What a great day to be a dog :-) I was VERY tired this morning but decided to take the dogs to the club again and let them have some more fun. It is really great having access to the field and blinds. I may complain about the surface of the field and the holes from time to time but it is great to be able to use it whenever the cops aren't on it.
Both dogs got to run around the property for a little while at first and then each got 2 working sessions.
Tor - put his harness on him and used a line to backtie him to a pole. Then we played tug with pretty much every tug toy or pillow in the car. That's a pretty big collection of tug toys ;-) The emphasis was on the "out". But with each toy he started getting it better and better. Every time we changed toys he went through a brief period where he really wanted to own that particular tug object. But he is definitely getting the idea and a few more sessions of that sort of work should help cement his out. Ended by giving him a few bites off the pole so he could launch and carry a little more. Also playing tug with him every time I let him out of the x-pen or a crate with whatever toy he brings me. We tug and out and tug and out. I think his "outing" problems will be short lived. Happy puppy :-)
Second session with him was just fun play retrieves and running through all the different culvert tubes. Too many people had shown up to work on blinds again. But it doesn't really matter at this point. He got to run and play and have fun with me. A happy, tired puppy :-)
Gata - She got out of the car and ran over to where I had been playing with Tor, grabbed one of the bite pillows, killed it and then brought it to me and shoved it at me. She made her point - she worked for the bite wedge ;-) She was thrilled to be working for a bite and was really killing it with each reward. I think she's a little jealous ;-) We continued to work on silence and combined that with the bite wedge to work on her out of motions. She thought that was just grand :-) Her heeling was on fire. Had to figure out how to reward that with a wedge but managed OK. For the out of motions we concentrated on the sit and stand as the field surface would definitely contribute to her not downing all the way. Right now I am trying to focus on speed of response and don't want to complicate that by asking her to down on surfaces that I know are hard, for whatever reason. Will deal with that in a separate session.
Also did a little bit of work on her long down with gunfire. No problems but am not going to fall for that one again. We will continue to work on it - hate losing those 10 points because she thinks it is the start of her fun. She had an absolute blast and made it clear that she would like to do more heeling for a tug :-)
Second session was running the blinds. Again used backing up to punish talking at the start. She seemed to get the idea pretty quickly. Blinds were fast and tight. Little bit of confusion about direction of turn on left side blinds but expect that from time to time since I switched the direction of the turn on those blinds with her. Rewarded her intermittently with the bite wedge. Tried to reward her after 5 but she said "No way, Jose" and went to 6. Of course, there was no one there so no reward. She ended the morning a very happy and tired dog :-)
Nice leisurely walk at mid-day.
Afternoon/evening session in our home park. Worked each dog on basic OB stuff on the concrete playground area and then played ball with each on the grass.
Tor - sits and downs for a tug. The speed of both suffers significantly when he is working for his tug/ball rather than for food. Will need to make sure that I continue to work him for his food rewards to make sure that he doesn't lose the fluency of his response. Typical problems - hover butt in the sit, elbows or butt up in the down. Waited him out or retried depending on my instincts as to whether he was going to make the final position or not. Did not use a no reward marker with these, just more or less lured him into a new position with the toy. Again out the tug and play a little in between attempts. So lots of play and only a little work ;-) Think that's what the balance should be with him at this point anyway.
He is great at retrieving the ball, even in the dark. Too bad that when I let the 2 of them chase the ball together he is more interested in chasing and wrestling with Gata and the ball frequently gets lost as a result. He never loses it on his own.
Gata - little stuff that I always forget to work on - fronts, finishes - specifically flips since she tends to get a little lazy about getting her butt in. It's more fun to jump high and try to body slam me ;-) Her around finish is generally quite good but probably should spend some time on that, too. Recalls and stays. Started using the command "Aller" as another recall command. Intend to use it as the command for the down on recall. Don't know if it will help or not, but maybe. Also did a few down on recalls. Am taking a slightly different approach since we're in no rush. I am rewarding every correct down no matter how long it takes her and throwing the ball behind her to reward. I've heard that this will help the dog learn to down sooner. Since she doesn't like to down and does want to get to me, I don't know if it will work all that well but we'll try it and see.
Finished up with some long throws on the grass. She doesn't lose the ball in the dark either ;-) Such good dogs :-)
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