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Good morning!
>I tried introducing bowls on the gravel parking lot at class Tuesday. Ven could not focus on them nor eat cheese out of them. >
This is really interesting! First order of business is going to be getting him to eat anywhere 🙂 Not being able to eat is a sign of overarousal/struggling with regulation, so there are a couple of options you can try to help that:
>I’ve booked another field rental for tomorrow (Fri) evening to see if by ourselves he can focus and play the game. I’m also going to work the game in the back yard after work today.>
Yes, good plan! Work it at home first so the game has value, then take it to the field and play it in a variety of places: parking lot, in the ring, by the crating area, etc.
And bring a variety of food – just because *we* think cheese is great, doesn’t mean he agrees LOL!! So you can try cheese, chicken, salmon treats, etc – basically we are asking him “what can you eat” and “where can you eat it”. Getting a handling on him eating will help in two ways:
– it will help his nervous system self-regulate
– it will help us be able to assist with arousal regulation and reward behavior.>Of course Mr. Social finds it hard to focus when there are people and dog friends he wants to go greet even though I rarely allow him to do so.>
That is probably part of what tips him into overarousal: the huge challenge of having to ignore people and dogs. The pattern games will help him ignore them happily without stress (which is why we want him to eat) and also, you can allow visiting! You can put it on cue: I have a ‘go see’ cue for my social dogs which means they can go say him to the person or dog I am pointing at. Being able to know when he is allowed to socialize can be a lot less stressful and overarousing 🙂
>Do you see any other things I need to work based on these 2 turns?>
A couple of ideas for you!
– It looks like you had the lotus ball in the 2nd run but not the first? He definitely did better with the lotus ball. You can even have someone holding a 2nd lotus ball, to throw as a reward on the bigger harder lines.
– he seemed to have trouble lining up to start when the food was not visible in run 1. You can see if you can get a hand touch or a simple trick without the food in your hand, then bring the food out for the line up.
– he had a lot of trouble with the weaves so for now as you get him more engaged in this challenging environment, don’t ask for weaving at all (make up a sequence that doesn’t go anywhere near them). The reason you want to avoid them is because either he fails and you fix then he checks out, or he fails and you reward. But that can ultimately be confusing about what correct weaving is, so better to just skip them entirely for now until he is better engaged and then it will be much easier to get correct weaving. Same with the contacts – he checked out a lot before or after the contacts, so skip them for now. Just stick to jumps and tunnels 🙂
With the jumps and tunnels – lots of rewards for doing them closer to the center of the ring, which is a little further from the super challenging distraction of the edges of the ring where the critters are. And if something goes wrong – the no fixing rule still applies because he checks out a lot when you stop to fix. Just keep going and add more connection, throwing the lotus ball when he gets on a line of jumps.
People and dogs being nearby are very challenging, so you can ask people to sit in a chair around the edges of the course to introduce rewarding when he does jumps/tunnels and ignores ring crew 🙂
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!!
Tracy
Good morning!
Good job working the stays in arousal! He is totally into the volume dial tricks. I LVOE how he was wild and tugging and then you said sit… boom right into the sit at 1:32 (and other reps too). That will serve you well in his agility future. You were able to praise and lead out, with a nice mix of throwing the toy back and releasing forward.
When you just cue the sit, he wa sa little sideways to look up at you. He was able to line up nicely at your side with the hand cue. I also think that when he understands that he will be released to a jump, he is likely to line up facing the jump more so we don’t have to worry about getting a perfect line up for now.
Since he was a rockstar here, you can take your parallel path jump setup and do stay games in front of it. So basically it is a stay in front of a jump with a pool noodle or something easy as the bar. Fun times with grown up stuff!!!!
For the wraps:
>Maybe for now I should just send and say nothing or make a sound that is motivating. >
That is how I ended up with one of my wrap cues – just a motivational noise because I couldn’t think of anything else at the time. Then I just kept it LOL!
