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Hi Ann! Steel sounds wonderful ❤
I like that he is very social! For now, keep working on the “get it” procedures and toy play. In the next couple of weeks, we will be installing the “focus on me, ignore the peoples” behavior into the existing procedures. That will really help him learn how to ignore people 🙂 Stay tuned for all of that coming soon 🙂
TracyHi!
>>No longet sure how much the issue is lack of food motivation or possibly motion of the reward.
Could be! But that is a value issue, and we need her to find value in food that is not moving because that is how we shape precision behavior. The pairing with tug will get that.
>>Question about posting videos – Do you want us to post a video and wait for your response before posting another? Or can we post several separate ones in the same post if we do a few of the games and edit/upload a few videos?>>
You can totally post several videos! If it is the same game, it is usually better to wait for a response unless it is all peachy keen and you are comfy moving on 🙂
T
Hi! These look great!!!
He was quite fast on these and also retained his tight turns- things are really coming together!!!!!!!!!! And yes, he totally nailed the tunnel threadles! When you drove into the first pinwheel, you decelerated a little too much so he slowed down there (correctly) so you can drive in and drive away, seeing how much speed into the tunnel discrimination he can tolerate.
I think he will be fine with the added speed – at :28 you were moving fast and running right to the tunnel, and he was perfect. Super!!!!
>>My wing for the get out was really close to the tunnel due to running into the fence so that didn’t go so well the first time.
Yes, he didn’t quite see it the first time but then was fine after that 🙂
And he was great about reading the subtle soft turn cues. On those, you can cue then accelerate away (as long as you stay connected) – when you remain in decel, he remains in collection Good boy!
These all went really well, he nailed all.the.things – I guess he wants to go to Florida next year LOL! What is coming up on his calendar in terms of trials and stuff? He is looking great! I am excited for you!!!
TracyHi!
>>Sorry for the 3-part video post. I hope it makes sense & can totally clip and edit it all into one video next time for ease of posting, etc.
Posting like this was great! And I loved the title “Wing Wrap Foundations: A Series” LOL!!!
This two-toy game is a great foundation game to work on separately. He was cracking me up: holding the dead toy but watching the live toy: “how do I grab that one while holding this one?” Ha!
The delay was not that long. It might have felt long in the moment, but he actually did a SUPER job here! I think you can totally keep playing this with two toys on the flat (or a pile of toys – whichever one you pick up and smack on the floor is the one you want him to play with) and you can do the back and forth with the cone here too.2nd video:
>>Using food made all the things Risk had to think about and the mechanics much cleaner.>>
Yes, it can be easier and cleaner with food for sure!
He was great here with the bowls. I wonder if the conditioned response to a bowl got the food more engaging. Plus the food was moving and perhaps he was hungry too 🙂 He got the rhythm here nicely! You can add more delay in between cookies to see if he will go another step or two back to the other bowl.3rd video:
>>So I do think I was too quick to add in the cone for the wrap foundation… what do you think?
Yes and no 🙂 You were very fast about getting the reinforcement in, so he had a super high rate of success and a super positive experience with the cone. Perfect! But he was not yet offering wrapping to the next bowl on his own, he was waiting for the cookie drop – so to start the next session, use just the bowls and after you establish the back and forth, start to delay the cookies more to get him offering to go to the other bowl before you plop the next cookie in it. When he can go back and forth between the bowls like that, you will be able to slide th cone back in and he will offer going back and forth around it too.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! Great session here!
Your outfit is perfect! Training in pajamas is a rite of passage in online classes LOL!!!
OMG he smacked the hat right away when it went down on the floor! Perfect! That is something else you can keep doing for now – picking up the hat during tugging the dropping it back down when you are ready for him to offer touching it more. The toy play was great – when he hits the hat, you can give a ‘yes’ marker and then play with the toy – the yes will isolate the hit a bit like a clicker. And then you should totally be loud and exciting during the play, you are perfect and he loves it!!!
