Another post where I'm going to post my "raw unedited training session", of Perri and I working on rear crosses. I am super glad I pursued this. In Perri's beginnings, she was not a candidate for rear crosses! She had no confidence and I could always be ahead of her, and Perri would never dare ever be ahead of me. I feel very foolish that I never actually worked on the mechanics of this with her, but in her early days, it likely would have shut her down. But! We are doing it now and I'm proud of her - because while she is iffy with her motivation at the start....we both warm into the training session as we go along.
And I can still get front and blind crosses in a lot with Perri. But sometimes I love to do a rear cross, and even if I never did another rear cross at a trial - practicing them builds Perri's confidence. It builds my confidence. Working on any skill together accomplishes this for us and we need that as a team. I won't say I'm not embarrassed by the training in the video - I am worlds behind perfect. I hate how I am bending over too much or not in the correct position or sporadic, but video'ing gives me this information. I see from video that Perri has a weak side - turning to the right. If we only post what we are the most proud of, then how does that help us?
At one point, I was struggling with my position so I brought Molly out to see if this was "Perri weirdness" or if it was me being unclear. I just love this "blooper" clip of Molly. Hey! Hey!!!!! Hey! Don't run into that poodle! HEY! Come back with my toy! (and don't judge me, it was only 8" and she wanted to play.)
This last video clip is the fruits of our labor of the evening. The "social media worthy" video to post. Good energy from both of us, and Perri highly motivated and showing the beginnings of a decent rear cross understanding. This is what we like to share with others, not the first clip I showed. But, the first clip is the trenches...it is a team learning and moving forwards and adjusting to one another. It is what could be criticized, it is painfully imperfect.
I am happy with our ending video - of Perri learning to turn to the right better rather than spin back towards me. We will continue to work on this. I am finding it to be empowering to work on basic concepts like this with Perri and it is helping me to enjoy her and where we are as a team.
A few nights ago I was "doodling around" as I think of it with Molly and her dumbbell retrieve. Molly has gotten to the point, with much self control work, where we have a hold. When I started to work on some short retrieves, it was pretty clear that Molly doesn't have the foggiest idea of what "front" position is. Molly's knowledge of front is basically a "good enough for rally" call in with hand guidance. Ein is a bit more advanced, we started off with the lure in with hands technique and have recently sharpened up with the use of platforms. Perri has done well using a stationary sit platform, she absolutely adores platform work.
For Molly, a platform is more challenging for both of us, though we are working hard on that. I thought a better fit for Molly would be a pivot platform. She has been heavily rewarded for pivoting to heel position or just for spinning around, so we are working through that. I have also been slipping on videoing my training sessions, but I decided tonight I needed to do so. These are our 3rd and 4th sessions of working on this skill and we are enjoying ourselves. I wanted to look at my timing as well as if I was clicking the position that I actually wanted.
And I thought, why not post my unedited training sessions. They aren't too long! The camera angle kind of sucks. By the second video I feel like Molly is definitely catching onto the concept of what I want. She absolutely cannot handle me having the treats in my hands - they have to be in my sweatshirt pocket -it is just too distracting for her at this time. I am trying to give multiple treats in the position I will eventually want her head to be in. And I note that I need to do some reps with myself moving in the opposite direction (counter clockwise vs clockwise.)
I haven't updated in a little while about my progress with Molly's weave pole training. We had a few big snows around here and that put an end to any outdoor progress. But now all of the snow is gone and the temps are high - the ground is nice and soft for practicing again.
A few weeks ago we went to an hour long Weave Clinic. (of course shared with many other teams.) I explained Molly's poor foundation, and her re-training (two times.) and how I just cannot seem to find the missing puzzle piece of why Molly behaves the way she does at trials. Our instructor asked me to bring Molly out and send her through the weaves. Molly was pretty jazzed up and went running...running....right past the entry. The instructor said, "I think your missing piece is that Molly doesn't understand collection."
She went on to explain that when I re-sent Molly into the weaves (from one of those 2x2 "around the clock" positions that Molly can nail anytime.), Molly was already in collection and could see the weave entry and was focused on it. (And while she did do the poles when she was re-sent, she was slow like she is at a trial. The missing her entry and having to stop running and Doing Wrong - it stresses her.) But coming in from a dead run, out on a course...the skill is not there yet.
Here is a video from our last exercise of the night: our instructor is squeaking and dropping toys, but Molly stays in her poles! Coming from the side off of a jump, Molly is already collecting her speed since she can't turn at full blast and she grabs her entry nicely.
That gave me a lot to think about! Reflecting on all of our training, it is sorely lacking in collection. I am a little ashamed that I did not realize it! My yard is not big enough for working on this skill, and I was not focused on working collection on any of our "on the road" sessions. It is a relief to have a direction to focus in though! I started trying to search for some collection challenges that we could begin practicing. I found this free article on Clean Run and it did contain a collection exercise.
This weekend I had time on both days to get Molly out to a park and do some sessions focusing on collection skills. No food, I used the ball as her reward right out of the gate. I want that high arousal that she has at trials - she needs to learn to think through that. She only bit me twice, a flying leap and nip in my face (scary!) and put a nice bruise on my pinky nail bed! We did the exercise and Molly did not really stutter - she grabbed her entry well from either side that we worked. I think this is because the way the exercise is set up, our paths have to converge and that helped her to slow down.
Here is a video, I was videoing while I was running! We were on a school's playing fields (because at 9am none of our parks were open, hmph.) and I didn't want to get too cozy setting up the iPad and really settling in.
I started playing around and trying to make the challenge bigger. I sent Molly over the jump away from the poles and peeled off without her. This was too much. She was so fired up by my sprinting away from her she blasted right past her poles. Now here is something we can work on! I repeated this exercise and slowed my motion slightly and cued her and she grabbed the entry, I wanted her to be successful to end with.
Sunday we started our work on Molly learning to collect and enter the poles while I run past. Holding her collar and both of us taking off running at the same time does not seem to do the trick - she easily enters the poles in that situation. Sending her over a jump, her focus is thrown off and the first thing she sees when she comes back towards me and the poles is my running away from her. The poles are staring her in the face, I just need to increase her obstacle focus there!
