Forum Replies Created
-
Posts
-
Wooohooo! That looks so much better! You are going to keep adding distance from here until you are about 10-15 ft away. I also think with dogs like this adding different handler positions/working on generalization in the beginning makes a big difference for adding distance. So I would also start putting yourself in different positions (sitting in a chair, standing, slightly moving, standing sideways, etc.)
Elevated target – YAY! Yes, that is looking a lot better. Keep working on those slower more thoughtful hits all around the clock. She seems like the type of dog that is pretty fast and would rather not think and just run (even though she does do a fair amount of thinking because you are a good trainer) so slowing it down to where she really understands it will help a lot. Because she also seems like once she understands things she rarely makes a mistake with it. Of course this is just my snap judgement and I could be totally wrong haha. All in all, this is looking fantastic, keep working around the clock with slower speeds. I am glad that that worked for the inverted target as well! It is hard for those puppy brains 😉
Half DW – Holy cow!! That was awesome!!!!! She is really figuring out both how to hit the target like that with RF and how to load on AND how to go find the wing after! Good girlie. There were a few hits in the session I wouldn’t have rewarded — the hits at 0:50, 1:33, 2:03. They were either too high or only one foot. Now is the time to start getting more selective about the hits that you reward or don’t reward. You can put a piece of tape in the middle of the target so that you can see where she is hitting better and if she hits below the tape R and if she hits above the tape NR. Continue working like this around the clock until you get to even really hard turns. Once she is really understanding this then you can start saying her wrap word while she is loading up/running down the DW. This will start to get her to understand that she can hear another verbal the the obstacle after the DW and still hit her contact criteria. That is really hard for some dogs. I say it quietly in the beginning then gradually say it louder. Keep in mind that anytime we are adding something new (more of the plank/more speed etc..) I got back to no verbals and only say the one “go” verbal. Then as they get consistency and confidence I start adding the verbals back
Great work!
That completely makes sense. It is hard to convince some dogs to start running but I have found that once they start to do it they will continue to do so. So keep playing with ways to get him running more and trotting less. I like the tossed treat ball that you are doing in this session. For my small dog it made a big difference when I would do a couple tunnels (or some other training thing) then 2-3 reps of the DW then back to the tunnel then 2-3 reps etc. So you could play around with bringing up the excitement like that too.
I also think it is easier to get better understanding and more speed/confidence using the raised target. So let’s start him on the raised target and only use that for now. Then go through all of your proofing exercises using the raised target for now.
Yes we will do a straight line from the target to the PT or the MM (doesn’t matter which). For now, keep working on the back and forth until he will really drive to the target without the help of your motion. You are helping a lot with your motion right now so slowly try to fade that help.
DW – this is looking great. Your question — No I think that session was great not too hard. I think she can handle working on both directions in the same session just fine. She is such a goofball going the wrong direction around the wing though! HA. I think she will figure that out as well. Just keep rewarding the correct direction and bring the wing closer if needed. In that direction you might start with the wing close then pull it farther away to help encourage the right direction. In the second session I noticed this more than in the first session but her striding was off just a bit and she couldn’t quite hit with FF and she couldn’t quite hit with RF. So if you are ever seeing that again just play around with where the loading wing is so that it changes her striding a bit. Just bring it a little closer to the bottom or top. Also if she keeps looking back for you and not taking the wing then you bring the wing closer and gradually move it farther out again.
Elevated target work – this is looking great. Just keep at it. Work on a lot from the closer starting position (she is way more successful there) then gradually add more speed and more angle. Especially if you are working on a lot of angle make sure the speed is low. Looking good!
-Elevated target: I have been doing the indoor elevated target as “warm up” at the start of the day. For the outdoor stuff I am going back to the MM and doing “around the clock” for that. Using the MM so she chills and thinks for now.
Sounds Good!
–Question 1: How many “good hits” do you strive for before you move the MM to a harder position? My goal is to make this a little bit more organized on my end as I kind of have been all over the map. So get XX number of good hits in a row, move the MM 10 degrees or so more angled.In the beginning I want to see 3-4 perfect hits before adding more angle with the MM. Then I will only move the MM by about a foot. Then as they get better and more consistent I will start moving it after 1-2 perfect hits and move it by more angle as well.
