Practice and Tracking Genius (6)

Gimme was overdue for a long walk, an important part of her regular mental enrichment, so it was very high on our list of things to do today.  On the way over I decided to drive by the tennis court.  I thought I was being foolishly optimistic to think there was any chance it would be available on a weekend, but since its only 1/2 mile from my house, driving by for a look-see is a worthwhile effort.

Amazingly it was vacant, but I almost kept going.  There was a lady outside and just behind the courts, throwing a ball for her Golden.  My initial thought was it would make it impossible to get any valuable practice in.  But at the last moment my trainer brain kicked in and I decided to at least use the situation for distraction training.  I took Gimme into the court and kept her on my 15' leash.  We did a bunch of perimeter walking, clicking for offered attention.  I usually just start at the gate and keep walking around the inside of the court, but this time I kept to a "C" pattern using the part of the court away from the distraction.  We gradually got closer and closer.  

Much quicker than I expected, we were able to work along the side of the court closest to the dog, within 15-20 feet of it running back and forth and Gimme was able to stay in her thinking brain!  She was able to look and then voluntarily turn her attention to me.  I was so proud of her.   I could have left then and been completely satisfied with the session.  However, the lady chose this time to leash up and head off... so I decided to see how much brain Gimme had left.

We did a bunch of "heel" and "side", along with moving "spin" and "turn" (she still needs a refresher before she can do it without me pausing).  Then we did our variation of what I call "the move" (something I saw on a Julie Flanery video).  It is: "left" "around" "thru" "right" "behind" and "thru".  Its a cute little sequence I can start with her on either side and either end up with a side transition or back where we started.  After this we did a 360 degree center front pivot, in both directions.  She had plenty of brain to work with me, so clearly she was doing even better with the running dog than I thought.  Yeah Gimme!  

Afterward we went to the place we've been walking lately, for a 4 mile walk.  We met a number of dogs and were able to manage space well enough with most of them to just keep walking by.  For the one where we couldn't, I just lured her past with her peanut butter go-toob.  After all this, she is contentedly snoozing.

I promised you a report on Gimme's tracking last week.  She did nicely.  Keep in mind our big focus right now is to reinforce nose-down tracking.  She's always had a tendency to air scenting, so we'll need to really reward this to make it a strong tracking behavior.  This week we did our drops at 12 yard and 6 yard intervals.  Its 12 yards most of the time, with two 6 yard interval drops after each turn.  

I got there early, so set a simple warm-up track (180 yards).  Gimme seemed confused at first and I thought it was because she was unaccustomed to following my scent, though she'd done it when she was still a puppy.  She got over it by 1/3 of the way down the first leg and then did very well afterward, finding all three gloves easily.  When the other dogs worked this track, they also acted distracted in the same place on my track, so it may have been caused by previous visitors or wildlife passing through the area. 

Once Nadine arrived, she set another course of 300 yards.  We alternated back and forth between the two tracks, so Gimme got to run Nadine's track twice.  The first time it was with the 12 and 6 yard intervals and then the second time it was a little bit variable from about the same interval.  It seemed to me she paid closer attention and kept her nose down better with variable drops, but it could just have easily been because it was her third track of the day and she was getting more focused by then.  

Gimme is a good tracker and really loves it.  She spends much of the time waiting, whining in anticipation.  When one of the other girls is out and tracking - Gimme steps the whining up to a proper screech.  She does not think she should be kept waiting.  And she especially doesn't think she should be kept waiting while some other d-a-w-g is having fun on the tracks.  Just sayin...

Agility (3/5)

Tonight was most interesting and it started yesterday.  I'd noticed during a walk Gimme had the attention span of a gnat.  It took most of 3 miles to get her able to focus.  Later in the day she worked beautifully with me for two different training sessions, so at the time I didn't give it much thought.

Tonight in class - I swear, the lights were on and no one was home.  Usually when she is so unfocused, I can do the Give Me A Break game (from Control Unleashed by Leslie McDevitt) and it works beautifully.  However, it really didn't work for us this time.  I finally had her attention for a bit, but it didn't last very long.

She is in season, but its far too early to be "the day" where she loses her brain.  Of course, she's had odd seasons before and I notice she's already loosing her puffiness and showing almost no color, so perhaps this will be a shortie.  I'll know soon enough.

I decided for our second turn to just work on basic stuff to help her get focused.  I wanted to do something where I could reward a lot in a short period of time and I knew exactly what I'd try.  (I told Blynn ahead of time) 

Recently I discovered Gimme is very distracted when I train in the yard, despite being able to focus and train in other more distracting settings.  I think its because she has no expectation of training in the yard.  Thus Kathy and I have been talking about using a "set-up" to help Gimme know when I want to start training versus when I'm in the yard for other purposes.  So for the last four days I've been working on it.  I started in the house to make sure Gimme knew what was expected with no distraction.  Then I did it during walks and then a brief session in the yard yesterday.  It was one of the two beautiful training sessions we did.  

Tonight when I brought Gimme in for her second turn, we just started off doing "set-up" a few times.  Then I added a few steps of heeling.  Then added a wait and release to a jump.  Next thing you know I was able to do half the course with really great focus.  

The difference was like night and day.  I can't wait to show you the video's - I'll probably edit them together to highlight the difference. 

 

Happy 3rd Birthday...

Sadly I had the camera settings all wrong, so these are not the best of pictures, but I hope you enjoy them all the same.  I also planned to get a picture of Gimme's six new toys, but "someone" has already spread them all over the yard.  The quilt you see is the one I made for her using the fabric in the colors she picked out.  Clearly Gimme has an inspired fashion sense...

We've already had a busy day, starting with meeting Frank and Tor for a five and a half mile walk this morning.  She does well with Tor and pretty much ignored the three other dogs we saw, as well as bikers, joggers, skateboarders, and walkers.

She did say she thought Tor should bow down before the Empress of the Cosmos on her birthday.  Unfortunately he's a big hairy guy, not at all cultured, and doesn't know how to bow, much less when he should.