This is our training session. I would like to see my body language be more consistent. There is some flailing, some moving in too close to the poles, some helping her with her collection...I might need to practice without the dog in order to get my body to do the same thing each time.
Analyzing, for my reference! I love to video my training and break it down, and Molly's weaves are My Great Project .
:01 This is sort of similar to the exercise from the Clean Run article, except I rear cross the poles.
:28 Our first rep of our "new exercise". I do a small shake of my right hand to reconnect with her - but the ball is in that hand. Not helpful! She blows right past the entry. I am flailing, and not helping her with her entry at all (I don't want to help her!)
:41 we repeat. I'm throwing my hand too high and not reconnecting - I think I'm trying to "send" her to the weaves. this time I do not run quite so fast, and I point and cue her and she gets the entry. I give her a second ball throw, "jackpot."
1:12 Again with the arm throwing, this time even more flingy. Need to clean that up. I come in close to the poles and cue them and really shake my hand (with the ball in it, bad!), but too late. She runs past them.
1:24 I send her into the weaves and reward her with the ball. I don't know how I feel about this. On one hand, I wanted to keep her confidence up. On the other hand, I don't know if she should have gotten a reward for my simplifying the exercise. I should have just praised her verbally. Rewarding, but not as good as the ball.
1:43 I really don't like my handling here. I got in to the poles extremely close, shook my hand hard at her - but I was majorly crowding her path! She misses the entry but I can definitely see why! I don't think I was aware of how close my body was to the poles. This is why it is so valuable to video my sessions!
1:54 I still get in close but I cue the poles quite clearly and am not really sprinting past them. I feel that I helped her to collect a little too much, but that is probably okay this early in working on this skill. I also have the ball out of my hands and in my pocket.
2:20 This looks like the rep at :28 except I am closer to the poles. She misses.
2:37 I repeat but I see myself bring up my right arm and I think it helped her to reconnect to me. She gets her entry and we ended there for some cool down and switching the side the jump was on.
So... I need to clean up my handling and be more consistent. I also need to get that ball into my pocket and out of the hand I am using to handle - she's not ready for that intense of a distraction yet! It is something I didn't even think about in the moment. A lot to think about! I am excited for when we will have some time and daylight and weather-cooperating to do another session.
Molly and I are once again at a stand still with our weave pole progress. I am trying my hardest to not micromanage her entries and not throw stress behaviors her way, but still the slow crawling weaves persist. We are having good moments. Moments where she picks up in the last 4-6 poles. She is staying in more consistently than ever before. But she is not the powerhouse that I know she is capable of, not ever. And we have not been practicing much because: I'm a little sad about it and felt like we've hit a wall. Nonsense.
I want to train distance to Molly's weave poles. Because I think, hope, that if we challenge her understanding and performance of weave poles to the maximum...that both of our confidence will grow at trials. Overtrain it. I am hoping so much that this is the missing puzzle piece for Molly. I feel like we have an excellent understanding of independent entries and performing the poles no matter what, but something is still missing.
We went to the park, because we cannot do distance anything in our yard at home beyond foundation work. For Molly's motivator we are going straight for the ball. I have not done much weave work with Molly's ball because she gets so high and over the top, so rude and unfocused, that I never felt like we could get a productive session with it. When we took our weave class on FDSA, the instructor told me that using the ball is probably exactly what we needed to do. So, I started with Weave 101 with the 2x2 and set up 6 poles varying between straight and channel. Zero issues. Drove ahead even when she could have turned out of the weaves to try to get her ball early. I wanted to start on familiar ground for her.
I decided to start our distance work today. When I did this in the past, I used her command "Out, Poles." to send her to the poles, at least 6 of them. It was never a problem and she was willing to do it, and quite well. We need something more. I used just the 2x2 and her ball and she was cranked. She was jumping on me, air snapping, shark eyes, totally insane. I held her collar and she kept trying to spin me around and lunge at the ball. When that wasn't successful for her she started checking her environment in half second intervals, totally frustrated that I wouldn't throw the ball. It wasn't long before she saw the 2x2. When she would look at it I would say "yes" and release her collar. Initially she turned on me and jumped all over me and tried to steal the ball from me. I was being so unfair to require behaviors of her for her ball!* (Molly understands to enter the 2x2 if we are close to it, maybe 5 feet. Challenging her to think and seek it at a small distance was something very new for her.)
But eventually she got the idea. I would say "yes" and release the collar and she was to go out to the 2x2 and then her ball would be thrown. I gave her many bonus throws for returning the ball to me and for being a good girl. We had a really good time out there and I felt like Molly had a lot of success. It was really refreshing and empowering to work on a new challenge.
These were new factors: extremely high arousal (in non professional terms, lunatic asshole raptor mode.) from using the ball as motivator. Molly had to sight the weave "entry" from a distance (we did about...10-15 feet today. I tried more distance on one rep and that was too much for her. No rush, we can increase the distance soon enough.) I specifically used no cues today, I need Molly to see her entrance independently of my cues, help or body language and want to get to it. I need that mental association (weave entry = BALL!) to happen in her brain. The ball helps to scramble her thought process and it is doing it's job. When she is working for food she knows: "We are here to train and I am going to do x-task for that food." She is too focused and not stressed enough, the ball can change that for us.
We were both a muddy mess by the time we were done, and so were the versaweaves. My favorite moment of today, and I ended our training session on it, was that when Molly returned to me with her ball, she chose to veer off her path, enter the 2x2 and do a mini-weave even with the ball in her mouth. Even when she knows that a reward isn't coming. So cute, so Molly. It is okay if I can't train every day, or even every other day with Molly. But I've got to make once a week happen. That's not so bad, that's not so much. And it's better than nothing.
*You may think reading this that I have not done an ounce of impulse control regarding Molly and the ball, but. I have. A lot. She just forgets each time and I have to be very consistent and maintain my criteria no matter what. Come hell or high water, come bloodshed or head buttings.
A friend and I rented the ring of a local training building today to work on Obedience Things.