This was a great session – the toy reward is helping to build it up and we are going to put the cookies back in soon, maybe do 2 more sessions with the toy then switch to high value treats. When you do switch to treats, be as exciting as you were here – treats can be as fun as toys!
Great job!
TracyHi!
He was so funny when you presented the toy! A little shocked by definitely happy 🙂
He does not yet like to move in hard to something that is stationary – probably linked to herding behaviors (BCs do not fling themselves at sheep that are standing still, right?) so the best results were when you moved your hand away a little bit – he went right in Perfect! And the toy reward seemed spot on. So – carry on with using the toy and moving the target away from him a bit to encourage him to drive towards it.Tracy
Hi there!
>>I can see it in these videos, but then there are times where he won’t play with me at all because he knows there is a bowl full of food on a table somewhere. He’s certainly a piggie and inhales his food, but I wonder if he isn’t as interested in the food if he doesn’t feel like he has to really work for it? OR maybe he doesn’t feel like working for the kibble vs a more high value treat (dehydrated treats, etc)?
These are all excellent questions and my only answer for now is that he it too young for us to know what the answer is 🙂 Reinforcement value swings back and forth like a pendulum for the first several months of training (or longer) so I always expect some surprises along the way LOL!
It is possible that the conditioned response to the full bowl (“I am hungry, mom!”) does override toy drive at the moment and also it is possible he had some competition for food with his littermates, so he learned how to be a good eater from a bowl (that is how my BorderWhippet because a good eater at mealtimes – a terrier or Papillon was always ready to eat his food LOL!) So you can save the cookie-based behaviors for high value reinforcement and train when he is a little hungry 🙂 It is entirely possible that the kibble is not yet very exciting, versus toys or cheese or meatballs I think if you use super high value food in small quantities in training, the value of that transfers to training, which with then transfer to the kibble, which becomes more valuable because it is associated with training. Or, you can use the food bowl as a way to present the reward – get a behavior then let him grab a bite from his bowl! Yum!
Keep me posted!
TracyHi there!
>>He can sometimes get nippy when excited and I would like to get to a point where he is focusing that on the toy and not my arm!
This is a great game for teaching the pups to NOT get nippy because the toy is a focal point that they commit too, even when we get really exciting. We will then transfer that to other commitments to live in a nip-free world LOL!
>>I noticed his confusion when I sent him after the tug, but I did not reflect enough afterwards to see what could be improved. T
My general rule of thumb is that transitions don’ need to be fast they need to be clear – so the transition from tugging to ready dance to send can be slower as long as it is very clear 🙂
>> I was wondering if there was something to change that would encourage the wrap and not the cone touch.
Earlier reinforcement will help because he won’t have time to think about offering – but also we won’t worry about it too much because the other games that are coming will make wrapping much more fun that offering behavior on it 🙂
Keep me posted on how he is doing!
TracyHi! She looks fabulous!
Her toy drive looks good here and this game also helps build it up 🙂 It is the playful toy drive that I like to see in a 9 month old dog – happy, playful – not frantic or frustrated. She did a great job of driving to the toy (and was perfectly cute leaping on it LOL!) Nice job releasing her to get it while she was looking at it and with a tiny bit of hold so there was a little build up of anticipation
>>Looks like line ups need some help!
Do you mean when you switched from tugging to the throw of the toy? You can slow down the transition there: take toy, your hand goes in to hold her nice and slowly, and then you toss the toy. I think things were happening really fast so she was squirting around a little.
Decel to handler: She is doing great here too! One thing – don’t be so exciting LOL!! This is the one time you have full permission to go slowly haha!! I will bug you about going fast with other things 🙂 You had a lot of motion which was tending to propel her, so you can be practically stationary when you are working in a smaller space
For the pivots, she was a little wide so you can decel sooner on that too, start it later and the pivot itself should be fairly slow. Let her get to you, within about an inch of your hand – then pivot The pivots are happening a little too soon and are going very quickly so she is not sure exactly where to be.