After that we had a break at home before going to Public Dog class (19).  Class was focused on walking on a loose leash, getting ready for off leash walking.  We start by walking "butler style", with the leash draped over our forearm.

The room had two dogs on one side and four on the other, with us one of the four at the farthest end.  There was about 20 feet between the two sides of the room.  Gimme was very comfortable the whole time and even volunteered a bit of "whazzat" when one dog got a bit out of control and too close for comfort.

We had three turns:

• Walking butler style between the two groups of dogs, the length of the room and back,
• Parallel walking butler style with a team consisting of a black Lab she doesn't know, down the room and back, between the two groups of dogs (which put us closer to the dogs on our side),
• And last, walking the length of the room and dropping the leash altogether after a few feet.  Ursula walked behind us and was ready to step on the leash if a dog started to leave their handler, while Elizabeth was positioned to body block in the most distracting spot (different for each dog). 

Gimme did very well with these.  She did start to distract and Ursula did step on her leash... which in reality acted like a leash pop - so I was glad it was attached to her harness, not the collar.

Lastly they set up two stations.

One was Elizabeth with her dog Angel (who they use as a neutral dog - even though she doesn't like other dogs), who we were to work through walking around in butler style. First we did it with Gimme on the outside and then with her on the inside.  She needed a few reminders, but did quite well walking around her with such a small amount of space.

The other station was to practice precision walking on stairs.  The dogs are supposed to walk with us keeping their front feet no higher (going up) or no lower (going down) than our most forward foot.  Its been a very long time since we've done this, but with one little reminder, Gimme got right into the swing of it.

Clearly a girl with both Beauty & Brains...

Public Dog (18)

The break week has passed and we were back in class today, in the park. Gimme did really well.  She was well focused from the moment we got out of the car.  I let her walk to the working area using the whole leash, provided she kept it loose.  Once we got to where everyone was gathered, she was ready to get to work.

Most of the class was working on our secondary reinforcers.  They are reinforcers that we have conditioned so we can reward behavior without using food (not to be confused with a reward marker, which is also technically a secondary reinforcer).  Our best one is me saying "woohoo" in a really excited tone.  We are also working on slapping my thigh.  Basically you condition a SR the same way you condition the clicker, being careful to pair with a primary reinforcer at least 80% of the time.

Our task was to do a sequence of three:

• cue "sit", word marker, food reward
• cue "touch", word marker, secondary reinforcer
• cue "down", word marker, food reward

We did this sequence at least three times, and making sure once or more was with one of the instructors observing.  Elizabeth observed us the first time and pointed out that Gimme has shown a lot more excitement upon hearing "woohoo" before and she suggested I pump up my own energy.  I did and it worked well.  She also noticed that I was tending to reach for treats before I said the word marker.

Then we repeated the sequence, again three times, and with an instructor observing, but using another of our secondary reinforcers.   This time I used the thigh slap.  Ursula observed us and noted Gimme wasn't very excited by the thigh slap - I told her we were only in the beginning stage of creating it as an SR.  She also noted that I was reaching to my treat bag too early and suggested I turn it to the side or the back (soooo awkward).  Anyway, we got that right.

For the last exercise they set up two distractions about 30 feet apart and we indivdually got chances to loose leash walk our dogs around the distractions.  We started walking a race track with the dogs on the outside.  Then as they showed they were ready for more intensity, we changed up the pattern to sometimes put the dog on the inside. 

The two distractions were:

1. Ursula sitting cross-legged on the ground.  At first quietly and then as the dog showed they were ready, doing sweet talk to the dog.
2. A baby stroller with a lifelike doll in it and a phone playing a crying baby app.  

The goal is again the auto leave-it, just like we did for the person in a wheel chair.  We are teaching the dogs to wait to be released to investigate or go say "hi".   We used body blocking to stop them when they tried to go to the distraction.  When the dog is on the inside, the body blocking basically turns into a small circle until you are again moving around the distraction.

The crying baby stroller distraction was not that hard for Gimme.  I don't recall that she's been around strollers before, she was more intrigued by the weird sound than anything.  So she was driven by curiosity and that wasn't too intense for her.

However, Ursula sitting on the ground level was REEEEEEALLY HARD for Miss Gimme.  She has always adored Urs and having her down at face level was about the highest intensity distraction she has ever experienced.  She was wagging her whole back end so hard at the mere thought of the possibility, I feared we might loose some of her spots.  Once Gimme figured out this was just more of Ursula being naughty, she did a good job mostly ignoring her.

Then Ursula started talking "Hi girlie girl, aren't you the cutest ever".  I thought Gimme was going to split a seam.  She wanted to smother Urs in kisses sooooo bad.  She was able to restrain all of her body, except her tongue.  She'd turn her head about 20 degrees and repeatedly did "air kisses" toward her as we'd pass by the front of Ursula. It really was very funny.

Overall she did great in class and is really learning a lot.  She has interestingly learned to not pee while we are working, though when the need arises, she gets really distracted and will pull to the side.  We did this whole class on the park lawn and she never peed there.  I've gotten really good at reading when she needs to go.  I used to think all her "marking" was just that.  But I do notice in classes and such that she needs to go more often and more urgently, so I think she also has stress pees.  As long as I am tending to her needs for pee breaks, she does really well.  The last time we had class, I twice saw her start to squat and then catch herself and stop without peeing and then just let me know that I needed to take her "over there" so she could do her "business".  I'm really pleased to see this, since it will take some of the angst out of the situation for exterior nosework searches.

Another thing I've realized...  You'll remember at the beginning of the Public Dog classes, Ursula suggested I needed to teach Gimme to not be so familiar in her affections when we are out in public.  The thing to do was the body blocking - i.e. moving slightly into her space when she intruded on mine.  Urs suggested that I make sure to give her plenty of tactile rewards to satisfy her needs, but in a more appropriate way.  So I've basically taught her squishing - standing perpendicular to me and leaning against my legs and I scratch her chest with one hand while petting her side with the other.

