had some really lovely moments in this session so you can add more motion (but less actual handling help :))
Fusion is all doing well! Same thing about motion with her as with Veloz: be moving the whole time, directly forward, try not to handle 🙂 Als, are you saying a jump cue before the left/right? I don’t think you need it, you can just say your left and right cues because the ‘jump’ is implied in the left/right verbals.
She was doing well with the start wing in position 1 and 2, but position 3 is too hard for her. So try a couple of more sessions in position 2 with the start wing, so you are not tempted to get it right by stepping in with handling 🙂
On the Mini Course – considering all the noise, Veloz did REALLY well!!! He had some good turns there without you needing to run a lot to help out. YES! He was definitely finding it really distracting – throwing reinforcement away from you can help him not get mad or jump up but I think he did well!! You can be a lot earlier on his turn cue – as he is in the air over the jump before the turn jump, start saying the verbal so he hears it nice and early.
Fusion also did well and by the end, totally got the idea to make a nice turn with the verbal while you run. She had a couple of errors at 1:22-ish, but it was because you were pushing her line so she was not sure of what you wanted and couldn’t quite get to the front of the jump – when you hung back a bit and gave her room, she was terrific!
Even with the dogs barking I could hear the difference in your verbals, and that is great! The sound and pitch and rhythm are just as important as the actual word 🙂
Nice work here! Let me know what yo think!
Tracy
Hi! Thank you for the reminder!!!!
Here are 2 videos for you –
one is of the game for the backsides and one is the head turns.This is specifically to train form for those backside circle wraps:
I don’t do multi-wraps in the traditional way of going around and around (I don’t really love the mechanics or the lack of excitement of those) but we do isolate the decision to turn the head/lead with the head which sets up great turns! So the dog wraps twice in a very specific way (but not over and over).
Here is how we start the baby dogs:
>>Is our course still “open”?
yes, til April 1
>>Thanks a million, this has been an awesome experience.
So glad you joined!!! It has been a pleasure getting to watch you and Prism!!
Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
The bluetooth mic sounds great!! Cool!!!He looked really good here – part of the happy dance is for the power and coordination through the set point, and part of the happy dance is for how well he held the stay with you dragging the toy and moving away faster and faster – hooray!
At almost 11 months, we can give Leo a little more height on the 2nd bar. It looked 8 inches here maybe? You can try 10 then 12 and see how he does. We have plenty of time to raise the height, so there is no rush at all 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! She did really well here!!
She naturally wants to turn towards you, so she looked great on the turn exits of the tunnel. You were a little late on the very first rep but then you got earlier (like at :50 for example) and she turned really well.
Go was definitely harder for her on the tunnel exits!! You were very early for all of them (yay!) so she will learn it with more practice and reinforcement. As she exits the tunnel on the GO lines, to get her to the wing – give her a TON of connection in the form of very direct eye contact (as you keep running of course LOL!) If you look forward she curls in towards you a little and if you point forward (like you noticed at 1:07) then she curls in a lot. So for now, give her as much connection as possible to support then line – then it will be easier as she gets more practice 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHello and welcome, thank you for all of the great info!!!!!
>>. It’s a hard topic to find training and an area of struggle for Sprite since he’s chase driven and waiting in line watching dogs run is not his strength.>>
This is true – there is not enough training on this stuff, specifically! Sprite’s questions are not unusual in agility, so these games will help him a lot.
>>He finds training very rewarding. He’s not a foodie dog but works for his daily kibble.
It will all get a lot easier for you if we can crack the code of reinforcement for him – what doe he really love that we can use as reinforcement? This can be types of food (you mentioned cheese and stuff) that make his head explode, or activities, or anything that he really loves (biting a broom? Barking on cue?) We can use a hierarchy of reinforcement to get better engagement in the ring for sure.
>>His start positions are not great as he insists on facing me.
The line up games will help this!
And, using his favorite treats, start the pattern games, those will really help him learn to to ignore the other dogs running. When you did the Naughty But Nice program, which games were most helpful for him?
And when you get a moment, video some of his tricks and we will build from there!
Looking forward to seeing more!!! Let me know what you think 🙂
TracyHi!
