Being Random

One bugaboo I have in training is an inability to be random and since she's a genius, Gimme picks up patterns very quickly.  That means she starts guessing what I'm going to say based on the pattern she intuits, which interferes with her development of listening skills and true stimulus control.

So I went online and located a Random Number Generator.  I'm going to try using it when I want to train a set of skills that are similar and require Gimme to focus and differentiate between one cue and another. 

On this RNG, you can specify the number of integers you want, such as between 1 and 3 and how much output you want - quantity 25.  Push a button and within moments you will get a string that is random. 

Now for my purposes I would want a roughly equal representation.  So I cut and paste the string of numbers into Word and replace each number with a cue, such as 1=high, 2=five, and 3=pretty.  Then as I use the replace, it will tell you how many replacements were made and from that you can gauge if its distributed in a roughly equal way. 

I did it twice.  The first time wasn't even close, but the second time was 9-9-7... which was just fine. 

Nosework (4/10)

Gimme had nosework class this morning and did a great job, as always.  Nosework really wipes out her little doggie brain for a few hours.  Usually I've been at work all day, so there is rarely time to train before class and too lazy to train at midnight after class.   So one advantage of having morning class is that later in the day I can have another training session. 

Joyce put out some really tough hides for her.  I have to say Gimme is very persistent.  I remember when she was a puppy riding to the airport, screaming her head off because she didn't appreciate confinement to the Sherpa bag.  At the time I said, "one day I'll appreciate her persistence, but not today."  Well I was right, today I certainly appreciated it.  One hide was on the wall between a rolling mop bucket and a chair.  You can ask to move things, which I did, but Judge Joyce said "no"... because at level 2, inaccessible is part of the challenge.  Gimme bracketed all around it and then just got as close as she could and streeeeeetched her neck over to within inches of it.  She might have a contortionist in her pedigree, hitherto unknown.

None of the other hides were completely different, just less accessible than usual.  One threshold hide was on the side of the metal furnace unit where all the treats are, so she was distracted and tempted by them, sniffing all around them, but not stealing.  Then finally homing in on the actual odor.  We repeated the drawer hide in a different cabinet.

I think the hardest one for her to actually find was a q-tip in a crack on the floor.  She was just all over this one section of the room, kept checking stuff around the sides and going  back and forth.  Joyce asked me where I thought it was and I said the toy bookshelf.  Turns out I was practically standing on top of it.  Since we keep moving to prevent the dog from using our location as a clue - I was pretty much dithering all over the spot where it was.  When I finally got a little off of it and it coincided with her going by, she went right to it.  Me and my big feet.

Later we did another session of the leg-weaves and figure-8-weaves.  I did randomize as I said I would and we quickly moved the mean up to 4.  I discovered I was being boring.  She wasn't all that hot about doing "thru" when I first taught it, so I went slow and unthinkingly have kept it slow.  Today I pumped it up, giving the cue for the next thru before she'd finished the last and she got into it.  She's gonna be flashy.

We also did a little more work on listening skills.  Started out well and I was pleased with what she was doing.  When I tried to do a second/different listening skill exercise, I discovered I'd used up her brain.  So obviously, on nosework day, we can only do one brain-intensive exercise.  She still wanted to train more, just couldn't focus enough for that.

I considered giving her a quick session when I got home tonight, but she zoned to nap-land awful quickly, so it'll hafta wait.

Agility Class

Last night Gimme did well enough in class.  We started with a bit of emotional-girl stuff due to a false pregnancy which makes her more sensitive.  I walked her out to the start line and she peed where I was placing her for the start and then naturally didn't want to sit anywhere near that.  So we had a bit of a challenge figuring out how to set her up that still made the opening doable and yet didn't put her too near you-know-what.  After we got past that, it took a bit before she was sure I still loved her.  She can be kinda needy during this time.

However from there on, she did the course beautifully and again afterward.  And when we did the other course later, she was brilliant.  This was the first time Gimme had ever seen the broad jump and she tried some very interesting variations on jumping it.  Once she figured out how its supposed to be done, I think she actually enjoyed it.  After that she was just flying over it.

Her weaves were especially nice and Blynn really complimented us on how much work we'd done to get them so nice.  I had to confess the truth that we hadn't been anywhere near any weaves since our last class, the last week of November.  I think the little break just bumped her enthusiasm some.  I hadn't intended it to be a 6 week break, but that's the way it worked out.

After our second turn, Blynn suggested that we could stay in the arena and work Gimme's dog reactivity issue while Kia was having her turn because she never shows any interest in other dogs.  Things were going quite well until Kia spotted Gimme from the top of the aframe and turned "never" into "almost never".  So that was a little set back and I had to bring out the PB and switch to counter-conditioning.  Afterward Blynn very wisely had me take Gimme out on course and do a couple obstacles so we could end with a totally positive association.

Lessons learned -

• always switch to her front hook harness for the reactivity work, so that she's not getting an unintended collar correction. 
• always set up with a good exit route or a safety barrier of some type

I have been trying lately to work on our leg weaves and just was having trouble figuring out what I could do well with my hands that could also be part of the cue system.  Today I watched a Carolyn & Rookie youtube, to get the hand gesture she used in one routine firm in my mind.  It worked really nice and Gimme picked it up in no time.  We are kinda stuck on 4 repeats whether doing leg weaves or figure-8-weaves.  So next time I'm going to try doing a random number of repeats, using 3 as our average and work up from that to get more duration.

I also worked on some of the listening skills exercises.  Its been a long time since we worked on those and its clear that Gimme hasn't magically gotten better at it on her own.  My girl just wants to do-do-do and not have to listen and think before doing.  I did discover that if I said the next cue while she was actually eating her treat from my other hand (i.e. before she started moving toward the object), then her accuracy went up dramatically.  I think it gives her just a little more time to process what she heard before she decides on her own what to do next. I plan to work on that more in the near future.