Ursula assured me that restricting our PDAs would not affect how Gimme behaved with me at home.  Actually that has not been the case.  I've noticed recently that she no longer insists on giving me hugs and kisses when I am putting on my socks and shoes each morning.  She now brings me toys and tries to engage me in play, but no hugs and kisses.  That made me really sad because I love those moments with her - its something we've done since she was a little bitty puppy.  Fortunately I have learned that if I lean back half laying on the couch and throw my arms open wide, she will come in to hug and kiss me.  Gimme just needs the invitation now.  This hasn't affected our evening cuddles...

After class we went over to visit Mary and Grafton.  We had planned to take the kids to the fort's training area this morning, but they were all closed down.  They haven't gotten to play together for at least a month.  Mary said that Grafton has been mopey for a couple of weeks and she thinks he misses playing with his girlfriend.  Gimme was happy to see her boy and especially thrilled to pointedly ignore him.  She really liked his Kong Wubba, more to keep him from having it than to actually do anything with it.

I'm going to get her one to toss around in the yard.  I figure there is a good chance she won't want the one I buy, in which case Mary and I have worked out a deal.  We'll let her steal Grafton's and then I'll give them the new one.  Who says I'm not smarter than a dog?

Agility Silly

We started the day with a 3.5 mile walk, which was bumped up for Gimme by a half mile run at the start.  She had fun running along in the grass.  It was a warm day, so we got good use of the water bottle/dish combo that I found among some things I've been sorting.  I've been thinking I should get one for our walks - who knew I must've had that thought before, eh.

Came home and I put a second coat of paint on the front porch.  I'd run out of the original color and they can't make it in this new kind of paint, so I selected a stronger blue/grey that goes along with the overall color pallet for the house.  Its a new kind of paint by Behr, designed for maximum coverage of cement/deck.  It's very thick paint (almost gel like) does cover nicely, but has a very strong ammonia smell.  I was worried that I might end up with a migraine, but I finished with the steps where I had good air flow, so that didn't happen.

Class was a good learning experience.  Gimme was pretty silly and not as focused as I know she can be.  That is at least partly because she hasn't been to class in nearly a month.  Still there were some really good moments. 

Her start line stays were mostly nice, especially given I purposely bumped up the distraction level.  Both times on the weaves she missed the first time, but when presented again from a couple obstacles back, she caught the entries and did a nice solid job.  Since we haven't practiced weaves since the last class, that's understandable.  Her contacts were 100%.  She did have a problem getting on the dogwalk the first couple of tries.  Blynn thinks an optical illusion was throwing her off, caused by the yellow tunnel passing right under the up-ramp and visually right behind the up-contact.  I continue to see a tendency for her to swing wide around a jump if its "inconvenient".  Blynn says she can do those jumps, but chooses not to.  I think is mostly a confidence issue and not entirely knowing her job.  So that is something we'll train at home, now that the yard is cleaned up and ready.  In the final exercises she did a nice call to tunnel from a start line even though we've never trained it.

I was most pleased that she had some good focus outside and was loose leash walking almost right away.  She wasn't phased at all by the gelding that was repeatedly stomping around, kicking and bucking, right where we had to walk by.  Since she used to have concerns about horses, I was pleased with her nonchalance. 

For our first turn, they changed the run order because one of the students injured herself and the student that was supposed to run between us and her, worked her dog for her.  So we didn't get the mental warm-up time that I was planning for. 

For her second turn, we were moving toward the arena as that team was finishing up and as we approached, the large black GSD left the lady handling it and came rushing toward the fence (not aggressive, just wanting to get to its Mom).  I was focused on Gimme and didn't see it coming, but fortunately someone yelled at me, so I was able to do an emergency u-turn.  We've practiced that so its not a huge deal for her.  Once we were in the arena, partway through our turn, they again lost control of the shepherd (behind a large barrier, but we could hear it).  Gimme left me to go check that out, but others ran interference, so there was no real issue.  However she did have to do a short zoomie before she could come back to work.  On a positive note - she was totally back with me when she did return and did some nice work.

So, while not our best class... there was still a lot to like.

Once home we settled in on the couch for a bit of TV and cuddle time.  Gimme often likes to lay belly up, having her chest and tummy rubbed - she definitely likes to have her boobies "fluffled".  This is one of the times in our days that I completely love and it occurred to me, if I could stop time and live forever in one moment - that would be it...

Public Dog (17)

First, I'm rereading "When Pigs Fly" by Jane Killion.  I wanted to review some of her excellent ideas.  I was fascinated to realize how often she talks about Gimme in her book, which was written in 2007, many years before my girlie was born.  At one point she says of pigs-fly dogs, "You are not going to get a Gimme when it comes to attention."  How did she know that Gimme would have such good attention skills (well, most of the time).  She mentions her many times in the book, but this one really stood out to me.  <g>

Today in Public Dog class Gimme did so well - the best she's done since we started this ten week round of classes.  I was careful with management - especially so after going in the training room to set up and having Max (giant Schnauzer) go off on me.  He's unpredictably reactive and his owner just corrects him for it, but isn't really working on the issues that set  him off.  So I made sure there was a good visual barrier between where we were setting up and where his owner was sitting with him.  I absolutely wasn't going to risk him going off when Gimme was near.

Our exercises were interesting and challenging.  First we were to walk a figure 8 with a dish of french fries for one pole and a person in a wheelchair for the other AND we were not supposed to cue "leave it".  One of the goals for this class is to get such things on an auto-leave-it when the dogs are working.  We were supposed to body block any attempt to engage either.  Obviously we want the dogs to be friendly and comfortable with people in wheelchairs, but we also don't want them to assume they are free to greet any person they see.   As it was set up, there was also the man with the creepy shepherd sitting nearby to observe, so Gimme had to walk between them and the person in the wheelchair.

I was very pleased with how she did.  It took a couple reminders to start with to get her into LLW mode, but then she was really very good.  As we went back in the building, they remote rang the doorbell - which was of no interest to Gimme, unlike two other dogs that had a barking fit.