This went well overall, his commitment is strong!
>When I try to send him with the hand that is holding the toy, he is slower to commit but hopefully this gets better with time.>
Yes, a little stickier because it was hard to ignore the toy but he was able to do it really well! He was using a lot of brain bandwidth to NOT try to grab the toy when it was in your send hand which is why he was not as fast on that side. But we will take accurate for now, rather than jumping at your hand!!
One thing that will help is if you use a toy marker for when he is able to grab the toy in your hand – you were using praise words, but a specific marker (like ‘bite!’) will clarify for him that the toy should be ignored until you say the magic word 🙂
And you can also tuck the toy into a pocket and whip it out when you are ready to reward (it doesn’t have to be a super precise reward for this game). That will allow him to go really fast without having to think hard about ignoring the toy 🙂
You were thinking hard about which move to do 🙂 You can either do a FC of a spin, both of which start with rotation towards him like a FC, but for the spin you then do a blind. You were doing some true blinds (turning away) which work but might have felt weird here and also promote a slightly wider turn in this context.
>I didn’t get to the post turns…that should really throw me for a loop!>
Disclaimer – they are actually kind of hard for us humans LOL!! But they are fun for the pups and get them learning to stay out on line. Have fun!
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
The remote reinforcement game looked really strong, with both food and the toy! He was definitely aware of the reward station but was fabulous about moving away and responding to cues. And it looks like the responses were crisp and accurate, no drop-off in quality or slower responses (that is normal but it is great that you didn’t see any of that). Since this went well, you can expand the distance by putting the food or toy in one room, going to another room to do a quick trick, then mark and come back to the reward.
Good job with the stays too – you lined him up and let him do the stay in a stand even on an angle, and that allowed you to get a ton of reward in with zero conflict about where he was facing or which position he was in. I love how he got ALL the toys at the end LOL!
Since this established a really fun baseline, you can ask for more in one variable: more distance (which brings more duration with it automatically). Or, you can ask for a sit but reduce the duration/distance. Or you can ask him to line up straighter (hand cue even with a cookie lure is useful, if needed).
And you can bring this game to different locations – and make it easier if you feel it is hard with new distractions/environments.
Find my face was great too! I think he was potentially wondering if he should offer something (like getting on the bed) but with you moving a bit, he looked into finding you. Yay! So this is also a good game to take on the road, even if he is on leash: start with getting the back and forth pattern game going really well, then add in a little find my face.
>Our snow has gone away for now. It all washed away in the rain while we were gone during the day. We came home and Aelfraed was so excited to go out into the yard, got out the door, and looked around with utter disappointment. His little face was so sad! I’m ok with the snow being gone for now but I was a little sad for him.>
Yay for being able to work outdoors again without snow (maybe some mud LOL!) But also, poor little Aelfraed who was clearly a sled dog in his past life! No worries, he will get plenty of snow this winter 🙂
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning! Nice work on these!
Minny Pinny went great, she was easily ale to zip around the 3 wings, no problem at all. Adding the 3 bumps – also no trouble at all.
She might have been getting tired at :54 when she cut in between the wings… or she might have seen your hands moving to get the treats ready and she took a shortcut to assist you in delivering the treats 😂 Good girl! You might have been tired when you were using the right verbal for the left turns right at the end 🙂
The only suggestion is to hold her collar while you say the left/right verbals 3 or 4 times then let go so she starts – it will be great for solidifying the verbals and you also won’t add an extra ‘go’ before it.You can add more excitement by using a toy and a front cross the run away as she is doing the minny pinny 🙂
She also did really well with the tunnel session! Since she has a good stay going, you can use it a bit here to smooth out the initial cue: that will give you time to tuck the toy away, show the arm cue, then use the tunnel verbal as the release. That actually slows down the info so she can read it better. You were a little too quick in some spots (like :12-:15) for her to process the cue cleanly especially on the right turns into the tunnel. On the left turns in the 2nd half of the video, you were a little slower to deliver the cues and it was already smoother. This is an instance where slower is good 🙂
The threadle slice on the jump went really well here! Based on her responses, you were much more visible in threadle position relative to the barrel and she was able to get lots of correct threadles even from the harder angles – super! The only thing that as going wrong was that the MM was misbehaving LOL!