That was a lot to cover in one session, but Gimme really loves to train.  There were a high number of repetitions and the listening skills work is a brain challenge.  Still, she was disappointed when I said the session was done.  Always leave them wanting more...

BTW we are trying Thursday morning nosework classes for a few sessions to see how that works for us.  So I'll report on that tomorrow night.

Class Update

I'm a bit behind reporting on classes.  They continue to go well and Gimme is learning a lot and doing very well on her special challenges.  Last Thursday was an especially great class.

We were working in our cubicle and she could see other dogs through the opening, though basically ignoring them.  A couple arrived late and when they went by, they let their dog stick its head in our cubicle (not supposed to happen).  Instead of behaving badly, Gimme's eyes got big and then she turned to me and demanded treats.  I was so proud.  She was challenged, made a good decision, knew it was a good decision and then demanded recognition - gotta love that. 

Then later in the same class, one of the students was working on the stairs.  Our cubicle was at the bottom of one side of the stairs and I was working Gimme on something that was hard, when the lady comes down the first flight, onto the landing and before realizing we were there, started down the flight that would have brought her right into our cubicle!  She was so focused on training her dog that she got turned around and started down the wrong side on the stairs.  Again Gimme got big eyes, totally forgot what we were working on, but made a good decision, turned to me and demanded the payoff.

And even better - after these two episodes, she remained calm and went right back to working.  There was a time not long ago when she would have spent the rest of class on high alert.  This is evidence of really good progress since both dogs were within 5 feet and intruding on our space.

The thing we were working on was related to listening skills, again.  Ursula had me pick six cues that Gimme knows well, that she could do in class and in a small space.  I picked: kennel, chill, sit, down, touch, paw and melon.  Touch is a nose touch to my hand and paw is shake hands.  Chill is to down and put your head down, wherever she was.  Melon is to push her cube with her nose.

Then Ursula strung them together in different logical sequences.  The idea was to cue the first one and the instant Gimme did it cue the next, and the instant she did that cue the next, and so on to the end.  The last behavior got clicked and treated.  If she made a mistake, we broke it off and then tried it again, starting at the beginning.  We did each sequence about five times (correctly) before moving on to the next.

The sequences we did were:

• chill-touch-down-melon-sit-paw
• kennel-chill-touch-down-melon-sit-paw
• sit-kennel-chill-melon-down-touch-paw
• paw-down-melon-kennel-chill-touch-sit
• down-touch-melon-sit-kennel-chill-paw

Even though it was hard mental work to focus like that and especially really listening part, Gimme seemed to enjoy it.  I times I fully expected to see steam come out of her ears.  This girl really loves a challenge.

Learning Styles

This week our class schedule is all turned around, because Ursula is leaving town (for a herding trial). So instead of nosework class tonight, we'll have it tomorrow morning. At first I was really worried about what affect the change to our routine might have on our ORT Friday evening. Now that I've thought about it, I think it will work out well. After nosework class tomorrow morning, we'll go to the fort for a walk. So Gimme will then have a nice relaxed evening after nosework and a walk. And since what we are working on in Ursula's class is proving to be a bit challenging (and frustrating), I think its better that we did that tonight, rather than tomorrow night.

As I've talked about so many times, Gimme has a real challenge with stimulus control. I recently learned of a model for learning styles that I think applies (been discussing it with a canine behavior researcher in Australia). One thing I really like about this model is that it talks about both the pros and cons for each strategy. "Briefly" explained (blue-green are my comments) it goes thus: 

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There are two different learning strategies. The model describes them as either/or; I think its more likely that they are on a continuum. I also think dogs may change strategy or slide up and down the continuum due to various factors. This model surely applies to humans and other critters, it just came from research on dogs. Also, though its described as a "learning strategy" in general, it seems to have the most impact on the stimulus control aspect of learning - which is also what piques my interest. The two strategies are:

• the stimulus-response strategy (doers)
• the cognitive strategy (thinkers)

In SR strategy (doers) the dog responds quickly and habitually to a stimulus. These dogs are more focused on consequences and less likely to think through what to do before taking action. They hear a cue and immediately respond without necessarily processing what they heard, often doing the last thing that got favorable consequences. They are behaving by rote in response to a stimulus, any stimulus, and then check to see what result they got. Do keep in mind this describes a learning strategy, so we are talking about the pattern of how the dog learns - it doesn't mean the dog is always that way. IE this isn't etched in stone and yes, it can be modified with training.  Also, just because the doers are not called thinkers, has no reflection on how smart they are - this only applies to how they learn a certain aspect of training. 

In cognitive strategy (thinkers), knowledge of the correct response is linked to a general rule rather than a particular behavior. These dogs might be slower to respond, but are generally more accurate early on. They think about the stimulus and pair it to a known behavior to get a known result.  While the thinkers start out with an advantage... as you will see below, it doesn't seem to last. The doers catch up and in some ways may surpass the thinkers. 

Both groups of dogs end up with an understanding of what different cues mean and the same level of accuracy. The doers eventually pick up the discrimination through association and then become much more thoughtful about their responses. The thinkers are thoughtful right from the start. Thinkers are a little bit faster to learn the stimulus control aspect of the task, but doers are usually super motivated. Thinkers with lower motivation sometimes get bored or distracted and take longer as a result. A focused doer that is not too aroused may pick it up in about the same time, but the tendency is to get over-aroused and then easily frustrated and make more mistakes. And I think vice versa - make more mistakes and get frustrated.