After that we did a session in a cordoned off section of the room with Ursula for "join up".  I'm not totally sold on the concept of this, but still it can't hurt and Gimme enjoys the treats.  Once she realized I was going to pay with peanut butter, she was almost unable to be distracted from me.  That is no small feat given that Ursula was using a whole jar of peanut butter (opened) to distract her.  After that we went out to repeat the exercise in the fenced in play yard.  By then Gimme realized Ursula was back to her old tricks of trying to distract her but never paying up... so she did really well and didn't fall for it (well hardly ever).

Then we did a session with Elizabeth and her dog as one post and the food as the other post, again with the man and creepy shepherd observers.  So LLW between Elizabeth and her dog and the man and the shepherd was a significant task.  I cut the space in half and paid well the moment after we passed between them, so the second time Gimme never even looked at them.

Then Elizabeth had us stop and she cued her dog to bark for us.  That's a special trigger for Gimme and I didn't expect it to go well.  However, it was a single controlled bark and she barely took notice of it.  We were able to get within about 6 feet and she was still able to "whazzat" for a treat.  Then we lined up for down stays and rewarded the dogs heavily for staying put as Elizabeth heeled by with her dog.  Gimme did great.  She did not do as well when she went behind us.  In her defense the poop bucket was between us and the wall and when they detoured around it, their their line of motion changed so it was headed more toward us.  I made sure when I reset her in the down that I moved her a couple feet forward and the next time she did great.

Then Elizabeth cued her dog to get crazy with active play and barking.  That was almost too much for Gimme and I had to move her a little further away.  With a little more distance she was able to work through it nicely - about ten feet away.  Given that kind of thing is very difficult for her, it was a huge achievement.  We ended with a short session of all the dogs LLW around randomly in the play yard.  After all the other exercises, this was pretty easy for Gimme.

All in all it was a very challenging class and I was totally happy with how Gimme did.  She got stuck once or twice, but her recovery was excellent.  She was quiet and content up until I had to leave to meet friends at the Freedom Shootout.  I left her loose in the house for what turned out to be 4.5 hours (the longest time I've done this) and she was a good girl (she likes having light classical music playing on the TV).  I think she is showing that she has fully recovered from our earlier discombobulation and is ready to work on some of the bigger challenges.

An interesting note from the Freedom Shootout -- where we got to shoot trap, which I hadn't done in 20 years and have a major bruise already coloring up.  We got to shoot some practice rounds with an instructor to coach us and the one I got was very good.  He figured out right away that I am left-eye-dominant, so was able to tell me what to do to correct for it.  As he talked I was reminded of stuff Lanny Bassham says in his book "With Winning in Mind".

Its not at all easy to keep your mind out of the way and to go with your unconscious mind.  I was thinking as my instructor was talking about how easy it is for us to go on a sort of auto-pilot when we are free-shaping a behavior.  If you wait to consciously note the behavior, your click is always too late.  So, I found if I treated pulling the trigger like clicking a clicker, that it went much better.  After that, for my round I hit 17 out of 25.

I understand that is considered very good and people who shoot a lot don't do that well much of the time.  One guy at our table had shot 23 the first round and 3 the next... so I beat him percentage-wise and he shoots all the time (I was uncharacteristically gracious and didn't say anything).  Still the word got around and a few people came up and congratulated me on doing so well.  I don't know of any other sport where a 68% success rate is considered good - I've gotten so used to dog sports where the standard for success even at the lowest level is much higher.

Public Dog (15)

This day did not have an auspicious start.  We were awakened by the painters at 7:00 a.m. scraping the woodwork around my bedroom windows.  Needless to say, Gimme was alarm barking and really wasn't going to settle down.  So I got up early, checked through windows to make sure all the gates were closed and then went out to say a sleepy (and grumpy) "hello".  Have I mentioned that I'm not a morning person?

I worked briefly at some of the work I had started the day before, so the things would be dry when I was ready for them later.  Gimme had great fun "supervising"... though not one of the workers would let her kiss them appropriately.  My plan had been to take her to a Fort Lewis training area for an off-leash romp.  Unfortunately none of the training areas we can use were available today - that almost never happens.

Instead I drove her to the next section of the Western Chehalis trail ("next" being defined by my goal to walk all of the rails-to-trails in the county).  Gimme had a very hard time focusing and LLW was not on her agenda either.  Still I persevered and by about half way through the walk she was doing much better.  Basically I went back to basics.

When we got home she got to spend some more time supervising the workers, while I was working on some general sorting, cleaning, discarding, etc. of accumulated junk.  In the course of painting my house, they had to pull everything away from the house and thus its suddenly obvious how much stuff is laying around.  My car port had become a huge repository for all things junk, so that is another large sorting project...  Built into the price of the house-painting is an extra dump run to haul off anything I want to get rid of, so I'm motivated to really go at it.  Since this project started, the guy who had started the yard project has bailed on me.  So the house painting crew has grown by some more workers, who are doing a yard make-over.  They are taking out some different "trees" (two of which were originally bushes), along with all the blackberry vines and excess ivy that had taken over part of my yard.  That alone will enlarge the useable yard space by 30 percent.  Its a big project that is definitely in the ugly phase right now - but its going to be really nice once its all done.  I think Gimme will enjoy having a larger personal domain.

At one point they had to have the gates open to load the trailer with some of the yard debris, so Gimme had to be in the house.  Since I wanted to keep going with the momentum I had for the de-junkafying, that meant she had to be alone.  Naturally I'm not concerned about her being alone normally, but did worry that any scraping and other noises might bother her.  So I lowered all the blinds and turned the TV to a classical country station, with the volume up... in hopes that would allow her to rest and not be bothered by outside noises.  Since she was snoozing on the couch when I came in, I guess I was successful.

I really didn't expect much of her for Public Dog class.  With all the uproar and resulting stress from our day, I figured she would not be in a good frame of mind to deal with class and I was prepared to leave early if necessary.  Actually she did really well.  I made it a point to approach training from the basics/beginning and work up from there.  I even went so far as to "charge" the clicker at the start of class.  The approach worked well and she got up to her normal capability pretty quickly. 