For the next session: add your threadle slice verbal! You can start saying it as she is getting the start cookie and keep saying it (even shaking the threadle hand) as she is coming towards you. The other thing you can do it move the MM further away, so she can go all the was across the bar to get it.
Great job here!
Tracy
Good morning!
Both games here looked good! Lowering the toy to the ground was really hard but after the first rep, she did GREAT! The other approach you can take to this game is to have your prop already in the room on the floor (like a jump would be) so you can line her up in front of it, just like at a start line 🙂 Then you can mix in release forward to it, or throwing a reward back to her.
Find My Face looked great! She was spot on and re-engaged as fast as possible. The only delay was caused by chewing the treat LOL!! But she seemed happy and relaxed to come find you when you turned away. Super!
You can take this game (and Happy Stays) outside when it stops raining 🙂Great job!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I hope the family time was stress free! >
Well….. not really hahahaha but the dogs were well-behaved so that is a good thing. We ended up staying in a room that also had 2 guinea pigs in it, and the various sighthounds did not attempt to eat them so I will score that as a win 😂
This session went really well!!! My suggestions are mainly small details that can tighten things or make cues earlier.
One small detail is to tuck the toy in a pocket so you don’t switch hands – the hand-switch moment delays the cue the hand is supposed to be doing 🙂 like on the blind-to-threadle at :08. We don’t need a precision reward here, so toy in pocket is perfectly fine. You didn’t switch the toy around on all the reps, but you might not realize you are doing it and it is making your arm cues a little late.
On the push cue after the blind: you can use more connection (big eye contact as you deliver the cue) and less arm pointing to the backside to get a better line to the backside. If you freeze the video when he lands at :14, you can see he is behind you and not clear yet where to go, so you hang out there to help get the backside. If you keep your dog-side arm back to him and a little lower, and look right at him to say your push cue, that will turn your shoulders to the backside and he will go very independently so you can keep moving.
One detail for the threadles: you can cue a turn on the jump before the threadle to tighten up that turn, which makes the threadles much easier to get and on a better line. In this context, the turn can probably be cued with just a name call as he exits the wing wrap (different contexts might call for strong verbal and turn cues).
An example is when you are doing the threadle on the takeoff side at :26 – you can set up a tighter turn on the jump before it by calling him as he is exiting the wing wrap so he is already orienting towards you rather than jumping the jump in extension and heading into the threadle after landing.
Same with the threadle wrap at :30 – a turn cue to get him turning on the jump before it will set it up really well!
For the threadle wrap –
>But I repeated it because I stopped moving.>
I think decel is an important element of the TWs, but also turning your feet to get the new direction set will be helpful too. On these, your feet were facing the slice line so you kind of had to be stationary for a while. You can decelerate just enough to turn your feet to the exit line so you can set the TW and move away sooner too!
>With the threadle slice after the tunnel he came out wide the first time, so I repeated it to see if I could tighten that turn.>
Yes, he was a little wide there because you didn’t mention you wanted a turn 🙂 You can tell him to turn on the tunnel exit before he goes in – at least 6 feet before he enters.
You called him on the next rep but it was right before his head went in, so the cue can be a stride sooner there and also on the last rep where you were threadling to the inside. On that one, he exited turned to the backside of the jump and found the threadle a stride late.
So I think setting up the threadle from the jump before it will make it easier to get nice tight fast lines on all of it.
Great job here!!
Tracy
good morning!
For those of us who have no natural patience 😂 I think the 2 failure rule will be the best guide. One failure in the session (meaning, the dog does something you didn’t intend) – we note it, reward the dog. And if we think something needs to change we can change it. Or we try again.