My researcher friend does say that of the dogs in her research project, all but one of the doers tested as overall optimistic. That one doer exception was just neutral, not pessimistic and did turn out to be moderately dysplastic. Every pessimistic dog has been a thinker. She tried to explain to me how the evaluation for optimistic vs. pessimistic is done, but I confess I couldn't get it.

I had an idea that this might be one time when traditional training might provide a "benefit"... When traditional training was in vogue, I think the doers as a result of punishment, had an overall suppression to their behavior. Then being risk averse would cause them to slow down and become more thoughtful - acting more like thinkers. Please do not construe this as any inclination on my part to start using traditional training methods - that stuff is no longer in my training bag, nor do I intend make room for it. Its just a thought I had and my friend thinks it is plausible.

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So where this is most interesting to me is that Gimme has really strong doer tendencies. As this model describes, she tends to hear a cue (stimulus) and throw out a behavior, without necessarily processing what she heard.  We've put a lot of effort since last year into what Ursula calls "listening skills".  Ursula noticed the improvement right away when we started classes this time around.  Gimme is  also very highly motivated and attends more to the consequence than the stimulus itself. Because of that, she makes more mistakes, her rate of reinforcement falls off and then she gets frustrated.

Because this is our biggest training challenge, we've been focusing on it, using the learning of "touch" and "paw" to emphasize it.  One of the elements of stimulus control is that the dog waits to hear the cue before acting and that is by itself hard for Gimme.  In the case of targeting, the prop is there and Gimme tends to see-prop-do-behavior.  Since this way of targeting that I'm learning can use the same prop for different behaviors, its a handy way to make it clearer to Gimme to wait to hear the cue.  Of course with her doer tendency, when she hears the cue - she just leaps into doing without actually paying attention to what the cue meant.  So overall, this is very hard stuff for her.  When she gets frustrated, it definitely impacts her abilities.

Please understand this isn't a case of her not understanding the cues "touch" and "paw"... she's got those down cold.  Remember what I described in my blog the other night?  Gimme was switching back and forth between them with great accuracy, as well as "feet" and "bring" with a bit less accuracy (because they are newer behaviors).  However, at that time we weren't doing any waiting for the cue, so she wasn't dealing with frustration.  And just for the record, there have been times when I've noticed this same issue with "sit" and "down"; I am 500% sure she knows the difference between those two.

In class we have been doing short bursts of training with down time between them, but its still been hard for my beautiful girl.  Tonight I flashed back to how worried Michael would get at our early agility trials and how I'd play the "get it" game to keep him busy and having fun (and thus, not worrying about what was going on around us).  The get it game is really just tossing small bits of treats one at a time in any direction, with the cue "get it".  Real easy for the dog to win and burns off a lot of energy (and frustration), while keeping them busy and entertained.

This worked really well for Gimme tonight, so by the time we did the next training burst, she was really refreshed and did much better.  The get it game worked so well, that I decided when I clicked/treated during the session to toss the treat and let her pounce on it.  That also worked and kept the difficulty of the task from building up frustration.  So our last little session was the best of the evening.

Gimme LOVES training and learning and wants to do it all the time.  She thinks training is loads of fun and quite possibly the best thing she ever taught me how to do.   She is not convinced that we couldn't do this any time, all the time, whenever she is awake.  Some tasks are harder for her - specifically some concepts - and, of course, that is frustrating.  Still she is making good progress.  I believe when she finally grasps the concepts of stimulus control, training is going to take another quantum leap in the fun department.

I love that no matter how hard it is and no matter how frustrating it sometimes is... Gimme never gives up and always keeps trying.  She is certainly the most determined dog I've ever worked with.  I really love her attitude.   And, as I've said at least quarter-million times, she is definitely the smartest dog I've ever worked with.  Not to mention (except I will) that she is also the most beautiful, most loving and most wonderful dog I've ever known...

Nosework (6/4)

Last night was the last class of the fourth set.   We started with an outdoor search, which was challenging because of the way the wind was whipping around the building.  Gimme found the first hide easily, but wasn't catching the drift of the second one and so kept wanting to return to the first so she could paw at it and get paid again.  I had to keep her away from it, which put us in a spot where she could catch the scent for the other hide.  Then she was able to work through finding it, but it wasn't easy because of the wind and where it was located.

The second session was indoors and Joyce introduced a new concept.  The dogs are used to finding odor IN boxes, but not quite sure what to do when the tin is on the floor next to the box.  Odor out in the open is just outside their expectation.  The other hide was with the odor tin on a table that was similar to a counter top.  Gimme found the odor on the floor right away, just didn't stick it.  It was obvious she found it, but then she just went on and searched the rest of the room and finally came back to paw vigorously at it.  She really does love the hunt.  Then when it was on the table, it took a bit to find it (the air current sometimes moves very oddly in that building) and when she did she had no problem getting her feet up on the table.  Some of the other dogs were too well behaved.  Gimme has always been good about searching high up - I guess that is because I never discouraged it - I knew there was a reason I'm lazy about such things

The third session the on the floor hide got moved next to cooler on top of another box.  Gimme found that one right away.  Then Joyce had rearranged the stuff on the table so there were two boxes forming a v-shape with a gap at the back and then another laid across the top of those two.  The odor tin was in a little alcove formed by the boxes.  The idea was to extend the challenge, since the scent could drift out the back between the two boxes, but was only accessible from the front.  If they get the scent from behind the boxes, they have to puzzle through to go around the table.  Some dogs had difficulty with that; Gimme got it quickly. 

Today we didn't get to walk because by the time I got in gear it started raining and was pouring shortly thereafter.  I had errands to run.  Am still trying to locate a copy of Animal Wellness so I can see Gimme's pictures in the nosework article.   I am going to weigh in tomorrow and then if the weather is decent, will leave immediately and go to the fort.  Otherwise I'll go to work early and keep an eye on the weather for a good reason to skip out.