Our class projects were to work on "wall" (sit close to and leaning against a wall), then down stays while a wheelchair moved into position, then "stand" to be petted and maneuvering so the dog was easy for a compromised person to reach and pet.  Gimme really did well with all of those.  We worked on duration "pretty" - still building core strength for that.  Along with attention exercises and practicing "chill", which was not as successful, but she wasn't amped up either. 

BTW - charging the clicker when Gimme is clearly clicker savvy may seem like overdoing it, but it is something Morgan Spector recommends for the start of every training session.  He promotes it as an easy and quick way to get the dog into a training frame of mind; he calls it "priming the pump".  She certainly was more focused than I ever expected, so I think I'm going to start doing that at the beginning of all our on-leash walks and basically any training we do in a distracting or challenging environment. 

Overall I was very happy with how she did.  I'd really like to get in an off-leash romp before the weekend, so cross your fingers that a suitable training area is available for us tomorrow.  And remember to keep crossing your spare body parts for our ORT on Sunday.

Attention & NW (6/14)

I decided that I want to walk all the rails-to-trails in both Thurston and Lewis counties.  So, yesterday I started with the beginning of the Western Chehalis set.  We didn't get very far because Gimme was so distracted and unfocused.  She just had the worst time even trying to do something that resembled LLW.

Partly I think that has to do with two things that happened at home.  First a deer walked through the yard, hopping over the 4 ft fence like it wasn't there.  So I'm sure Gimme smelled the intruder and possibly it made her more intense about the rural smells.  It probably doesn't help that she hasn't been out to the fort to stretch her legs and run around in a week and was very cooped up for most of the weekend.

Then before we left, Ted came over and was working on some of the projects I have going on.  I don't think I've mentioned that I'm having the house painted, along with a lot of other exterior work.  The power washing and house painting hasn't bothered Gimme, probably because it is so quiet.  But the tree removal and tree topping are pretty noisy. 

In any case, practicing attention exercises is our big focus right now.  Tomorrow I plan to do another Attention O.T.R. to see if she is getting it.  Some things she seems to pick up pretty quickly - others seem pretty sketchy.

Since the last class I got in a late entry for an ORT this Sunday.  I wasn't originally planning to do it, but its right here in town, so I figure I may as well.  We do need to get Clove out of the way.

Tonight was our last nosework class for this session. Joyce set up a container search using clove, an exterior search with three hides and a vehicle search with one hide.

Gimme did very well with the container and clearly knows what to do when she smells clove.  I feel really confident that we'll get the ORT.  She did bust the stuffing out of several boxes.  I have been working on moderating her paw indicator, but its just in the beginning phase.  I realized that the "paw" cue is not specific - sometimes its pawing (repeated strikes) and sometimes its paw and hold.  So if I'm going to use it as a part of a behavior chain for an indication, I have to be specific about what "paw" means.  So we're in the process of redefining "paw" before going any further.

Our second search was the exterior and while Gimme found the first one very quickly, she dithered all over for the other two and then peed and I walked her off the area.  She was repeatedly distracted by playing-people sounds out of sight, which she's usually better about.  Also, that's the first time she has peed in an exterior in a very long time.  Later as I watched others try to find the odor, I understood why it was so challenging for her.  Joyce had placed the three hides really close so it was essentially a three-way converging odor exercise.  Only two dogs of the 6 got it and Joyce was helping them.

Our third search was a vehicle and while it wasn't a particularly hard challenge, Gimme was taking her time about it.  Since she wasn't getting it fast enough to suit Joyce, she stepped in trying to "help" her... but her idea of helping was essentially getting in Gimme's space, which then Gimme would back out to let her have the space - being a polite girl.  When I told Joyce to back off and let Gimme solve it herself... she got back to work and did solve it.  She was positively strutting her stuff on the way back to the car.  She always gets really impressed with herself when she does something challenging.

So not our best class, but I do feel really good about the containers and the ORT this weekend.  Cross any body parts you can spare.

The Weekend & Public Dog (14)

We spent the weekend at my parents' house.  It was pretty crazy all weekend.  I don't know how my 82yo mother takes care of my father who is almost 85, in declining health and has Alzheimer's.  It was chaotic and tiring for me.

We had a little excitement on Saturday at dusk.  We were all watching TV when Dad said, "Gloria, look at that!" And there it was... a HUGE Barred Owl, sitting on top of the bird feeder. It sat there at least 20 minutes - long enough for me to run over to get Scott, hoping he had his camera, since mine was at home. Finally she dove to the ground and caught something for a light meal. Mom is really hoping the meal was not one of her squirrel friends...  We didn't have a camera available... but this is what it looks like.  I was surprised to see how big it was.  I found on the internet that the females are much larger, up to 2.5 pounds.  The one we had visiting was easily that big, if not larger, so that's why I refer to it as "she".

Gimme came in later to entertain everyone.  She ran through her whole repertoire of tricks and even showed off the new one we are working on, "jumbo", where she backs onto a perch and spins around (like elephants do in a circus, hence the name).  She has the backing-on solid, since she's always been very back foot aware and confident.  But until then I had never gotten the spin without luring it.  I'll be darned if she didn't do the spin the moment I said "spin".  I think she just likes having an audience.

Today was our out-and-about Public Dog class - held at Petsmart.  I decided in advance that I would treat it as one giant attention training exercise.  We spent a lot of time outside as a group... working the first exercise.  While we were waiting our turn, Gimme did whine some and so I put her to work doing some tricks and that settled her down.  I think standing around not-doing is frustrating to her.  On a positive note, doing a few tricks works and she is able to then go for longer and longer without whining.  I could have worse problems than a dog that really wants to train all the time.

The exercise was LLW without sniffing, using the uprights on either side of the door where many dogs had clearly marked.  We walked by and body-blocked the dogs when they attempted to sniff.  I'm pretty good at body-blocking, but not so good at relieving the pressure.  I see her give way, but there's a huge lag time between me seeing and being able to change my motion to relieve that pressure.  I think next time I'm just going to block-then-unblock in one continuous motion... because Gimme is so good at giving up the space, that if I just assume she will give it up, my unblock "response" will be more timely.

