A-frame work has a breaktrough

I have been working on a running A-frame for Pixie. She has learned A-frame by clicker training and 2on2off technique. I started this project last autumn. Our first goal was to brake A-frame stops. This was easy on blank and piece of dogwalk and running dogwalk was ready in no time. On A-frame she just didn't know what to do: jump or come slowly to 2on2off.

I tried different helps to brake the running in A-frame. My first try was with the "box". It is square shaped frame made of pipes. Soon she run with it nicely. But when I took it away, everything just fell apart. Pixie came really uncertain what to do. After that I tried speed bumps. It stopped her from slowing down and getting more better at running over the A-frame but again she didn't get the idea after I took the bumps off.

So we were at the beginning. I finally what's the Running Contact video of Silvia Trkman. It showed so easy and Pixie had done nice job with the dogwalk. I founded two key factors that I had been missing: Jackpot and hitting contact with hind legs. So we started to use double reward. Pixie would get tennis ball from running over the A-frame and would get Jackpot reward if she did it without jumping the contact zone and gradually she got the jackpot only when she hit the contact zone with her hind legs and low enough. Soon we both the idea!!!!!

Now we are working on turns to right and left and changing tennis ball reward to another obstacle. This journey has really hard but I have learned so much. I actually learned more from this because I didn't watch Silvias DVD. Although it took us way way longer to reach the goal!!

Marianne, Pixie and Louise

Nose touch and making passing more calm

I have read now tons of articles about clicker training. The story of Emma Parson (author of Click to Calm) and Ben really stood out. She told about her aggressive dog Ben that lunged and showed aggression to other dogs. Emma's methods of curing Ben where just exciting. It was very interesting to read how clicker training worked to calm the dog even though it didn't even eat the treats in the beginning. Clicker has just a strong influence to the brain and how it handles to feedback. (Story of Ben and Emma).

We have few very lunging and aggressive dogs on our walking routes. Pixie gets really hyper and her mind goes anxiety state of mind from uncertainty. Louise react by protecting by barking and this behavior got stronger after Pixie got attack by another dog. So started to use clicker and nose touch to keep my own dogs calm. First time we passed a one of the aggressive dogs just said "touch" to Pixie and she started to poke her nose to palm. Pixie was calm and worked nicely with me. Louise was calm because Pixie has always been the provoker with her anxiety. Just making Pixie comfortable to the situation of passing aggressive dog made to whole team work better.

Now we have done this for several times and it's getting better and better. I hope this help us all the situations that might escalate to anxiety from Pixie and protective actions from Louise. These exercises on the walks have made both dogs much calmer and they have make me calmer too. It has been win-win situation to all of us and our team has become even better than it was before. 

I have to go back to reading... Can't wait to learn more!!! We have also made some changes in agility and Ob training.. But more later on!!

Yours Marianne, Louise and Pixie

Click for silence

My Spanish Water dog barks a lot when we do agility and I mean between the exercises. So I tried to make her silent between the cues and make her listen better. I just started marking every time she was quiet and I didn't give her any cues if she barked. It just worked like wonder! Louise became more focused and listened even better my cues which didn't drowned under her barking. We were both much happier and relaxed.

Next barking problem, that we will attack, is barking while I'm training Pixie. For that I probably will need some assistant to click the right periods. I have just learned so much more after my readings about clicker training. I have just been absolutely blown away by all the scientific work done behind it. Especially about the things that happens in brain. Clicker is to powerful and I hope to try it soon training humans in agility.

TAGteaching is very interesting area of training and have made some plans to try it in agility training. I spend last night planing first some tag points that I should work more on tracks and other tag point ideas evolved from there. Hopefully I will get change to try my new learned skills in reality.

I can't wait to get this all together!!! So just brief note what I have done in these few days.

So excited!!!

Marianne, Louise and Pixie