And it begins...

SoBe went to see Dr. Keesling today, she is a Veterinarian who specializes in PT.  

We were able to actually isolate the issue today, SoBe has a pulled Iliopsoas muscle. Her symptoms make perfect sense with the diagnosis, the reason SoBe has been on again, off again three-legged lame which of course has scared the crap out of me.

I have been worried sick that it is a knee/cruciate injury, knowing that it is a muscle pull, although a major muscle is definitely a relief!

When the muscle spasms, it causes her to pull her leg up in order to get relief. We are looking at about a 6 week rehab program, in which we will be gradually easing her back into her active lifestyle. Huge sigh of relief!!!

I had a busy day today and did not get much of a chance to train dogs but I did take Vandal down to the training building before one of my lessons showed up and we played on the plank.

Truly Vandals plank work should begin with the plank on the floor but he is quite the brave young man and he really thought the plank on the floor was an unnecessary obstacle so I put it up on the edge of a 12" table.

Doing this turned out to be very beneficial for 2 reasons, first he really enjoyed running down the elevated plank but we also got a first look at the table and how much fun it can be.

I started by encouraging Vandal up on to the table and rewarded him with treats and play when he hopped up. There was no duration involved just fun!

To introduce the plank I moved down the plank with him and rewarded him for running all the way through it. He was very quick to figure out what I wanted and within a rep or 2 I was able to place a target out about 3 feet from the bottom of the plank and send him to it. You will see this on the video, yes another video!!!

 

The most interesting part of this whole exercise was the fact that although I had placed a couple of really yummy treats on the "target" he ran down the plank, grabbed the target and took off! I continued to put treats on the target plate but made sure that I got there as fast as I could so that after he actually ate the treat we played tug with the target plate. 

I am totally fine with the fact that he wants to play with the target plate, play is always good and of course I do not have intentions of using the target for very long.

The plank was quite bouncy and although it did not bother Vandal even a little bit, not every dog is going to be quite so receptive to that much motion, so use caution if you are trying this yourself.

On the same yet slightly different note, a question was posed regarding my running contact decision. 

The question was in reference to how I will handle a running contact in a gamble situation? Well, a lot of the success in running contacts has to do with the handlers physical cues as well as verbals, once my dog is truly understanding the concept of "running" the contacts which generally involve driving to obstacles straight ahead I will spend an equal amount of time training turns off of the contacts.

This will involve asking Vandal to turn both left and right as well as doing 180 degree turns to obstacles as he runs off of the contact obstacle. I have to be sure that my physical position/cue supports the direction I am asking Vandal to go.

Wally has running contacts and has managed to Q on several Masters level gambles that involved contacts, it can be done :-)

Speaking of Wally, as long as I have gotten so darn good at "up" loading these videos, here is a video of a standard run from the Colorado Kennel Club AKC trial a couple of weeks ago :-) Enjoy!

Tomorrow, Merger, Beep!, and, Vivid are going to play with Sheepies! It is supposed to be the most beautiful day tomorrow and hopefully we will get in a great walk, sheepies and some serious quality agility training with Merger, Wally and Vandal. I will let you all know how the sheep wrangling goes!

Not even close to a computer whiz!

So, the video did not upload properly, so much for the computer whiz thing!! Not only that but I went to edit the post and then could not get back in to add stuff before posting. I am a long way from "whiz" status, fortunately I am a much better dog trainer than computer geek!

A few more thoughts, then off to bed for me...

I took the Merge man down to train tonight and he was a really good boy! He still cannot walk more than 3 feet without bumping into something but there are things that we can work on that are a bit less physical :-)

Actually our mission tonight was to start clarifying for Merger that he needs to seek out and take obstacles if they are between me and him. 

We played on low jumps in a pinwheel configuration, tunnels, the chute and even the tire. He really seemed to be getting it! It helps that he is so incredibly in love with the flying squirrel toys and that he only gets the toy when he "chooses" to take the obstacle in line with our path. 

We worked on the weave pole channels and I am happy to say he will stay at the beginning of the set of 12 poles and wait until released then drive through the poles to me. Merger is also doing the poles with me and away from me as well.

