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Good 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 🙂
TracyHi!
That is odd that she is feeling emotional about the stay… is she coming into season? You can break it down and just make it easy and fun for now 🙂I agree, she did really well here! She was lovely on the tight turns!!! The jump height didn’t seem to bother her, she jumped really well at any of the heights including 12 🙂 super!!! 12″ was definitely a little harder but she was sorting it out and looked great. And after all of the wraps, the Go at the end looked terrific.
I noticed that she didn’t jump up at you at all when you were running 🙂 I guess she hates walking haha and even fake running with arms pumping is better than walking. 🙂
And a big breakthrough at 1:19 – you moved away from the FC too quickly and she didn’t commit – notice how she also didn’t bark at you or jump up. That’s huge! Good girl! She got right back to work. That was probably the best moment here 🙂
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
TracyLeft and right is going well! And she did well with the Go reps too. You were definitely moving faster, especially in the 2nd part of the video – I think adding more distance between the wing and the jump will help you feel like you have room to run.
Have you tried the exit line games? Those are a good Next step for her after these.On the serp video: nice work with the verbals here, she did really well!!!
You can get a little further ahead now, try to get past the jump (you’ll get to really run run run!) to add even more challenge.
She needs a little bit of the open shoulder to help her come in on the serp jump and that is fine for now, so as you add more of your running, you can turn your upper body towards her a little bit more.
Great job! Let me know what you think 🙂
TracyHi!
The threadle vortex is a real thing! For a lot of dogs, it is really hard to get them to STOP threading and that was part of what was happening on the first side.So, you can help her out by getting more into the gap between the wing and jump to support the line, or to angle the serp jump ever so slightly towards her, so she sees the bar more and the threadle possibility less.
The other thing to be careful of is rotating your feet on the threadles: ideally we don’t want you to rotate your feet, but if that is what you want to do, then you need to do it every time.
You did it on a couple of reps on the first side, at :34 you rotated but not at :47 or :54 or 1:02 so she legit thought those were serps. At 1:12 and 1:25 you rotated your feet so she threadled.
After a couple of good serps (this might be a harder side for her to turn, making the threadles harder and serps easier), you did one more threadle with just a tiny bit of rotation.
So I think she might be guessing a bit, and watching your feet like a hawk 🙂 try to keep your footwork the same unless you want to rotate on your threadles (and if so, do a clear rotation each time :))
Nice work!
Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
She was on fire here!This session went well – yes, she had a question or two but you can totally help with a little more handling. On the tunnel reps, you can take that one step towards it. And with the wraps, you can rotate a little bit. She was perfect on every rep where there was a little bit of handling (and the young dogs can see a little handling here because trust me, if they wanted to go into the tunnel instead of wrap, they will ignore the handling LOL!)
How is she doing with going back and forth between cookies and toys lately? Last i remember, she was fine with it, so you can use cookies for line ups and resets, and toys for the wing and tunnel rewards. I think she did really well on her tunnel exits – we do want a good balance of turns and Go, so for the next tunnel game, check out the week 2 handling game which works different types of tunnel exits.
Great job here, let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning! This was a great session, she was on fire!!
I liked the timing of your toy throw on the last rep the best – it was really early so she could just run run run to it 🙂 You can throw it as early as the moment she looks at the jump, as long as you keep moving forward like you did here.
And yes – work these games at the times you know she will be toy crazy 🙂 so you can get the excitement that you had here. She was great!!!
Nice work 🙂
TracyHi!
The more I think about his hind end, the more I think he is trying to gallop and the bar is at an awkward height for him in the set point – he doesn’t have to jump for real, but he can’t gallop for real either. He is almost 13 months, so I am tempted to show him a 16″ bar here and there and see what he does (in a very limited way, no rush).On the video:
This looked really good!! Lovely commitment from ahead if you and behind you! And I’m glad he was relatively careful with your flesh LOL!
Watching his jumping, he doesn’t seem to be doing anything unusual over the bar here with his hind end (was it at 12″?). Really nice use! The toy throw was changing the jumping a little – technically you were not late, but it was more that he keeps getting faster and more confident 🙂With that in mind, I think the toy throw either needs to be sooner (as soon as he exits the wing wrap) or placed well past the landing of the jump especially when he is driving ahead.
One other thing to do with this stage of the game is add even more distance between the wing and jump. Wheeee! We will build on it in other ways soon 🙂
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning! Lots of good work here:
At the beginning, you did some turning away – he did well turning away from you, so let’s talk about which verbals to use:I don’t recommend using left and right for turns on the flat because we don’t want the dog turn turn away on the flat on the verbal, we want him to include a jump in that. So for practice on the flat, you can use a hand cue to help him turn away and maybe a different verbal or silly noise 🙂
He did well when you added it to the jump – using the angle you sent him on, these were threadle wraps, because he was gong to the backside as a threadle and turning away (wrap) which is neither left or right verbal 🙂 It would be a threadle-wrap verbal (mine is ‘in in’). For the left and right to also mean “turn away” you will want him to be taking the front side of the jump and turning left or right regardless of your position so sometimes right might mean turning towards you or turning away, as long as it is his right shoulder.
The fast lines setup looks really good! Really nice conection on these! He has some trouble with sudden deceleration – if you stop moving too quickly, he doesn’t commit as well. In a perfect world, we would never stop moving too quickly LOL! but in reality, it happens, so we can train him to commit: as you say the wrap or soft turn verbal, decelerate but don’t stop (just a gentle decel :)) And throw the reward out ahead – move the wing in closer so it is easier for him to commit as you decelerate. Over the course of several sessions, you can move the wing further and reward him for committing as you decelerate – then we can add in sharper decel and still reward him for committing.
The rest looked great! I think at the very end you were doing a bit of ‘get out’ and he was great, so now try to run straight forward to cue the get out or the go – the upper body and verbal will give the info, so you won’t have to run towards the ‘get out’ jump at all.
Great job! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
Ah yes, I can see a lot more value on the wing here! She also seems to REALLY like the GO verbal – big acceleration! YAY! Great job with your toy throws so she could get the rewards without having to look at you. My only suggestion is to say GO several times, not just once, and keep running even after you throw it. That will be easier if you spread this out so there is more distance between the wing and the jump. Go to 20 feet… 25 feet…. 30 feet… that will really let her feel the wind in her hair LOL!Nice job on the smiley face game too!
You can run in closer to the tunnel so you are in motion more, and also spread things out so you both are in motion more (sorry not sorry hahaha)
Her commitment looked really good and you did a great job with all the various verbals! One detail is to be very connected directly to her eyes – when you were connected she was great! If you looked forward, she would look at you first like at :27 where she zigged towards you before going back out to the tunnel.
This is especially true on tunnel exits like at :36 where you were looking at her a little peripherally so she towards you before going to the wing, as compared to the last rep were you looked at her very directly and she was perfect on her line!How does she do with tugging? I think on a lot of these games you use cookies or a lotus ball, so let’s get more tugging involved if she likes to tug. The smiley face game is a good one for tugging!
Great job here! Let me know what you think!
Tracy
