Nosework (5/5)

Gimme and I have been verrrrry busy this week.

We've been down to walk around Capitol Lake twice.  I timed it to hit the quieter times, so we saw less dogs and that has interesting results.  Gimme has more time to settle down between sightings, but on the other hand, seeing less dogs makes it more like sudden environmental change - so it concerns her more.  Still she is doing very well with it.  And incidentally we are getting some good loose leash walking practice.

Last night we had our first Targeting & Shaping class with Ursula - starting the first of ten weeks of class.  We'll be hitting that class every Tuesday and then the 7:00 p.m. class on Thursdays.  Plus she has nosework class on Wednesday.   We also try to get out to the fort two or three times a week.  Plus I train about five days a week... sometimes only three minutes and other times more.  As you can see, Gimme is a very busy girl.  She really thrives on having a lot to do. 

Ursula has a different approach to targeting than I've seen before and I really like it.  I was always taught that each targeting prop had a different cue and if you wanted a different behavior, then the props needed to be somewhat different.  The way Ursula teaches it, there are only two targeting behaviors - nose touch and paw touch - so, only two cues (touch and paw).  The goal being that if I point at something and say "touch", Gimme is supposed to touch it with her nose and if I say "paw" then she should paw at it or put her paws on it.  So then its a simple matter of transferring the behavior to different items, making slight changes and putting a new cue on it.  Its very versatile.  Since Gimme already has a lot of targeting experience, she picked up this new way of doing it verrrrrry quickly.  I am focusing on nose "touch" first through all the skill levels, because she's so paw oriented that I want that skill to be solid first. 

At home I am also teaching her (free shaping) to pick up things and bring them to me.  So far we've worked with a slipper, tug toy, tiny rubber cone and a stapler.  I want her to understand the concept of pick it up and "bring" it to me.  Then later I'll just attach names to things and she will be able to bring me specific things.  After the first item, each time she got faster and faster at going from a click to sniff it through to putting it in my hand.  The stapler proved to be the hardest for her, because she didn't know how to pick it up; I think because it moves some.  We didn't get that to my hand, but she was actually picking it up and I jackpotted with all the treats I had left, since it concerned her.   Then ended the session, leaving her to percolate on how rewarding it was to do that hard thing.

Nosework class tonight was very interesting.  We had two sessions of hides.  For the first session, we had basically four piles of weird stuff and the room was made smaller by using the dividers to cordon off part of the room.  There would be one hide out at a time and when the dog found it, we rewarded at source.  Then we'd take them back to the start line and while we were doing that, Joyce was putting out another hide, so we used each of the four piles.  The goal was to watch the dog for "tells" that show when they are in odor.  Gimme tends to air scent and then when she's on it, her travel becomes very direct and her head comes down more.  Of course, that change in head carriage may be a bit different when the hides are up higher.

The second session we moved most of the stuff away and had three lines of six things... with a fair number of tall things.  Joyce put out two hides and they never changed.  We brought the dog in and sent them to search.  After they found the second hide, we took them to the other end of the room and sent them again.  I was just sure the dogs would all go right back to where they'd already found the odor, but Joyce said they wouldn't and she was right.  She said they are searching based on scent and don't really focus in on a particular sight picture in one try - though they might if we repeated it several times.  The goal was to watch and see how the dog uses odor pooling and bouncing off tall things to hone in on source odor.  Gimme didn't do that much the first round because she just found them too quickly.  The second time coming from the other end of the room she did it more on one of them.  Joyce had said it would be a very different search for them just changing our starting point and that proved to be true as well.

Gimme has been sound asleep ever since I put her back in the car the second time and is now asleep under the desk.  Its interesting she can train and have activities before nosework and still have enough energy and focus to do nosework, but never the reverse.  I never try to come home from class and train anymore.  I did once and it was clear there was just no one home.  So she'll get rest for the rest of the day and all of tomorrow so she can be fresh for class tomorrow night.

Shake Baby, Shake

I have been reading a book on teaching tricks and decided it was time Gimme learned to shake hands. 

The book recommended holding out your hand with a treat in it and waiting for them to paw at your hand in the course of mugging you for the treat.  I knew that was too much like the way I teach Doggie Zen, so figured it would be confusing for Miss Gimme. 

So instead I held my hand really low to the ground, near her paws.  I clicked one time when she fidgeted with a front paw.  The next time she moved her paw I happened to slide my hand under it so she touched me as her paw came down and I clicked/treated that.  She is so smart and that was all it took.  She quickly started pawing at my hand.

We had to sort out how I hold my hand to get her to paw the way I want it.  She tends to use her paw to grasp my wrist.  For now I'm turning my hand sort of sideways (fingertips pointing across my body) and cupped like I have water in it.  That worked to get her to start laying her paw in my hand consistently.  I want to change my hand signal to a more normal orientation, so that she'll shake hands with other people. 