It is time to start working on entries, I will employ the help of my little guide gates for this new challenge.

It was fun to have Merger back in training, I just have to remember that his giant size does not match the active brain cells at this point, it will surely catch up, someday!

Time for bed...

I am a computer whiz!

OK, I am not a computer whiz, but, I actually downloaded, oops I mean "up"loaded a video to this blog!!

This is a clip of SoBe doing some A-frame training that I took a few weeks ago :-) Of course there are no A-frames happening right now as the lameness continues, we are going back to the specialty clinic tomorrow and hopefully will receive good news regarding the direction we take from here.

I am not sure who is more bummed about this forced lay-off, SoBe or myself! I have so much fun training the little monkey and I am actually home for 10 days, of course she is out of commission, AARRRGHHH!

I apologize, I need to whine a bit to keep from worrying even more about her.

OK, I may have lost my mind completely but I am seriously considering teaching Vandal a running dog walk as well as a running A-frame.

I have been heard to say that I would never teach a running dog walk again after Wally, yet here I am already thinking about it and I am still working on Wally's dog walk :-)

So, why am I thinking such outrageous thoughts? 

Honestly, because in this day and age of agility competition it is becoming less and less likely that a stopped contact performance will be competitive at the level that I choose to compete. 

Don't get me wrong, a well trained 2on/2off contact performance is very fast and there is always the quick release, however, I feel that it is the "quick" or "early" release that can undermine the whole process. 

Even if I have done all of my proofing exercises and am careful to "bank" the early releases, the very driven and pushy dogs will eventually question their responsibilities and there will very likely be an erosion of performance at least in a competition setting.

I am not really interested in putting all of the time and energy into teaching a solid 2on/2off performance if I am going to have to loosen my criteria to be competitive, at this moment I am thinking I would rather put the time into teaching a running contact and be done with it.

Keep in mind, a running contact requires just as much, if not more training. A running contact is not an alternative to training the contacts.

I am in the process of trying to figure out exactly how I want to teach these running dog walks. I used stride regulators with Wally and I am very satisfied with stride regulators to train a running A-frame, but I am trying to establish a method that minimizes the use of visual props as much as possible.

I will certainly keep the blog updated with whatever I decide to do.

Great day!

I just finished up teaching day 6 of my 7 day seminar series in Portland and it was a great day! I had Novice dog and handler teams today and they were awesome! It is true that Novice can be very scary for a presenter as there is about a Grand Canyon gap within the heading of Novice.

These handler and dog teams were amazing! 

We spent the day focusing on flat area skill sets, I put up a course of 18 obstacles that included front and rear cross opportunities, a serpentine, a threadle, a 270, and a couple of places to let the dogs open up.

We immediately broke the course into pieces and worked each skill set seperately, which really showed off the overall abilities of each of the participants. Don't get me wrong, there were issues but the group was fantastic about taking instruction and applying it. We worked very hard and by the time we were done both dogs and handlers were definitely cooked but ultimately happy I think :-)

Wally got to come out at lunch and show off how well he could put all of the pieces together in one flowing course, what a good boy! 

One of the discussions that arose today was about signals and their consistency of use as taught to the dog.

My dogs are taught to target to my hand and to always seek out a path parallel to me. Because of this I am very confident when I walk a course, if I plan a path signaling the correct obstacle and facing the appropriate direction that even without more information as long as my motion supports the physical cues my dog will offer the proper behaviors.

Knowing this allows me to handle each course obstacle to obstacle without over analyzing things. Take for example the fact that we have named so many obstacle configurations, such as serpentine's, threadle's, etc... We may have planned the handling necessary to run an unnamed obstacle configuration without much hesitation and with downright confidence, but, throw in a threadle and we are confused, uncertain and downright scared of our ability to get through this portion of the course. 

It is really important to not get hung up on the name of the obstacle sequence and just analyze what signals are necessary to cue the dog through the "threadle pattern" just as you would any unnamed sequence of obstacles.

It would also be a good idea to go through your list of cues and what they mean to your dog, are you being consistent in their usage? 