Our training session today was more of the listening skills stuff.  Its interesting that doing this is pointing out holes in her generalization of some of the cues.  So glad I'm keeping notes so I can know what I need to work on.  Otherwise with my crappy memory, we'd be in big trouble. 

Before I forget, wanted to share some silly girl creativity.  Gimme was in front of me and I cued her to "grape" (roll over).  She did, while spinning on the ground and coming up in a sit at heel.  I was six kinds of stunned - I just don't know where she comes up with these things.  Don't tell Gimme, but I think she's the brains of this outfit.

Listening Skills

One of the issues I've had with Gimme is that she has poor listening skills.  She tends to make assumptions about what I am asking for, without actually listening to the cue I used.  She loves offering stuff and so would rather run through her extensive repertoire of skills until I pay for one.  Naturally this isn't particularly useful.

And yes, I am certain that she actually knows the cues I'm talking about.  She is learning 53 cues with more to follow, and just about half of them are strong enough that they should be on cue.  We've worked the drill to put them on cue and she has demonstrated before that she understands how cue attachment and cues work. 

From what I'm seeing, I think she just prefers to do things her way.  There's a reason I bought her a little train conductor's hat and its not because she ever intends to let me wear it...

So tonight I decided to try something new.  Leslie McDevitt had given me the idea to use the Gimme A Break game as a reset for Gimme's frustration bark-a-thons and that has continued to be successful.  There are times she will quit barking, and default sit in front of me "talking" to me in the funniest way (sounds like a cross between a pigeon cooing and someone moaning).  I use judgment about her attitude when she talks - is it just talking (I "get" being verbal, being a yakety-yak type myself) or is it frustration?  If its frustration leaking out, then we wait for actual silence, otherwise I ignore it.

Anyway, the thing I did different tonight was to cue a behavior and if she gave me anything other than the behavior I cued, then I go to sit down and wait for a reset (Gimme comes and offers me a default sit to ask to work again).  My theory being that if she isn't listening, then she must need a reset.  It took a bit for it to sink in, but then she was really trying. 

There were a few times I'd give her a cue and she would start to do something else, then catch herself and give me the right behavior.  I rewarded that copiously... since she was definitely trying to do what I wanted and clearly showing that she understood.

By the time I ended the session she was doing very well.  I was even able to alternate between "finish" and "behind".  Both behaviors start in front position and are very similar - only differing in direction.  For finish she passes on my right, ending sitting in heel position; behind, passes on my left, ending sitting in side position (my right side).  In the past, no matter which I said she would just repeat what she'd done last.  So being able to alternate and/or mix it up between two such similar behaviors is a huge step forward in understanding. 

If we can get Gimme's listening skills to match her thinking skills, there will be no stopping this kid.  Naturally I'm thrilled with this step in her understanding.  She doesn't know it yet, but ceding a tiny bit of control to me will make training a whole lot more fun. 

Nosework (3/3)

Class continues to be great.  This time we did various hides, some paired and some not.  There were q-tips in the tin, in a straw and in a plastic packaging thing (folded over and taped shut).  They were placed in various spots in the room.  Probably the hardest one - that all the dogs had a tough time finding was the odor under a leather glove.  You've no doubt noticed that YOU can smell rough-out leather, so you can imagine what a strong smell it is for the dogs.  It doesn't mask the odor of the birch oil, just complicates sifting it out of the scent potpourri. 

I keep saying I'm going to take my camera and get someone to video Gimme in class and I still plan to do that.  Wish I'd done it this time because she'd sniffed the leather glove twice and passed on... then another time she was streaking by it and suddenly skidded to a stop (a good 3 feet of skid) and snapped back to it.  That building is so strange in that the air currents are just not predictable.  Both of the other times she went by it she was going in the other direction, passing through the area where she caught the scent the third time.

One thing I really love about her scenting work is her determination and persistence.  I did a field trip to Home Depot again.  I placed one hide near the leather/canvas work bags in the tool aisle, another in the plant section of the nursery, and the last was in some plants on the sidewalk outside.  Gimme seemed to not be up to par on her scenting that day, but she never gave up - she is a persistent little squirt. 

It occurred to me that both of the other field trips we'd just come from our walks on Fort Lewis, where she drinks a lot of water from puddles.  On this day, I'd been at work and she'd been in the car.  Hydration is very important when a dog is doing scent work.  So possibly she needed to have more water.  I'll have to refill the water container I keep in the car for her.  I hope to do another session tomorrow and will make sure she's had something to drink before we go - and for a comparison will set the hides in much the same place.  Another possibility is that the q-tips in the jar in the car had been used before and maybe they were losing scent.  So, I'll have to make sure I have some new ones out of the main jar.

We are continuing our walks on the fort and Gimme loves it.  My right knee has been bothering me lately, so I'm sore afterward.  Monday I have a chiropractor appointment and sure hope there is something he can do.  I think I over stressed it on one of our first walks after the big snow when I was doing a lot of stepping over branches that had broken and fallen all over the road.

Today during our walk, I decided to spend a little time teaching Gimme to look at my index finger on my right hand.  Been planning to do this for awhile, but just hadn't gotten to it.  She picked it up very quickly, then went off to play.  When she came back I was just walking along and she came over and nosed my left hand (where I was carrying treats) and when that didn't work, she went to the other side and licked my index finger - not the hand, the exact finger.   She's just so darn smart.

Training is coming along nicely.  We continue to have listening skills and control issues.  Gimme is so smart, but she really thinks she should be the boss all the time; whereas I have this weird notion that I get to be the boss, at least part of the time.  I put a cue on something and after that, she isn't supposed to get treated for it, except when I cue for it.  Gimme is not convinced that is how it should work.  She picks up the cues right away when I put them on, but then she wants to snatch back the control right away.  Ursula says her dog Wyl-E is the same.  I'm lucky because Wyl-E is about six months older than Gimme, so I have the advantage of Ursula going before me on this stuff.  Basically the answer is to persist and be very, Very, VERY consistent.