I wanted to work on:
Stand for Exam
Dumbbell Retrieve (on the flat and over the high jump)
Ring Entrances
My friend thankfully brought some sections of ring gating which we were able to set up. I noticed at Ein's last match that he entered the ring and spent the first few moments of heeling sniffing, so I wanted to work on that picture a little bit. I wasn't able to recreate that stress in Ein, although there were a few moments where he broke focus and I was able to ask him to reset.
Stand for Exam work, very happy there! Ein has certainly come a long way on this exercise. We warmed up with my friend walking past and stopping next to Ein's shoulder, and quickly moved on to the full exam. We did two full SFE exercises and Ein handled it well, though he did look at our "judge". He reoriented to me quickly enough and I think I am happy with that. I don't think I want to ask Ein to completely ignore something that makes him uncomfortable and I will have to play it by ear as we go along. I don't want the glances to become fixations, but only more set ups and training will tell me what course of action needs to be taken. We took a break from SFE but later did a second set up where my friend carried a clipboard and wore my dangling lanyard work ID while she did two separate exams - again solid stays and this time his attention on me only flickered for a second.
We did so much work on proofing his stays and "you stay no matter what", he quickly figures out that "this is just another trick and I'm going to do my job."
Retrieve work was super. There were a few times I threw the DB far and Ein lost track of it and returned to me. (the far throws were accidental.) And in fairness to him, we have not had any opportunity before today to work on throws that far since my garage is our main training area. We did a lot of work on Ein's retrieve and I was completely happy with him! No dropping the DB, no mouthing it. Retrieve over High went super, I even did some off centered throws and he found the jump on his return. I did have my friend stand a few feet from the DB and we tried a rally-style retrieve and he did go to sniff her on quite a few send outs. So, having a person in the ring during his retrieve is something that is going to continue to need a lot of work. But then again, the concept of working independently from me in the ring is still extremely new for Ein.
Videos are so valuable. I'm certain that I don't always so "Okay, Get It!" but I did here! I don't want to be saying "Okay". I took this short video of Ein because he is cute and I wanted to get his retrieve on video, but I got some valuable feedback about myself in the process.
With an early day off of work this week as well as two actual free evenings, I was able to make time for some Ein training sessions. (Plus, Perri's rehab exercises are so much smoother lately - we have a rhythm so things don't take quite as long.)
We only worked on Stand for Exam one time this week - on down time in Ein's weekly rally obedience class. Ein has been doing well on his stand-stays in the lobby of our training building, so I decided to add a human distraction. I had one person walk along side of us, about two feet away. He did not even break his gaze with me. I asked another person to walk in a circle around us and this also did not phase him. That doesn't surprise me, "Stand with Distraction" is a Cynosport Level 3 Bonus sign and Ein has never had a problem with it. I asked her to walk around us again and when she got nearly to Ein's right side, she stopped walking. Ein noticed, her pause created enough spatial pressure to challenge him. He quickly reoriented to me with his ears not quite as perky as they had been. I asked her to walk away and jackpotted Ein. That was enough for one night!
As I expected, when we actually put in the work on the dumbbell, Ein progressed quickly. We had a session or two still stuck on being a frozen corgi statue with his dumbbell hold. Nope, cannot walk and hold that thing at the same time. Out of the question. I ditched the chin rest and started asking for hand touches. Still nothing. I started asking for running to a hand touch with no DB in Ein's mouth, kept it super upbeat and of course successful. I started mixing the hand touches in with his holds and finally got a weight shift forward while holding the DB. Click. And alternate back to the happy fun hand touches without DB. It wasn't long before he was stepping towards the hand touch while still holding the DB. Yay!
The lightbulb went on and we are enjoying stitching together all the little links in the behavior chain. Pick up to hand touch. Pick up walk to hand touch. Tonight I got brave and wanted to see if he would pick up, turn and bring the DB to my hand. (We have worked on the pick up and turn separately) This was no issue! Initially I had the DB about half a foot away from us (sent him from "heel position", I was sitting down.)
Finally I threw it about four feet away and held his collar and then let him fly. He dove at the DB, picked up, turned around and ran to me and pressed it into my hand and wagged his tail. Woohoo!!!!!!! Things are coming together nicely! Now that we got over that "can't walk and chew gum at the same time" bump, progress is huge.
I am an x-ray tech at a hospital. This means that I need to move people's bodies into necessary positions to display whatever anatomy that the doctor needs to see. (Nope! Contrary to popular belief, x-rays are far from obsolete.) A chest x-ray is the most common exam. Standing, sitting, lying down...people need chest x-rays. Something that x-ray techs always secretly giggle about is how patients interpret our verbal positioning instructions. A chest x-ray exam is performed with the patient placing their chest against a "Bucky" (or wall board, as I refer to it for patients.) and taking a deep breath in and holding their breath for the exposure. The Lateral is next, or the "side view" and this is where the fun begins. I have been through it all. "Put your left side against the board." "Turn and face me." I try everything from showing patients what to do with my own body, physically moving them into position. My new favorite thing is to tap on the glass window of the control panel and tell them to face the window with their body. I get less success if I do not physically tap the window. It is absolutely fascinating to me to experiment with communicating with my patients. I am in an endless search for that perfect phrase that will get every able-bodied patient to turn their left side against that Bucky and lift their arms in the air.
Patients put their right side against the board. They plaster their arms against it and turn their heads to face me. They put their backs against it. They are not listening. Physically manipulating patients is the worst method and I learned that early on. Nobody likes to be pushed, pulled and jostled around. It is coarse and useless. I avoid asking for a specific side to be placed against the board because it is embarrassing for people when they have mixed up their lefts and rights. And when they get embarrassed they get flustered and then they listen even less. You can guess where I am going with this.
Dogs. Communicating with dogs. I think part of why I am fascinated with communicating with my patients is that we almost always speak the same language. Yet it can still be so difficult to explain what I want them to do. They are distracted, maybe worried. They are all different and probably stressed out that they are getting an x-ray, a medical test. These are all factors that erode away their ability to take a moment and listen to and comprehend what I am asking. My dogs and I do not speak the same language. They do not speak English. They could be distracted, they could not be in the mood to work with and listen to me. And if it is a challenge to get a human who speaks English to move their body the way that I want, then it is a challenge to get a dog who speaks Dog to do what I want.