My dogs understand that if I ever offer an outside hand as a cue it always means to turn towards me, this outside hand signal is a turning cue and it means turn towards me, always. So, I would use an outside hand signal to initiate a front cross, to do a pull through, aka threadle, or to signal an RFP or false turn.

An outside turn or rear cross is always initiated with the hand closest to the dog, the outside hand will be used after I have changed sides as follow through and because I have now changed sides so it becomes the hand closest to the dog.

To maintain consistency, you will never see me cue an out by crossing over my body with my outside hand as this cue should always mean to turn towards me, it is very important that I keep my signals clear.

Vandal started his heel and side training yesterday, it is very intense, I lure him into position, labeled it and offered him a treat and immediate release. He was brilliant :-)

We also learned how to run across a flat teeter plank today. A flat teeter plank differs from a flat dog walk plank because it is attached to the teeter base so it does move a little bit. 

He started out just bouncing back and forth over the plank and spending as much time running beside it as he did running over it, it was all good and I was very sure to offer reinforcement and rewards for anything he felt like doing on this plank. Within 5 minutes he was actually thinking about running across it with purpose rather than just bouncing around on it. 

I also interrupted his "work" with lots of play! I am so enjoying this puppy, have I mentioned this recently?

Tomorrow, is day 7 and another day with my superstar Novice group, until next time...

 

I'm back!

I am back online but of course not back home :-) I just got done teaching for the day and boy the days have flown by! I am in Portland, OR teaching 7 days of seminars the past 2 days have been high drive masters level dogs and the first 2 days were advanced handling skills, what fun!!!

Tomorrow I have a day of foundation training, I am very excited about that topic, a proper foundation is so important to the overall agility ability of every dog. It is not that foundation training has become more important than it was 5 years ago it is just getting a lot more attention these days which is definitely a step in the right direction :-)

So, Vandal is having a blast in Portland although I am not sure he had a blast getting here. He has already out grown his sturdi bag so he got to join Wally in the hold on our flight over, he handled it just great as did Wally. I suppose it was nice for them to have the company of each other.

Wally, has been training everyday and is loving it, we have been able to spend a significant amount of time on weave pole entries, broad jump work and perfecting that pesky dog walk. I am sure we will be working on the dog walk for the duration of his agility career but hey we need to have something to work on.

I have definitely decided to stick with the running dog walk with Wally as he seems to really get it, and, being the very sensitive soft being that my sweet Wally is, it would be in my best interest to work with him not against him. Trust me the running dog walk is a lot of work but if Wally gets it then I am happy to put the work into it!

I keep Wallys training sessions fairly short to guarantee quality work with a maximum of success, dog's fatigue mentally quite quickly and as a result I am a huge believer in quality over quantity of training.

Vandal had the opportunity to see sheep for the first time earlier in the week, he reacted to them pretty much the way he reacts to everything, thoughtfully and without care, he was not even remotely bothered by the sheep he was quite disinterested actually. My friend Marilyn who owns the sheep commented that she was glad he is supposed to be an agility dog :-) Of course she was saying this with a smile as he is really way too young to decide his sheep herding potential, although between you and me I couldn't care less as there is very little liklihood that we will ever work sheep again.

Vandal has been wonderful here, he has once again met all sorts of people and dogs and has even had the opportunity to play with a sheltie puppy who is the same age as he is, what fun!

As I wrote the other day, oh yea no one got to read the blog earlier in the week, we have definitely started to put together the to do list for Vandals foray into the world of agility.

So far we have been working on hand touches, eye contact, sit and down, a verbal release cue, name recognition, restrained recalls, and, attention. 

Attention work is of course ongoing and forever in nature, however, starting now will make the overall process not only easier but will help to create a situation that allows Vandal to learn to choose to pay attention without ever realizing that he has to. 

Vandal is a bit on the independent side so it is imperative that I always have high value rewards on my person at all times when we are together so that I can be sure to reinforce all overtures that Vandal makes in my direction.

There is an even more important component to our foundation training that I have purposely mentioned last and that is PLAY!!!! I cannot stress enough how important play is to the overall end result of all of the training that you do with your dog.

