Week 3, Day 3

Decided to mix things up a little more today. We stayed home and worked in the back yard. I did a bit of work on the mini-blinds. Both dogs already know the mini-blinds but I like to reinforce the Figure-8 pattern that I have them run. I do that by just setting up 2 mini blinds and running them, multiple times back and forth, and reward at random places. They are set up far enough apart to allow the dogs to clear the blind, make eye contact with me, and then I send them on to the next blind. They both like these types of games alot and are VERY fast and tight to the blinds.

I know that many people really worry about having their dogs look in every blind. I don't really work on that too much. It's been my experience, and I admit my experience is very limited, that judges are so pleased with fast and tight that they assume the dog looked in. But, I've also found that once the dogs are fast and tight on the blinds that I can get them to look in pretty easily by moving the helper around occasionally.

I like the idea of clipping a ball to the blind and having the dogs snatch it out of each blind before coming to me. But I haven't done it. I'm also not sure that I want to be futzing around in the middle between each blind that much. Partly, that's just because my dogs are pretty ball crazy and I would almost certainly have to stop them to get them to drop the ball between the blinds. And, I just don't like the idea of that.

It was quite interesting - we haven't worked blinds in quite awhile. But we have been doing the Bob Bailey exercise. And though, in some ways, it is the exact opposite of running blinds, it has similar principles and the dogs both ran very fast and for extended rounds right away. Tor made one mistake on entry the first time I sent him to the left. But that was it for both of them. They were both very fast and very sure of themselves - no hesitation at all.


Program: 2 sets of blinds (4 or 5 reps for each dog/set), OB between and after sets
Total time: ?? minutes
Status: Didn't use ice vests today. Interestingly, Gata seemed to have the better endurance of the 2 of them for blind work. I don't know if it was because she gets in the stock tank and lays down (Tor just stands in it), or if it was because I started with her and Tor was already frustrated by the time he got to run, or what, but I'll definitely be keeping an eye on it.

Our obedience work was nothing fancy, just heeling. OK, well sometimes that is pretty fancy with these two ;-)   With Gata I was just working on precision with her left turns a little. With Tor, I have allowed him to start to develop a bad habit that I need to get rid of. If he doesn't see a toy in one of my hands he tries to forge and wrap around my body a little bit. I'm not sure what exactly he thinks he will accomplish with this. But I guess it must have worked once or twice when I carried a toy in my right hand or something. Anyway, it's not very bad ... yet. And I don't want it to get worse. The body position isn't as bad as the head position, the lack of eye contact, and the lack of movement due to the different head position.

A fun morning was had by all. They sure do like running blinds :-)

TGIF :-)

I think we're all happy about that :-)   I'm definitely liking the new job but we all needed the week to come to an end so we could enjoy more training and time together :-)

Took the pups to the MPSC field as soon as we were done at work.  Had plenty of daylight left to work both dogs.  Started with Tor and finished with Gata.  Thought about doing 2 sessions with each but decided it would be easier all the way around to do a single seesion with each of them.

Tor - just puppy play stuff, lots of outing his tug, position changes on the field, and we even started working on running the blinds.  Started on the right side blinds.  Will teach him to run high side on all blinds, that means right hand turn on right side blinds and left hand turn on left side blinds.  Since he naturally turns left handed, it will probably be harder to run the right side blinds though he's so athletic I'm not really worried.  Just did a couple of little luring him around the blind.  When he did the turn in the correct direction I threw the ball for him.  I then ducked into the blind and called him into me there.  If he came from the correct direction, I quickly rewarded again.  Did that a few times and enough for his first session on blinds.  Will get the right handed turn pretty solid but not entirely finished before starting left side blinds and then start working on distance and stringing them together.

We ended up by running through the big culvert drains that are kept out there for no apparent reason.  Good puppy exercise plus it teaches him to run away from me to get his reward.  His default is to stare at me and will his ball/tug into his mouth ;-)  Tor had a great time running through those and didn't seem to care that they are a little slippery :-)

Gata - position changes and heeling.  Worked on reinforcing the concept of "silence".  Decided to make it a little less tedious for both of us by changing the consequence from being put in the car to backing up (away from where we were heeling).  This works really well when heeling onto the field (thru a gate) and heeling into start position to run blinds; where there are very obvious visual markers.  I liked what I got with it but am not sure that it will work as well if she starts talking once we're on the field.  I think I will try it for awhile though and see if it works.  It is definitely something that could be used in competition between exercises without being noticed as opposed to taking my dog to the car.  So, definitely worth playing around with a little.

Ended by running blinds with her.  She just loves that game and was flying around the blinds :-)  Both dogs were very happy and tired at the end of their sessions.  A tired dog is definitely a good dog :-)

Stopped by club for a little bit in SJ.  Needed to drop some stuff off with a friend there so we hung out for awhile.  Played around with Tor near the clubhouse.  Have not been focusing on his socialization as much lately and could see a subtle difference.  If that's what he ended up like it wouldn't worry me, just didn't like the idea that he was sliding backwards a little.  So will have to make sure that I continue to work on his socialization.  I think it will just take a little more work than I expected to make sure that he remains neutral to friendly.  Just want to make sure that he doesn't continue sliding backwards, he has come such a long ways.  Definitely don't want him to end up a sharp dog given my lifestyle.