But when we hit 2 failures? Definitely change something to get success. It doesn’t even have to be 2 failures in a row – just 2 failures total. And sometimes we don’t know what to change, so stopping to watch the video is the lifesaver there! When I stop to watch the video, I look to see if I am connected for real (not just kinda sorta LOL – can the dog really see my face?) and I look at my line of motion. Am I running towards the incorrect thing?
The 2 failure rule is helpful because it prevents the rate of success from dropping too low (and therefore prevents frustration or stress for both human and dogs). And we don’t need to be patient at all (I am NOT patient at all haha) – we have a plan for what to do if something goes wrong!
Have fun this weekend 🙂
Tracy
Good morning!
>I *think* we are in the same group for the Open, though that might not mean much depending on what heights are together in what rings. And free time… what free time? lol>
I think I am in E because I am always in E hahaha but I admit to not having even had time to look yet LOL!!!
> And Monday is the planned day to meet Pick’s new owner so if I somehow make it onto the chat that night from the road, I will have literally just handed him over and will be quite a whirlwind of emotions I’m sure!>
I am sure it will be a combination of joyous and sad. I will be thinking of you!!
T
Good morning!
The head turns on the barrel with motion (leading into backside circle wraps) went great! You did a great job by starting to move sooner – as soon as he was past you, you tucked in right behind his tail on the second half of the session. That asks for a LOT of countermotion and he did well. Placement of reward really supported it!
So since this went so well – add the verbal cue for whatever you want to use for your backside circle wraps (mine is dig dig dig). Hold him, say it a few times, then let go and start to move. Since the verbal is a new variable and it might be a little distracting, you can dial back your motion at first. If it goes really well, you can ramp up your motion by moving sooner. And when he is happy with that – start further away from the barrel because you can both add more speed 🙂>Also reverse retrieve but only 1 toy was correct apparently.>
He was a super good boy retrieving the toy!!!! Yay!!
He definitely had “first toy is best toy” vibes here! It might be that the first toy was higher value or that it had moved so it was more fun in the moment. You can totally do this game with just one toy, or you can whip out the 2nd toy and throw it or drag it for him to chase. A more active 2nd toy might be very engaging too!
When you have footing where he can really grip and you can really run – send him to the toy you have dropped an then take off jogging at first, building to running 🙂 That will be both a good retrieve challenge and also a commitment challenge: can he commit to the skill of getting the toy even with da momma running the other way? That helps when we eventually add huge countermotion commitment to jumps.
Great job here!!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>She got very distracted and someone is mowing their lawn. She doesn’t love that noise. After the first rep she took off zooming and it took several minutes to catch her.>
It is hard to tell about how distracting the lawn mower was – there were no overt signs of concern about it but her brain definitely had to process it! It was definitely loud. So that changes internal state and her brain has to devote bandwidth to it.
But what we could see here is that she was indicating she needed to move move move 🙂 You were trying to set up a controlled session with treats (pattern game then the minny pinny) but she was trying to move more. Then she just couldn’t contain it and had a big zoom (zooms are arousal regulation).
Think of it as reading the room 🙂 If you have a plan but she is indicating she needs something else (by moving away), change plans! I think bringing out a toy and playing at the start of a session will help more than controlled movement with treats. She seems to be doing well using treats and toys in the same session (the end of the session went great!) so you can start with tugging and play mixed in with the treats to really optimize the arousal while allowing her to move move move 🙂
>She’s still not sure about driving around. I’m clearly using too much arm to “help” her.>
She was off to a good start, offering it a bit – it is a big change of picture! You can drop rewards in around the circle – so when she begins to go around it, you can toss a treat or drop the toy on a line past the middle wing. That will help build it up. Also, in these early stages – if she tries to offer going another direction than you originally planned, just go with it rather than react with a verbal and stop her – you can praise, give a quickly reward then reset her on the other side with ore clarity. We like the offering and really don’t want to stop her and tell her she is wrong.