I don't get angry at my patients. I don't sigh and groan. I don't think that they are blowing me off. The thought of delivering a painful or startling correction to a patient because they did not understand what I was trying to communicate is far and away removed from acceptable conduct. I will spare the argument "but they are humans and dogs are dogs." in this blog. I respect my dogs as my friends and as intelligent animals. I am a fairly new trainer. We have many miscommunications. We get frustrated with each other that the lines of communication are not always clear. And just as I do with my patients, I learn from failure. I learn every day what works and what does not. I watch reactions, I measure success, I build on what works and leave behind what does not work. What does not work with my patients? Physically manipulating, repeating the same thing again and again, repeating the same thing louder. The same is true with my dogs.
The communication fascinates me, it really does. That one phrase or exam instruction that clicks with the majority of jittery and harried patients, discovered through trial and error and close attention to body language and response. It crosses over with the dogs, it does. I am forced to pull myself out of my own head and instead of resenting a person or a dog for not understanding me, I will ask again and again, "How can I make this work?"
I have been putting some serious focus into getting Perri to have "fun" and "enjoy" her Downs. It was suggested to me by a friend that I should try a different cue word for Perri's down out of a sitting position than I do for Perri's down out of a standing position, and that made a lot of sense to me. Yes the "down" position is a position and perhaps Perri should work her way to that position no matter what her body is doing when the cue is given. But I had to think about Perri and how she wants to be Right Every Time and how confusing it might be to her when I ask her to move her body in two very different ways and expect her to understand what I want, and I had to go ahead and give it a try.
Shaping this took all of...ten seconds. As soon as Perri offered a down out of her sitting position, she was hooked! Attaching the cue has been easy and the struggle now is to get her to only do it when asked! We are making some quick progress on that front as well. Time flew by tonight and I think we were training and playing together for well over twenty minutes and I had this wave of amazement that Perri was willing to work for so long. Isn't this the dog that would get so overwhelmed by thirty seconds of work that she would shut down and start sniffing? Perri's confidence has skyrocketed this year, and I am so proud of her. And every day that goes by, I am discovering a dog with actual drive. I love it.
I brought Perri upstairs out of our regular training area to start generalizing the behavior to some different locations and she did freeze for a minute. She was not initially willing to offer a drop up in my living room next to the sliding glass door (I did not use the cue word). Perri popped up into a stand and pivoted into heel position instead. I was secretly thrilled to see this because this is what we need to work through. I also thought it was adorable that she offered that. I moved back to my original position and waited ... and Perri offered a drop! We had a big party and jackpot! After that Perri seemed a lot more comfortable and was happy to do two more reps, and then I ended our session with the poodle tail wagging. Very short and fun session upstairs with Perri. We will begin there next time, I feel very positive about this!
Since I work a double shift for the holiday tomorrow, I was given today off. My friend and I rented the local agility building for an hour to work on some things with our four different dogs.
I arrived first and crated my dogs and worked Molly on a sequence that involved a jump and then a fast hard run into the weave poles. It would require Molly to collect to enter and stay in the weaves properly. Not an issue! We did another sequence that included the teeter and a few other jumps to build up her speed and focus on things other than just that weave entry, and then we hit it hard again. Molly again nailed it and stayed in the poles. I was very impressed!
When my friend arrived I put Molly in her crate and set jump bars and ran video for her dog Sly. Molly was chattery in her crate. When Molly's next turn at training came around, my friend's two dogs were barking and yelling in their crate off and on. This video below was the very beginning of Molly's ring time after my friend arrived. I was very surprised at the change in Molly. The building was the same. The weave entry was different, yet easier since it was so direct and she was not building up speed. But the barking of the other two dogs and the slight frustration build from being in her crate watching Sly work had jacked her stress levels up and jolted her focus. Of course, it was just what Molly and I needed to work through.
Since I just wrote a post (yet to be published) for Team Unruly about the learning value that I pull from taping and watching my training sessions, I am in a mood to post and analyze here this evening.
:03 that required so much less collection and was truly so direct, yet she was very distracted and did not continue in the poles.
:07 this stresses her out, she tries to disengage and sniff.
:21 I am disappointed in myself for not rewarding her for doing the poles properly
:22 and here I completely turn my back on her and do not support her coming around on my left side. Lame!
:30 mistakes abound! I run all the way over to that jump with Molly instead of sending her there like I should have, and that left me no time to set the line to the tire.
:34 and Molly understandably runs right into me.
:50 after setting her up and starting everything over again, I finally give her a reward. Poor dog, she deserved this!
1:02 Hey look at that, I stay a little further back and send Molly a short distance and get running. I could have sent her further and trusted her commitment and set the next line sooner, though.
1:06 late front cross but at least I did it. I have the most difficult time with this. Would prefer a properly timed cross and less talking!
1:16: another front cross here would have taken that aframe out of Molly's picture...
Molly is such a good girl putting up with my catastrophe of mistakes and lack of reinforcement and continuing to work. This is why I call her my teacher.
:02 I pull away from the jump too soon, and so does Molly! Oops!
:10 lumping! bad! After that backside (still a somewhat shaky behavior for us.) and good weave entry I should have rewarded instead of testing Molly's commitment with that cross.
:32 yay, molly's toy!
1:06 not sure what on earth I was thinking with my arm out there. Way too late for Molly to get to that other jump.
1:08 Pretty much everything else happens off frame, since I had the iPad set up on a table. I loved this weave entry and performance though.
:08 I was thinking, "Great, now all Perri will ever want to do during agility is race around aimlessly." :13 One thing I wanted to work minimally with Perri today was a start line stay. More specifically, maintaining connection with me while in the stay and not losing all focus and energy.
:16 I kept it short, awesome!
:19 and then rewarded her and didn't get carried away, great!
:37 yay Perri! Look at that drive into the weaves.
