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Hi!
I firmly believe in separate cues. The backside slice and the backside wrap are behaviors that are as different as sit and down – so require different cues. That way she can hear the cue much sooner and make the right choice! Picture this: she is exiting at tunnel 18 feet from a backside. At the tunnel exit, you can tell her if it is a slice or wrap so she has plenty of time to set it up in terms of jumping and collection.
If you only have 1 verbal – she won’t know til much later if it s a slice or wrap. This can lead to bar knocking or guessing where she defaults to one or the other (usually the dogs pick the slice). You all need to rely on the handling which can work sometimes… but won’t work when you can’t get there.
Some folks use the backside verbal plus a wrap cue, but many dogs find that late info because they don’t hear/process the wrap cue til they have arrived at the backside.So… I think you will be happier if you have 2 separate verbals (and so will she :))
Let me know what you think! How did UKI go this weekend?
TracyHi!
I like how you set up this space – the jump for the out and the tunnel behind you. It is challenging but also this is what we are seeing on course lately: running through boxes and past things without the correct obstacle being visible.
He did really well on the out, especially when ou cued it as soon as he exited the wing wrap. The go-straight was indeed harder, maybe because there was no visual obstacle ahead and therefore he didn’t think it could be simply straight? So you can add a wing or jump straight ahead, so there is more value for the stay straight moments… which also adds challenge for the out cue 🙂Nice work!! Have fun!
TracyGreat! And thank you for coming to the connection seminar today, it is always fun to see you there!
T
Hi!
You and Fritzi looked great here!Baby level – really nice connection with your baby dog! That is why she had so much fun AND was so successful – connection! The only spot I think she ended a little more connect was on the left turn ‘racetracks’ from wing to wing at 1:15, where you looked ahead a bit and so she looked at you. If you keep your eyes back to her, she will find that line without looking up at you.
The leaf chasing moment was so funny, she came back with so much speed – she is just a joy to watch 🙂
Mini course:
You had really good connection here too (except for one spot LOL!) At the beginning, when she went wing-to-wing from :04-:06, you had better connection than in the baby level reps so she really didn’t need to look at you there. Nice! And she found her lines easily thanks to the good connection on the rest of it too, except…>>Has a funny Oops at the end
That was HYSTERICAL!!! Baby dogs are the BEST! Nailed it with lovely jumping form LOL!!!!
Keep your arm back more for connection – she was coming to the correct side but then you pointed forward while she was still behind you, so she read it as a blind cross to your right side… and then the tunnel hurdle was the only option LOL!
Compare that to :32, where you kept your left arm low and back until after she passed you and she had no trouble finding the correct tunnel entry 🙂Awesome job using all of your verbals too – the earlier we start, the better we remember to use them 😂 and the better the dogs learn them 🙂
Great job on both of these – it was SO FUN to see her nail these!
Tracy
Hi! Hope you had fun at the herding seminar!
This is DEFINITELY less bouncy. She seemed to think it was GREAT lol!!! It took her a couple of reps to get organized – the game was more exciting so she lost some of the precision and organization. She was getting it back at the end, so we will definitely use this but make sure we take our time to keep the thoughtful organization. You can lead out a little more and move the toy very very slowly 🙂 Maybe in the bigger space try it with a bar on the 2nd jump and let me know how it goes?Great job!
TracyHello and glad to see you back, it is so fun to watch you two!
This game is going really well – he keeps getting faster and faster 🙂 I am really happy with his commitment!!!
