Motivational hand touches and other things.

First of all let me say that all my contact practice last week with Dylan paid off.  He came 2nd in agility on Sunday!  Not by the skin of his teeth but by doing his contacts properly, right to the bottom etc.

Today we went for our morning beach walk, practised hand touches, spins, recalls and RZs while there.  I had to put Percy on her lead as she was determined to find a dead fish to roll in again and I wouldn't have had time to bath her before leaving for work.  Need to work on that distraction.

It rained most of the day.  Alela's stitches are looking fine and she has brightened up now after her operation.

We played indoors this afternoon, doing motivational hand touches, walking backwards from me, right across the room and playing the bed games.

POA for tomorrow:  Random, fast sits and downs.  Aim 10 fast sits and downs from each dog.

Games played today

On the walk on the beach.  With all three dogs: Whiplash head recalls, CGs, IYCs, RZs (loads).

In the garden:

Dylan:  Tuggers, like Susan Garrett with Swagger.  Dylan is much more into his tugging now but seems to have a preference for one tuggy so we played with three tuggies.   - 9/10 successful I think.   He also got his down contacts well and is speeding up in the weaves.  In the box sits, downs and stands - 10/10.  Walking across my wobble board from one bed to the other.  8.

Ponto:  Crate Games - brilliant with distractions, did a restrained race back to the crate from further distance.  Using four two by two weave poles now.   In your box sits, downs and stands - 5/10 for these but it was less so progress happening.  Walking across wobble board from bed to bed 6.

Percy:  Send aways using her ball.  She is old, dislikes tugging anything, only plays with a very soft ball, so we practised that.  Very good at her in the box sits, downs and stands - 10.

POA for tomorrow while at a show.

Sit tugs runs.   Can you do it in a box downs, sits, stands.  Crate games close to the car.  Plenty Look at Thats for Ponto as she is not competing but continuing to practise not being reactive to other dogs.

Did I stick to POA's - yes!

Alela was spayed and is home safe and sound from the vet, if still a bit dopey.

Ponto is improving in crate games well.  She waits and comes out and now runs back in after collar grab.  Hand touches very good these days.   Played In a Box with her stands, sits, downs.   Sits from standing, stands from sits or downs, but often downs instead of sits when I am in strange positions and if already down.  I had a lightbulb moment and realised that in early training I had always said "Up sit".  Decided to change word for sit to "assis" (i.e. French) this is beginning to work better than sit in the In your Box games.  Ready to move to two lots of two by twos.

Dylan v. good in your box downs, send away downs, down when coming to me.  I am also teaching him down on his contacts to ensure that he reaches the bottom every time.  Down and touch basically.

Percy - well we started the touching the paws on the wall game.  So far, one paw on the card I am using to begin with.  Might decide to play put your paw on my foot as well.  She thoroughly enjoyed herself, but I know a little often works well with her.

All of us enjoyed ourselves immensely playing together.

One year later two further training methods in between

Teri Martin in the Recallers 2 Group asked if anyone kept a blog.  I did last year, but like many of us Recallers (Susan Garrett's training online) my weakest point is my record keeping.  As with this blog, I did it well for a month and then gave up on in for a while.  Teri has inspired me to use this for my record keeping.   As for Ponto, she is still improving.  Having taken her out of agility for almost a year, she now competes occasionally again, the problem being me and my nerves that she might misbehave again.  However, last Sunday at the show I ran her with her toy, not for competition in the first Steeplechase, and then competed in the second Steeplechase, no incidents from Ponto and I easily managed to front cross at the last jump bringing her well back into the ring to me so she didn't even think about running off to chase away the other dogs.  However, some of her biggest improvements have come since I started using Leslie McDevitt's Control Unleashed book, especially keeping her calm before her run, rather than hyping her up, and doing loads and loads of "Look at That" around the rings and on the beach, in fact anywhere when we are out.  She now looks at other dogs, such as a group of collies racing past us and then looks to me and gets treated.  I then decided to do Susan Garrett's Five Minute Recall Course online.  I am still doing this course along with joining her Puppypeaks course.  Since commencing the Recallers with all my dogs, Dylan's speed has upped immensely in the ring.  His drive is so much better.  And the biggest bonus is that training, even the reactivity training has all become such a lovely game for both me and the dogs.

Right, if I am going to use this blog as my record keeping I better put down my POA for tomorrow:-

• Take Alela (border collie whippet cross 14 motnh old pup I'm training) to vet to be spayed - so obviously no training with her apart from perhaps a collar grab and a quick sit, tug and run in the morning just as a game before we go.
• Ponto - crate games, hand touches, are you a gambler and continue retraining weaves two by two method.
• Dylan - are you a gambler - especially for the downs, extreme maintenance on his contacts, Deke Game.  Dylan also visits the Nursing Home tomorrow where he will be practising (performing) his mixture of tricks for the benefit of the old people again, so will have a lot to do.
• Percy - my old red setter - I think I'll start clicker training her to put one front leg and one back leg on the wall.  She enjoys learning new clicker tricks.

Tomorrow I will comment on the above, what we did or didn't achieve etc.