I swear I'm going to get Gimme a little conductor's hat - since she always wants to drive the train. 

Today's Training

Since our schedule has been off for the last couple of days, I decided to do a couple short sessions today, even though Friday is normally our day off.

I started with "around" using the guides.  As soon as I set them up Gimme jumped in (edited out).  I was sure she'd be eager to get in there when she figured out that was where the rewards happened.  I opened the guides and had her go out and re-enter, wanting to reinforce how she should enter.  This session was really short - only 7 click/treats.  Do note two things... first, she never left until I indicated the session was over (unlike prior sessions) and as soon as we were both in the circle she started moving around me.  I think the idea of the guides is becoming clear to her.

This next session is a bit of target stick training related to waiting for the cue.  The idea is to present the target stick and give her the cue.  Then toss the treat and wait before giving the cue.  If she comes back and touches right away, I do nothing and just wait her out.  The moment she pulls away, I give the cue and reward her for doing the behavior with a click/treat.  This is something I think I am slow to do and the video confirms my impression.  If I give the cue and she doesn't do the behavior in a reasonable time (for now I count five) then I am lift the stick out of range to indicate a loss of opportunity.  I also lift the stick out of range when she bites on it, which still seems to happen a lot, though it is diminishing.  At some point I can also start clicking her for not touching the stick when she begins hesitating more often.  I think her touch-touch-touch and then sitting is an indication that she is starting to figure out the game.  There are clearly some missed opportunities during this session; Gimme will just have to figure it out in spite of me.

Then we did a bit of noodling about stays and heeling around food on the floor.  I haven't done it for quite awhile and obviously we need to go back to it.  It wasn't training so much as testing. 

Because life isn't exciting enough around here... now that Gimme is coming out of season, Meaggi has decided to give it a go, for the first time in several years.

Copier Pictures

I've already sent off the 4 best pictures from the 9/11 photo shoot.  I had to tidy the office before taking pictures, so it looks better than any time in the last five years.  Of course now I'm sneezing my head off from stirring up all that dust. 

Gimme was very good about getting into position and sitting there waiting through all my picture taking nonsense.  She really does have an excellent sit-wait.  In the first picture, Gimme is patiently waiting after I pushed the button for the copier to take the picture of her cute little tushy...

In the second picture, she is clearly impatient to see the final results and is actually watching the paper come out of the copier.

Afterward I spread her pictures out on the floor and let her look at them.  She spent quite awhile examining them, before tearing a couple to shreds.  I should have gotten pictures of her doing that.

There's another picture I would have loved to get, but needed someone to take the picture... I didn't want to risk Gimme breaking her stay and jumping off to get to me since its a long way down.  I may get that picture some day, simply because Gimme is so photogenic and it would be a cool shot.  But obviously not until I have another set of hands to take the picture so I can make sure she stays safe.

I have a great Halloween costume idea for her, but was too busy with other things to get it done.  Maybe next year.

We've only done a little training in the last couple days since I was fighting a cold and needed to work some extra rest into my days.  The second session with the target stick went really well, so I attached the cue.  Next time I'll start working on the exercise that I learned from Ursula.  I'll try to videotape it.

We have a working slot in a freestyle seminar next weekend.  I have been so focused on the fruit project that I wasn't even thinking about it and now here it is almost upon us and I really haven't taught her any of the behaviors I wanted to have ready. 

So, I'm also using free shaping to teach Gimme to back away from me.  The hardest part seems to be getting her to understand that I want her to go straight away from me.  On the hardwood floor, I lined up with the strips and started by clicking any time she kept one foot between the strips, then two and finally three.  Still, I'm not sure she is getting the idea and it was kinda frustrating for her.  So I'm going to lay down two strips of duct tape to form a corridor for her.  Then as she gets the idea I can cut away at the edges making the tape narrower and narrower to fade it. 

Private Lesson & Target Stick

I wanted to do one of the exercises we did in our private lesson, but needed to attach the cue to the target stick behavior first.  Silly me, I thought Gimme would remember how to do her target stick behavior, even if we haven't done it for at least six months.  Whereas Gimme thought it was really nice of me to bring a stick in for her to chew on. 

So I quickly dropped the idea of attaching a cue to the biting-the-stick behavior.  I basically had to free-shape it from the start.  By the time we finished she was doing really nice nose touches on the end.  So if she does that again next time from the start, I will attach a cue to it.

PRIVATE LESSON...

We started with some discussions, based on some questions I had been thinking about. 

Q1a.  Are we complicating the wait-for-the-cue process by using her two default behaviors (sit and down) in the mixed sets?   When we did so much work on her relaxation protocol in classes, the down turned into a second default.

• Maybe we shouldn't use them in the mixed sets for wait for the cue training.  Its possible we'd get better stimulus control, but lose them as default behaviors.
• However, just because they are defaults, doesn't mean we shouldn't expect some level of stimulus control, we just may not get all four elements.
• If I cue sit or down, she only gets click/treat/reward if she does what I cued.
• If she offers either default I don't have to click/treat it, but could do so randomly.  I can also reward in other ways.
• If she offers a default in place of the behavior I cued, no reward.

Q1b.  (based on the last question) What are the four elements for stimulus control?

• If I cue X, you do X
• If I cue X, you don't do Z (or others)
• If I cue Z (or others), you don't do X
• If I don't cue X, you don't do X (doesn't apply to defaults or naturally occurring behaviors)

Q2.  Are there times when we should change the training order for the last three of the six stages of learning?