Then we went inside and I quickly got separated from the group.  So Gimme and I just walked the aisles, practicing not sniffing, being attentive and LLW.  She was most intrigued by the rodent, bird and fish food aisles.  IE... "intrigued" means "challenged".   I did have to bring out the peanut butter to help motivate her to resist that level and duration of distraction.  But... I was able to give it randomly.  Overall I was very pleased with how she did.  I plan to go back from time to time on my own.  It'll be a great place to train with distractions in the winter.

The small poodle showed up late again, but this time Gimme didn't pay much attention to it.  I think since there was a fairly constant stream of dogs coming and going, it didn't seem as big of a deal to her. 

And, kudos to me - I think I did a good job managing her proximity and exposure to the other dogs.  She did well and only got sticky from time to time.  She is contentedly snoozing as we speak.

Attention O.T.R.

O.T.R. stands for on-the-road, as in taking it O.T.R.  Its been a long time since I've done really focused attention work.  Yesterday in Public Dog class, while I was able to manage her exposure so she could work - her attentiveness left a lot to be desired.  We never could do more than a few steps of LLW.  My impression was that as soon as Gimme knew where we were, she started checking out, instead of checking in.

Don't get me wrong... she wasn't bad or misbehaving.  I just thought she wasn't really focused or putting in her best effort, even though I managed space so she was clearly well under threshold.  My thinking is that, we've been to class often enough and had it go awry often enough, that she's developing a habit of being inattentive.  Of course that is my fault.  I wasn't managing the pressure well enough and as a result didn't feel right about expecting more from her.  Thus she is thinking that's the new normal.

Kathy once shared with me the idea of taking her many different places and working only attention.  What was a great about the idea was the suggestion that in a large enough parking lot you can get back in the car, drive two rows over and get out to train again and its just like a new location.  I used to do that a lot and was seeing good results.

I decided to use much the same technique and just pull over every little place on the way to the fort's training areas.  I am also using a technique to measure and track attention that I saw described on line.  It was such a good idea that I've kept the email for 15 months.  I'm such a procrastinator that I haven't done anything with it for 15 months.  The idea is:

With a dog that gives you attention, go count out 20 treats, and go somewhere new. Time how long it takes 1) for the dog to give attention when you get there, and 2) how long it takes him to earn the 20 treats for returning attention with distractions of the new location or by visibly working to maintain attention under the circumstances. Write these numbers down. You should see decreases in both numbers, the second one helps you know that the dog is learning to rebound from distractions. This is important. HOWEVER, the FIRST number is the one you *really* need because that's the one that tells you how much time your dog needs to adjust to the surroundings before entering a ring.

I modified this to ten treats, just so it would go faster.  I also did a baseline at home to teach her the game.  At first she thought we were free-shaping something and so was throwing behaviors at me and that ate up a lot of time.  After that first round I put her on leash to limit her options.  At first she found that frustrating and was snapping at the leash.  But you can see she really started getting the rhythm of it for the last two rounds.

 

Then we took it on the road.  She did okay to begin with, then regressed substantially.  The last two were her best and I was very happy with them. 

I found it a useful exercise and plan to do it once a week.  These Out and About we did on the way to the training areas and it added almost an hour to a 20 minute drive - so it isn't something I'd do all the time - at least not ten rounds.  Two to four rounds could be doable when I'm out doing something or when I'm on the way home from classes.  I also plan to incorporate the rhythm of this into classes - to teach her that attentiveness is important no matter where we are.

From there we went to the fort's training area and walked 3 miles.  It was hot and dry and now my feet hurt...

Seminar and Public Dog (13)

We had a two day seminar this weekend in Corvallis Oregon.  I drove down Friday and came back Sunday night. 

 

Debbi Decker was fun, nice and entertaining.  That day was mostly about clever ways to teach tricks, though nothing really "exciting" (I'll describe them in the blog).  She relies a LOT on luring, which isn't my favorite way to teach things and not as useful for Gimme.  Kris Hurley on Sunday was all about Mental Management ("With Winning in Mind", Lanny Bassham), though that was only mentioned in passing in the seminar promotion materials.  She's about to become a certified MM instructor.  There were no exercises with the dogs - or even with people, even though it was advertised as a working seminar for people.  I guess she thinks a 6.5 hour "discussion" qualifies as a working seminar.  It was okay, but I wouldn't pay money for her again.

 

It worked out great for us because the seminar was in Julie's new building with 5000 sq ft usable floor space. Early sessions only had 5 dogs out at a time.  I used wire guides to make a reminder barrier, so that other teams wouldn't unintentionally encroach on our corner.  Also, I told the instructor we'd signed up for a working slot when Gimme was doing much better, about our recent regression, and to please look for us in the far corner.

 

We started the day by walking the grounds and coming in before others arrived to work on focus. She wasn't worried - just distracted. So I worked with her until I was getting good check-ins and cue responsiveness.

 

During the seminar, Debbi came to us last for each session, by which time I had already done a lot of "whazzat", so Gimme was focused and working.  Debbi was really impressed with how smart Gimme is and had a lot of nice things to say about her, calling her "exciting" and "gorgeous".

 

For the 3rd and 4th sessions, there were 8-10 teams on the floor and Gimme  was still able to work nicely.  It was a little harder for her, so I made it a point to cue "pretty" (a sit up "pretty", as opposed to stand up "dance") and then rewarded her with PB.  I've been using the PB to get her to hold the position with the intention of building her core strength.  With regular treats its hard to dole them out smoothly and she has a greater tendency to try and grab my hand with her paws to steady herself.  Plus she's not as inclined to work hard like she will for PB.  So in this case I was able to get two benefits from it.

 

During one of our sessions in the building we were doing LAT and I noticed that Gimme had stopped turning her head all the way to look at the dogs when I cued "whazzat". Basically she was looking at the wall behind and to my right and then looking at me. I immediately thought someone was *sneaking* up from that side and turned to look. Instead I discovered my little canine genius was using a wall mirror and dog reflections to play LAT.  She's always been fascinated by mirrors and particularly likes to pose in front of them and admire her lovely self. She'll even turn so she can admire the other side of her lovely self. So she obviously knows what they do - I just never thought she'd be aware enough conceptually to use them in that way.