–Question 2: have you ever put a MM on both ends of the target and dog runs back and forth between them? No clue if that is a thing or I just made it up while I had 2 MM’s outside haha.Yeah absolutely! However, you are working with more speed like from a wing or a static position so much now that you may be past the point of needing to do this. But adding lots of angle you could do this-Inverted target: glued some cabinet liner to this upside down piece of wood with small wood sides, so that has to wait a day to dry. More on that once it’s ready. I still find she is not as good with the inverted target – my initial thinking was that it was slipping and she doesn’t want to hit it and slide. Not sure if I am overthinking that. Thoughts? The inverted target is SO MUCH MORE DIFFICULT for the dog. It seems like it would be the same level of challenge or easier but it is so much more difficult. So my guess is that it is not because of slipping or anything like that just that she doesn’t 100% have it down yet. So keep working it, making it easy in the beginning and gradually make it more challenging. She will get it.
-DW: I started this this afternoon. I’ll post video shortly. My wing is straighter off the DW than yours but so far good results. In parallel to my elevated/inverted target around the clock, I will start this around the clock on the DW with using the wing as a loader to the DW.
–Question: While doing this, I am thinking I should pause the further back dog walk with speed for now? Only focus on concentrated and thoughtful hits on the target on the DW? Meaning, get her on the DW using the wing/jump up method only for the new few days and see how that goes? Not sure if what I said makes sense…Yes, pause any DW stuff with speed for right now. We really want to build in that understanding and then we will add the speed back into the picture.Okay that completely makes sense. Yes, she did pretty well in the house. It definitely already looks so much better with you tossing the rewards farther (both inside and out) so keep doing that! Actually both. I would do a few sessions with the b&F games using the elevated target and separately sessions where she is running across the elevated target. She actually did really well with speed at the park — she was running pretty much the entire session (rather than trotting). So that was really good! And you can see it in her hits because of that. When she is hitting the target she really is jumping on with FF and pushing off with RF which is exactly what we are looking for. If she were trotting you would see her hit with one FF and one RF. Continue adding more speed to this one. I think she is ready to add in some toy rewards to help build up the enthusiasm even more.
With the mat work I don’t think she is understanding this as best as she can yet. She knows that you want her to do something with that mat but she hasn’t developed a sensitivity to where the target is under her feet yet. So I think we should actually now ONLY do sessions with the raised target and then go through all the proofing exercises with that to really build an understanding to hit with all 4 feet. Then we can more slowly generalize the elevated target to the ground to keep that overall consistency with her hits. I have worked with several dogs that really needed to go this route. This will also help train your eye. Hits are easier to see (and easier for the dog to understand) on the elevated platform. It had very defined edges. So it is often a great tool to help us as well as them.
Awesome! So smart of you to meet him exactly where he was at in that environment and giving him exactly what he needed at that time. Smart training 🙂
Everything he did here was fantastic. He hit really nicely and everything. Sometimes if I know they are really distracted I will use the elevated target instead of the target on the ground because it is actually easier for them to meet criteria with the elevated target than the target on the ground. Just because the edges are very distinct and clear. They tend to get a little sloppy with foot placement on the target on the ground. So if things are really distracting, I will use that.
Much better! Yes exactly this. She just needs more sessions just like to to learn to think through the cookies a bit more 🙂 This is completely normal so don’t worry about it at all. Continue like this and as she is figuring it out slowly add distance.
Okay rewatching your half height DW with Kirbee after doing Mercy yesterday made me think of some things I’ll try today:
1) Still less handler motion from me.
Yes 🙂
2) Perhaps I need to be further back – her hits are better with me behind her cause then she plays the chase game.
Yes, and we want her to learn how to drive ahead of you looking for the next obstacle. We will work on you ahead of her more later after she has built up a LONG history of muscle memory finding that position/hitting the target.
3) Don’t worry about which side she takes running around the wing…(?)
Yes, she should take the right direction just set the wing up so that it is the obvious without any lead change. So you will have it off to the right or left slightly depending on what side of the DW you are on.
4) And maybe I need to move my wing closer to the end of the DW so it’s slightly more obvious for her first time.
Yes see the video – you will want to do the same distance as I have set up there
5) Begin moving location of wing.
Yes with the new slower set up for now.
Sound good?