:43 boo way too late reward
1:02 very good rewarding right away after she re-engaged with me
1:20 not sure why she comes out of the poles here, but it probably has to do with the amount of time I am working her. Perri is actually really high (for her) and distracted by the barking and it is hard for her to remain focused, so this could be a product of burning out.
1:26 more disengagement, I should have ended her ring time there.
1:40 I rewarded and ended her session, good choice!
:07 I love my two front crosses here
:19 she read my outside hand pointing to that tunnel really well instead of running into me, cool!
:23 Oh boy, getting carried away here...
:31 but she does it! And I reward her with some tug and wrestling, great!
:46 this looks a little overwhelming but the way Perri comes blasting out of my arms, I know she was loving it!
:52 Ohhh another late front cross, sigh, but hey I am trying and only get a slight hesitation from Perri.
:56 The last you see of Perri is her little tail wagging as she descends the Aframe. Love it.
I have to admit, it was fun to run the more relaxed poodle that cares about me and agility versus the stressed out zoomie poodle! And it just feels great to go into yet another ring and have 90 percent success with Molly and her weave poles. My confidence in her performance is blooming with every place that we go and work on this!
Almost all of my goals for Perri have fallen away, and have been replaced with the simple goal of helping her to be confident. To learn tricks. To not shut down and be overwhelmed. And it always feels like one step forward, three back. No matter how hard we work, a leaf blowing in the wind might derail her if we have the nerve to venture out of my basement.
We have not worked on her dumbbell retrieve in months. The thing has been collecting dust. I had not given up on it, but knew that it was something that was going to need to wait until later. I have this fantasy picture of "later" with Perri in my mind. Because as much as I joke that Perri is a Martian and A Mess and tricked me with her cuteness into taking another fearful dog in, I truly believe in her. I see an incredible dog in Perri. I see a dog that just needs to break through a wall, and all of the puzzle pieces will fall into place. When this amazing thing may happen, I could not say. So I just say...."Later."
An issue with Perri is that she has a very hard time trying something again if she does something "wrong". Especially something on the more "complex" end of the spectrum, such as bending down to pick up the dumbbell and placing it in my hand. (Do not laugh, we have not progressed further than that.) But tonight? Out of nowhere I just decided to play around with it. Perri remembers everything we worked on. She is to pick the dumbbell up and rest her chin on my open palm while holding the dumbbell. Where Perri begins to get overwhelmed is if she picks the dumbell up and opens her mouth: before reaching my hand, while in my hand but before I click, or picking up and dropping as soon as possible. For quite some time it was almost as though the thing tasted like poison to her. We generalized picking objects up but that seemed to only help a little. The real issue was Perri being overwhelmed by the entire experience.
Tonight I lost time. We must have worked for 15 solid minutes on it! I backchained what I wanted to start with, since it has been a while and then she was doing so well that I was able to toss the dumbbell. Perri had some mixed success. Still some trouble at times with picking it up and then walking it several feet away from the pick up and putting it back down. (And then looking at me hopefully wondering why I did not click it. HA!) But the coolest thing was that Perri was completely enjoying herself, completely willing to just pick the dumbbell up and try again. At one point I tossed the DB and it banged against my washer, making a loud metallic noise. Perri stopped and stared for a beat and then walked over and picked the thing up, then walked it back to me and set it in my palm. I was floored!
My dog's tail was wagging. My dog kept trying even when she was "wrong." My dog enjoyed something that used to overwhelm her. And furthermore, my dog is doing agility trials - and having fun! My dog is heeling ...forwards and backwards. My dog is really trying hard. I do believe...my dog has gained a whole lot of confidence. And more to come.
In other unrelated news...
Ein is doing amazingly well and is completely back to normal. As much as I keep taking his chew bones from him, he just keeps finding more! His mouth does not seem to bother him, not even a little bit.
I just discovered that the judge tells you "Tally Ho!" when it is time to release your dog at an AKC Coursing Ability Test. It is hard for me to express just how much I love this.
One thing that really frustrates me about myself is that I let my criteria slide. Often. For almost every behavior that I would like my dogs to do. This has to change. While I certainly do not mean for it to be so, it has to be completely confusing for my dogs. It is bad enough that I let my criteria slide at a trial, but I do it in training as well. Especially agility. Especially Molly's contact behaviors.
And the major problem with Molly's contact behaviors is that even I had never made a solid decision on what I wanted her to do. "Hit the yellow" is not a good enough guideline. It is not that simple. I am firmly settling on wanting a 2 on / 2 off behavior. All dogs, but I feel like Molly especially, need to know very clearly what is desired of them. To me, a 2o/2o behavior is a very specific behavior, and specific is good for Molly. This is a thing that I feel like we can accomplish with the equipment and space that I have available. A thing that I feel like we can translate to actual contact equipment, without actually having those things in our own backyard to practice on. (Vince is understandably reluctant to have an Aframe for our yard, even though he said he would build one!)
We are having fun practicing 2o/2o all over the house and outside the house on different sets of stairs, with me on the right or left side. Molly is doing quite a bit of coming down the stairs, nose touching the target and then bouncing her rear legs off. No cookie. I am almost glad to see this, because it makes me feel like, "Ah! Something to work through!" I'm not sure if it makes any sense why that seems like a positive in my mind, but it does. Almost like, "If we can work together to stop that bouncing, it will help Molly perform a better contact behavior."
(And thankfully Molly is happy to work for her kibble meals, being that she is on a diet and all!)
Another area that I do not hold my criteria that is completely embarrassing to me is Molly's release with toys. I allow Molly to give at least three or four additional tugs or shakes until she gives a jaw shuddering and reluctant release for her toy. It is kind of embarrassing in agility class because I know that I should have a higher standard. That is another thing that I am becoming more firm about. We can pair it with the 2x2 training since I reward Molly with a toy for that. I pull her toy to my leg and say "Give." It takes absolutely all of my strength to prevent her from self rewarding and continuing to tug. Molly is an extremely strong dog. As soon as she lets go I whip the toy away from her and let her get it again as a reward. I have always done that, but from now on I absolutely cannot permit her to continue to tug if I want an instant toy release.