>> had a couple times where I lost connection and he went in the wrong end of the tunnel. I think he’s going to make sure I improve on this. LOL. >>
Yes, connection is key to this game 🙂 Your connection in general was really strong! Just a couple of little disconnects with the tunnel: The first rep where he ended up in the other side of the tunnel was because you pointed forward and that broke connection and turned your shoulders to where he went. Keeping your arm back and looking at his eyes got on the correct tunnel entry beautifully (like at :25)
At 1:26, your dog-side arm WAS back (yay!) but I think he just needed you t move more directly to the tunnel entry – your line of motion turned to the other side of the tunnel so he thought you wanted that one. You moved more directly to it at 1:35 and he was great about finding the one you wanted.>>I have a couple questions. I am wondering if I was using the verbals right? I wonder if I should have been saying right or left on some of the start wings, instead of my wrap cues? I
Any time that he comes around the wing to go back to the tunnel or you do a turn and burn exit, you can use the wrap cues (which you did here) When you are doing more of a racetrack moment from wing to wing, you can use your left/right cue.
>>There was also a part of the session where he just kept either anticipating the tunnel or the wrap. Do you want me to handle that differently?
The good news is that he loves loves loves these games. So that is why he was trying to anticipate and start without you LOL!!! I suggest fast reset cookies to line up at your side: after the toy reward (or after an error), call him back for a line up cookie at your side. That way he can build as much value for lining up to start, as he has for running the sequences 🙂 the value of the line up cookie will depend on the value of the toy – if he can handle a high value cookie also playing with the toy, you can use a high value cookie. If he will stop playing with the toy, you can try lower value treats so you can maintain the toy value.
When you are feeling comfy with the connections here, you can spread this out so there is even more running 🙂 Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
Nice work on the tunnel-wrap proofing game. It is a hard game for sure!
The look on your face when he went into the tunnel was so funny LOL!! You were like, “DUDE!”Keeping the wing further from the tunnel was great – the tunnel value has come up recently so he had trouble when the wing was too close and turning to the left.
He did not appear to have the same trouble turning to his right, he was perfect – maybe the wing was further from the start on the right turn reps? Or maybe turning left is harder. Either way, it is also perfectly fine to have a bit of handling involved – you can say the verbal and then handle. For example, holding his collar, start the wrap verbal, let him go, then do a front cross. He will find that helpful and it will help solidify the verbals, but cause the verbal cue will predict the FC and reinforcement placement. We don’t always do FCs with wraps, but the concept will work for this and then we can fade out the FCs. He definitely seemed to like the handling, and he was GREAT for both of you when you did the tunnel-tunnel-wing game (which had a little handling in the form of decel but not a lot).His commitment on the smiley face games looked great! I think the first two reps were warm ups to get the verbals going but them BOOM! The bigger sequence with the wraps and lefts/rights was fabulous! His commitment looked great, your verbals were spot on. When Mike took the wheel, he needed the one rep to warmup the verbals and then the next rep was great too! You can do walk throughs at high speed with the verbals… and without him 🙂 There are a lot of words in this game LOL!
My only suggestion is to make more connection to him on the tunnel exits – try not to be looking forward. When you two look at him at the tunnel exits, he immediately finds the line. When you don’t look at him, he looks up a little at you or comes off the line. The very last rep is a good example: At 2:44, perfect connection on the tunnel exit so he went directly to the wing. At 2:47, you were looking forward, so he came off the line.
Next steps for the smiley face? Spread it out 🙂 Go to 20, 25 or 30 feet between the wings and tunnel so he really feels the wind in his hair 🙂
Great job here!!! Let me know what you think!
TracyHello and welcome back!! So fun seeing you here again!! Glad to hear he is feeling better!
On the first video:
Dragging toy looked great, what an amazing dog he is to work with focus with all of those distractions!!! I am pretty sure my dogs would have head explosions LOL!He was great with the dragging toy, and his change in movement is for why I want to use the dragging toy for the jumping foundations – when the toy was stationary, he was a bit bouncy 🙂 Not in any terrible way, but he was not striding out powerfully because he knew he had to come to a stop at the toy. But as soon as it started to move? Perfect movement, head low, fast but not frantic. YES!
The set point intro went well. There was someone running past him in the first rep and he was perfect in his stay. He watched a little bit but didn’t leave for the exciting distraction – I think that he is going to find trial environments to be really calm compared to the park!
