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Based on what I have seen from other dogs with similar issues, it is usually pressure and/or countermotion that causes it: pressure from convergence to get into a non-obvious tunnel entry, or countermotion when da momma is trying to LEAVE haha!!! BE sure to get it on video and we will sort it out 🙂
TGood morning!
>>I also got lazy and used a jump instead of the tunnel in the lower right hand corner. I moved it around depending on what the course needed.>>
Not lazy! Efficient 🙂 And you also had to hustle to get the opening, so it was a little harder for the handling!
Lots of great work here with both dogs! First up, Miss Pose:
Course 1: I think you can start your verbal turn cues earlier with her for the #4 tunnel at :10, to help override the forward motion of you getting into position so she turns sooner on the exit. She has great tunnel commitment so you can probably start the verbals when she is 6 feet or more from the tunnel entrance.
Super independent weaves! Yay Pose! Easy peasy 🙂
2 independence elements to add as you revisit these:
– you can add decelerating while she is weaving so you don’t run past your line for the next section and then have to push back hard to it (which causes you to get further behind than needed and show her too much extension) – you’ll want to stay tucked behind the curve of the tunnel, which is a big challenge for weaving because it strips out the support of your motion.
– when you can be more tucked into the tunnel, you can also try starting the FC before she exits, so you are fully turned and running up the next line when she exits.Good timing on the left verbal before the tunnel! She was a little wide probably because of your position/motion relative to the tunnel before she went in as you were driving up the line.
Love how you are running and using verbals here, really trusting her, and not needing to over-connect or over-help. Happy dance!
Great job starting the FC at :20! She had a good turn there – something to play with would be a BC there – it would start at the same time but can be finished quicker. That will give us a good point of comparison: is the foot rotation of the FC more helpful for her as a turn cue, even if it doesn’t finish as early? Or does the connection from the BC (which would finished sooner than the foot rotation) provide a better turn cue?
Course 2 –
On the opening of the first run, she had the bar down at :08.
The tunnel verbal is mainly a forward cue and #4 here is a little offset, so she had to lead change away – sorting that out a little late is what pulled the bar because she didn’t see the tunnel. A “get out” cue before the tunnel cue can help, or one extra step to square up her line for 3 can help too (but only one step, you don’t have time for more than that LOL!!She knew where it was at :26 so she found it easily without any of that, but I think she was helped by having seen the tunnel line already.
You can decel a little on your turn cue on the jump before the weaves at :29 so she has a little collection before takeoff (landed straight then turned).
Weave exit – this is a similar challenge as the one in course 1, so you can also play with adding in tucking in behind the tunnel while she is weaving and trying the FC sooner too.
She turned away as you started the FC at :37 which was really interesting so I went and compared it to what you did on course 1, where the FC there went really nicely!
It looks like on course 1 as you were driving that line at :20/:21, you were a little more lateral and facing the line you wanted a bit more and as you started your FC, your inside (dog-side) shoulder went back as the first part of the cue, no real outside arm involvement until the cross was finished.
On course 2, you were less lateral at :36 by a step or two, and facing forward longer – and at :37 your outside arm came up as the first part of the cue – so that would explain why she was convinced it was a turn away (she sees ALL the things doesn’t she??!! Wow!) because the outside arm does become part of the cue on some of the turn away cues like tandem turns, for example.Ah! On the next rep down that line, you did the blind there at :48 – loved it! Perfect! Great timing, great turn.
A little too much ‘go’ at :53 plus the FC can start sooner: strategically, after the BC at :48, you can hang out where you finished it and send her to the next lines, which leaves you in great position for the FC. The FC being a little wider caused the turn after it at :56 to be a little wide as you helped get her back on the line – a little softer send there can add a little more collection.
The ending line looked great! Great timing on your left verbal before the tunnel!Next up, Differ! Good girl with the big weave layer, both at the beginning and also in the middle of the course! Yay! She looks great!
Course #1: fun to see how she runs the line differently compared to Pose with her massive stride – Differ made the lead change 2-3 really early on because of you squaring up to the line a little more (:15) so her line to the tunnel #4 was almost straight.
I think she would be able to do that with only 1 step up the line from you, so you can then peel away and get to the BC on the tunnel exit and call her sooner – you ended up a little late at :16 (blind started while she was in it plus verbal a little too late too) so she was a little wide. In a perfect world, she would hear the verbal and see the shoulder rotation of the blind starting when she was still a stride from the tunnel entry – we can’t always live in that perfect world, so the verbal coming when she is 6 feet from the entry will negate the need for you to be in position and starting the blind.