With the verbals — Yes, those all sound great. I would not add them at all until you have the behavior trained. So with everything that we are working on with driving to the wing, teach her how to do that first all with only one verbal running to the wing. Then once she understand (when she is at fulll height_ we will attach the verbals to each skill. It goes very smoothly.
Omg I had the longest write up for you and went to post it and it logged my out. UGH! So I may have missed some things here. If you have any questions, just let me know.
Elevated target work – Everything you did inside looked amazing. It was the right amount of motion to keep her thinking about her job but provide a really good distraction. Continue like this with the smaller target. I think going through the proofing with the smaller target (specifically inside where it is easier for her) will be a really good thing. It really makes her think about hitting. Outside. Overall, it was good. But everything needs to be slowed down a lot. I think it was just too much motion from both you and her in the beginning. Keep in mind if you are making one thing more challenging it is important to make something else easier. So here you both added more speed from her, angle and you motion into the picture. I think you would have been fine doing both the her speed going into it and the angle but adding in your running motion was too much. You could tell because she lost her ability to think and fix mistakes (which she did really well inside). So do this again, slowing your motion down and really focus on really good hits and rewarding those then continue working on the angles and once she is really solid on all the hard angles and straights then add your motion back. Don’t be afraid to slow things down. I really messed that up with Kirb in the beginning thinking that he would be really slow if I didn’t encourage speed. I promise she will not go slow in the end. She will go fast with better understanding 😉
The wing with the DW the first time was actually not bad at all. The lead change off of the DW when you switched sides is what was causing her to leap. When you tried to be in the right position to get the correct direction around the wing she leaped because she doesn’t understand how to hit with you pushing on the line yet. No worries at all. For right now you will always want to set her up so that she is taking the wing on the leading turning into you. So you did the right thing by moving the wing to your side of the DW and from now on you want it to be there (or on the other side if you are working on the other direction).
Something I do a lot with the dogs in the beginning (and later if I want to go back and do more proofing) is I will set them up to load onto the DW with a cone or wing. This really helps put everything in motion for them without it being a ton of speed. It is a really great in between step for a lot of dogs. Here is a video where I am doing this exactly. In the video I am working on 90 degree turns and rear foot separation but you can see exactly what I mean for teaching her to load up, run down, through the target then onto the wing. You are going to have your wing close in the beginning to make it easy (about the distance that I am working on in this video only straight instead of turning). This will also all you to basically stand still so she will learn to drive ahead of you to the next obstacle if cued. Making sense? You are going to work on all the angles around the clock by moving the wing as she is confident and successfully hitting almost every time. Then you can add a bit more distance with the exit wing then, once you have done all of that, come back to the half way starting point. Here is the video –
Woooohoooo! This was a great session and I agree, he is really starting to figure out exactly what you want him to do. The next step for him is to get him into a run more often and not a trot. That will start testing his understanding on how to hit as well. The beauty of this is that we are starting to teach the dog how to think through their excitement with this behavior right from the beginning 🙂 In the upcoming sessions I want you to start doing some toy rewards in addition to the food rewards to bring up the excitement level. While you do that, make sure that you also maintain your criteria with all 4 foot hits. If criteria starts to slip, then go back to food or less distance to make it easier for him, then gradually build back up. Great work!
To be honest, the teeter is my least favorite obstacle to train and because of that I always do it last when I am finally like “well f*** if I want to compete I guess I have to train this”. So far I haven’t had any trouble with them understanding or seeing the difference. Possibly because they are already very proficient on the DW by the time I get around to training the seesaw? I have a 4 on on my seesaw and so far have not seen any creeping for hesitation on the DW after introducing the seesaw. Again, by this time the dogs are very proficient on the DW and understand how to drive forward with different exits and have really rehearsed the DW behavior.
Awesome! Just toss your food farther away from the mat so she can run to it and away from it faster and with more room. Otherwise she is doing a great job finding the target. Now it is time to try the elevated target with farther tossed rewards 🙂
I figure you would have some pare vet wrap around being a flyball person 😉
Both. Small in overall size (length and width) makes hitting the target more challenging so I definitely do that before making the height much smaller so there is a very clear boundary or edge for the dog. Then you can also make it a smaller in height as well. With this current elevated target, I would like to see her doing these same awesome hits on a elevated target that is about half this size in either height or size. It will really teach her how to think through this problem and be more thoughtful with where her feet are with the enthusiasm 😉