I wish I had been a more sensible and competent trainer back when I started agility training. I wish that I had a better understanding of almost everything and had insisted on a better and consistent foundation for Molly. But I did not and none of that is her fault. I can only own up to my own faults and try to rework what I can and see where it gets us. I miss agility trials so much with my girl, but not a second goes by that I am not grateful that we are taking this time off.
Perri and I started a new session of Rally Intermediate class last night, with one change: Molly will be joining us this time around! I have committed to the idea that I would like to earn Molly's ARCH, and I think that I have mentioned that before on this blog, but I want to do it with a well trained and confident dog rather than just by squeaking by. And that means stepping up Molly's training from "working rally behaviors ringside at agility trials" to actual commitment to at-home training of obedience behaviors, as well as getting Molly into different environments where we can work on proofing and confidence.
Rally class is great for this. I don't have to set my own course up, and Molly gets to walk amongst signs and cones on a training center floor - these are all good things and things that we don't have access to. Also, our knowledgeable instructor is watching me and pointing out where I need improvement!
I have to start by saying that between being exhausted from work and juggling two dogs, I was a total mess last night. I had cut hot dogs as treats, I kept dropping them. I kept lurching off into heeling and mumbling "heel" to my dog after I had already stepped off. I wasn't communicating clearly with either dog. I wasn't comfortable with handling the treats and delivering them while juggling the clicker. I was reaching for treats before clicking or before a behavior was completed and that was pulling my dog (especially Molly!) out of position. My self dictated homework is to do a few training sessions without my dogs where I walk around on a pretend rally course with my training pouch. I need to focus on crisp cues, properly timed treat delivery ... and never ever again will I have cut up slippery hot dogs for a rally class!
The dogs, as ever, were not a problem. I expected a whole lot of lagging out of Molly, and I did get some, but I also got a bit of actual heeling out of her. My focus with Molly has lately been on that crucial moment where we step off into heeling - she usually just sits there. (even when I do manage to cue her properly.) We have been working a lot on making coming with me rewarding and it showed and I am so proud of her. Another area I was proud of were Molly's recall to fronts - where I used to have to call Molly with a verbal command as well as point to front, and even then she might lay down - last night I was able to keep my hands at my side and recall her with a verbal cue only and get a nice square sit! The last recall of the night she did decide that recall meant to recall to a crooked front with a nose touch to my right hand - give me my reward! That needs work, but it was awfully cute and Molly-like. Other kudos to my girl are that she was only mildly chattery at the beginning of class and was very focused on me when we were working. I wasn't sure if Molly's first rally class would be spent actually playing rally, or just focusing on calm behavior without ever even entering the ring. Not bad for my girl's first ever rally class!
As for Perri I was very happy with her too. We have been working hard on her heeling and it showed last night, majorly. I think this is the first time ever in a rally class where Perri did not lag tremendously and ignore me to sniff on the ground - wow. And I was not watching closely, but it certainly felt like we had many moments of that happy, focused heads up feet flying heeling that I so desire. I was trying not to stare at Perri and I was trying to walk at a normal clip (in comparison to my normal robotic, shoulder turning limp....because what dog on earth could figure that out?) Fast Pace still leaves room for improvement, of course. Perri showed a whole lot of improvement on her "downs". She doesn't drop down quickly, no and I still have to point to the floor - but we are moving away from me actually having to crouch down with her.
So, some good and bad on both girls - lots to work on (hello Left Pivots!), but they definitely out performed me last night and that is for sure!
Maybe there are agility dogs who took to tunnels like a fish in water. None of my dogs were that type of dog. Nope, not even Molly.
It went without saying that Ein would be afraid of tunnels. I mean, he used to be afraid of cups, so a long dark tunnel? Well, that's asking a lot. On the list of Agility Things Ein Hated, tunnels weren't on the top. The teeter was at the top, followed by the weave poles, then probably the chute. But he was no "tunnel sucker", that's for sure. We quit agility school last autumn and since then he surprised me on that one beautiful day on the agility field at Glen Highland Farm by being fearless on the agility equipment, tunnels included. He has done two trials since then without tunnels being an issue.
Fearless Molly used to refuse tunnels! She would take them no problem, and then a week later she would outright refuse them. The fix was as simple as buying our cheapie at home agility tunnel for forty bucks. A handful of sessions in that thing and she is most definitely a Tunnel Sucker and never looked back. Molly's confidence isn't terribly difficult to build up.
And then we have Perri. Quite contrary.
On Perri's list of Most Horrifying Agility Obstacles, tunnels and chutes are probably at the top. Every week in class when we were waiting our turn for a sequence, we would practice on a tunnel somewhere else on the course. Different colors, different shapes (straight versus curved.) Some weeks she was okay with the tunnels, others she would refuse and need more encouragement.
We practice at home with our cheapie tunnel. Same thing. Sometimes good, sometimes refusals. I may or may not have been seen crawling inside of the tunnel and inviting Perri into it for a nice snuggle and Everything-Is-Safe-In-Here pep talk. As if the neighbors weren't fascinated enough by my training sessions.
And we are still working on it. About a month ago Perri had an assessment with an agility instructor who teaches at the club where Molly takes agility lessons. Perri was nervous about playing agility in a new place but quickly warmed up to most everything, even the teeter. Everything except a dark blue tunnel in the corner of the room. I could beg and plead all that I wanted. Perri would not go in that tunnel and the stubborn pudelhund has spoken! And I felt crushed, but determined to improve.
It's not just tunnels of course. When Perri's confidence drops she runs out jumps, paralyzes on the teeter, creeps on the dog walk, clatters the broad jump. It's life with Perri right now. Hey, at least she likes the Aframe. But tunnels are the one thing that I can count on her to balk at.
While I have been working the tunnel outdoors with Perri a lot, I finally did something tonight that I said that I would do after Perri refused that dark blue tunnel on her assessment. (and dogs do discriminate on tunnel colors!)