You had the verbal here too – I think it was a little too soon to add it and might have been a distraction. She was like “what does that mean” while also trying to figure out the full minny pinny LOL! So you can just let her offer it a bit without a verbal. Then when she is zipping around it, you can add the verbal in pretty easily 🙂
Find my Face went great! Part of the usefulness of this game is it basically asks for engagement but also allows a lot of freedom of movement. You set it up well, with good environmental options but also not a million options LOL!
I love how she came running back to you to get engagement! Super cool! And you can sometimes reward with the next cookie toss – or surprise her with a big tug party. Surprises are GREAT for both learning the behavior and keeping it fun!Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
He did really well with the prop on the ground here – he love his prop, zillions of cookies given for it… but he held his stays really well! Mission accomplished with the holding of the stay except for one moment where he stood up and did a shake. Be more connected so you can see if that happens – to was correlated to a higher arousal level: after tugging and also when you tried to fix his line up (he was a little sideways). But after that you kept tugging and did quicker releases which helped. We *need* this behavior in higher arousal so we don’t want to avoid the arousal.
>He did have trouble sitting with the toy in sight so I put it away. >
Yes – when the toy was in front of him and you were not using a hand cue, he did not seem to know what the sit verbal meant. This is GREAT information to have from him!!!! You can revisit the tug-sit-tug game where the toy is right there and you tug, then with the toy still present you cue a sit – then release and tug. That will help improve his understanding of the sit verbal in that context. Don’t worry if the sit is a little sideways for now – it can be confusing if he sits immediately but then you try it fix it to make it straighter.
>Also, when I lure him with food into position, I am giving him the food. Should I phase that out?>
The part to phase out is the cookie in the hand as part of the lure. Use an empty hand to get him into the sit at your side. Then you can still deliver a cookie sometimes – or just lead out with connection. I personally don’t give a lot of cookies for getting into position because it can then be confusing: is the rep over? Many many dogs get up to get the cookie (lifting their feet) or they move forward after eating it – it becomes a bit muddy and there are too many ‘you’re wrong’ moments. But since he is used to seeing a cookie in the lure hand, you will want to fade it out gradually first with an empty hand.
Skipping to the release video:
It looks like you did the sit cue with an empty hand here and he did well! He still needed a bit of a hand movement but didn’t need the cookie in the hand. Super! Be sure to look at him more directly as you lead out in case he is moving or looking around. You can totally try the releases to the prop now – it will give him a good object to focus on and help make the releases more exciting too!
Find My Face went really well too – he is very good at the pattern game and so the transition into find my face went well! He definitely had a question about why you turned you back on him LOL!! Note how he slowed down and looked up at you like “what the heck, human?” But the rewards kept flowing so he was starting to drive back to you with fewer questions. It was definitely hard – he was a little slower and then towards the end he did a big shake off. You must have felt his questions in the moment because you said something like “you didn’t like that”. But it was a good resilience exercise for him, so revisiting this here and there will be great and you will see he get happier with it each time he does it.
Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>Skizzle has been very fun to work with lately.>
Yay! This is awesome!!
The turn away into the wrap is a different picture than the sends to the barrel and he did really well!! He was very confident and even trying to start without you LOL! But it was because he was clear on what to do and excited to do it, which is a very very good thing.
>I was a little caught off guard that he didn’t stick to the barrel on wrapping. >
Do you mean him being a little wide? I attribute that to him coordinating the mechanics of turning away while also widening his visual scope to watch you (as a way of making sure he was doing it right). But when he was starting without at the end, it was like he was saying “I GOT THIS!” and then I think he would get tighter and tighter.
>Can you remind me about the words you use for this? Is it “dig” or “in”? >For a threadle wrap – the pup has to come between me and the barrel (eventually the wing of the jump) and turn away to wrap back on the entry wing/barrel: that verbal for me is ‘in in in’ (repeated as much as needed). Be warned that most people in agility use ‘in in’ as their threadle slice verbal, I am a weirdo in that regard LOL!!
