I have been working with both girls to get them ready for OB3 which is the highest class in FCI obedience. Both girls have worked on the send to straight which has been a bit of challenge task. Basic are pretty simple but there are just to many distractions to train for example the markings of the stopping circle. I have used a target and toy to get the send straight and with high speed. Freya has has a problem with toy that she starts to make a herding circle so needed to using to toy so much and have very black and white criteria that she needs to run straight. Pixie has learned to keep her head straight forward pretty nicely when I send her to target mat. Next face is to teach her turn stop 180 degrees. We will see how this projects goes.
Other new task has been the going around an object followed by a retrieve over a jump. Freya has already started to do the whole chain. Pixie has still some trouble of giving up the jumps. Both girls have pretty nice positions after going around. Freya has still some work with sit but otherwise work has been super. I have split the task in 3 different chains and tasks. I train the position takes in different situations like going around a tree or after doing an agility tunnel. I train separately the going around part to built it as tight as possible and last have direction retrieve with jump as last part of the chain. This task has been one coolest to train and has lots little things you can make better and better. Just love it!
Agility
Agility has been a little down mode right now. I have had trouble of remembering courses and really have a good concentration. I have had take a little brake to find out how to set goals that don't make too much pressure to competitions. I have had a lock down in my head and I have tried to open it. Sometimes goal setting can make it difficult to find even a little positive things in your work. I hope we get this solved and start having fun again in competition and I would start remember the courses again.
In training we have done mostly running contact which have improved a lot. I have also noticed that Freya would need "a judge" running in training too. She sometimes gets little distracted when judges run next to her. She is sensitive dog and would need more variable training. My fault is that train a lot alone with my dogs so Freya won't get enough distraction training as she would need. Our next goal is to train more course work. I have been very lazy to train course work and we have done just skill improving. So we have to change a little bit how we train to make our work in competition more successful.
I have done dog training for about 14 years. I have trained in many different ways and found my way
to clicker training. During my journey I have learned that training techniques can help you to succeed in your goals but there are few fundamental skills that every dog team should learn before starting any sport training. Basic training is sometimes boring but gives you a rock solid base to built on. Basic skills I see important to learn in first year is socialization, calming down, impulse control, motivation and rewarding. All this basic work leads to a good solid relationship and gives basic tools to do anything the team wants.
Socialization
First thing the puppy must learn is to be with its new family. This time should be peaceful time and time to relax from the stress that comes from separating from the mother and the siblings. Little by little the puppy can explore the outside and see new things but safely. It is important to observe the puppies character and see how much new things it can handle. This is time to teach the puppy recalls and walking on leash. Puppy should also meet safe adult dogs and other puppies of same age and size. Also taking the puppy to new environment is important so it learns different surfaces, smells, sound, traffic, meeting different dressed (man wearing a hat, big coat etc.) and moving people (wheelchair, babies, old) etc. All this need to be done in the puppies terms. Shyer puppy might handle few short visits to new places per weeks and more bold puppy can visit new places more often. You just need to watch your puppies reactions and how recovers from the stress.
Calming down
Calming down is skill that can be the hardest teach at first but pays off in a long run. It means that you teach your dog a routine that leads to calm lying down. First you train this at home. First time might take 15-30 min if you have already a older puppy. Make sure you have something calm to do like watching a TV show. You can use a mat as spot to lying down so that you can take it with anywhere and it can be save spot for the dog in the future. You can have collar or harness to help the keep the dog close to you and then you start making long strokes from head to the end of hind leg. Remember you need calm down too. In this exercise you don't need treat the dog. Dog just need to learn calm down. At first time exercise end when the dogs has calmed down in lying down position. Dog will start calming down faster and faster as practice this routine. Then you can go and try this same routine in new more busier place. This can lead to longer calming down time but more work on it more faster it gets and the dogs learn to take it relax stage in anywhere. In longer run this helps reduce stress in new places and competition trips.
Motivation and rewards
Motivation can be from internal like hunger, thirst and reproductive needs or it could from outside smell, social interaction, car ( takes to forest run), ball (change for game). Every behavior have some kind of motivational drive. Every time you train and your dog does something out of the ordinary you should think what motivated to do it. Finding our the motivation to each behavior can be the key to solve it or route to find away to train for your liking. Behavior has always reason why it happens. Dogs don't have ability to be nasty or try to trick us. We just have see what motivates them to do it differently or have we have our training lead to the seen outcome.
In training we need different things to make the dog work for us. Usually we use rewards like toys, treat, social reward or environmental rewards ( like permission to play with other dogs). The most important thing is that THE DOG get choose what is rewarding and what is not. Playing can mean a lot things to different dogs. One might want to chase something or chew the toy or just do the tugging. In the end its the dog choice and as handler it is our job to find out which things our dogs like. Some dogs like treat but you give them in many ways to make it more interesting: like chasing treat hand, tossed treat, treat ball etc. You can also built up value to toys or treats with using the preferable reward to enhance to the other. Treating games can be built but always watch how you dog reacts and does it really feel that reward is rewarding. Some dog might like tugging but other might feel most rewarded when they can run around with toy in their mouth.
It is important to find things that your dog thinks is valuable. This gives you motivation tool to teach the dog to things you like. Different situations might need different rewards. At home your dog might work for a kibble and in the busy dog training arena you might need treat likes chicken heart to get as good as motivation to work with you. More games you teach more tools you have in the future. I try to teach my dog to play with anything from piece of grass to fallen leaf in the autumn. I want the any surroundings to be a change to play with me.