• Yes, there are times when we would.  Actually the last four stages are what makes up stimulus control. 
• Those last four are usually on a circular cycle where they are each being taught over and over, or in random order, as understanding and difficulty of behavior increase.  Its important to specify, that when I say random here... that doesn't mean within one training session.  It merely means that between different sessions, these don't have to be in a specific order.
• Different behaviors have a different logical order for teaching.
• Plus, some dogs do better with a different order.  For instance, a dog as smart and active as Gimme will be bored with most duration work, so it works better to teach her distraction and/or distance first.  Then the duration develops along the way without boring her.
• And, which "stage" you are working on may depend on the environment in which you are working at any given moment.  IE. What I train and expect in the living room will be different than what I can train and expect in a parking lot.  I would be more likely to train for distance or duration in a familiar environment, while distraction is present in a strange environment, so initially that is what you are training for.

Q3.  In classes we discovered that stopping after 5 good repetitions gave us the best results. Am I doing too many reps at a time and is that undermining the process?

• Probably yes – even though the sessions are still relatively short, 3-5 minutes, there may be too many reps in a set.  It's better to focus on repetitions rather than time.
• We did a plan for this private lesson, where for the most part, after 5 reps we'd break off that set and let Gimme relax and refresh.  Then after a minute come back for another set. In this way Gimme was able to stay with us for a session that lasted 30 minutes, even despite the distraction of a new location (never been in that room before), despite her knowing that nosework was happening elsewhere in the building, despite the brain intensive nature of some of the work and despite the fact of her being in season.  Woohoo Gimme…

Q4.  Does Gimme know the behaviors (peach and orange), does she simply believe she should do whatever prop she is looking at, or is it still a listening skills issue?

• We didn't really address this issue in depth, rather went into training and working on listening skills.  We initially found she couldn't do a number of well known behaviors, as well as the two fruit behaviors, in that distracting environment, so we had to show her that it still applied there too.  Then she did much better.
• When we set up a different chair (folding no less), after just a moment of attaching the cue to that chair, Gimme went right to work, if slowly, so she does know the cue.  Initially the quality was lower, nose under instead of head under.  Then as the lesson progressed she went back to putting her whole head under the chair.

In other blog entries I'll talk more about the exercises we did.  There is much to do and it has become quite a fascinating process.  Gimme always keeps me on my toes.

Peach Extinction Burst

As I said I would, I did a training session using peanut butter to increase the value of the peach behavior.  I made some toast, put PB on it and then cut it to crouton sizes, making 20 pieces.  I had cheese and steak bits for anything else I wanted to reward.

Gimme quickly decided that peach was THE behavior of the century.  I spent a little time refining it and asking for better peaches.  Sometimes she only puts her nose under and other times her whole head goes under, the whole head is what I want.  I didn't want to belabor the point though, since I think my click timing is part of the problem. 

When I had 6 toast treats left, I started asking for other behaviors.  That is when the extinction burst for peach happened.  Twenty-four minutes later... 

I defined the extinction burst as finished when she was no longer:

• offering any form of peach
• walking around the peach chair
• sitting as demand
• barking
• whining
• cooing
• talking
• screaming
• putting her paws on the table to see if there was any toast left
• nose bumping my hand
• stomping her paws around the room
• pouncing on the couch
• sitting at heel
• mouthing my hand
• licking my fingers
• trying to steal leftover toast
• whomping into a down
• stomping her feet while down
• anything designed to get my attention

Needless to say, that was one impressive extinction burst.  Too bad I didn't get that on tape.

Once it was done, she didn't offer me the peach behavior except when I cued it.  I did have to help her the first two times, but after that, she was right on it.  A surprising side benefit, suddenly the sit responses tightened up a lot as well.  I'm sure we'll go through this again, but right now I'm leaving her to percolate on what just happened.  I'm sure she thinks there is something seriously wrong with her person.

Private Lesson

Our lesson didn't turn out quite as expected, since Ursula got distracted by late arriving guests and forgot to bring her dogs.  So, she gave me a free lesson on the "wait for the cue" issue we've been struggling with.  Remember, this is the third stage of learning - the one referred to as true obedience.  Ursula sees it very much as a listening skill, one that very smart and very confident dogs often have difficulty with.

We first discussed what the consequences should be for a wrong response.  I knew I didnt' want to give a no-reward-marker because of the overall behavior suppressing affect of NRMs.  Still I wasn't clear on what to do that wouldn't be an NRM.  Ursula said to just calmly walk away until Gimme gives up the behavior and joins me, then turn back and give her a new chance to be right by repeating the cue.

Something Gimme had been doing and I'd been rewarding was - I'd say "sit", she'd give me a down (her new favorite behavior) and I'd wait, then she'd ponder and say, "hmmmm that's not getting a treat, now what did she say, oh yeah it was 'sit', I'll do that".  By rewarding that, she is still getting rewarded for a) not listening, b) not giving me what I asked for and c) poor latency.  So from now on I'll do the turn and walk away until she joins me - which will make it clearer and won't reward stuff I don't want.

Ursula suggested that I sometimes play a listening game with Gimme -- in particular when she is not in training mode.  I can give her a cue for a behavior she knows well without any other prompting (i.e. not saying her name to get her attention first) and then if she does it, say "good" and give her a treat, petting or some other reward.  I won't use a clicker since that gets her in training mode and I can't have the treats on or near me.  So, if I want to reward with a treat, I can repeat "good" on the way to where there are some treats.  BTW we are using "good" specifically because it is not our click-word (ours is "yes"), so if my timing is bad, I'm under no obligation to pay up.  For instance, I told her sit and when I said "good" she had started to lay down.  I didn't want to reward that so she got nothing and it wasn't a case of breaking the click=reward bargain.  (obviously you won't muddy the water with this approach for a dog that was a clicker novice)

Then the second thing we worked on was to get Gimme to give me a behavior only when I cue for it.  Ursula suggested that I might get better results if I tried the extinction approach, with a bit of the mixed sets.  I had worried about using extinction, since I didn't want to risk weakening the behavior.  In reality, using extinction won't weaken the behavior.  The moment she stops offering the behavior, then I'll cue it and she'll get rewarded for it.  At that time, its essentially on a variable schedule of reward, which makes the strongest behaviors of all.  Well duh...

