Bummer ORT

As you may have gathered from the title - our ORT attempt was not successful.  I am soooooo glad that Susan brought a friend who was able to tape our run, since reviewing it multiple times makes things clearer.

What you will see is that Gimme was distracted throughout.  Early in her search she does sniff the correct box three times very quickly (the third one on the line closest to the camera position), but then immediately moved on.  I wondered at the time if that was it and almost called alert, but then she moved on so quickly I thought maybe she was just catching a breeze of scent.  You will notice that she never goes back to it.  Later in that search as she is moving down that line again, she actually steps away and avoids that box.  If I had called alert sooner we'd have gotten our ORT, but I don't think that would have benefited us in the long run as we moved into trialing... since this has pointed out some holes in our training.

Anyway, she finally goes to another box and is all over it, pushing it around the floor like she usually does - so I called "alert".  That was incorrect and we are then directed to the correct box so she can be rewarded at it.  You'll see how excited she gets when she gets rewarded there.

BTW in NACSW lingo, this is not called a "false alert" or a "failure", but rather a "miss".  Ya gotta love politically correct stuff - felt like a failure to me.

After looking this over (several times) and reviewing recent events, I have some ideas about what went wrong to conspire against us here.

First, we've never done a blind hide (where I don't know the correct answer).  I don't think I did anything wrong in my handling to pull her off and I don't believe I'm helping her in other instances.  What I do think this shows is that Gimme has a different idea of what she is doing.  When I didn't rush in to tell her that she was right, she moved on.  She is normally more persistent in class/training and I think I need to build on that persistence.  In class and training I am there very quickly (as fast as I can be and yet not so fast that I'm coming in too soon and not waiting for her indication).  In this case, with the distraction and my not being there instantly, she decided that wasn't it after all and moved on.  I think the fact that she tried showing me a box that was obviously not right, shows that she was toying with the concept of maybe just acting like there is scent there would work. 

Second I do think she is experiencing some frustration now that things are a little harder, though certainly not too hard for her.  On Wednesday our first hide was at threshold and Joyce wanted us to keep them on leash and in the vicinity until they found it.  Because Gimme was persistent in her interest about the food kept there, Joyce moved in and stood there blocking her access.  That put Joyce really close to the hide - adding social pressure.  Gimme wasn't concerned about Joyce, but I can't help but wonder if that experience paired the feelings of social pressure to what was already a frustrating experience for her.  Thus when she was frustrated by my staying close to the boxes today... perhaps it just added up.  Three times I saw her turn her head and snap toward the leash (only one of which shows up on the video) and that is something she has done before when were are working on LLW and she gets frustrated.

And last, this was not a great week for our walks.  Our last two walks (last Saturday and then Tuesday) were shorter than usual because my knee is giving me problems.  We would normally have walked again on Thursday and Saturday.  Thursday I ended up working an extra long shift and Saturday it was raining.  Besides which Tonya didn't wanted her to have some rest time for a few days after her treatment yesterday.  So that adds up to her being more restless than usual and thus more subject to distraction.  She was more distracted this time than she was when we were at this location for the match early last month. 

So this shows us training holes: 

• I've got some ideas of how to set it up so that Gimme learns to be more persistent, demonstrating the courage of her convictions, until she convinces me that she KNOWS she is right.  I'll also talk to Joyce about ideas she may have. 
• Also we need to do some blind hides.  Susan said she'd be willing to do them with me.  We can set them up for each other and videotape each other as well.  So I'll contact her and start adding a few of those into our training.

In the category of lessons learned:

• I need to be certain that Gimme gets enough physical outlet in the days leading up to a trial/test so she can be at her best.
• On a positive note I did remember to park further away and was able to get Gimme to do her business before her test.

I'm trying to have a positive attitude about this "miss".  Still feels like a failure to me, but at least I have a fair idea of what went wrong and a training plan.  I'm going to enter her right away for the ORT on April Fools Day in Oregon City, Oregon.  If we don't pass that one, we have to wait until September for the next one.