I brought the tunnel into my dark basement, covered the entrance with a blanket, and had a fun session. All three dogs were involved! You do the tunnel, you get a piece of cheese. Molly was a whirlwind, Ein was Mr. Serious and Perri made many many confident passes through the tunnel! I will not be fooled into thinking that she is over her tunnel fears. She's probably not even close. But I was proud of her for going into a dark tunnel in a dark room, over and over. One day at a time. Building tunnel confidence.
After a two week break, Perri and I were back in our Open Fundamentals class tonight. Tonight was one of those nights where I felt a mixture of Left Behind and Just Right.
Left Behind in that every dog fetches a dumbbell but Perri... doesn't. When we were doing the drop on recall I chose to just do a plain recall to build confidence instead. Oh well. There is no time limit.
But the spot where I felt Just Right was a wake up call for me. Now, I often wonder when my head will get screwed on right. Tonight we divided the room in to spaces with ring gating. There was a working dog performing the recalls and drop on recall exercises. And there was the rest of us, practicing sit and down stays. We started leaving our dog so that they were facing the working dog and us handlers had our backs to that dog. We moved on to leaving our dogs and dogs and facing away from the dog. Perri is good at this stuff. We've got this stuff.
Insensitive handler. Clueless. When we moved our dogs so that their backs were facing the working dog, Perri broke her sit stay. To be honest I was a little stung and shocked. Perri broke her stay! Why?! I reacted instantly as I had been trained to react in Ogre Obedience Class, "No!" and put Perri back in her sit.
But, in this training center, we think about the Why's of things. And we move forward accordingly. We do not just tell our dogs "You will do this or ELSE." And I love that. Remember when Perri flunked out in NoviceA because of that horrifying line of Open dogs? Remember when she google-eyed that terrifying newfoundland in CDSP obedience? Remember when she struggled through agility class because there were three hulking german shepherds in that class and it was all Too Much? Now do I have a clue? Perri is habitually unsettled by other dogs, and leaving her in a stay with a dog running behind her back...well, that was just Too Much. My classmate immediately (and kindly.) said, "Don't scold her, this is hard for her with that dog behind her. Stay closer". So I did. She would look over her shoulder at the working dog and the second she would refocus on me I showered her with treats and "Good Stay". Our teacher praised me for staying closer and supporting Perri (I flat out admitted that it wasn't my idea. I was way too clueless to think of that.)
When I left her in a down stay she actually barked, putting a voice to her concerns. That's a new one.
So tonight in class it was Just Right. Perri was working through something that really freaked her out, building confidence. Building trust. "I will reward you and support you if you do this for me. That dog will not come to you, it will not touch you. Just stay and good things will happen for you."
That right there. For Perri, that is what we need more than the dumbbell or the drop or agility tunnels or teeter performance. Unlocking that confidence block will unlock Perri.
When it was our turn to do the recall, I did two straight fun recalls (my teacher suggested this after I told her I didn't think that Perri would do the DOR.) . Perri's DOR is shaky at best, and if I was asking her to do a job next to a scary line of dogs, I wanted that job to be something that she is fairly solid on. And she stayed, recalled and fronted beautifully and fast. Good poodle.
Autumn is my favorite, favorite time of year. Molly and I had over an hour of time to kill before agility class tonight, so we went for a walk on the newish trail near the training center. (and, found a geocache!)
Her behavior was absolutely terrible. Leash pulling and reactive, my favorite! I have Molly to the point where she will focus on me if I ask her to, or will stop leash pulling when I stop walking, but her manners leave much to be desired. Ah well. She's a work in progress.
We still had a very nice walk together!
Big Leaf.
Agility class was fun. I think that I am starting to relax a little bit and trust Molly (in classes at least.) We did some long lead outs and she held her start line stay really well. She handled some tricky-ish jump sequences really well. She did not blow contacts. I totally forgot to do a cross when I was supposed to and messed us up. She forgave me.
And really cool moment, Molly did a 12-weave sequence fast and without popping out. CUE THE PROUD. I paced with her and kept an eye on her out of the corner in my eye. Tried to stay a little ahead of her but not race away and she stuck in. That didn't work the second time but oh well. Once again, we are learning to dance with one another. Molly has a hard pace to learn.
We had a good time! And we are back to trialing this weekend and I am very excited about that!
At home Perri and I worked on her weave poles and retrieve shaping. I let Ein hang out with us while we did so and it seemed to bolster her confidence. Perri did very nice weave poles tonight, but she still seems to think the dumbbell might electrocute her if she bites it. We will get there. My good friend told me that animals learn at their own pace and are oblivious to my goals. True. Perri can only work at her own speed and I may as well learn to have fun along the way. Confidence building is our friend.
We also played around with some single jump exercises since Perri was a bit nervous about jumps again in last week's class and she did well with that also. Poodle was in a good mood tonight, and so was I!
And Ein got rewarded for being a buddy to Perri, I have started playing 101 Things to do with a Box with him because he just loves to work. He thinks its great! I'm having a tough time finding a large enough box that he can step into with those stubby legs but we are just playing around and having fun. Oh how his tail nubby wags! I love this guy. I am as ever amazed at how his confidence has grown during the last year.
I had big plans of an epic 12-miler on the Appalachian Trail today. Beautiful weather! I wanted to finish the PA AT in 2013 and I am woefully behind!
And then I just didn't. I had lots to do at home and was entirely too cozy sipping coffee in my pajamas while browsing the internet in the morning to be coerced onto the trail. Ah well!
When you start your day waking up to this...
You don't stand a chance!
I spent much of the morning cleaning my house in preparation for the coming week and doing other responsible things. Perri and I also played with her dumbbell and all related Retrieve Class homework.
In the afternoon my husband suggested we get the dogs out for a hike, so we drove out to St. Peter's Village (one of our favorite places to hike.) The village small and full of tiny shops and eateries and is just generally adorable. There was a band playing out on the deck of one of the restaurants and they could be heard through the hiking trails until we walked really far out.
The place is full of really fun and well done graffiti. At one area there was a flat rock with a checkerboard and painted rocks placed onto it as the pieces. Very fun. There is something new everytime that I go there - I had never seen this dinosaur rock before!