We tried this with her orange behavior (get on a box and sit) and it worked well.  We were starting to get some good results.  We tried it with peach (head under a chair) and it didn't work as well.  Although Gimme clearly knows peach, she doesn't seem to be that fond of it.  I think that's because its not a particularly active behavior, which is Gimme's preference.  So before we work on that again, I'm going to train the behavior and raise its value by using Gimme's favorite reward.  You know the one - peanut butter. 

So that's some work cut out for us in the next few weeks.  Ursula agreed with me that Gimme has difficulty with this because its not on her agenda.  Gimme's agenda is "its all about Gimme-me-me-me".  We talked a bit about this, because Urs wanted to be clear that we aren't talking about dominance stuff - which she and I both agree has nothing to do with dogs. 

Rather, its about giving up control, which has to do with all species.  A dog that wasn't clicker trained or lacked confidence won't have as much of an issue because they've never really had any control, so there isn't much to give up.  THAT certainly doesn't describe Gimme.

Nosework (3/1) & The Project - Day 19+

Its been a full week.

About half an hour after my last entry, I got the beginnings of a migraine.  Its still with me, though milder.  I was unable to sleep Tuesday.  Finally about 5:30 a.m. after a long hot bath, I was drugged enough and relaxed enough try again.  Michael chose that exact time to get up and leave a pee trail from one end of the house to the other!  Having pulled all the carpet, it didn't take long to clean up, yet enough to get me wide awake.  I spent most of Wednesday taking drugs and laying around.  Around noon fell asleep, but 90 minutes was all Gimme could stand.  She thinks that since entertaining her makes her feel good, it should do the same for me.   Got up, had lunch, took more drugs, played tug for awhile and even had a training session on apple.

Apple - back into a box, back feet only
I discovered toward the end of the session that Gimme does better about backing in if I'm careful how I treat her.  If I throw the treat too far, then she turns and approaches the box head on - which means either walking through or turning and side stepping in.  If I drop the treat between us, then she only takes a step or so forward and so just backs into the box.  I'll do that each time for the next few sessions and see if we can get backing in more solid.

That night in nosework class, Gimme couldn't get focused during her first two runs, flitting around the room and having a devil of a time finding her hides.  I'm sure being cooped up all day was the reason.  Her buddy Grafton was the best overall that night; though all the dogs are improving.  By her third session, she was back in the swing.  We had three piles of boxes and the food was in one of the lower boxes, so the upper boxes were in the way.  Gimme and Grafton found their goodies in equal time, but Gimme excelled in getting to hers.  Grafton is a little timid about pushing into the boxes, whereas Gimme was more than happy to pounce on the pile and scatter them in all directions.

Thursday I ended up working my Wednesday stores and when I got done decided to get Gimme and me out to the fort for a walk.  She was very quiet until we got on Rainier headed out there and then she fussed up a storm.  Even though the rescue remedy has been wonderful for everything else (and since), she was just fit to be tied.  I don't know what sets her off.  I think she may have a little homing pigeon in her and somehow senses when we are approaching that area of the county.  I'm going to try some different routes, but the last mile has to be on the same road.  I'm thinking in the future when she starts in as we are going out there, if she doesn't settle fairly soon, then I'm just going to turn and head home.  Even if it does take forever to get there, I can't help but think the behavior is still being rewarded.

Since it took so long to get there, by the time we walked and were heading home it was getting dark.  I rounded the corner and just barely had time to slam on my breaks, there were cars scattered every which way and just at the last moment I swerved to miss the cause of this mayhem.  Myself and another lady managed to catch the fattest Pug I've ever seen - wider than he was tall.  Since I had crates in the car, I took him.  Went to the nearest well lit home and after about an hour was able to figure out where he belonged and drive him home.  The owner was a piece of work.  He was more interested in making excuses for how Bob got out, than expressing appreciation for the efforts of those of us who saved his dog's life and for my bringing him home.  Some people!  Bob was just very lucky that he stopped traffic when he did, since minutes after I stopped it was pitch black and no one could have seen him in time to stop.

Thursday and Friday I did some parking lot sessions.  I'm revising how I'm doing that.  Gimme gets about a minute to look around and satisfy herself about the environment, then I'm pushing her more to get to work.  Basically if she doesn't turn her attention to me, I just keep moving her around, so that she doesn't have time to look around.  I think the behavior is too self-reinforcing.  Naturally this requires me to accurately assess why she is looking around.  If she has a real reason to be distracted that would be a different matter.  If not, my plan is to interrupt the self-reinforcing aspect.

On the way home Friday we stopped by Home Depot to pick up something I needed.  Took Gimme in for her usual cookies.  She'd been doing so well with LLW that I didn't put her EasyWalk harness on her - 30 seconds after getting in the door we returned to the car to correct that oversight.  HD is a great place and we get some nice training in.  Plus, as luck would have it, they have some of the most dog savvy employees at my store.  If they aren't busy, they are more than happy to work with her.  She always gets lots of attention and is finally getting used to the bizarre concept that some people actually don't want to pet her.  She turns her nose up and walks jauntily by when she realizes its one of those really aberrant types.  She's just sure they need medical attention.