Impulse Control
Impulse control is one the most important skills when it comes to dogs sports. The dog need to learn to give up from distractions and give the attention to the handler. Basic exercise is given up the treat. This is one the first trick I teach puppies when they been at the house for awhile. First you have treat in your hand and when the dog tries to get it you close hand as soon as the dog moves away from the treat hand you treat the dog with your other hand. This trick advances to a stage where the dog takes an eye contact to get the treat. Later on you can play with the open treat hand near the dog and it needs keep the eye contact to you. This is same thing you can do with food bowl. Dog need to sit and give eye contact before it gets cue to get the food. This kind of work helps the dog to built up self control.
Next game can be done with a toy. If dog tugs well, you can do impulse control game. You start with playing with the dog and then you stop playing and freeze your hands. At this point you wait that dogs lets go of the toy and takes default position. Then you move the toy a bit and if the dog hold its ground you give it release cue to start tugging again. First time you do can release the dog to play as soon as it gives up toy and then increase the distraction. Before you do this it good have done tugging games so that you dogs feel confident and has good drive to play with you. Remember to let the dog win the toy a lot to built up a strong playing mode with you. Some manuals say not let the dog win but that isn't right. Winning helps the dog built confidence and playing drive, also it gives the dog reason keep playing with you because it can win and feel awesome. Impulse control games are just part the game and gives playing some rules.
Here is video of Freya doing some impulse control play:
Freya has
been working on the tasks in OB4. It has been so much fun. First we started to
work on the box task. Freya needed to learn to run straight to emptiness. I
started to work on it with a foot target which I moved to different locations
and distances. My goal was to make learn to focus her work straight forward and
also to go as long I stopped her with cue or she reached the target mat. I also
teach her to go straight to nose touch to wall. This training was to help her
handle the situation where she need to run against a wall in small competition.
So far my plan has worked out really well and she super focus when we do the
forward sends. Time will tell what challenges are ahead. First will the markings
on the ground. This will be our first distraction challenge.
I have done
the running part separate from sending forward. I have put Freya straight in
front of me and starting send to left and right to the box. Freya has finally
got the idea of running in the middle of the box. She has been super. Her speed
and accuracy has improved million times. It has so fun the work with her. Next
is to back chain the two part together. She has learn this little change to the
task really fast.
Going around
with sit/down/stand and retrieve with jump
This task
has been my favorite ever! So many little things to train. I have mostly
trained the positions in the wood by going around the trees then I get easily
few repeats with nice brakes. Having brakes between positions stops usually
gives more quality to the work. Freya can to max of three super good stops. So if
I want to keep them super I need train them as less as possible in one session.
Other part
has been the retrieve with the jump. First we have worked on retrieve part.
Freya needed to learn to lift the dumbbell from down to up. She usually has
pushed to dumbbell little on to the ground first and then picked it up. This
created a problem that the jump came to fast to her and it didn’t look good
enough. We started to work this problem by putting the dumbbell to little stool
which she had to picked from to retrieve. It took only few tries and Freya
started to change way she took the dumbbell to her mouth. I took this helped
retrieve behind a jump from where we started work on rest on chain. Freya
improved work superbly. I think we going to a right direction with this. Next
step is to try all these chains together so little backchaining work ahead.
Distance
control
We have
been working her technique a lot to make even better. I have done some body balance
training and also work with the back legs. I have tried to improve the control
in her body. It has started to pay off and she has done super work. I have done
technique from close up from 5 m and then 1st changes from 20 m or
more. So I’m trying to work the distance and control in separately. So far so
good. I have also used a mat to get her better sense to keep her hind legs
still. There are so many little things you can improve at the same time to work
your way to the end goal. Years I have make me better at braking skills apart
to make awesome together. We have still long way WC level work but it fun to
try improve even the little things in our distance control.
Recall with
stand and down
Recall has
also a lot of element that need to be trained separately. Stops can be work on
walks and also high speed recalls. Then we have try to make stops more interesting
with recall game with two people where the dogs runs back and forward between
two persons. Then you can make stop and give backround reward behind the dog.
This little game has helped to make the stops even better. We usually do about
4-6 runs or less. This game is also a very demanding physically so better keep
the repeats low to get high quality performances. More is less!
That's all for now!! I hope to get some awesome pics of Freya doing OB work because she is just a perfect ob princess <3
New has begun and new winds are blowing. I want to take look at the last part of the year 2016. Both girls had some brake from agility and we focused our work to other sport like obedience, rally and nosework. Our goal was to really get into the training and enjoy other sports than agility. This has been a very successful brake and we got lot of progress in all of the task we did.
First of course was a reaching of big goal in obedience which was to get a 1st prize result from the winner class (OB2 FCI). We finally did it with Freya on our Indenpence day 6th of December. Freya did wonderful job at trial even though we got a zero from stay. There was another dog that yelled before the task started and in the end came out of the ring. This was just too much for Freya and she stood up and went back down. So something we need to work on. Otherwise she did her work pretty well. Here is some video of her work in that trial:
Kong Prize and testing some new Acana kibbles
I had some luck in the Clicker Expo and won the raffle at the Kong stand. My girls won 12 toys form the Kong company. This was an excellent prize. My girls just loved the prize. They have with us in training ever since. One thing I also got was a Wobbler which is a plastic toys that you can put kibble and dog has to push to get it out of it. The Wobbler was big hit Pixie and loves playing with it. Here is some video how it work. This was also first time she tried Acana new Kibble Cobb-Chicken Greens.
Wintery Scenary Dec. 2016
Our Acana Kibble Cobb-Chicken tasting went well with Pixie but my younger dog Freya didn't really fancy it. Cobb- Chiken is grain free kibble that is one the new tastes in the series. Freyas favorite was the new Acana Classic Prairie Poultry. This food contained some oats but this seems to be ok grain for both of my girls and gives them carbohydrates to high speed performances like agility. Classic version has also freeze dried liver which might have been the winner taste for Freya. I liked it also that you could get bigger bags like 17 kg which is nice when you more than one dog at the house. We have tried bigger bags of both foods to my dogs but their favorite has been the Prairie Poultry. We will see what we should try next.