Obligatory "three dogs posed on a rock" photo!
With that done I collected a toasted marshmallow mocha for a treat and we headed back home. I decided to put in some work on Perri's weave poles before heading ot the grocery store. I opened a narrow channel for Perri and she was pretty good. When I closed the channel slightly, she struggled but worked through it. We ended on a good note.
I did not ask her to pose for this photo, she does it all on her own.
I rounded off the day by baking the dogs some Honey Cranberry Oat Cookies and they LOVED them. I wrote a baking photoblog for Team Unruly and it will be posted this Friday, so STAY TUNED.
This weekend has been frustratingly busy with work-call, house chores, poodle grooming and family gatherings. It left little to no time for dog training. After spending a beautiful, not-a-drop-of-rain day eating hamburgers and chatting with family, we arrived home with two hours of daylight left and a thunderstorm rolling in. I had had high hopes of getting Perri and Ein to the park to work. When we pulled into the driveway, a thunder rumble crushed all hope of a training outing.
We had to wait the storm out, and that meant having to work in the yard with what light we had left in the evening.
Ein's biggest struggle Rally-Wise is the Directed Jump in Level 3. Since March we have struggled with it in every way possible, and last weekend we had a big breakthrough. Our troubles are history! Tonight? I tried to work him in my yard. He hates my yard (everyone PEES there. How's a dog supposed to work?!) He was spotty with his jump taking, directed or not. He was spotty with his distance Stand-Down-Sit. I'm learning: Don't push it. If he doesn't want to work, don't overwhelm him and frustrate yourself.
Next, Perri. We worked on Stand-Stay proofing. That went well. I ran around like a lunatic, threw her ball and squeaked it. Gave her frequent rewards for staying, which she did. I provoked one moved paw with a ball throw but that was all. She is improving.
We worked heeling. It was great on the Figure 8, but for some reason Perri didn't want to go in certain areas of the yard tonight. She did not want to go by the garden. I cannot imagine why, nothing has happened there. Then we worked on recalls. Perri stubbornly sat and stared at me instead of recalling. I double commanded her one time and that worked, but I don't want that to become a habit. I don't know why she was behaving this way tonight, she has been very consistent with her recalls.
And though I wanted to slam into the issue and "fix it", I put our toys away and went inside. Not pushing it.
Perhaps the storm bothered the dogs. Perhaps they could feel my less than cheery mood. Perhaps they simply did not feel like working. But in the end the answer is always: quit on a good note, come back to it later. Training with my canine friends should be a fun bonding experience, not a chore to be rushed in at the last moment, right?
It seems like forever ago that I decided to abandon lure-based heelwork training in favor of Silvia Trkman's clicker and perch-work based method for Perri. I have not been the most diligent when it comes to Practicing Everyday, I will admit that.
But over the last two weeks, and especially over the last week I have been trying so hard to work with Perri at least once if not twice every day. But Perri does not always want to work with me.
After Ein's anxiety and Molly's wildness, Perri seemed like a dream to me. But I am getting to know this curly dog, and it's not always easy. Ein? Pretty consistently will work work work for Bil Jacs and my approval. Molly? Will work for absolutely anything and until the end of time. She is not afraid to be wrong.
Perri is absolutely not a confident dog. I think that "this too shall pass", but in the meantime it is my job to build that confidence. Perri definitely seems to enjoy perch training, but only sometimes. And if I raise the criteria? Oof. That is very overwhelming for Perri.
This all comes to mind because Perri has been doing great with her perch work, and I finally got her to rotate around the perch in both directions. I decided that it was time to add a new challenge...Finding My Leg. Perri would have to rotate counter clockwise until she comes to my left leg (in the beloved Heel Position that I am dying for her to love.) and that gets her a click. We stepped up (literally) to this new challenge two days ago. Perri was so overwhelmed by my standing next to her perch instead of a foot away from it that all she would do was sniff the surrounding area obsessively on our first session.
I am getting better at just putting my toys away and trying again later when it comes to Perri. Molly may be maddening in a dozen ways, but if there are edibles to be earned, that girl is THERE. And I have been spoiled by that. My dogs challenge me in new ways all the time, and I never imagined that Perri would add a third dimension to that so thoroughly. But there it is. As much as I've always called Molly a frustrating pain in the ass button pusher, she completely caters to my "drive it into the ground" personality when it comes to working towards goals. Perri? Slow and steady wins the race with this girl. I have recently seen at least three different dogs belonging to friends of mine whiz past where Perri is progress-wise on their perch work, and that has been hard for me. We have to take everything super slow because Perri just isn't willing to offer and offer behaviors because she Might Be Wrong. Some days, some sessions, I may only get one or two clicks into Perri before we have to quit for the day. End on a good note. Short but sweet. That's tough for me. (A new game that we are going to pursue is "101 Things to Do With A Box" so that Perri can grow more confidence-wise when it comes to shaping.)
The other thing I am learning about Perri is that her motivation is all over the place. She definitely enjoys toy and play rewards more than food rewards. Off the subject of perch work, I reward her purely with her squeaky tennis ball or tug toy in agility - and she has improved a whole lot since that.
Just in the last week Perri has alternated between wanting to work for: her squeaky tennis ball (number ONE reward, usually.), her destuffed crab toy, grilled chicken, pomegranate sorbet, running around the yard with me, meatballs or hot dogs. It's a lot of work, sheesh! If I don't find the correct motivational object, or choose the wrong time of day temperature-wise, Perri is simply not into it. That piece of mulch needs sniffing, thank you very much.
It's a learning journey. But just tonight Perri was wild working on her perch, finding my leg and smiling at me for just the joy of chasing her squeaky tennis ball. Tomorrow it may not be that simple. But tonight I ended our work with her wanting more and both of us having fun, and those aren't bad goals to work towards.
We have an Obedience Fun Match this Sunday and I am looking forwards to it. We have been working hard on Recalls and hand-signal-only Right Finish and I am eager to see how she will handle those exercises during the "stress" of a match.
"I'll get there when I get there. And I will be awesome when I do."