 

We skipped one session because I found her sound asleep and I didn't have the heart to wake her. Then for the last session when I brought her in, she wasn't nearly as focused. A couple of teams were close... though not any more than had already happened. I saw her getting stuck and even with helping her get unstuck, she couldn't work for the cheese. So I worked through her slow and minimal behaviors to a known cue until I got a good response and then rewarded with peanut butter. Cued it again, got a faster and better response and I rewarded her heavily and headed back to the car.  It was particularly helpful for me to have looked at the descriptions in what I was writing and to distil it down to a short list of clues that she was reaching her limits.  Having just done that, when I saw two things from the list, I immediately recognized it and changed gears. 

 

One thing I noticed when she was getting a little stuck was that when I touched her she didn't turn to me right away. She's so tactile and normally responds to any touch by turning to see what she can get from it. So, I decided to play with that during class today, where she was immediately responsive to it every time (even for the poodle - see below).  I will try it in other situations to see if its consistent that she doesn't respond quickly when she's concerned.  If so, it may be an easy "test" for when I suspect the environment is getting to her and before it other clues become evident. 

 

In hindsight I should have let her take the rest of Saturday off when she slept through me walking up to the car the first time (she's "psychic" and usually wakes up when I even *think* about getting her). Still I found it encouraging that she was able to work through it...

 

Interestingly, after noticing the difference in her evening behaviors last week... Friday night when we arrived at Motel 6, she was calm and barely noticed the motel noises. She'd lift her head and softly wuffed once or twice. On Saturday, she was much edgier and barked several times. I went to bed leaving the TV on to obscure much of the hotel noises, turning it off at 3am. So I think evening behavior will be a consistent after-the-fact assessment of how well I managed her exposure during the day. 

 

On Saturday night when Gimme was alerting to motel noises with alarm barking...  one of the times I said "what's that" after she bounded off the bed to the door.  Instead of continuing to bark as I tried to cajole her to stop (as I had the other times), she immediately ran to me with a change of attitude, thinking I'd cued "whazzat" (which is why I picked that cue). It worked in the morning too...

 

I got "Through A Dog's Ear" CDs from the library and thank God I did instead of spending money on them.   For one thing, I didn't notice any measurable improvement for Gimme.  And equally important, I found them intensely annoying. I kept waiting for the next note and it was like Chinese Water Torture, just exhausting...  I may consider getting a white noise machine or a small CD player and some white noise type CDs, for when we travel.  And could use it here at home when she's had a stressful day.

 

For today's class, she did pretty well.   We were in the park, so it was easy to move around and use space effectively.  She was whining a lot, but I took it more that she was wanting to be "doing" something rather than stressed.  This class tends to include a fair amount of standing around and that frustrates her.  Once we started really working the dogs, then she got quiet and worked well.  I did notice that she often was watching the dog that came late (small poodle) keeping one eye on it almost the whole time.  The poodle did look in our direction a fair amount, so that could have been part of it - it could also be sudden environmental change, because of them joining our group so late.  She responded instantly every time I touched her, so I'll watch to see if that turns out to be a good test for us. 

 

Ursula saw her flirting with Tor (Alaskan Malamute) and she has always been more comfortable with him.  So Frank and I are going to try to get together to go walking together, maybe Friday.  She needs more opportunities to walk with dogs that are well behaved.

For class on Thursdays (and all classes in the building) I have pretty much decided to continue grabbing the area that has the the only separate door to the outside. I'll also take the expen and stretch it around our space, enclosing the door. I can park my car right outside the door, backing in, so I can use it as a station as well as having her matt inside.  There are also visual dividers that I can set up as needed.  My initial approach was to start in the building and then leave for breaks... but that didn't seem to work well enough. So now I'm going to flip that and work outside and then dip in for short times, building up from there. Which of course, in hindsight makes perfect sense. Far better to start from a calm place and add small amounts of challenge than to start in a pressured place and try to relieve it. Duhhh...

 

Also I've been thinking I should try DAP again and see if its beneficial.  I tried it and it didn't work when I was trying to solve her car whining, back when I thought it was a stress issue.  Perhaps that wasn't a fair test, since I later realized its anticipatory whining, which is a rather different thing.

Comparing Public Dog (13) & Agility classes

Monday was supposed to be our out-and-about class, but Ursula wanted the opportunity to work the dogs off leash in a fenced in space so we met at the training building.  The rest of us were in the building, with the enormous industrial door open to the outside.  I set up off to one side with our own personal door leading right to my car.  I also set up a visual divider, but only one so Gimme could still see the dogs around the side.

While Ursula and I have discussed using distance more to relieve pressure, I am still not doing it effectively.  Partly I unconsciously think I have to listen to exercise instructions, despite whether Gimme needs a break.  I agreed to Ursula's recommendation to follow along in the class and heed hers and Elizabeth's suggestions.  So I think I have to live up to that too.  Also there is a certain social pressure to look like I'm not babying Gimme.  In reality I'm not living up to my primary obligation, which is to look after Gimme's needs.

I want to talk to the Ursula again to say that I want to remove any "expectation" that I will participate in class exercises.  I will participate only when Gimme is comfortable and able to have a decidedly positive and confidence boosting experience - not just get through it.  Maybe its okay for pets to simply "get through it", but with my performance goals I'm going to need a lot more than that.  I want confidence and attitude.

I also have to talk to Ursula about Elizabeth's lack of familiarity with Gimme.  Ursula and I learned early that Gimme does not show her stress in obvious ways.  One deceptive thing is that she has what I call "leaky tail" and her emotions leak out her tail.  All of her emotions: happy, joy, fun, stress, anxiety, fear and uncertainty; they all result in wagging.  To complicate things there isn't much difference between the quality of the wag either.  Her tail only stops wagging when she is totally relaxed, asleep (though it often wags then too) or when she is about to have a reactive outburst.  Frankly, a wagging Gimme tail just means she is still breathing.  In any case, I'm going to tell Ursula that I'm going to "Just Say No" when Elizabeth suggests things unless I am confident that doing the exercise will be "a decidedly positive and confidence boosting experience".

