Week 3, Day 6 - Negative Reinforcement

Played with the dogs last night and this morning. Did more or less the same thing both times - mini blind work and obedience. Continuing to work on Tor's accuracy in heeling and just having fun with Gata. She's probably crowding my leg a little more than she should, so working on that. We have to deal with that every now and then.

Unfortunately, for Gata, she has gotten into the habit of squeaking at the set up for blinds. Since I don't really like the idea of losing points for stuff like that, if/when she ever trials again, we're working on it. Plus, it is just a really good opportunity for me to try more negative reinforcement. Something I've never used very much but suspect would be good to have more comfort with.

So, I'm working on discouraging her mouth, whenever she decides to use it. I'm sort of fluctuating between 2 different, but similar, responses to noise from her.
1. Tell her "No", put her in a down, step away and let her wait about 30 seconds to a minute before she gets to try again
2. Tell her "No", put her in a down, step away and let her wait while I do a little something with Tor before she gets to try again

Trying to balance the impact on both dogs in this sort of situation. If I give her too many tries using the first approach it becomes pretty punishing for Tor. Alternatively, if I use the second approach it is probably too punishing for her, plus too many of those in a row and Tor starts to get tired. But, I'm not sure that she would understand if I put a number on it, for example, after 3-5 back to back repetitions of #1, then she would have to wait while I worked Tor a little.

This stuff is not easy ...