Looks like she slipped right past 6 at :20 – it looks like your shoulder was a tiny bit too closed so she lost which side to be on. You were clearer with the connection at :29, plus I think we can chalk it up the a young dog error – as she gets more experienced, I think she will be fine with that and commit easily.
Differ course 2:
That jump for the send instead of the weaves is a perfect modification! And it also proved to be challenging! She got the send but then missed the tunnel because you were hustling up the line at :21 (the hustle was correct – it was a baby dog error to run past the tunnel parallel to your line, and a great training opportunity). You ran the same line with a little less hustle at :38 and she got it – it is a spot that requires convergence into your line and that is *difficult* and counterintuitive. You can add more hustle back in and you can also open up your left shoulder as a serpentine to help her come in as you hustle – with more experience, she will be happy to do it while you ran the way you did at :21.Reducing the hustle down the line at :38 made you a little late for the BC at :43, but that will not be a problem when you are fully hustled after she gets more experience finding that tunnel after the send.
I really liked the BC at :48 on the backside!! It might be able to come a shade earlier but honestly, it does not need to be tighter: she was turning in full on extension and I would bet that it is the fastest way for her to do it. On the jump after the BC at :49 – I would be interested to see how the send that you did here (she was pretty wide, off screen for a moment LOL!) would compare to just a decel & leave moment to see if we can tighten it. Conventional wisdom says tighter/prettier is faster, but small dog wisdom says the wider line might be faster. Goddy up! We will start timing that stuff officially in the next set of games but we can look at it now too!
Second rep – nice opening again! You got the nice decel at the jump before the send jump, she collected for a lovely turn so I ran and got my stopwatch (hello, obsessing.) The collection was a tiny bit slower through that sequence – I would be curious to retime it with the big extension she had in the first rep where she missed the tunnel – that might end up being fastest? Good to keep track of!
You had even better timing on the BC at 1:13 – I think when you can totally trust her tunnel commitment before that, you can get there even sooner to get it as nicely as you did with Pose.
Gorgeous blind to the backside at 1:18! And you did more of a decelerated send at 1:20, the turn was still in extension but tighter – so I timed it (can’t help myself haha) and she was faster on this rep by about .15 . And she had a great turn out of the tunnel there (I didn’t include that in the timing of the send, but it was also faster) – same good timing on your left cue, but she was gaining experience on how to respond and was really lovely there!!Great job here with both girls! Let me know what you think!
TracyHi!
Try this as the link to #3, it should work:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2m6iege–l0>>proof I didn’t do all of the Max Puppy series
It was part of the pandemic re-write of the MaxPup series – totally revamped, top to bottom, because I had 3 puppies and a lot of time on my hands LOL!!
The elevator game looks good – note how he is focusing ahead to the target during the countdown! You might want to stop feeding during the countdown because I am not sure he can multi-task chewing AND stepping to target position when you cue the target LOL! So a cookie for hopping on, then no cookies during the countdown – then when he steps into target position, the cookies flow again 🙂
>>If the weather ever gets cooler, I’ll do some video on Threadle, FF, German and Japanese (forced blind).
Perfect! I have been doing the training just after sunrise – it has been a really hot summer! And the next games package will give you lots of things to time – the only way to know, is to time all the things. And it will also tell us which, if any, skills need to be improved to go faster and which ones we don’t need to bother with 🙂
T
Hi!
>>Both of these worked fine, as long as she knew the toy or treat were there.
However – and I think this is a BIG however – I didn’t practice doing any handling.Ah! That might be the missing piece. The handling is where we see the issues – handler tries to send and leave, and the dog refuses the tunnel. For example, I used the frisbee-in-tunnel recently when I was working on tunnel threadles – I got the dog turned and heading into the tunnel entry I wanted, but then she pulled off at the last second as I ran away. So, the friz-in-tunnel helped her continue to drive to the tunnel while I continued to run away.
So try it with the handling and see how it goes! It might take a whole bunch of sessions to build the value but it will be worth it.
T
Good morning!
>>So I think the theme of these videos would be reinforcement strategies. This is something I feel like I really need to improve but it’s been evolving and I just don’t feel like I’ve been the best at sorting it out alone. I will notice when it’s not working and as you noted change things- this is more of I think a helicopter parent thing where I just start to throw the kitchen sink at him to keep him happy because he can be so quick to disengage or lose enthusiasm and I perceive him as an overly soft/fragile dog.>>
I don’t think he is overly soft or fragile – but training is much harder if reinforcement strategies are not in place. We try to train things but we don’t quite have ways to reinforce things, so things don’t get trained and everyone gets frustrated.