What was the distance between the 2 jumps, and the height of the 2nd one? I think a slightly shorter distance would be perfect for him: If this was 6 feet, going to 5 or 5.5 feet perhaps would be great.
The food target as reward went well but I don’t think the food was as exciting as spring day in the park LOL! I want to add the dragging toy into it to get the power and organization going even more. Setting him up like you did here, use the same progression you ddi with the dragging toy game in the first video – introduce the concept of the stationary toy. And when he is fine with that (probably one or two reps) – release then drag the toy. When he is organized in the set point with that (either one or two reps… or several sessions, or somewhere in between LOL!) you can drag the toy before the release. There is no rush to get to the dragging toy before the release, because we want him to maintain the precision of the organization of the jumping with the power he had here.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning! This looked strong! For tracking purposes, what were the heights and distance between the 2 jumps?
I am liking what he is doing with his jumping mechanics! Good power and organization, he is NOT losing his skills with the moving toy (because you have put a lot of training into toy play! Yay!). I love teaching dogs to stay thoughtful even when more stimulated by sporty stuff. Big happy dance!
Little mechanics details with the dragging toy – drag it with the dog-side hand so you don’t end up rotating towards him and he can see the picture of you moving forward. I think the right hand is your comfortable hand, and but hand it in the left when he is on your left (on the first rep, it was in your right for example)
You can also use a longer toy (or a couple tied together so you can stand up more, which can help with the jumps but also with the desire to ‘vulture’ a little in the stay LOL! It keeps the set point a little less exciting 🙂Since he did seem to want to lean forward in the stay, we can help him be a little more upright by leaving a toy behind him and sometimes giving him the cue to turn back and get it. I believe you have a marker for this in your treasure chest of words 🙂 It might not be strong yet because it doesn’t get a lot of use, but you can brush it up and use it here! I personally have not found throwing rewards back to help with the leaning forward/vulture position, because the dogs lean forward, catch the reward, then go back to leaning forward LOL because it gets reinforced with the throw reward. I also don’t want to nag the dogs about leaning forward because he was not actually breaking the stay. So the turn back for the toy produces nice results – the turn back is incompatible with leaning forward, plus we can transfer it to his leash for trial and NFC purposes.
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
His commitment to the barrel looks great on both videos – yay! So we can use this as a way to get really clean, sharp mechanics for the crazier games that are coming soon 🙂Ah yes, on the first video he definitely did not want to come into you! Even if you are not sure why during the session, try not to physically move him into position – it will be better to use a cookie lure to reset him than to put him into position or to let him start backwards. I think reset and line up cookies are great for him in general, because he didn’t want to line up next to you on the 2nd video either. Yo can use the reset and line up cookies as a way to teach him to love the line up while you are also training other things.
And yes, if he’s doing odd things, check the environment and see if there is something causing it (like the dremel torture bag LOL!)
One more mechanics suggestion: have the cookies ready in your hand – reaching back for them caused a significant delay in reinforcement, so he was looking at you a lot while waiting for the cookie.
On the 2nd video – The commitment looks really strong here, so I will bug you about mechanics 🙂
Think of the food rewards as interactive toys, something to make a big deal out of, present and engage with. I think dropping the cookies on the ground between you and him is not all that informational in terms of placement (they don’t reward the barrel, specifically, or driving to you, specifically, they are kind of in a cookie no-man’s-land) and also dropping them like that is not that engaging. He has very high food drive but don’t use that as an opportunity to not really engage with him – use the cookies like a toy, with engagement meal specific placement and interaction before during and after you toss them or deliver from your hand. You were praising here, but it wasn’t really interaction or engagement, if that makes sense – he was off scoping for the cookie, you were thinking ahead for the next rep but not really engaging with him in the moment.