For a backside wrap – the pup has to leave me to go around the barrel (like a send) and wrap back towards me: that verbal is dig dig dig dig.
>One word, or 2?…left or clockwise and right or counterclockwise?>
I repeat the one word (like in in in in in) but the context indicates which way the dog should turn so I don’t need a left/right version of each cue. By context, I mean the handler position/dog’s position relative to the line, and where the wing and most importantly the jump bar is! The position of the jump relative to the line is the main context.
There are people out there who are using different cues for threadle-wrap-to-the-left and threadle-wrap-to-the-right (and for all of the threadle and backside cues) but so far, I have not seen a single instance where that is actually needed (not a single one in all these decades LOL!) So for now – no need to worry about it. If something changes and suddenly there is a context we need it? Ok cool, we can always add it 🙂
> I should really watch more agility, so I can connect some of these exercises with the end result. 😉 Though I’m content with trusting the process, and we’ll figure things out as we go.>
It is fun to watch! If you search for 4LeggedFlix on YouTube, you will see some good streams from various events to give you an idea of the flow of courses and application of the verbals/handling moves 🙂
Great job here!
TracyGood morning!
This went great!! She committed to the minny pinny beautifully, so you were able to do the FC/turn and burn while she stayed committed. And you added your left & right verbals – these will be super useful! Super excellent to you BOTH!!!!
Since this went perfectly, you can move to the next steps:
– add more bumps so there is one for each wing
– hold her at your side for a moment so you can start the verbals. Then after you say the verbal 3 or 4 times, let her go so she starts moving independently. And as she is moving through the minny pinny, keep saying left or right so she hears it attached for each bump.Great job here!!
Tracy
Good morning!
>I was surprised at how quickly Jazz caught on to the MinnyPinny game. Didn’t seem to have any hesitation even when I added the jump bumps.>
She sure did! That is one of the reasons why I think it is so much easier to train the left and right this way – it just seems intuitive to the dogs (and very easy for us humans too LOL!!)
>I’ll add the verbals on our next session. Staying with “left” and “right” as that is what I use with my other boys.>
Yes, since she did so well, you can definitely add your left/right verbals. I think you were saying ‘go’ to get her moving here, but you will want to replace that by repeating your left/right verbals (take a moment before you start to plan, to make sure you are saying the correct verbal 🙂 ) If she is OK with you holding her – you can say it a few times then let her go. But if she is still not really loving the hold yet, you can start the verbals then step forward to indicate she can move.
> I did change the spacing of the bumps after the second “run” as it looked like she needed more space in order to bounce it. >
Yes, that was good! She looked more comfy with a little more room and did really well.
>In the interest of time I edited out all the tugging between reps – she was happily engaged even with all the school noise. >
Super! I did notice there was some good school noise and she was not sensitive to it… maybe the session where she was sensitive to it was just an adolescent brain day where she had a sensitivity to the sound on that particular day (totally normal).
>Question on verbals – Is your threadle tunnel cue the same as your tunnel bypass cue (if you use one)? Trying to keep my cues the same as what I have been using for my other boys. Thanks!>
I apologize, I think you asked this earlier and I answered in my head but clearly never typed it out! Oops!!!
First, what do you mean by tunnel bypass?There are 2 different definitions of bypass out there.
Is it “ignore the obvious end of the tunnel to find the other one, closer to me?” If so, then it is the same as tunnel threadle for me “kisskisskiss” because that is how I define the tunnel threadle behavior.Or, does your tunnel bypass mean “don’t take the tunnel at all”? Some folks use bypass to mean ‘take nothing’. I don’t have a verbal for take nothing, I just stay apply whatever I have (verbals and handling) to the situation.
Let me know what you think!
Great job here!Tracy