With more experience, you go faster but for now – you can be slow 🙂
And you can take both of these games outside – the driving ahead game is ready for more distance and more running (wheeee!! This is where you can go fast) and for the decel – you can toss the treat further so when she starts heading back to you- you can decelerate when she is halfway to you, then pivot when she arrives near your hand.Great job here! She is off to a great start 🙂 Let me know what you think!
TracyHi! She looked like she was having a fabulous time here – running fast, finding the backside perfectly YAY!!!! So now you can totally add to this in several ways:
first, add more of your motion: you should be in motion the whole time don’t let yourself stand still! I am sure she will be fine with that.The add that angled bar and repeat the process so she still finds the backside. When the angled bar comes in, start the balance reps so that you cue the front side of the bar sometimes too – we don’t want her to think *everything* is a backside LOL!
I am glad you enjoyed the class! She stepped up and NAILED everything! A true future rockstar! You can start the threadle foundations but you don’t want to put a ton of emphasis on those yet 🙂
How is Breeze feeling?
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi there!
Lots of great work here:Threadles:
Yay! Your work is paying off!!
Comparing the different threadle videos – on the one where she was able to do the pinwheels, I see a big difference in her ability to read the difference between the threadle and the 180! And she is really starting to collect on the check check cue which really helps because it tells her “heads up, threadle coming!!!”
I think you can start to use the threadle arm sooner – you were tending to lift it as she is taking off, so now try it sooner ad see if you can lift it when she is still 2 or 3 feet before takeoff.>>At the end of the video, I did an experiment to test if Annie really needed me to pause slightly during the threadle and she said she does.>>
Yes but it was really close to perfect! You had ideal motion but you were really fast and you can open up your upper body to her more And when you are adding motion, try to be at the exit wing of the turn jump so you don’t get too far ahead and end up in a serp positional cue. So keep trying staying in motion slowly at first and then gradually adding more speed. The little tiny bit of decel you are using now is really strong so keep working that while challenging her with more motion 🙂
>>You may notice that I’m starting to use my new “Get It” cue to announce that the ball toss is coming.
Yay! Awesome!!!
Switch aways:
>>I saw this sequence at Zip’s recent CPE trial. There wasn’t any advantage to layering in that course, but I thought it would be a perfect opportunity for Annie to work on some of her new skills.>>
It is great to know it is happening in CPE too! CPE maps don’t get widely posted, so it is hard to keep up with CPE course trends.
on the first out, you turned and left too soon at :04 and :13 and :21 – your verbals were good but you closed your shoulders forward – try to leave your shoulders more open to the takeoff spot
At :31 she had learned the sequence and also at :44 and on the last rep so it was easy for her – on new sequences, be sure to take the extra heartbeat to commit her before moving up the next line. The layering gives you a huge advantage so you have plenty of time to commit her.
>>I know I made it harder for her by putting up the ring gate next to the jump (Annie is really sensitive about space), but there is a small retaining wall there and I wasn’t willing to move the A-Frame to get farther away from it.>>
I don’t think it was the ring gate – I think it was the line of your shoulders and where you chest was pointing. One extra heartbeat of facing the takeoff spot will help her out – you went in closer to help her, but I think you can show her the takeoff spot without moving closer to it, if that makes sense.
>>You mentioned in previous feedback that I can do something with my hands to let Annie know that the switch is coming. I looked back at the demo video, but I couldn’t tell exactly what the hand cue would be.>>
It is a two-hand motion that is similar to a tandem turn – that shakey shakey grab-attention-then-flip-away move 🙂 The outside arm comes into play to help the dogs se the turn away is coming. I think you also use two hands on the tandem turn? So it is very similar to that except the lower body is not stepping in behind the dog.
Threadle wraps:
>>. She did great on this setup, but in general she has an amazing ability to switch to the front side of the jump at the very last second.