>>He had not eaten prior to this session, initially he seemed excited for these and then he lost it.>>
BCs and similar dogs often don’t seem to have high food value during ‘work’ even if they are theoretically hungry. I personally think that is NUTS because I am clearly a terrier or Papillon who is ALWAYS hungry… but my BC types and pointies all started off being happy to not eat (WTAF? HA!)
>> I can certainly use a higher value cookie- he loves cheese but is weird about cheese that touches the ground, and pair it with movement.
All sorts of separate reinforcement strategies to work, then, starting with these 2:
– picking up cheese from the ground then getting a toy or movement (bearing in mind that cheese is not necessarily a reinforcement in that moment, so that skill is trained as a skill at first)
– using cheese as a reinforcement from a lotus ball or treat hugger>>I do think running off would help his excitement. When we train in a known space and the food is coming directly from my hand he will take it excitedly 100% of the time so I do get confused regarding his food drive.>>
I think it is a combo of needing to expand the ways you can use food as a reinforcement (thrown, etc) as well as acclimation to new environments – it is pretty normal that a dog can eat in a known environment but not in a new or distracting environment – it is indicative of stress levels.
>>So he will pretty much always chase a thrown frisbee, whether he goes for it on the ground may be a different story. Do you think the act of chasing it but maybe not getting it is reinforcing enough for me to build on? I will usually stop throwing it if he’s not chasing and then CHANGE again because apparently I really like to do that >>
Hard to know because it sounds like he stops before you stop, which causes you to pivot. So I think limiting the reps on any given type or style of reinforcement will really help. If he stops chasing the frisbee on rep 5? Then you should stop with the frisbee at rep 3. That will help break the rehearsal of reinforcement losing value followed by you pivoting to something else. 3 high quality, well-reinforced reps are going to be much better than 10 reps where you are trying to sort out the reinforcement.
>This is a good reminder for me, and please point it up if it keeps happening. I will usually eliminate the difficult behavior in order to sequence instead of doing it and then reinforcing it. It just doesn’t automatically occur to me and hopefully it will>>
Take note of every failure or every time you don’t reward – and then change something to be able to reward to help pump up the rate of success!
>>I did initially have his mat out but if we have too many failures on the contact, he will get avoidant of the mat.
I suggest living by the 2 failure rule (or the 1 failure rule, for now) – 2 failures in a row or in a session and you need to change something to get success. If you can’t figure out how to get success, stop the session and change plans for the next session.
>>I am better about reinforcing everything on the DW with super enthusiasm when he hits as a jackpot. Hopefully I will get a good hit so we can show you. Although usually it stops the sequence… which maybe something I need to train through later. You can also usually hear Carrie scream yes if I get a great hit too which will usually terminate the behavior ha!>>
Stopping to reward is not an issue, as long as there is clarity with what is happening next: a ‘yes’ verbal is not clear LOL! A “get it” means reward is available, and a cue to continue is also a reinforcement (but not necessarily as strong as a primary reinforcement).
>>Back to the reinforcement strategies here. I want to make sure I’m understanding. It would appear that I should always keep moving until I reinforce and action movement with toys appears to be the best. So a dangling tug that he can strike/bite or a thrown toy?>>
Yes, basically – but also reward before there is an error, and if there is an error: no apologies, don’t stop to discuss or just plop a toy or turn away from him 🙂
And the dangling toy to chase or a thrown toy might be stimulating but it is important to stop before he stops finding it stimulating.
>>I REALLY appreciate your observation here because I do think it’s the piece that’s missing to take us to a higher level in training. I just feel like I haven’t quite put the pieces fully together. I see progress but there’s still more struggle in our training sessions and if it’s on my part, I want to fix that! He gives really great feedback to me but I am not the best at putting it all together and in the moment its harder for me to sort out. He’s so different from Callie who 100% of the time lives for food and would jump through flames for it but has lower toy drive but I have figured out what’s reinforcing for her.>>
I think a good rule to live by is if the behavior is not progressing the way we like, we can find the answer in the reinforcement: timing of it, rate (clarity) of it, and placement of it. It is the reinforcement that builds behavior so the more can can add clarity and expand the types available, the easier it is to time it and place it well – and then the behaviors come together really nicely!
Let me know if that makes sense 🙂
TracyHi!