So new year has begun and lots new plans have been done. I will tell more about it later on. Next post will be update from my coach course with SAGI and from our Nosework Scent test tomorrow!!
We have been to two trials in Winner Class. First one was one paw away from first price and second went more off. I first had in mind of just trying to compete but I got to my senses. I wanted to improve our weaknesses and built her ready better for the higher classes. In the end after one first price in winner class we have to make three first prices in OB4 to become ob champions. Freya is also pretty good in ob so we might even try our luck in the National Championships. But we have more few challenges ahead and the biggest one is her sensitivity.
We have done lots of work to make her comfortable near people. In last trial she got distracted from work of ring guide. She wanted sniff her every time she showed us our new starting point. This little distraction and checking her our took part of drive. So we need to do lots of work to make everyone in the ring meaningless. She has done already a lot of progress. But as you can see from our training video from last week she still get tense every time we go near people. This same can happen with dogs when we do the laying down or sit in a row. Freya's confidence is pretty fine line but it can be built to be better.
In overall she has improved in every task. Our biggest challenge has been the box. Freya has had a habit of stopping before to first cones. We have done position work from close range and helped sending from long distance ( by this I mean going half way to send her so that I'm closer to box). Work has finally started to pay off. I think we will be soon ready to take another try in winner class. She has speed and super work ethic but I hope we will over come her fear to people and dogs so that she can work with full confidence.
Here is our video from our last training. This was competition mode training where we did about three task in row without reward:
I have trained Freya for the winner class in obedience. It has lot of new tasks and some that are more challenging version of open class tasks. It has been fun to see her progress and also to see how learning curve goes up and down. When you teach a new behavior chain it usually works pretty well at first. Then follows a testing time where dogs test can they get away with different kind of behaviors. This a normal learning curve period which tests the handlers’ patience and skills to overcome the testing phase. Today Freya had her test period with controlled retrieve. She had her stocking mode on and stopped to a U-shape position to watch the dumbbell. This was the first time she anticipated the retrieve part. It actually looked really funny. So I rewarded her from healing nicely to the dumbbells and next reward point was doing nice straight stop. This is just one example of the testing of the behavior chain in ob.
Scent discrimination
Freya have had problem of being in too high drive while doing a scent discrimination. When she is in a hurry she takes the next wooden object to the right one or she runs so that half of objects are behind her and when she doesn’t find the right one she just brings the nearest. I have tried in many ways to correct her working energy but I haven’t got the results that I wanted. I wanted to find something knew to change the way she worked. I got my answer from video library in Karen Pryor Academy.
I watched a lecture of Hannah Branigan from Clicker Expo 2015 library. She had a very interesting idea how to train scent discrimination. Hanna used a cover of a plastic containers to teach scent discrimination. You start with one cover to teach a strong nose touch, then introduce second cover that has touch only from the edge. You click every time the dog touches the right cover that has touched between hands (a hot target). At first the dog doesn’t know what it’s doing but it doesn’t take too long and the dog hits always the hot target. As soon as you have more than one cover you should change the order all the time. Later on you just add one cover at the time to make this search more complex. If you dog makes mistake, you just wait it to find the right one. With these cover you can easily stop dog from lifting the wrong one and you just click for the right one. Gradually you can also introduce distraction between the cover. Also you can start using retrievable object that you make as the hot object to bring the retrieve part to the task.
With this exercise I could make Freya find out hot object even though it was behind her. With plastic covers she couldn’t retrieve closed object as panic choice if didn’t find the real hot object. I could just wait her to look for the cover that she had left behind her. All together this way of training has made her scent work calmer and I have had change reward her more during one session. I think this plastic cover technique would we super to start to whole scent discrimination work even though I only used it to improve Freya work. Here is a video of scent discrimination work right now, not the best:
Winner Class
Today we had our winner class competition. Freya was in low drive mood but she did the task pretty well. We could have got even 1st prize but I didn't wait her to correct her position in the box. My biggest win today was scent discrimination!!! She got 9,5 points and it was just wonderful. Really liked her work. Few homework for next time but she did really well today. I hope that we get her competition confidence as good she has in training. She could be my best ob dog so far. Love her to pieces. Here is our whole winner class:
What to train? How much to train? When to start? How balance training? These are few questions that have been on my mind these days. I have been constructing a base line to a puppy class. Since Freya have had some issues in everyday life I have changed my thoughts what is important to learn during puppies first year. Last few dogs I have built pretty fast to competition form and I haven’t done so much everyday skill training. Freya made me really change my mind. With her I have had to train a lot of everyday skills like passing other dogs relaxed and control her re-activity. This has given her more tools to cope with scary and unexpected situations. Of course there are dogs that can cope with lots of things without any problems but shouldn’t we make “the good headed” dog ever better?
Many of buy a puppy to a certain sport in mind like agility or obedience. Most of thing about starting to train the task that will come in these sports. But how much we train the social and environmental aspects of the sport? Do train relaxation by the training field? Do we train relaxations after high drive play? Do trained to dog to be ok walking in the crowds and noisy places? These are scenarios that the dog need to cope to even do sport without extra stress. Many of train the dog to do agility and hope it will just fine in competition situations and don’t burn itself down the situation where there is lots of new dogs and people. Training for competition situation can take a lot time and effort when you have for example a sensitive or reactive dog. It can be done but how many are ready to do the work for the dog to get used to more to competition environment?