Yes, her athletic ability is pretty impressive LOL!!!! Plus most of her value is on the front of the jump – so when you were too early at :27 and :40 and not far enough ahead, she switched back to the front.
On the other reps from the tunnel (like at :19) and when you used the jumps instead of the tunnel, your timing and position were GREAT so she was nailing it each time! NICE!!!
So the key is to be patient and it will feel a little late- let her nose get to the edge of the wing before flicking her back to the jump, and be sure that you are parallel to or past that wing.
I agree that she was not 100% speed on this skill yet – but she was still pretty darned fast! This is never a skill that will look blazing fast because there is so much collection. I think if you keep working the skill and adding more of your motion while continuing to be patient on the cues, she will get even faster (and by patient, I actually mean late on the hand cues for now LOL!) When she is more experienced with it, you will be able to cue that flip away sooner and she will be even faster.
Great job on these! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
>>. I was using left/right here because I didn;t feel like this skill was going to be a a very collected wrap turn.>>Based on where you tossed the reward, they were generally soft turns in the beginning but then you started rewarding back on the wrap lap, in which case I would use the wrap verbals.
>>Why do you use a separate switch cue for the flip away out of the weaves instead of a left/right?>>
Left/right or wrap verbals tell the dog how to take the obstacle, such s “jump in collection and wrap to your left”. The switch verbal is a turn-away on the flat and left/right/wrap is not. Plus, it depends on whether the directional info affects obstacle execution – the weaves do not chane based on the exit directional but the jump, tunnel and running contacts do change. So I would use the left/right/wrap before the dog goes into the tunnel because that is useful info for how to turn on the exit, which happens pretty quickly. The weaves take a while so I don’t give the directional before entry (the dogs are unlikely to retain it) so I use the turn-away-on-the-flat cue.
>>And what should I use if this is a DW/Frame flip away to tunnel? I’ve tried a L/R followed by tunnel, a checkcheck/digdig tunnel for a collected turn away, and a flip/turn tunnel with Min and am not sold on any of them. Flip/Turn has also turned into a very solid 360 left flip and right flip (turn) for Kaladin with doing the flips while moving so I don’t want him to spin in a 360 turn at the base of the DW!>>
Those obstacle take about as long as a tunnel thereabouts (weaves take about 2.3 seconds, a RDW is more like 1.3 seconds and the a-frame is less) so I use the directionals because they will be having to set up the turn while executing the obstacle and it is fast so they can retain the info.
Conversely: on the stopped teeter and for Voodoo’s stopped dog walk… I use switch for the turn away.
Kaladin did well on the turn aways! You can begin to ue the RC info sooner, you were moving straight til the last minute so he was turning over the bar on the one jump reps – you can get right on the RC diagonal for those early reps, and when you are fading the RC pressure you can turn your feet sooner. That will get easier as you add more speed into it so you can then start the cues sooner too.
The outside arm did look a little uncomfortable – you can stylize it however you like so it is comfy 🙂 I think of it as a bit of a two-hand tandem turn – the outside arm is a bit of an attention-getter as I start the RC info then it does the swoosh away. And it is higher than the threadle wrap cue. I don’t do the big NADAC-style outside arm 🙂 but many people use it very effectively for this cue! Having my outside arm higher than the threadle wrap and moving differently is keeping away any confusion.
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
She did well on these, just a couple of questions here and there.
A question for you:
was camera reversed or did you have the left and right reversed here? I think you were saying left for a right turn and vice versa (but I might be hearing it wrong).
Going through the box was really strong! She only looked at the line you wanted. Nice! Sending her to the jump outside of the box was harder – It was not as much of a Go for her, it was more of a ‘get out’ so the pressure on the 2nd rep of trying for that jump really helped her – and then you kept cuing it sooner and it got even smoother. Nice!It looks like she had a question about finishing the wrap when you were accelerating away (she was taking the tunnel. When you made sure she saw the connection, she got it. So you can work that for now in terms of starting pretty close o the cone so it is easy for her to see the wrap, then work back up to accelerating away like you did here. I think you were connected when she took the tunnel (a little hard to see) so it appears that she was reading motion, and that is why she took the tunnel. It is a good proofing game to be able to run away really fast and still get the wrap!