This was a really clever way to set up a ‘ring experience’ at home! There are a lot of really good elements to the ritual! We will be working more specifically on that in coming weeks – an idea for you for now: as you are getting him ready, you can start with the food rewards in your hands so he gets rewarded for the tricks, and then as you transition into the ring you can let him see you place the reward in the reward spot, then head into the ring. He has all sorts of good tricks and that will really help!
>>Will take you up on your suggestion to practice at the Regional. Had a feeling that you were familiar with the location. So getting down to brass tacks, I began to think about what we are going to do there.>>
Looking at the Regional as a training opportunity, 2 ideas:
– when you first get into the ring area each time, start with the acclimation game with the cookie tosses each time – and see what he does. You can start it pretty far from the ring at first, then gradually build up to being closer and also to doing it when dogs are running (you can be far from the ring when this is happening).
– when he looks pretty acclimated and is very quick to offer engagement, play around with different tricks. Have rewards in your hand for now, and keep track of which cues he responds to immediately, which ones he is less quick to respond to, and which ones he doesn’t respond to (or needs to hear/see a re-cue). And also track how he responds: excited, engaged? Or doing the thing but not quite as quick? And one more thing to note: his body language: how engaged/aroused is he? We are going to start tracking the behaviors that get him into the optimal arousal state so we can use them when we take those behaviors into the ring!So the Regionals adventure is really just a fact-finding mission 🙂 Same with the visit to Kim’s!
Let me know if that makes sense and let me know how it goes 🙂
TracyHowdy!
For your viewing pleasure, here is the elevator game progression:Good morning!
I feel the pain of the camera getting too hot! We do our training as close to sunrise as we can get now. So hot!!!!
>>I need to work on the teeter video, it will be like a blooper video. I will just say after I tried a number of things, I pulled the chair away and just did a teeter (not on the video), she looked great.>>
Blooper videos are fine 🙂 What was she doing? She is a little young to be doing full teeters because of the impact of the slam, so we can sort out the games without any of the impact.
The Lazy Game is looking good! I think she is slightly stronger on your right side here tan on your left side. If she doesn’t commit, keep moving rather than stop then restart – she is a smartie and will quickly figure out the NOT taking the jump gets no reward, but finding the jump gets the party 🙂 Yes, there was a throw where she was looking at you but the others were better about happening when she was looking forward. And she was a good girl about bringing the toy back! YAY!!! At least once. Haha!!
You can take the lazy game setup now and add the sequences into it.Nice work here! Let me know what you think!
TracyHowdy!
>>SOOOO, any ideas about sending and getting her to go into a basically “blind” tunnel would be lovely. I know this is very off-topic for this summer camp,
Nothing is off limits for summer camp!!
Not every dog loves the tunnel. Something I have done is hidden the toy or reward or MM inside the tunnel 🙂 I might have video of it somewhere… at first the toy was visible inside the tunnel just past the entry. Then it was halfway through, then further and further through til eventually it ended up on the exit. The tunnel was short and straight at first and I did all sorts of handling. Then the tunnel become curved – with the reward going just inside the entry. Basically, we are shaping the tunnel in successive approximations and using placement of reinforcement to help. When she totally adores the tunnels, you can add the early exit cues and reward those too!
let me know if that makes sense 🙂
TracyGood morning!
>>lazy game is hard for us! Must. Be. Running.
TOTALLY relatable! I was like that until my dogs required me to be perfect… and then I was all like “OK dog, you need to commit no matter what” – the lazy game fixed it and now I can be happily imperfect and they will still commit. Which means I can run more LOL!
Good job on the lazy game here – feels weird to be so calm and lazy, right? LOL! You did a great job of forcing yourself to be chill hahaha!!! The outer jumps were easy, it was the center jump that was harder for sure! Mo had a lightbulb moment at about 1:04 when he took that middle jump. You were a bit closer to it there too, which helped – you can totally stick closer to the line until Mo is whizzing around while you are being lazy. And then you can add more distance! You will see when Mo is ready for more, it will be nearly impossible to convince him to NOT take the jumps. Then you can move into the sending and running away as well as the handling sequences.
Great job here!
TracyHi! Thanks for the raw footage here! I think what you are seeing speaks to both what is actually reinforcing for him and how that plays into the rate of success. Here is what I mean:
Starting on the send to the wing into the distraction area is very hard, so just isolate it rather than risk failure right at the start. Think of it as a bank account – that failure on the first rep puts you into a deficit that is hard to recover from. Get closer and reward it specifically a few times (pump up the account balance!) before trying to send and run. Then when he got it right at :30… reward 🙂 That is a really difficult spot!