Play is a stress reliever, play is interactive, play is a non rules restrictive free for all with your dog. 

It is crucial in my training program that my dogs are both food and toy motivated, it never seems to be a problem to create and maintain food motivation in the majority of dogs but people seem to have a huge problem creating and maintaining toy drive.

I have a theory on this and I truly believe that because we begin our dogs training career using food to reward approximations we forget to play with our dogs. It is true that food is a reward but you need to introduce toys into your training program as well. 

If your dog is used to food as the primary motivator as well as reward and reinforcement it is very possible that when you reintroduce toys at a later date the dog has literally forgotten how to play with them, and they have certainly forgotten how to play with them, with YOU.

Every training session should begin with play, play should happen several times during a training session, and, play should end every training session.

You should also play with your dog as various times when you are not training as well. Remember the definition of play is not tugging, if your dog will not tug then try wrestling, just let loose and interact.

On that note, I am off to play with my dogs! Until next time...

 

huge computer glitch

HI All! 

Well, the more puppy adventures blog topic was a hour and a half full entry that included the first installment in the to do list series and although I spent all of that time typing, unbeknownst to me the computer had lost it's wifi signal and was not auto saving, therefore when I attempted to publish I found out I was off line and when I got back on line all that was left was the first line. 

So, everyone will have to wait for the next installment which will not happen tonight as I am exhausted after a full day of work and a full hour and a half of blog writing!!!  AAARGHHH!!!

More puppy adventures

First of all, SoBe is doing much better

What a Weekend!

Well, I just finished up with a really fun weekend of trialing at the Colorado Kennel Club 4 day AKC trial in Denver. The courses were fantastic and the trial was probably one of the smoothest run, efficient trials I have ever had the pleasure of attending in Colorado :-)

It was, however, bittersweet... Wally was fantastic and continues to be a complete joy to run, Rumor and I were hoping to get our MACH this weekend and lo and behold the very sweet part was that she did it, TODAY!!

SoBe was entered all 4 days and although the bulk of this entry will be about her and our trial tribulations and moments of brilliance, the weekend ended with Rumors MACH and SoBe being pulled from all of her runs due to a sprained/strained knee!

Ahhh... the joys of dog ownership :-) The good news of course is that what I feared was a career limiting/ending injury appears to be a hopefully minor strain.

Let's talk about the brilliance, I like that topic better. SoBe was so very excited to be at the trial and although she certainly had moments of brilliance, she also showed her age and experience level.

I am happy to report we have definitely got food for Blog with little Miss SoBe. 

Speaking of food for Blog please allow me to digress for a moment to answer a question about the "to do list" I will indeed be giving away the contents of the list as well as sharing all of the things that I am doing to shape little Master Vandal into the consumate agility dog.

I have not forgotten about sharing the progression of Merger, but, he is so busy adding inches to his legs right now that he is taking a bit of time off from agility training while he figures out how to coordinate his brain and his feet :-) He is going to be doing a little herding to keep him sharp and hopefully build a bit of coordination at the same time, so stay tuned.

Anyway, not only will I be bringing up baby online but will be shaping SoBe as well. 

SoBe had no speed issues this weekend, she is as fast as I expected her to be, she thought start lines were semi optional, and, she was complimented numerous times for her beautiful contacts which were quite stunning, running contacts. Oh, did I mention she has a running A-frame and a 2on/2off dog walk and teeter?

I mentioned she was very fast, right? That may be why collecting to get into the poles was such a challenge!

As soon as I figure out how to download my Flip! videos to this blog I will share one of her lovely runs with you.

The good news is that none of these minor issues are a big deal, they were excellent training tips! 

All of SoBe's issues were a direct result of adrenaline and environment so with time, experience and proper reactions to her mistakes we will have the same super performance in the ring that we have in training.

How does one go about filling these holes? 

First, I have to up the ante in training, more proofing is the biggest item on the agenda. I am a believer in training to 200% to insure the best possible outcome in competition, it is virtually impossible to create ring nerves in a training situation so you must instead train your dog better!

SoBe gives every indication in training that she is ready to trial, so we did, I still believe she is ready we just have to work out who decides what what is acceptable behavior in the ring and I believe this has to be worked out "in the ring".