What about starting to compete? As soon as the rules lets you? Or do you wait your dog to be more mature and ready to handle all the distraction and your excitement in competitions? I started competing agility with Freya as soon as I could but later on I realized should have waited to let her grow to her role better and work more on her skills on the competition site. In obedience I have kept my mind and made her pretty ready to each level. I have really given more thought about letting your dog to grow up and enjoy teaching it new things and building up strong resistance towards different distractions. It is our benefit build a dog with strong confidence when it enter its first competition.
Bodywork out for performance dog and nutrition
More have done dogs ports more I have learned how important is to keep your dog in super condition. As wrote before we do a lot of balance work with my dogs. I usually use our evening or morning meals to train these exercises so that the dogs don't get too much extra energy. This time we got another delivery from SLN Imports. Freya and Pixie got Wild Boar Treats, which are freeze dried meat treats. These are so good that my girl get little wild. These are easy keep in you pocket because they are dry. Other bag was from Acana single series, where you can have on option with only one meat. This is good choice is your dog have any sensitivities. We got to taste Pork and Butternut Squash. This food has 50 % of pork and 50 % fruits and vegetables. I like to use grain free food for my dogs to keep them in shape. Grains can make muscles to build up fluid and make more easy stiff. I have been super happy with Acanas and Orijens grain free products.
Here are some balancing work from our girls we try to do about 2-3 times a week depending on our other training session. I also your different object in the forest walks to do similar exercises. So I can do this training during our walks. Now less words and let the videos do the talking:
I hope these little works outs will give some tips how to built up your to more stronger and balanced.
I have read
a lot about how to build up your training season. You need to have training,
competition and rest period during your year program. In sports training people
spend lots of time to build up their training year so that they could be at
their best in the most important competitions. This is also something we need
think with dogs. Especially in agility dog to high performance work that ask a
lot from their whole body. As dog trainers we should also build up training and
rest routine for our dogs. Did you know that you could roughly say that 1 year
old dog needs at least one day to recover and 5 year old dog 5 days to recover
from hard competition day? To me this was a little surprise how fast the
recovery time rises. This would actually mean I could safely push Pixies limits
only once a week and other times keep the training and competition work to
minimal. With her it is pretty easy because she knows her stuff.
For whole
year I make rough plan how I keep my training and rest periods. My plans evolve
with how my dogs are doing and how I my own training is going. I usually keep a
longer brake during Christmas time. At least 3 weeks without training. This is
a recovery time for all of us. Other bigger brake is kept after tryout season.
Then we usually keep at least 2-3 week brake enjoy the summer. I think, it’s
important watch your dogs’ behavior and condition to make fast changes to your
plan if needed. I have only seen improvement after our brakes. Learning goes
forward and movement also becomes better.
During
training season we work with three different areas. Body balance, muscle work
and of course specific sport training. I think it is important to build up your
dogs’ body as good as possible. Going to walks and run is part of it but one
important piece is core work. More stable the body less injuries you get. We do
core work three times a week with balance pillow, different platform and trick.
At the same practice I also do stretching exercises. This helps to keep the
body working smoothly. Usually training session last about 5-10 min. I have
also thought my dogs to stretch with cue and I always praise long stretching.
Muscle work includes hill work and also lactic acid training during walks just
build up my dogs’ durance. I do lactic acid training only if I’m not doing hard
agility training because agility is always anaerobic training because its high
speed. Little things can sometimes make difference. Listen to your dog. Help it
become balanced in body and in mind.
For
everyday work
In everyday
training it important to remember warm up work and cooling walks. Warm up are
as important to us as it is to dog. You can try to run full speed 100 m run or
do 20-40 tendon jumps without warming up. Next day you can feel how the dog
feels if you do agility training without warming up. Cooling down is as
important because it help body recover from anaerobic training with causes
lactic acid to build up in muscles. Lactic acid is one the reasons our muscles
get stiff and painful. I do usually warming up walks that last about 30 minutes
and rise speed and stamina all the way of the warming up routine. Cooling down
routine I do in two steps. 20-30 minute walk right after agility run
/competition and second round two hours after when I do trot run about 45-60
minutes. With these routines I hope give my dogs the best treatment to keep
them in good shape. Of course these routines make my body recover too.
Lots of things has happened since last time. Freya finally rise to A3 and will be competing with Pixie next weekend in the highest class in agility. We have lots of little things to work on with Freya. She has had some problems with jumping again and by this I mean she jumps with a crazy big space of air between her and the bar. But we have lots of time make her work better with that. With her running contact we have worked on turns. We getting close to our target.
With Pixie we have done lots of work with contacts. She has finally started to make as trained in competitions. Our old problem of dropping of one bar in each course has come back to hunt. At this moment it feels like Pixie is a standard 5 fault dog. So yet again we have work to do. This has been really hard on me. We have been used to be one of the top pairs...... Patience, I need lots of it.
Here are our work from last few week:
Obedience
I have almost forgot. Freya got her first prize in open class obedience (OB1). We had a nice trial. Only thing she didn't do was going down from my side. This has never been a problem in training but I guess she was little too tense to listen properly. Otherwise she did super. Her healing is just so good. I need work on our full turn it didn't look nice when I saw it from the video. Little things to work on but we on our way higher classes. Here is our work from the trial:
At this point we have started to do all the new tasks coming in the winner class. So far so good. Especially our directed retrieve is super cool!!!! Freya was born to do it!!! Sit-down-stand has been super also. I have worked on her head position to make her look forward. This has also worked also super good. Our only challenge right now has been scent discrimination. Freya has had way too much speed and she brings usually the next one from the right one. Too much speed and not enough concentration. So I have started train it again from the start. So that's a little bit of our ob work. Here is video of distance control from today:
Next time full text about dog dancing! Pixie and I have started Michele Pouliots dog dancing online course. I have been so excited about our new sport! Next week I will go check Nordic Champs in Helsinki to get new ideas.
There has
more and more studies coming out about social learning used in dog training.