She did really well with the game in this new environment!
For now, when working the up-and-down with the cookies on your shoes, be careful with your motion. Try not to use motion as a lure to re-engage. What was happening was as she was chewing, you would move away towards the end of the chewing and it was becoming an antecedent (cue) to re-engage. We want her to drive the bus on this completely, so stand totally still. (The opposite side of this is to be moving the whole time, no start and stop, but that comes later).And the good news is that after a couple of minutes, she didn’t feel the need to look away 🙂 Yay! So if that happens – you can end the session, take a break, move to a new environment for the next session. You don’t have to make it harder by adding different things for her to look at, as that makes it unpredictable and predictability is our best friend on this one 🙂 You can train a skill if she is engaged, but that would be separate from the pattern games.
>>I have a question — on our way home she saw a dog she wanted to harass, and insisted we keep walking. Zippie moved into a pretty heel, slightly forged and FOCUSED on my face. Demanding. I could now ask for proper heeling, sits, downs, spins, all really flashy & without luring, all from the higher arousal state. Cool. I love happenstance opportunities to get and reward that high quality performance. I notice this after lure coursing as well. Any reason not to?
That is a great example of how arousal state is so important for optimal behavior! The first thing to do is always just reward the offered engagement. Yes, you can go into a training session after that but you want to make sure the FIRST thing is a big reinforcement for the excellent decision. And if you are training after that, be sure that there is a super high rate of success, keeping things simple enough, to help maintain the positive conditioned emotional response.
Or… you can just continue the walk after the reward for engagement – we don’t need every environment to be a high arousal work environment 🙂>>And should I food-reward offered engagement whenever it happens around the house, even when I’m not “training”?>>
I personally do not do that, it is exhausting for me and the dog LOL!!!! I don’t want my dogs to always be “on” in the house. If there are triggers (like a time where she would bark ou the window at something but offers engagement instead) then yes, totally reward that! Or if I am having a lot of struggles with a dog, I might do it – but it can potentially lead to some attention seeking behaviors and frustration so I tend to have the house as a place of chilling out 🙂
Nice work here! Enjoy the weekend!
TracyHi! She looks like she had fun with the retrieving! This one is hard to do outside the ring because you need a lot of space but it will be VERY useful inside the ring for training opportunities (USDAA and UKI)!
She did well ignoring the breakfast bowl… but note how when the ball was gone and you were moving away, she hung out with the breakfast bowl LOL!! That is both adorable and useful info! So definitely practice the remote reinforcement of simply walking away from the breakfast bowl and she offers to engage and come with you, without cues or the ball 🙂 Let me know how that goes!
TracyHi!
Definitely start to find the engaged chill behaviors! Being able to just chill is a big piece 🙂Also, with the remote reinforcement – do you mean the game in isolation, or being able to run full courses at home with the cookies or bl visible on a table outside the ring. That is a piece we will be looking at closely too 🙂
TracyGood morning!
He did a really good job with food in pockets in video 1! His behavior is already sharper and he did really well not seeing the food first. 2 more ideas for you:
– you can use the cookie more like a toy, moving it so he moves yo follow it as you deliver it. That can be a good balance of food and toys for him, in terms of arousal.
– the backing trick is still hard for him, he tends to not quite get it right. So for now, you can use the other tricks that he isnpretty perfect with and we can revisit the backing up later.The toy is definitely more stimulating 🙂 and this game will actually help him center his arousal because he has to kind of back off and control him self to doing something precise, in order to earn the toy 🙂 Perfect! He did really well, so a couple more sessions of this are in order, especially at the seminar this weekend.
You can also do the combo of food and toys, that might end up being his ‘sweet spot’ for trial settings.
Toy pattern game – do you have a word that says “grab the toy now”? I heard a bit if get it but not always – a specific cue for toy in hand can really help, especially if get it also gets used for tossed rewards.
He wasn’t distracted all during this session 🙂 so it was more about establishing the pattern with the toys and he did well!!!
Try not to hide the toy behind your back, I think that makes him a bit leapy for it 🙂 but as soon as he recognizes the pattern with the toys, it will be even easier!