Trust me there is still a lot of work to be done from a training standpoint, such as, weave entries at even more angles, with even more speed into them. Weave poles going into fences, walls, etc... you name it we will continue to proof it!

I see a lot of racing past contacts, toys being thrown, etc... to really be sure the understanding of that 2on/2off behavior is rock solid. Then there are those pesky start lines :-) You get the picture.

So, what is the appropriate response to lack of criteria maintainance in the ring? I am not a big believer in leaving the ring unless I have a dog that truly believes they were born for agility, don't get me wrong I think SoBe fits that bill but she needs the ring experience more than she needs to be removed from the course when there is good training to be had.

This weekend for instance, if SoBe did not maintain her 2on/2off criteria on the dog walk I verbally marked it and asked her to heel before we moved on to the next obstacle. The most important part was to not allow SoBe to be immediately rewarded for ignoring her job. 

I am hoping that every obstacle is a reward for the previous obstacle, with this in mind I am going to withhold the reinforcement of immediately moving on by requiring her to stop and gather herself first, both physically and mentally.

SoBe had a lot to say about this philosophy and was happy to verbally berate me on every occasion around the course!

However, now that we have lived through our first full weekend of trialing I can say that I had a blast and I am as excited as ever to play with my girl SoBe, now we just have to get her back on 4 legs!

Rumor celebrated her MACH with 2 mini cheeseburgers from Burger King and she is ever so happy to be daddys girl once again as he will take over all future handling of princess Rumor from now on.

The to do list

It's time to start making a list and checking it many, many times! Every time I start a new puppy I have to rewrite the laundry list of things to do, not because there was anything wrong with the old list but because I am always trying to improve on what I have done with each of the other dogs.

I suppose it is possible to train a dog so perfectly that there is no room for improvement but I am doubtful that it has ever really happened. Keeping in mind of course that every dog is different these differences alone make change a necessity.

If I was to pick apart my own training program I would say my biggest hole is contact training, I am happy with the ultimate outcome and for the most part I am happy with all of my dogs contact performance, however, I have been retooling them with each dog and I do not feel as though I have yet found "the" method that I would train each and every dog. 

So, here we go again what to do "this" time :-) I have experimented with and had good results with: running, four on the floor, 2on/2off, moving contacts, so many choices how do I choose?

First things first, all of the new behaviors that I will shape Vandal to perform will have the potential to be a part of any of the above methods, his ability to offer these behaviors and overall understanding of each of them will help decide, as Vandal will always be part of the overall decision making process when it comes to determining what obstacle performance criteria will be utilized.

My gut is telling me running A-frame, 2on/2off dog walk and teeter which is what SoBe has been or should I say is being taught. 

I would love to entertain the notion of a running dog walk again but let's face it, I am not getting any younger and my dogs are getting faster!

I am and have always been very happy with channel weave poles as a method of teaching very fast, and accurate weave pole performance so that will be how Vandal learns as well.

Of course there is that pesky jump training and I am a big fan of a lot of one jump work when it comes to actually teaching my pups how to jump. I have found that there is not a behavior or handling maneuver that I will use on course that cannot be taught on the flat and over 1 jump. 

Talking of jumping specifically, I have found that the 1 jump work helps teach my dogs the proper take off and physicality necessary for any on course situation. Of course it is very important to start slow and continue to increase criteria as you progress.

Teaching my pups "how" to use their bodies is a very important part of our early training. Agility is a very demanding sport and the better the dog knows himself and how to use himself the more you will increase athletic longevity.

The to do list will of course include as early training necessities, hand touch work, parallel path work, outside turn cues, the cone game, restrained recalls, chase me games, and, lots and lots of play!

Oh yea, those basic obedience behaviors as well like sit, down, a recall and a stay. 

I have also added a more formal verbal release, (very important for contact work).

Keep in mind during all of this we will be working on name recognition, making Vandal's name the most wonderful and positive word on the planet while at the same time continuing to create the most attentive puppy  on the planet by consistently reinforcing him for looking to me for anything.