Also use reward markers this. You were generally praising but that is not specific and I don’t want him to think that any cookie on the ground is fair game for finding and eating… that could lead to distraction issues where he sees a crumb or piece of fuzz and goes to it, thinking it might be a cookie. You did say search here and there but it was after the cookie toss aafter the praise, so it got lost – say search first before you throw the treat, so it is really salient and so it means “eat one cookie and return attention to me”.
Also, the tossed cookie in no-man’s-land 🙂 didn’t help him want to come back and line up. You can reward from your hand, or after a tossed cookie, use a reset reward.
This game is also great for using toys! You can incorporate your toy play into this one as well.Let me know what you think about the mechanics suggestions! The commitment skills are really strong so we can make she the mechanics are sharp in a setting where he is unlikely to make a mistake.
Tracy
Good morning! All of these games are going well! Yay!
>>It’s kind of killing me now that I didn’t teach the tuck sit. I was thinking about that this whole year and never got around to it and now…regrets. Would sure come in handy for this one!
Ha! Yes, If you don’t have a tuck sit at you side or between your feet, a good ol’ lure helps get the position 🙂
The sit stays with the toy on the ground were good! With the stationary toy, you can release a little sooner so he looks at the toy more and less up at you.
I definitely like his organization better with the toy than with the TnT, where he is thinking about slowing down rather than engaging his hind end to power over jump 2. So, since his stays look strong and the pre-games went well… let’s add in the dragging toy from the pre-game! Everything is the same as you did in steps 2 and 3 of the pre-game – first you release then drag the toy, then when he is happy and successful with that, you drag the toy THEN release.
The step after that would be to add things to jump over more, which will also probably change the distance between the jumps. Do you have small jump bumps you can use?
Wind in your hair game:
>> 1)I didn’t have the wing lined up with the side I was sending. The wing was in the middle and stayed there throughout.
Yes- that will make the line a little easier for him for sure. He still did well with the wing in the center, so you can change the placement of it but you don’t need to worry too much about it.
>>2) I wasn’t watching for his face to look at the jump to reward right at that point.
I think this is the main thing to work on – the connection 🙂 When you were not looking at him, he was looking at you, which is why he was not necessarily driving as hard as he could to the jump (when we disconnect, they look at us. When we connect, they look at the line. It is crazy but true LOL!) So on the next session, keep moving up the line like you did, but look at him – the moment you see his cute little face look forward, throw the reward or click the MM. When you used the MM at the end, you were a little bit late with the reward (you clicked when he was between the uprights) so that can happen when he looks forward (which might be as early as when he exits the wing wrap). You can use your ‘get it’ marker in that moment if you are throwing the toy, and also if the toy is placed: he is going to drive to a placed toy 🙂 so you can mark the moment of the good decision to look forward with your get it marker.
Smiley Face: He did really well here too!
Good connection on the first rep but yo were quiet, you did a great job on the reps later in the video adding the directional verbals and tunnel cue. Try not to say yes to him – it is distracting from the task-at-hand LOL!!! So if yo want to reward, yo can mark and reward otherwise just keep the information flow going with cues (because cues also tell him he is doing things correctly).About the connection – yes, more connection will help here too! A couple of spots to add more connection are:
– Look at him when he exits the tunnel. You are getting ahead and looking at the wing and kind of waiting for him to get there and he slows down a little because he is not entirely sure of where to be. As soon as you see him enter the tunnel, the next place to look is at the exit.
– Same thing at the exits of the wraps – when he is finishing at wrap, look at him to say tunnel tunnel tunnel and not at the tunnel (for example, 1:23 was a little disconnected and he looked at you before heading to the tunnel)At 1:30, he didn’t go to the tunnel, caused by a big disconnect: you ran away from the line, looking at the tunnel, and he had an error because he couldn’t tell which side of you to be on – definitely a reset cookie moment! From his perspective, the handling looked like a blind cross to your right side, which also presents a tunnel entry. Assume all errors in this game are you handling errors, and reset with a cookie or toy play. Much better connection on the next reps and he got it consistently.