Recent topics has been mimicry where dog are teach to copy a behavior from
another dog. Second hot topic has been copying a behavior from an example
from human ( Topa et.al 2006). I was fascinated by both topics. I have shown my younger dog always
performance of my older in obedience. I know she probably wouldn’t pick up the
whole thing but I have always thought she might learn something. The most
interesting was the copying protocol. Ken Ramirez had a nice lecture in the new
training frontiers in Clicker Expo Europe and this inspired me try this with my
own dogs. Plan was to use this method in dancing routine.
I have
started to my work with the basic protocol where you use 3 familiar behavior
that are under a cue. I chose sit pretty, lay down and volt (dog goes around
counter clockwise). Behaviors needed to be easy demonstrate with my own
movement. First step was introduce copying cue. I did my behavior first and then
I gave “Do it!” cue followed by my cue to dogs wanted behavior. I repeated all
3 tasks in random order with this protocol in short session. It took Pixie
about 4 repeat to start reacting to copying cue. In of my first session she was
able to repeat all three behaviors from my example. Freya had problem of
starting always the sit pretty behavior before I got time to give her behavior
cue. She will need another session to figure it out. Although I did with her a
copying test without any commands and she did three different touch behavior
correctly. So I can’t wait use this to behavior they don’t know! So much fun!
Obedience
training with Freya
Our open
class test is getting nearer and nearer. I have worked on our tasks through and
I’m trying make as full behavior chains. Box training has had its testing phase
as it worst but I think / hope it’s starting to be over. Freya has worked
really well under different distractions and has started ignore a ring guides
commands to me. We have still work ahead but everything starts to look really
good. Especially healing and sit-down-stand during healing. I have managed to
build very high drive healing that is also really accurate in turns and
position.
We had box
problem a month ago that Freya went around of mark post on the front. After I
fixed that we had a problem going around big mark object. She just stopped
seeing it. I tried to show her where it was but still she could start running
around the training area without any goal to do something. It took few session
and we got the basic going around behavior back. Then I wanted make a sure she
watched the mark cone on cue. I put few mark cones all over the training are
and started walk around then took straight line randomly to each cone. On the
second try Freya tried to go around the first mark cone which was behind me.
But this was goal of the exercise to make her focus her look to mark cone that
is straight front of us.
Wow!! I had one the best days of my life. Expo was very well organized by Positive Animal Solutions. We had wonderful expo shop were we could fill our library with dog training books and dvds. I bought a big pile of them to get even more information but the best part was still the lectures. There’s lot of topic choose from. I wanted to see as many of faculty speak as possible. My plan really paid off! Each speaker had gave a lot to think and learn even though some topics were familiar to me. One person I waited the most was Ken Ramirez and he sure didn’t let me down. He was just super at giving lectures. Very lively and I got lot of insides in both topics I went to hear. Actually all the lecturers were just super! So big thanks to the whole faculty!
I learned so much new training techniques and also new stuff for my old training tools that it will take some time to get everything in use. Since I have come home I have made new training plans for own dogs and I have started design a puppy class. My plan is to build up more course plans as digest all the things I have learned but first my own dogs will be my little test animals. I have tested already some training protocols like Do As I Do. It is still an ongoing progress but I have had a little taste of it how it works. One thing I have also given deeper thoughts has been back chaining. I have used is a lot but I had little wakening in Cecile Kostes lecture how I can use it with even more power. I will tell more about the things I have learned but now I show you few things we have done since I came back home.
Platform work has been something I have read about many times but always thought that I wouldn’t have any use for it. This time I wanted learn more about it and I found out that I would have more than one thing I could use it for. My goal is to teach Pixie more dog dancing tricks so we can enter to a competition and I will use platforms to teach Freya a working dog trial recall. So I started to do some foundation work with my dogs. Here is a bit of our work so far:
Paw Crossing
I have seen paw crossing trick many times but finally I had energy to start building it up. I used had target to get the paw movement going. Now later on I learned that it would have been better to use a target stick because the dogs got really stuck to any movement of my hands. In the end I got what I wanted. I want to make this work with a verbal cue and with a leg cue. So far I have given the movement a cue but still use hand as a help but most of the time my dogs don’t need it. Here is a video of our second session:
Orijen Tundra
Pixie waiting for Platform training
It has been also wonderful to test our new sample from Orijen. This time we had a new Orijen Tundra. This is grain free kibble with lots protein that is comes from multiple sources like venison and goat. My dogs went just wild with it! It smelled very yummy for them and we did all our training above with it. I use a kibble for basic training to keep my dogs calmer and in right drive to learn new stuff. Also by this I can control better the energy in take. Orijen Tundra was almost too good but it gave my dog nice high drive to work. I love to use high protein treats in our training and Orijen Tundra was just a perfect for it!
Freya has
been working on her open class tasks for while. Our biggest trouble has been
the box work. She has mixed markers of the box with the big marker object that
you use in a jumping retrieve in the higher class. We have done now few box
training with a toy in the box. My goal has been to remind her to go to the
back of the box and not to go around a marker object on the front. I tried to
shape the right position at first but this didn’t work from a long distance. I
hope this works and she starts to do her box work as good as she used to.
Scent
discrimination
Freya has
been a little wild when she does her scent discrimination work. She goes with fast gallop and does the
smelling work wonderfully. Our problem has been that she even if she picks up
the right one, she has to make checking round before she brings the right one
for me. I need still built her confidence to make her bring the right stick
right away to me. Her return speed has been always super but her work on sticks
needs some adjusting. She has done this task in many places. It has been very
interesting to see that it has been the hardest on a sand field. Freya has done
her best work on grass. I have wondered if the moist in grass makes the scents
even stronger and this way easier for the dog. At least with Freya it seems
work like this.