Since you have the seminar opportunity this weekend, try to bring the pattern games into the setting (with food, first and then try with toys). That’ll give us some great feedback for trials!!Great job! Have fun this weekend!
TracyGood morning!
>> Yes students walking a course and lab just off screen soliciting play are less distracting than the barn :).
I believe it! This building has fewer distractions in general (fewer smells) plus gating plus the people were not watching her :))
Lots of good work here, she did really well!
On the pattern games – try to be ‘quieter’ in your mechanics, meaning have the cookies ready in both hands so you can just flick one with which even hand is closer to where you want to toss it – you were leaning back and forth a bit and that can become a cue especially if you are early: and we don’t want to cue her, we want her to offer.
For the pattern game, put a leash on her – at first, just all her back and forth with neutral distractions and when she is happy with that, and walk her amongst her peoples (your students) as they are walking the course and ignoring her 🙂 That can begin the process of teaching her to ignore the people because she has trouble with that 🙂The line up game looks good – remember to release from the stay after the dismount. I think you can add more duration now!
And she had fun in the tunnels too! To keep all the games super predictable (which is one of the keys to helping her focus and engage), separate them a bit with a quick mat break or tug break in between so she can say “aha! This is the pattern game!” Rather than trying to figure it out on the fly.
Great job here!! Onwards to adding that pattern game around more people 🙂
Tracy
Hello and welcome! Grady sounds like so much fun! And my favorite reward is filet mignon too hahahaha!
Thank you for the very thorough history! After reading it, I think that we can concentrate on getting him more pumped up (first with cookies visible, then without) and also teach him how to run with a lot of passion on course with distractions… even though all the cookies are outside the ring 🙂
There are a lot of games to start with, so take a look at the tricks game, the remote reinforcement game, and the pattern game (which will TOTALLY help him learn to ignore those random bits of things on the ground!!)
I am excited to hear more! Keep me posted!
TracyHi!
I think eventually it won’t matter if yo are calm or energetic 🙂 But I don’t want him to rely on you being very energetic, I want you to be able to relax a bit if you want to 🙂
Have fun!
TracyGood morning! She did really well here – there is a lot of good distraction around!
2 ideas for you on this game:
– when you enter a new environment, you can start the game as soon as you step into the environment with the get it. That way you don’t have to wait for her to engage (because she might be overwhelmed if it is a really challenging environment) and so she knows how to assess the environment with the offered engagement. Plus, she will recognize the pattern and be flooded with happy feelings 🙂
– to keep the pattern SUPER predictable, stick to one food delivery in the session – either the toss or the drop on the feet or the hand delivery. Mixing it up makes it a little harder because she can’t completely predict where the food is coming from – and this is the one game that we want to be soooo easy for the dogs 🙂 So, whichever cookie delivery you start the game with, stick with it for the session.
You can add movement now too, walking around and playing this game 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning! It is hard to know exactly what she had trouble, but here are some ideas –
Was she settled in the car while the other class was going on, or barking or unsettled? She might have been tired from not being able to rest while the first class was happening.
Also, she definitely was concerned/interested about the person and dog behind her. Does she often get to work in a quiet ring with one dog behind her in the distant? That was definitely distracting her.Also, there is a repetitive mechanical sound in the background that got louder in the 3rd video – was she possibly concerned about the sound?
I agree, the engagement games will help. Try to use your food more like a toy, so yo are moving and rewarding her rather than handing it to her – a higher arousal state can help whatever distractions she is experiencing fade into the background. Or use a tug toy, if she will play with it there 🙂 You did notice she was not as focused so you tried to break things down and help her be successful, which did help!
Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
>>He sometimes won’t take his toy if he’s scare or barky lungy but we can always keep building.
You can toss or roll it away and if he is interested in chasing it, which can be stimulating and get him away from the scary thing.
>>I try to keep him engaged or put him back on leash.
Engaged chill is helpful here! I bet you will find it already happening elsewhere in life and we can transfer it to agility!
>>I need to also work on letting him take the toy not attached to mom in a seminar setting.
Yes! The real friz, with real throws 🙂 wheee! You can ask other people to keep their dogs away so you feel more comfortable letting him be free 🙂
Tracy