Connection is really hard with young dogs, because we have to be pretty perfect! Keep reminding yourself to look at him and not at the obstacles 🙂
On all of these handling games where things are moving quickly, do little high speed walk throughs without him, before each rep, to double check your verbals – the left and right were flipped here 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
>She gets a tossed reward almost every rep, so toss-rep-toss-rep and so on most of the time, I just cut them out of the video to shorten it up. She regularly looks on the floor for treats regardless of what we are doing.
Are the tossed rewards generally treats? Then the looking around might be either the treats are not that stimulating so she isn’t glued to you in anticipation that they might come, or they bounce around so she is looking around. Try throwing the toy as the reward. Or if it is the toy, throw it sooner and more randomly so she watched you more.
I don’t want to obsess or put pressure on her about it, I just want to gently shape her to choose to watch you and not look around 🙂
Wind In Your Hair
The milker is definitely is a better throwing choice!!
This went really well for the most part – she was able to drive ahead pretty easily (nice early throws to help jumpstart that!). Her only real question was at 1:38 (and later at 2:39) where you went from being really close to the start wing to really close to the jump on that side – too big of a change in criteria, especially because it puts her closer to where all the reinforcement was landing. Splitting the difference and being halfway between like at 1:44 was much better and she did it easily from there. I don’t think it was that your leg didn’t step forward, because you had that leg position on lots of other reps – same with the toy next to her, she was fine with it on other reps. I’m guessing the distance was the issue. So definitely continue with what you already did: start halfway between to get more distance, then gradually work up to being close to the jump.On this video (and the next one) add in reset cookies for the line up, both after a reinforcement and after an error. She is a little bit not loving the line up collar grab – she is a little sideways and doesn’t come right into position next to you, especially after an error. So a lifestyle of line up cookies (used as a reset after an error as well) will really help get that flow going. And that way there errors don’t get rewarded but also you don’t have to do big praise or jolly her up to get her back into position for the next rep. Reset cookies to both line her up at your side, and to reset after errors so it is not just praise but a quick reset
For the next session: Yes, add motion on the reps where you can start really close to the wing and to the reps where you are halfway between the wing and jump. I bet if you can work up to running in a session or two, you will be past the jump when yo start from that halfway point. And without a lot of motion, work on sending to the wing from further and in those cases, you can reward the wrap by throwing the toy to the wing to help her remember that it is great to go all the way there without you.
Wing-Tunnel proofing game:
I do see it visible in the Course Syllabus section, let me know if it is not there when you check again.
She started off really well did well without motion in the beginning! You can add reset cookies here too – both after the toy play rewards to line up for the next rep, but after an error – for example, if she goes into the tunnel an you’ve cued the wrap, you can say something casual and call her to your side for a cookie to line up for the next rep. That can make a seamless transition into the next rep and reduce that moment of frustration when she is not getting the toy but isn’t quite sure of what to do next. I wouldn’t use the toy as a reset because then it van get muddy in the mechanics of why, exactly, she is getting the toy (for which behavior) and the cookie reset used consistently will be clearer.Because this is a really hard game, you can totally use motion to help! You can use FC handling to help the wing versus the tunnel, as the verbal can predict the FC if you say the verbal first like you did here, let her go, then do the FC (I know the wrap verbal doesn’t always mean FC but it is fine for now :)) And same with the tunnel – it can be the verbal then she moves then you step to it. It is pretty easy to fade the motion out.