On the other parts – he is DEFINITELY a ‘just the facts ma’am’ type of dog – stopping for conversation even if you offer reward is not cool with him, and then when you were touching him and moving the reward towards him – not reinforcing. So, I think he has paired the stops & conversation with being wrong so based on his response – he perceives it as a negative punishment which reduces the reinforcement account balance. For example, at :40 when you messed up, you got into a conversation about it… and he turned off. Same thing happened at 1:25 on the backlap – then you moved towards him to engage which is not his preferred style of reinforcement (a lot of pressure and not enough prey drive) And also, reward at 2:00 for the pass even if was not the wing you wanted – he was correct so reward really fast as if it was exactly what you wanted.
>> I did try to convince him he was right there but he was skeptical. He didn’t want to take the toy. He didn’t want physical affection (he’s not a huge fan of that when we are working but he is my dog child and tolerates it) >>
Yes, because he knew that it wasn’t right (doesn’t matter whose fault it is) and stopping/ discussion is not part of the reinforcement. So try to just keep going as if it was entirely correct (don’t stop when something goes ‘wrong’, just cue the next thing and run), don’t mark errors with apologies (even if it is your error :)) and throw the rewards in when things are going right! You might have to do some acting because you know it was not correct – but to keep the reinforcement rate high and keep him engaged, acting like it was totally perfect was great! Then you can change up the handling the next time through.
>>he did offer a jump so I kept working and he seemed happy.
yes – he wanted action and not stopping/discussion/ hugs LOL!! That is a really important piece for him, and gives u insight into what is actually reinforcement to him (action, cues) and what he might perceive as not reinforcing/punishment: stopping, conversation (which sounds totally different than cues), toys moving towards him, etc.
Let me know what you think! I love that we can figure out how he ticks, that will make it easier for train and handle!
Tracy
Hi!
>>Much better attempt here.
Totally yes! You had better rewards overall and lots of great energy on the rewards too – he liked that 🙂 And for the handling, you were very connected and that produced a ton of lovely lines!!
>>We did have to fight a little bit of a distraction with the pool guy in the yard. Like WHO SAID HE COULD BE AT FEVERS POOL WHILE WE WERE TRAINING AND WHY AREN’T WE MORE CONCERNED?
Ha! “GET OUT OF MY POOL, MISTER!” lol
>>For comic relief I left the 2Ă—2 WIDE OPEN and you can see him smoke me every time. He is sending to them beautifully and independently and had zero failures.
That was great!!! Very affirming for him 🙂 For the weaves (and frame and DW) you can have more rewards the end of the obstacle and not form your hands. Those 3 are obstacles that we want him to be looking at the end of, so the more you reward out at the end, the better. That can be a placed toy or throw toy or manners minder – anything that is not in your hand 🙂
>>His DW does not look great here. He is most successful when we constantly work it. Unfortunately while I’m trying to train all of the things, it’s not been consistently worked in about a month. His middle plank striding here is what’s causing him to not hit. He usually is more extended. I suspect it will be just as beautiful when I go back to working it regularly.>>
Totally relatable, it is so hard to train all the things, all the time. Feel free to use your training props when you are working the contacts in a course – for example, I use a mat and a MM and a flyball jump for the RDW and I leave them out there with the youngsters if I am sequencing the DW.
He was having a little trouble on the down of the a-frame, but I think that was the approach: give a better line up to the frame, he is having to scramble and get on sideways and that is changing the down ramp behavior. You can angle the frame towards the entry line so it is a sweeter entry and then the down will be better too.
A few thoughts on the handling stuff:
At the beginning, he had some trouble finding the wing with distractions. Pool? Or stuff? Either way – it is a great training moment for wing wraps! And even if he was not perfect, reward him before a small bit of it – he needs more reward in those moments or he tends to check out.
Good connection on the line to the weaves and also good energy on the rewards!!! And also really nice line after the weaves! And he liked the reward – get in there and engage after you throw it to keep that energy high.
The pass on the next rep was out of view of the video so I couldn’t see why he went around the tire – but he might’ve needed more of a turn cue – it was correct to continue there and carry on, so he could get rewarded. Yay!