>>. In order to get around the tunnel, should the verbal be sufficient to take the jump, or should I have given a ‘get out’ to get her past the tunnel if I don’t want to get stuck behind the tunnel mouth?>>
Do you mean when you were sending her to the 2 jumps on the other side of the tunnel, when you were also moving with her? If so – yes, verbal is sufficient but also connection will help too! Only ue the ‘get out’ if you think she has to push away on a line by lead changing to get to it (she did not appear to do that here).
If that is not what you meant, let me know 🙂
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning! Great job with all of these games!!!! Going through them in the order they appear in the video:
Driving ahead – really nice! You had great timing on your releases to the toy (he was looking forward and you were connected to him), and great retrieving! Super nice cookie rewards – you can also play tug like you did when you added motion but the cookie rewards for the retrieve are great to build value for the retrieve, get him to out the toy, and also build value for food in arousal which is not always easy with BCs. You mentioned wanting to play this game with food as the target rather than the toy – you are welcome to, but the toy is going to be the target that yields better results in the long term and he is doing great with it. You can play this with a Manners Minder or something similar if you want to eventually train running contacts.
You can add more of your motion to it, building up to really running. That will require more space 🙂 And this is also a great game to take on the road to help acclimate to new environments!
Drive to handler also looks great! One little suggestion: drop your food hand into the picture a bit later later, after the release and when he is halfway to you. You had it in place when you released, so now I think we can delay that a bit so the deceleration is more of the cue and the cookie hand is less of the cue. And you can put your hand close enough to you leg that it touches your pants. The pivots looked strong, he is bending really nicely!
You can now add more distance between you and him (the throw back cookies to start can help this so you don’t have to worry about the stay) – and as you add more distance, you can also add more motion: as soon as he grabs the cookie and turns back to you, you can be moving fast – then when he is halfway to you, let him see you decelerate (hand can come into the picture at that point) then you can pivot when he gets to you. You can build this up to running full out before the decel, he will like that a lot 🙂
And, you can you can also train this with a toy – it will add more excitement and arousal, so he will have to process the deceleration cue when he is more stimulated 🙂The Prop game looks great on both sides! I like this prop, it is really big and obvious, making it easy for him to commit to it. One suggestion: after the tugging and before the next send, do a longer “ready dance” – when he is releasing the toy and being sent at the same time, he didn’t have as much time to process the cue, so he was not able to be as precise with his commitment and had more errors. Puppies need a couple of seconds LOL! So, after the tug, you can do a ready dance long enough to say ‘ready’ 3 times – then send him. That will get lots of speed and precision, especially as you add more distance.
The wing wrap foundations – also going super well and he is beginning to wrap the cone beautifully!! For the next session: do you have cookies that are smaller and less crunchy? It will speed up the game 🙂 He is now at the stage where he doesn’t need to hear the cookie drop into the bowl, I think he has the rhythm, so you can go to cookies that are easier to swallow and require no chewing LOL! And, because he loves toys too, you can totally play this with 2 toys.
As you continue to build this: you can mix in dropping the treat in earlier, as soon as he is heading towards the cone so he doesn’t try to offer behavior on the cone – if the treat is only coming when he is all the way around for now, he was offering a nose touch and a food smack on the cone 🙂 So, ping pong the timing – you can reward that first step towards it, or arriving at the second bowl, and everything in between so that it is more about the motion around the cone, and less about interacting with the cone. And over the course of the next couple of sessions, you can push the cone a little further away from you, to add distance to his commitment.
I LOVE how he is leading with his head already to turn around the cone – that is an early predictor of great turning skills in the future! Fun!!Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