It all sounds so simple, doesn't it, except that it is not easy to set criteria, break it all down into dog friendly pieces, proof all of the pieces, connect the pieces, proof all of the connected pieces, maintain the criteria all through the addition of each new behavior, etc...

This is why a to do "list" is a very good idea. Tonights puppy training session will include, play, play and more play, some hand signal awareness work, a few obedience behaviors, some name recognition work, a few restrained recalls and Vandals first experience with "perch" work. All of these things will be worked in 1/2 hour max. with the majority of time spent on the play part.

Babies learn better and faster with tiny pieces of lots of behaviors being taught at once to keep boredom to a minimum and mind expansion at a maximum!

Well, I am off to train the baby... 

Everyone loves a challenge!

Well, I am home once again from a long teaching gig out east. It was tons of fun as always even if the weather was about 50 degrees colder than it was here in Colorado!

It was a great trip for the newly named "Vandal" aka "Torque" :-) He named himself, and, will live up to it with no problem I am quite certain!

He was amazing, during our 9 days on the road we "lived" in 4 different hotels, taught at 3 different facilities and were fortunate to be able to reconnect with some old friends as well as meet a bunch of new people.

He learned self control in the cliff notes version as the poor young man had to spend large quantities of time while I taught in either crates or X-pens. By the last day he had it all figured out and was quite content to amuse himself in between naps, I was very proud!

Vandal is quite the people dog he never misses an opportunity to meet everyone he sees and makes a point of displaying his thoughts about jumping on people, if you jump up you get closer to the petting devices known as hands :-)

He is also quite enamored with every dog he sees, the unfortunate part is that his idea of meeting and greeting is to jump square into each dogs face and bite whatever parts present themselves, not the smartest idea ever!

So, what is the deal with todays heading? What challenge am I referring to? The newest challenge raising a Vandal :-)

Don't get me wrong, my life is already filled with many challenges including but not limited to Merger, Wally, SoBe, Sparky and the list goes on, however, I seem to revel in challenge so I have added a Vandal.

He is going to be an awesome challenge however, very different yet again from the older kids here at the Peardot-Goudy household!

Some things I learned this past week: Vandal is VERY bold and equally independent. His independence is not a negative and he is very conscious of where I am at all times but he has no problem heading off on walk about when something interesting catches his eye. 

He is very fast already and has made it clear that he enjoys his time on a leash because he goes out of his way to make it clear that he needs one whenever he is out and about and could potentially wander into a dangerous situation.

I may even have to do something I have avoided with all other puppies, invest in a gentle leader! He has already at the tender age of 9 weeks and with a whopping weight of 12 pounds mastered the art of pulling me around like he were a sled dog!

Vandal loves to play with toys and loves to work for food, well he works for food until he doesn't want to anymore :-) I will be working very hard to insure that I keep food a priority as well as toys so it is a must that I have high value food rewards at all times.

Vandal got to see his very first dog run across the dog walk he reacted like any normal over the top, higher than a kite BC puppy, he screamed bloody murder!!!

He also was fortunate enough to get to watch a dog playing frisbee for about 3 seconds, interestingly enough the frisbee play had the same effect.

I will be diligently working focus and attention work with distractions, minimal at first but you can bet we will be cultivating the tremendous drive that I know he has and that I want but at the same time he will need to understand there is a time and a place.

Vandal is a wonderful mix of bold, brassy, smart, biddable, independent and equally appropriate and inappropriate all rolled into an adorable puppy form.

A challenge yes, but one I am most certainly looking forward to.

As I said earlier I just got home from the big trip and after only getting about 3 hours of sleep last night I can say in all honesty that I was not the most motivated person on the planet today, however I did clean my training building and set up some of the exercises that I found to be the most challenging from all of the past weeks seminars and spent some quality time with SoBe and Wally who were amazing if I do say so myself! 

We got a lot of practice on various weave pole entries as well as some great decelleration and weight shifting exercises, I will explain this in the upcoming blogs :-)

I am very excited about where I am with my dogs right now and I am very lucky to have the up and coming agility stars that I have.

Great ready for a wild ride, it's time to train the puppies!