Jumping
retrieve with mark object
This new
task in the highest class has so much fun. It has so many little parts that you
need train with your dog. First you need teach the dog to go around a big
marker object. Then the dog needs to learn to do sit-down- stand 2 meters after
it. Next to learn how to do this between two jumps and dumbbells. Then learn to
take right or left side on retrieve when asked. So lots of little things the
dog learns to master.
My both
girls have a little different background to start this work. Pixie has done
very hard jumping retrieves and has had a very hard time to give the up the
jumps. On the other hand she has trained positions by going around a tree so
this part came together pretty easy. Pixie had also problems of going around
the mark object and coming back because she has been thought to stop at the
mark object. Freya has started everything from scratch so it has been much
easier for her to learn the new concepts of the task.
At this
point Pixie has done the whole task. Her only problem is the sit position. This
seems to be the hardest from a top speed. Right and left commands came together
pretty easy and she had no problem of going forward with same cue as in
controlled retrieve. Freya has done only position and retrieves but so far so
good. She has also some work with position but we are getting there. I hope to
get more speed and accuracy to her work. Also we need to start tackling the
jumps. All together this has been a super fun task to train and really learn to.
Freya has
finally reached a competition age. Freya has super to train with. Her hardest
parts have been jumping. She has done super going around the wing but her
jumping cross along the bar has been a challenge. We have done a lot of jumping
work to make her take off by the wing and not from the last third of bar. I
don’t know how to say this problem clearly in English. But here are some pics
from our jumping work and problems.
Running contacts
has been our biggest job. This has been a first time I have done dog that has
running A-frame and dogwalk. This project has gone pretty well. I have done our
work with shaping and using a toy target.
Freya has responded to my training very well. My goal was also to do
working verbal cue to turning after contact zone. This process is a still going
on but she has done pretty hard stuff already. I think this will be whole life
project but I like our work so far. We have done most of our work in contact
obstacles so we will see how we will do on whole course.
In overall
Freya is very easy to handle and she gets new stuff in just few tries. Slalom
entries were done in few sessions. Her ability change her behavior after
mistake is phenomenal. If she doesn’t get rewarded she stops and thinks.
Usually on the next try she does it perfectly. Our lack off course work shows
in our work but I think she will catch up my handling in no time. She improves every single time. I just need
to remember to reward her every time she responses exceptionally good to my
handling. My bad habit is to keep running when she is doing super work. Our
rhythm on course is getting better and better even though sometimes we have
different routes. :D One thing is that
Freya has a very strong jump and this makes it sometimes hard predict where she
will land. Good thing from this is that Freya has no problems with bars!
Obedience
What can I
say? Freya is a super learner which makes obedience training super easy. She
has nice high drive while we work but still she can keep mind working all the
time. We have started all ob tasks that will be ahead of us. It’s been really
exciting to train because our ob rules change in August. I have had even more
motivation because I have had to done lots of work to new create training
routines to the new tasks. I have usually tested my training plans with Pixie
and then use them with Freya. I hope to built Freya as good as possible and
even achieve National Champion level.
Scent
discrimination training as advanced really well after I started pine cone
training. This has given me change to make more repeats and improve her skills
in more difficult situations. Pine cone training has also stopped her from
lifting the wrong ones and improved her scent work even more. I have been so
thrilled how she works with her nose. I think our Nosework work has also given
her more confident in her scent work. Soon we will start to put this all
together as a competition task
.
Freya’s
heel work and sit-down-stand in heel work has been really good. I actually could
do heel work with her all the time. Freya has really good energy and very nice
contact. Her position work in heeling has becoming better and better. I do lots
work sit-down-stand outside to healing to improve her cue discrimination. As I
wrote before our next goal is to make her stand without turning her head. I
have used a treat target at this point. My plan is to start training her with
Z-walk with mark cones. I will test what she likes if I have sometimes a toy
behind the mark cone so she would have front target. This will probably keep
her from turning around when go behind her. At first this might lower her speed
and accuracy when I built the reward but hope it will improve the total
outcome.
That’s a
little bit about Freya. She has been just a perfect girls scout in training
(saying in Finnish). I couldn’t ask for a better training partner! Thank you
Jane!
Freya and I
missed the National Team championships because she started finally her first
heat. Since then we have been working on all ob tasks coming ahead in a higher
classes. My goal has been to work little part at the time and make them as good
as possible. I have also tried to work with her in different places to make
variation skills better. Still lot of work to do but she is ready start
competing with the new rules in August.
Distance Control
One big
project has been distance control. I have done series of training in pair of
two changes (sit-stand, stand-laying down, laying down –sit). I have done this to keep the technique in
super shape. Now I have started to take distance more and more. It comes slowly
together but I like the quality of her work. I hope to build up her confidence
and speed in small pieces. We will see how this goes. Freya is much faster than
Pixie but her staying in one place is the hardest part.
"Square"
Square has
had it challenges. At this point I have been able to make her find a right
place and run in to the square from various distances. Her stop has been little
too slow. This we have worked with Tarja’s constructions where I send Freya to
a target mat and stop her before she reaches it. This has made her stops faster
and she turns right away towards me. We still need some repeats to get this
super stop integrate to the square task. After we have succeeded in this we have nice
and fast square.
Z-walk
Sit-Down-Stand
in movement has becoming nicely together. I have shaped each movement
separately in different positions around me. Then I have done them during heal
work. Freya handles now all three of the positions but we need to work more in
different places and I have to start training her between mark cones as you
have to do in Z-walk. Freya has pretty nice speed to reach to cues and she
holds the positions nicely when I walk behind her. I need to change her focus
more to the front so that her position looks more steady and firm. So some work
with front reward and that should be fixed. I don’t want her to turn her head
when I go behind her.