During this last two classes in the building, while Gimme wasn't becoming emotional or reactive, no feeding frenzy, etc... I've noticed a couple of things. She is externally still, but not able to relax.  Her responsiveness to cues has dropped way down.  Sometimes she doesn't hear me at all.  Other times she responds with the wrong behavior (like down when I cued "sit") or responds very slow. This tells me the environment is still putting too much pressure on her and she's still too close to threshold.

Also, after the first few minutes in class, she is no longer able to work for cheese - which she's always loves. She still eats cheese, but after that first few minutes the only way she can "work" is if I bring out the peanut butter. On a scale of 1-10, PB is a 20 for her. I refer to it as her "doggie crack". She will do anything she is physically capable of doing to get it. In the past, I've used it in tight situations to lure her through and as a reward for her best efforts.  Now in this situation, I find I have to use it to get any focus and still her responsiveness has an erratic quality to it. She does what I ask and we get through the exercise, but its certainly NOT "a decidedly positive and confidence boosting experience". I think of her desire for PB like an addict's desire for their drug of choice.

In this case I think her knowledge that I have PB and will reward with it for everything, is acting as a lure, but one that has a compulsive nature to it - as in obsessive/compulsive.  I don't mean compulsive as in compulsion training - though there could be that element as well, since I'm essentially using it to "force" her to work when she otherwise couldn't.  I am also concerned that she may be learning undesirable lessons - such that working around other dogs is uncomfortable, Mommy doesn't look out for me and the training building is no longer a fun place.  There is also the possibility of peanut butter becoming poisoned.  For example, if it shows up most often when she has something to worry about, then it could become a predictor of yucky stuff.  I want to get back to where I'm using the peanut butter for a lure in a pinch, counter-conditioning as needed and to reward her best efforts.

The other concern I am seeing is there is no increase of offering rewarded behaviors. For instance, if I reward check-ins with PB in this situation, I don't get a noticeable increase in the frequency of check-ins. She is still looking at the other dogs, somewhat intently and getting stuck. Then she'll offer me a check-in, almost like when she needs another "hit" and once she gets it, she goes right back to looking.

To me, it all comes down to the same thing, I must manage the distance better to help her feel comfortable.  Gimme could easily do all these behaviors if she were starting from her usual comfortable base.  I need to step back and regain the stable footing we had, before I can ask her to stretch to achieve more. After all, if you have to stretch up to get something way out of reach... do you pile up a bunch of unstable boxes and other stuff - or would you prefer a nice sturdy a-frame ladder.  So, I think we are going to be spending a lot more time right outside the building.  Frankly, I would be perfectly happy to spend our whole hour sitting right outside the door next to my car with Gimme relaxed and doing light training, while knowing the other dogs were nearby. I'd rather do that, than spend the hour inside with the dubious benefit of "getting through" exercises, where no positive experience is accruing. 

So, in reviewing this I made a list of signals that she is near/over threshold.  Thus far I have: 

• inability to work well for rewards other than PB
• incorrect or slow responses to cues
• lack of response to cues
• getting stuck looking 
• lack of offering rewarded behaviors

I know that was a long blather about where we are at and what I'm seeing in class... but indulge me and read the difference between that and tonight's agility class...

 

Blynn, our instructor, is a real gem and lets me do what I want. We started out relaxing 40 feet from the building and Gimme was distracted and unfocused, unable to LAT... not because the distance wasn't enough, but just that her mind was not in the training game, yet. Our first turn on the course was a bit wild at the beginning, the middle was lovely with some nice work and then I messed up and let the rate of reinforcement fall off when we were working the final challenge, so I lost her attention. 

 

Our second session of relaxing 40 feet away was much better, she was at times comfortably relaxing and even playing LAT while still laying down sphinx style. We walked on a loose leash into the arena and she did a really nice job on course with pretty close to full attention. When we were walking off the course, another team was walking in just 25 feet away and Gimme was able to LAT a couple of times, still on a loose leash, and then just ignored the dog in favor of getting to the water bowl. 

 

BTW this was all done with a combination of cheese, peanut butter and toy. I used a little more PB to start with, but then was able to reserve it for her best efforts.  This really encourages me. It feels like my instincts are supported by the results when I do it my way. Ideally I'd want to have focus and attention throughout the session, but if I can't have it all the time --- I think its better when I have more focus and attention at the end of class than at the beginning. To me that says our rewards are working, the training is progressing and she is learning. 

 

Another thing I realized today was how different Gimme was driving home and throughout the evening between Monday after Public Dog class and last night after agility.  On Monday Gimme was exhausted after class and was asleep before we got to the main road, but still alerting to every little road bump or noise.  When we got home she continued to act tired and when I tried to train there was no brain left.  During the evening she was more edgy - alerting then barking at noises outside.  Candy can testify that during the course of our phone conversation, I repeatedly had to check to see why Gimme was barking and all four times it was things I couldn't see or hear.  I had noticed that Gimme has been edgier since the false pregnancy and I just thought it would take time to dissipate.  However, last night was an eye opener. 

 

After agility Gimme snoozed comfortably all the way home.  She woke up from time to time and looked around, but then quickly resumed napping.  Once we got home she remained relaxed.  While outside she found a toy that had been unearthed by the yard man, and brought it in to destroy it.  After that she laid around comfortably snoozing, without alerting to anything outside even once.  And last night I heard noises outside.  She'd have happily trained if I asked her to. 

 

This comparison makes it clear to me that the classes are still too stressful for her.  With agility class, she leaves contented and happy.  I should also mention that while we were outside before our second session, we were snuck up on by an off leash black lab (black dogs are a special trigger) and I had to do an emergency u-turn to get her out of there.  Minutes later she was working with focus and attention and a happy waggy butt - which shows what her bounce back should be like. 

 

It all gets back to me doing my job to honor and support her needs... first and foremost, above all else.  PERIOD - END OF DISCUSSION...