When working this game, alternate behaviors more 0 Don’t do too many of one thing in a row, because she will just go on autopilot like she did with the wraps… which gets us to increase criteria too quickly (by moving the wing closer and closer) – but then the behavior breaks when we add the other cue back in. So more alternating will give you a good sense of where she is in the processing, and if you can move the wing in closer or not.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
>> I was at a trial yesterday with Potter and walking the courses I recognized all the places I could use left/right and how HELPFUL that would have been if I had that verbal with him!!! We also had a spot in premier with a threadle wrap. Again a skill almost 10 year old Potter does not have, but little sissy will!!! Exciting!! We did get the sequence anyway with a series of front cross wraps which I would never had made with speedy Promise!>>
This is great!! What do you think Potter would do if you just started saying the left and right verbals? That way youare practicing saying them, which will help you be ready for when Promise is trialing.
>> I decided to use the cookie lure going forward at first to help her not immediately launch in to a backside or a front wrap. It also helped fend off the resulting attack on me if her guess was wrong lol!!!>>
1000% smart to go with helping her understand that turning away was legal 🙂 It is always better to help get things started and then fade the help, than it is to risk your life with an enraged Sheltie LOL! You got tthe behavior going then you were able to start fading it.
You will need rear crosses and turn aways with her so I am glad you worked these!
>>Hopefully, I am adding the verbal a hair sooner than I am adding the movement. >>
I think you did a great job with that! You were really emphasizing mechanics and that is why she did so well.
On the next session, start off with the handing help you had here – then continue to emphasize your hand cue and fade out the footwork. You can keep helping her with the hand cues (for now) and just walk forward, don’t do the actual rear cross. Then we can fade the hand cues too!
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
>It is high season here, so I am working a lot. >>
Tax season? Whatever your field is, I hope the high season is productive, easy, and over soon 🙂 It can be stressful to have to work so much during high season!
I think this session went a lot better than you think it did LOL!!! Pretty darned nice work, on a REALLY hard setup that doesn’t provide a lot of physical cues to help. The most important thing is that he got a lot of reinforcement, a very high rate of reinforcement. And when something was not quite the way you wanted it, you broke it down and got multiple successful reps without letting him feel that anything was ‘wrong’. I call that a big win!!! Nice!!
>> I was a bit confused on which way to send Prism -but very clear on WHY- so I think we worked it out.
I think the easiest way to get the go is to send him around so he exits the side of the wing further from you (nearer to where the tunnel is on this setup, like you did at 2:58), because theoretically that would make the Go line easier. And for the serps, you can send him around the outside of the wing so he exits on the side closer to you, which should make the serp easier.
Because this game is so difficult, you can help with reminder reps right before you change to the ‘other’ option here: Right before a go rep, you can throw the toy to the landing side of the Go jump (letting him see it) then send him to the wrap wing and into the go. That also adds challenge to the send to the wrap wing even though he knows where the toy is already going to be 🙂
Then you can alternate reps with and without the placed toy for the go to continue to build it up, and you don’t have to worry as much about how well you throw the toy. (There is video somewhere from yesterday’s seminars where I was in charge of a toy throw and ended up hitting the ceiling by accident LOL!)
And when you do the serp – do an easy one to start then go the faster ones. An easier one can be less motion, or taking out the start wing speed and doing it from a stay on the other side of the jump. Then you can go back to the speed that the start wing brings.
He is producing some impressive behavior – the Go lines look good and so do the serps! His speed and turn on the serp at 3:59, for example…. HOLY WOW, impressive!!! Those moments show us what the future will look like and it is goose-bump-worthy.
>>Prism had another brilliant moment deciding to take the SERP jump on cue – overriding a strong urge to GO extension.
Yes, that was cool too! Good boy!!!!! Excellent decision!
>>I should have stopped there, but I think I asked for another rep and then Prism ended the session due to fatigue/heat and that is also not desirable. But I had to prepare for work and that was all we did all day. (Not ideal, I know).>>
We have all done the one more rep thing haha and in that moment, I don’t think you were wrong. And it is fine if a session doesn’t end with perfection – he worked at a really high rate of reinforcement and he was happy (hot, but happy :)) You can set a timer so every 90 seconds he gets a swim break or something as the weather gets hotter.
Great job here!!!! Let me know what you think.
Tracy