All
together Freya has been super to work with. She is very focused, high driven
and very fast learner. What more can you ask from a ob dog? She has so good
working attitude that she makes me work better and she makes me smile every
time and Freya smiles all the time. I think we will have a super obedience
carrier and lots of wild memories. Just
love this little girl <3 <3 <3 <3
For next time I try to make videos of all our work..
Freya has been getting ready for her depute in obedience National Team competition. She will be doing a beginner class performance for our team. She still hasn't had heat yet so that could ruin our change to take a part. So one day at the time. We have done lots of basic work. I have wanted her to be driven when she does ob and that she has as good as possible attitude.
Distraction training
One big thing we have been working on is distraction. In the National Champion Ships there will be several ring going on at the same time. So the dog has to handle multiple commands, distractions from other competitors rewarding their dogs etc. I have had a plan to build up a distraction duration so that Freya will see it as a mark to sharp up her work and rise from it. We have done a lot of work with this. First we done was a order command work this a distraction that come from a Stuart in the ob trials. We did some heal work and every time she ignored the extra command I rewarded her. I didn't take any notice if did something while she heard the command from the Stuart. It took few times reward her and her drive just started get higher and higher.
I have done distraction training with corrections with my older dogs and this has show in their work. You can see from the dogs in high level ob are their trained with correction or rewards. Correction use left to dog tense and wanting to keep contact to avoid correction. This showed out in the dogs postures and also many of the dogs make stress signals in they are in high level stress. I wanted do this a different way. I wanted to make Freya work for me rather than looking or reacting to things out side. I wanted her to like even more training in distractions. This has worked out super well!!! I hope that every time you correct your dog from reacting to distractions think again. Are you interesting enough?? Does your dog know what is expected from him/her???
Scent discrimination
We have had a problem in the scent discrimination. Freya has always took one bar in her mouth before she starts use her nose. She brings the right bar but it's a fault to take one incorrect one her mouth. So we tried a new trick. We put treats on the ground before the bars. We had long line of bars she needed smell before she could find the right one. This really worked good! Nose went on right away and no retrieve mode. Freya did excellent job. I need to keep using treats for a while to get her nose working right away. I think soon we have full scent discrimination handled!! :D
It has been a very
long time since an update to my blog. I have been sick for 1,5 months and I
still have some symptoms of a flu. I hope it will start getting better and we
get to finally start our agility season. I have lost a lot time of getting
myself fit again. Dogs have also had again some vacation from work but we have
done some progress in obedience with both of them.
Freya’s ob depute
It was so exciting
to take another a new dog to its first trial. Freya had worked pretty well in
training. She had had a problem with guidance person giving commands in
standing in heel work. I hoped that the problem was solved but it
turned out to be our only mistake. Freya worked really well in the ring even
though she really pulled me in with the leash. Ring entry really was our
biggest homework from our first ob trial. Overall I was very pleased to see
that Freya worked really well the whole time.
Our next goal is a National Champion Ships. Freya will be part of team and she will compete again in the beginner class. We have been working on with our problem areas and also done some work with higher level tasks. It has been a pure joy working with her. She just wants to do her best and she learns super fast. I think this route to ob champion will be a cool one.
Scent discrimination
Freya has started her scent discrimination work with looking for a one bar that has been hidden in a grass or snow. Next step was to put more bars around own one. I did this first with a net so that the untouched ones were under a net. This went pretty well. Next I just tried what she would do if I put a lot bars on a sand field. Not a good idea! Freya took 3 bars at the same time in her mouth. I really needed reset the situation. Then I put the bars on a grass and hid the own bar. This time time she brought me first a wrong bar. This one I just ignored and I send her again to find the right one. This time she found the right one and I was trilled!!! Still a lot of work to do but I think I'm clearing the idea of scent discrimination to her. I hope at least.
Agility training
Both girls have worked on agility a little bit. Freya has done contact and jump work. In jumping we have sharped our skills in different handling maneuvers. She has had a little bit of problem of jumping smoothly in German turn. Her jumping from left canter is a little bit different but when changed her reward spot I could get the jumping technique that I wanted. Lots of little things to improve but Freya is doing agility courses pretty well. She starts to really feel like a competition dog.
Pixie has improved with her start line stays a lot. She have had a problem of leaving too early and I made her stop running courses every time she took too early. I used negative punishment as technique this means I took some that she wants away from her. I needed to do this in competitions and it cost me some serious money but we have finally results. She has been sitting nicely for a few competition weekends. This has been a very waited change. Our next target is bar work. I have planning of stopping her runs every time she drops bar. Pixie can be a little too careless with bar work. She has a super jumping style but sometimes she just don't take time to make a neat jump. So lots of work on that area.
Here is video of Pixie doing a nice run with one bar down:
That's all for now!! Just quick note after long brake!
Freya heat is still not here so it looks like we are going to our first OB trial next week. Time just flied. We have been training our basic ob skills for last few weeks. Most inside in our living room- I have been sick again. Freya has been working really well and her attitude is just perfect. Our hardest task has been laying from healing. Sit and stand is much easier for her than laying down. It a bit odd problem for a bordercollie. Oh well something need to be challenging. Here are some video of our work:
Pixie has done some dog dancing work instead of ob. She has sometimes problems in concentration. Pixie might start doing multiple tricks and don't listen to my commands. So we have a big stimulus control problem. Although I do change our chain of tricks all the time. We have work on the control more to be able built a routine. I don't know will I have courage to enter her to a dog dancing competition in the future. I think it would be fun but I'm not a very skillful choreographer. Anyway here are some our trick we have been working on:
That's all for now!! Just a quick note.. I hope to have some agility update soon... I hope to get in running condition soon.