Peach - head under a chair
Friday after work I did another training session.  Gimme is having a real difficulty getting the idea of waiting for the cue (stage three of learning).  My thinking is either I'm doing something wrong or I'm doing something wrong.  When I cue Gimme, its like she isn't really listening to me because she's only right about which behavior to give me out of the four I'm using (peach, sit, down, touch) about 60% of the time, whereas her accuracy is around 95% any other time.  I swear she gets it in her head which one comes next (I'm working hard to keep it random) and then doesn't listen to what I'm actually saying.  I've emailed Ursula and we may add this to our upcoming private lesson.  She says that Gimme is just the type of girl she would expect this kind of problem and that she needs to improve her "listening skills".  She mentioned having the same difficulty with two of her seven dogs.  I re-checked my notes to see how to work on this part.  I'd been doing a combination of extending the cue and the mixed sets.  So I'm going to try clicking for waiting and see if that makes it clearer for her.  And if not, we'll add it to our private lesson next week.

Gimme was less focused today in agility practice.  So I'm making the same changes.  She gets a few minutes to snoop around while I set up the exercise, then if she isn't ready to work I put her on leash and do the drill of moving her around, so that she doesn't have time to look or snoop around.  Again I think the snooping is just too self-reinforcing, so I want to interrupt the self-reinforcing aspect.  After I did that, she got right down to work and did some really good stuff.

I did some yard work today, pushing through the remaining migraine.  What should have taken an hour, took twice as long with Gimme's "help".  I've been unable to convince her that its not really helpful when she runs off with my tools, the weed eater line (while balling it up into a big knotted mess), and the big pieces of ivy I've been cutting down.  She says she only does it to air them out.  I maintain that since the ivy, the tools and the weed eater line have all been outside all along, they don't actually need airing out.  She remains unconvinced.

Orange - sit on a small perch
Since this is her other behavior we're trying to get waiting for the cue, did this today.  I selected this because its a little harder behavior than peach, so thought she might not leap right to it as readily.  I started clicking for her not doing anything and at first thought it was working... but as we got into it, she went back to "not listening".  She'd wait for me to give her a cue, but then about half the time give me some behavior other than the one I asked for.  If I waited, then she'd give me the right one.  So clearly this isn't going to be the magic fix.  I did notice that when I did a rapid succession of cues in tertiary reinforcement style... then she gives me the right behavior almost every time.  Curious thing and I'll be interested to see what Ursula says about it.  When Gimme gets frustrated she gives me a nice bark fest.

Afterward I tried easy stuff.  We got out the brick and did some "get in" (counter clockwise forehand pivot).  Gimme didn't seem convinced that I wanted her front feet on it and kept backing on.  I wonder if that's a carry over from apple or if its because of our playing with two small platforms for a stand.  The other thing, once I got her doing it was that when I say the cue as she is doing the behavior trying to get this on cue, she breaks off the behavior.  After I was done training it suddenly occurred to me why.  I have always used "get it" for a tossed treat and now "get in" for this.  They sound so much alike, no wonder she is having problems.  Smack my forehead!!!

BTW at one point she started pushing the brick (octagonal 7" diameter board) around the floor with her nose.  So I expect that next time we do melon, she'll be the push master queen...

I really want to use the "get in" for the forehand pivot because its in my head and the first thing that comes out of my mouth for that behavior.  So will leave it alone for awhile and have a few sessions of just using "yours" for the tossed treats.  Add to that all the times I'll use that when tossing her treats for resets, it should switch pretty quickly.  Then in a few weeks will come back to this and see if she's able to accept the new meaning for the cue.  It'll be a challenge and we'll just see.  She's pretty smart, so I think she will.  If not, I'll make the cue an elongated "innnnn" and then later start putting "get" in front of it.  You know I'll let you know how it goes.

We also did some work with our single stand platform, ala Michele Pouliet.  I need to go back and watch the video again to get clear in my head about how to teach it before I go any further.

You know, it occurs to me that she has so many behaviors that are well on their way.  I think as soon as we get past the hump of "wait for the cue", she is really going to take off in her understanding.  Training my little genius is such a fun adventure.

Well, drugs are wearing off, so must be time for the next dose and I'm sure I hear the couch calling me.

Melon - push cube with nose
Grape - dead bug (on back, feet in the air)
Not trained. 

Capitol Lake again

We walked around Capitol Lake again.  We didn't talk to very many people, but those we did talk to were longer conversations.  Gimme was quicker about reading the pee mail and I'm starting to introduce the idea that you don't have to read every drop, "let's go" and I start walking.  She's mostly okay with it.  There were a LOT more dogs today... at least twenty.  So by the time we stop for a peanut butter break, that eats up a lot of time.  Thus our 1.5 mile walk took 1:23...

Came home to do a session of just sit, down and touch - trying to tighten up her responses.  I'm really convinced now that she doesn't listen that closely and often just throws one at me, guessing and hoping it is right.  Either the verbal cues were never strongly in place or they've become lost along the way.  The "touch" is probably the most accurate.  However, since that is accompanied by my hand moving into position, she may be responding to a hand signal rather than a verbal.  Her accuracy on sit and down was only about 60%.  That really surprised me.

In my living room with no distractions to speak of, she should be very close to 100% on those three.  Granted we just came from a walk and she may have been a little mentally fatigued, but I still think she should have been more accurate than 60%.  I will try it tomorrow morning when she is "fresh" to establish a baseline. 

Obviously we are going to do a lot more with this before I go back to using it for the wait for the cue phase of learning on the two fruit Project behaviors that are on cue. 

Tomorrow night we start the class downtown.  Its a CGC class and so we should come out of class with that certificate.  Though, of course, my main goal is for her to be able to work in that setting.