Really good line at approx 2:00 and good rewarding! He likes the pass on the wing, he can be fast and accurate! Nice connection from you on that entire section. Be careful about leaving the toy on the ground in his path though, that might be an unnecessary distraction 🙂
Also if you say the wrong verbal, just fix it and keep going, no more apologizing because it delays the next info. He subscribes to the “just the facts, ma’am” mode of thinking on course, he is not a conversationalist or apologist LOL!
A little oopsie getting up the line after the a-frame at 2:25, you just pulled away too early. And super nice line at the very end!!! That is a good spot to have a mat or reward target for the DW – so you don’t end up rewarding a big leap or withholding reward or rewarding from you hand. My RDW props line in my car now, so I can always whip them out for any available dog walk action.
Nice work here! Let me know what you think!
TracyGood morning!
You can find all of the seminar games here:
https://agility-u.com/course/au-032-maxpup-foundations-putting-it-together/
by clicking on the Live Seminar 1: Concept Transfers (Saturday, July 3) link. That will drop down both the zoom link if you want to see the live class, as well as all the various games if you just want to get right to work 🙂Let me know if you have any trouble seeing it!
Tracy
Hi!
He was able to offer some good behavior here with more arousal! You can be moving a little more now too. It was interesting that the line up cue is the default before, it seems – keeping your feet together so he can’t offer it will be helpful because we don’t want that offered while you are moving plus we want him to process the verbals.This is something we can discuss:
“” He was doing okay but not really taking it as a reward like I would like. I then did some just close work for food and that was great. Looking back, I should have just switched to food.””
I thought he was happy with the frisbee throws… so if that is what is reinforcement to him, then we go with it. Food is not incredibly reinforcing for him – and he was chasing the frisbee so you can work that in. I think overall, working out the reinforcement is the key – and doing it in one or two rep sessions is the way to go. If you do a couple of minutes in a row, you might end up changing things before you find out what works, and then lose him because he doesn’t understand what you want because it keeps changing. And one or two rep sessions (then he can go into the house or pool or something) will give you time to decide what you liked about what just happened and what you want to do on the next rep – that way you won’t ask for too much then have to recover.
Being predictable will help him too, so fewer changes in the moment will make for smoother sessions. And he was doing well when you added motion – just be sure you stay in smooooooth steady motion and don’t lean in or slow down when you cue the down.
>>I don’t have a ton of marker cues. Get it means the toy is available for reinforcement. Search (as used in my other video) means foods on the ground and you can get it. Scatter is food is placed calmly on the floor for you to get. I tried a face cue when he was a baby for toy is being thrown to you to catch but he was awful at catching.>>
I don’t think we need a ton of markers, just a handful of clear ones.
Ah, so search and scatter are different – you can also clarify for him how many cookies to look for on each – scatter is multiple, for example, and search is on.
And the face cue can be “reward being tossed back to you” but he doesn’t have to catch it 🙂 I have a catch cue and only one of my dogs actually catches it – but they all understand that it is coming back to them, based on how they stand still and look up and behind them LOL!>>I should likely add more for clarity but I really struggle with my words sometimes(using them/saying the correct ones).
This is something we can improve with planning! Plan plan plank out the wazooooo then do once or twice with the dog 🙂 That goes for marker cues and verbal directionals – so before you play motion override, for example, plan how you are going to move, what behavior you will cue, and which marker you will use, which reward, where it will go… and so on. And it is perfectly fine to give yourself a walk through of the mechanics without the dog. If you rehearse it and then bring Fever into it – you’ll nail it!
>>On a spectrum of importance, would it be better to use clearer words but late versus use a word that means reinforcement(but maybe not as clear as to what the reinforcement is)available promptly? This question could keep me up all night debating internally.>>
C) none of the above.
LOL!
The answer is planning and rehearsal without the dog so the sessions with the dog are amazeballs. This is what will make the difference. Think about what you want to do… plan it, plan plan plan rehearse rehearse rehearse maybe even try it with Callie they way you want to do it with Voodoo… and when you have it where you want it: Fever comes in.It might seem like it takes longer but it will actually be the fastest way to train and everything will speed up. The key is planning and rehearsal of the session and the mechanics so the actual session with the dog is as perfect as you can get it. Sure, the environment can throw in a wrench like fireworks, but you can respond to that and then go back into your plan. And, as sometimes happens, you find out in the rehearsal or training that the plan is not a good plan – no problem, back to rehearsal and figure out what to change up.
So the actual hands on training will be short but incredibly effective and precise because you’ve rehearsed so much of it without the dog. The markers and verbals will feel like second nature!
Let me know if that makes sense!
Tracy