I have been sick for a week. So I have trained mostly ob for last week. I have started make scent discrimination with Freya. I have started this with searching for one stick from a pile of snow. This way she will have start using her and not retrieve the stick. Her nosework started really well but her retrieve was just wild. Freya just threw the stick in the air just before coming to my side. So we needed to do training of holding and retrieving this little piece of wood. It took few times and whole chain started to be pretty nice.
Our next step was to introduce the others sticks. This was done with a net. I put the rest of the sticks under a net and the stick that has my scent before the net. This way she could see them but not be able make mistake. Her nose seems to be open and she notice the clear sticks. Now I just have to do this few times more and then I will start make it without the net. At this point I will reduce the distance from the stick pile just to keep her drive a little lower. Her drive to do this scent work has been more wild enough :D :D
The new jump retrieve in OB4 class
All of my girls have been training the new jump retrieve. This set up has many elements to train. One is the going around mark object and doing sit, down or stand. Especially the sit will be a challenging task from a full speed. I started to work this task in my living room. I used a foam roller as object to go around. Short distance made it easy to learn to positions and also to come back without a extra command. All the girls started this work really well. Pixie and Louise did nicely all the positions and Freya did stand and laying down but her sitting need some extra work.
Next level was to take the distance from the mark even longer way. This point Pixie had a problem of staying by the mark and not returning back. This comes from doing a regular mark work before box or retrieve. I really needed to do a lot work to get her come back. Freya was much better with this because she doesn't have solid ideas for mark. The stand and laying down I can do with both girls from 15 m, but the sit position is still a hard nut to crack. That will need a lot work from a short distance to become really good. In the end I really like these new rules. Much more little things to train!!!!
Operant conditioning lecture
This has been my dream to do for a long time but I have thought I don't know enough. I finally had the guts to do it. I had 1,5 h lecture about the rules and history of operant conditioning. After that I did some demos with Pixie. I think it went quite well and hope at least people got new ideas to training. Clicker training is really important to me and I hope to become better and better all the time. I'm still a rookie but I hope that what I have already learned is worth of sharing.
I have under a project a book- Don't shoot the Dog. This is a book written by Karen Pryor. She is one the founders and firsts trainer to use operant condition in animal training. I have read a lot of her books and articles. These are really a eye opening text in animal training. Her multiple examples about positive training from animal and human world just makes you wonder how isn't this become every day thing all over the world? With her examples she has challenge me also think how I train and how to find the answers to my training problems. I can only recommend her books to anyone that owns an animal.
Training ob with Freya
This morning we did some training with laying down. Freya is so sharp minded dog that I have decided to make her keep her head down in long stays. This project has been started in living room and I'm now starting to take it different environments. She has starting to be pretty good at it. Now we just need to built duration.
I just read last night to the new rules in Ob that will be coming in August. So Freya and I made a training to learn the new jump. This was much much easier than the jump before. We train the jump set up that we will have in open and beginner class. Here are videos from both training's in ob:
Agility with both girls
We also trained little bit of lapturn with Freya. My first goal was to make her come to me to get a reward. Then we made to whole thing. After we did the whole thing I saw that she was jumping head high. Freya got her eye on me and not to the jump. At this point I put a toy behind the jump to make her focus more lower. This worked pretty well. Although we needed to do few tries to make concentrate to the task and not to toy. But in the end she did super! Watch to jump technique difference from the video.
Pixie did the same lap turn challenge. Her hardest part was to come to me for a treat. She just went and said I know what I need to do. :D This was a good training to make her listen to me again. After little jump turn training we did the wave challenge from Italy and other wave distraction. Now more writing here are our videos from today:
I can't be any happier!! We have done now about 1 week of reactions training. This has been work of desensitizing and counter-conditioning. Freya has done super! She has become more relaxed. Our out coming from doors and car has been changed to situations that are in-control and in relaxed stage. Our work is not yet been done but I have really seen to power of positive reinforcement in changing behavior. Just love it!! I can only tell that if you have a problem in your dogs behavior research for a professional animal trainer that uses only positive reinforcement. Thank Kaisa again!!
Ob training
Freya and I went to train ob with Tiina and Jaime on Thursday. First I had an very wild puppy but in the end we got really nice tasks done. Freya did some speed work with a box and afterwards some position training in the box. We had had a long brake from box work so she had a little trouble of getting it again. Also we did some stop in healing. This has been a bit of problem task. Freya doesn't stop fast enough. We worked to stop by me walking backwards and giving her cue. She improved a lot but we have to do more training to make her confident of doing a high speed stop. Last we training healing with distraction. Freya was really cool! She just changed all her focus to me when distractions started to happen. I wonder, do I have already help from our reactions training? Has that changed better focus to me?? It really doesn't matter I have done something right with this little ob puppy!!! :D :D :D
Agility with both girls
It was an eye opening training to see how different dogs I have. Pixie has been coming back from training brake and I had a plan to make course training with her. First of all she had lost her brakes - so lots of rewarding of collecting if asked to slow down. Second our old problem of knocking down pars was present and needed to be addressed. In the end we made clear and fast run but we have few issues to work with before Pixie will be going back to competition arenas.
Freya in the other hand showed her agility skills again. I raised the bars to 50 cm for the first time. She dropped first two bars and took it from the beginning again that made it the last bar that she dropped during the training session. We also worked on a lap turn. This went ok but I could see that she will need basic work with this handling maneuver. I haven't done the basic training well enough. Also we had a little issues of should she stay in 2on2off position after seesaw. It needed few tries and finally she got the idea that she needed to wait my release cue. All this was made a little bit more difficult because seesaw was against a wall. Yet again Freya got it perfectly in the end. This training session was a good reminder that when working with young dogs it's sometimes better go back to kinder garden to be able to go forward again.
That's all for now!! Happy training for everyone!!