Gimme very quickly learned to offer the paw on the same side as the hand I'm extending - so she's ambi-pawstrous.  And in just two short sessions, I am able to extend my hand to her from a normal standing up position, though I have to bend over a little to get it low enough for her to shake comfortably. 

She's just such a smarty...

Taking a Break

Gimme is just sure that if Linda and I have enough energy after walking 4 miles to stand around and yak it up for twenty minutes, then we could'a been walking further.  Oh well, may as well offer a down and see if cheese rains from on high...

 ...and it does!

Making Progress

Sometimes you see every little bit of progress and other times it kind of sneaks up on you. 

I realized today that some progress snuck up on us so quietly that I didn't even notice it when it happened.  Last night at nosework, we were parked next to another car with a dog in it.  Because of the heat everyone had their windows open.  The dog in the car next to us barked at Gimme when she was getting out of her crate and having her harness put on.  Gimme was whining in eager anticipation of playing nosework, but paid no attention to the barker next door.

Then after class when I returned to my car, I saw Susan giving her big Lab Tucker a potty break in the grass right next to the car.  I stood there talking to Susan for awhile.  I don't know if Gimme noticed them before I walked up, but she was watching me when we were talking and couldn't have missed seeing Tucker.  Again, no barking. 

In the past she's been very verbal about things going on outside the car - so this is really huge progress for her.  No telling how long ago she got over it... since I didn't even notice it while it was happening. 

Today we walked on the fort and met a lady with a lovely Palomino.  She was interested in Gimme, so we talked for quite awhile.  Gimme wasn't worried about the horse, but a couple of times "faked it" trying to get me to train her or pay with more peanut butter.  Have I mentioned how she is always working the angles?

After our walk, we went down to Capitol Lake Park.  That's the place where I was going last year.  I quit after a month or so because it seemed that Gimme's vigilance to everything was going up, instead of getting better.  Tonight my plan was to find a good spot where we'd be able to play look-at-that to dogs walking by.  Our timing was really just perfect.  We'd work on a dog walking by and then usually have a couple minutes before the next one. 

Gimme did very well overall.  After the first couple of dogs, in between them she was trying to get me to do other training with her - so we played eye contact game and did short sequences of simple behaviors.  One couple that walked by actually stopped and sat down in the grass with their dog about 40 feet from us.  Thirty to forty feet is the threshold spacing where Gimme is able to play look-at-that correctly.  Even though they set up right on our threshold, once Gimme was done watching that dog, she really didn't pay any more attention to it for the rest of the time there.

This is big progress from where we left off last year.  Gimme has come a long way since we were last there, so that is nice to see.  I hope to get down there twice a week for the summer. 

Nosework (4/5)

Tonight we had an interior session with three hides.  Then an exterior with one.  Joyce had brought some of her gadgets so we could video our respective sessions and then view them on her laptop toward the end of class.  Unfortunately the download time from her camera was longer than we wanted to wait through, so we went outside for another session.  We'll watch those next week.

Because these were interior and exterior searches, there were no restrictions on what Gimme could/should search, so there was no way to gauge what she may have retained from last week.  Overall Gimme did very well and found all her hides fairly quickly.

The third session outside was a bit harder in a couple respects.  She was pulled toward where the hide had been in the earlier exterior session, and I had to convince her to move along.  She was basically getting residual odor and really wanted to check it out.  If I had anticipated that, I could have started her from a different spot.  After that she was distracted by wanting to visit the line of observers (our human classmates, including Grafton's Mom).  A plus, she came away from them with just a reminder.

This hide was interesting, because it was in one end of a short segment of pipe.  It was set up so that the actual odor was at the end furthest from our approach (based on where we were parked).  Breeze could blow through the pipe, making this a "channelled hide".  The dogs were considered to have found it regardless of which end they went to, but as handlers we were to feed them at the end where the source odor was located. 

All the dogs did well at this, which is interesting since this is a somewhat challenging exercise.  Gimme wasn't fooled and went right to the source odor.  Her nose knows...

Tormenting Gimme

Gimme has real difficulty with frustration and, like most Dalmatians, with distraction too.  I think these are her Achilles heel and I expect we will need to work on them throughout her life.

When I talk to people about Gimme's issues with frustration and distraction, I notice a disturbing trend for some to assume I am just making excuses and avoiding the issues, while not trying to do anything to train through it.  That is not the case - I work on this a lot.  I work on them in targeted exercises and training specific to those issues.  At the same time, I am sensitive to Gimme's needs as well as my overall plan and long range goals, so I manage her exposure to frustration and/or distraction when that is not the thing we are working on.  My preferences is to work on frustration and/or distraction in planned training that addresses them directly, not as a by-product of other training.

Case in point - nosework distractions.  I discovered back at our first ORT that our instructor's advice at the time was counter-productive.  Since then I have intentionally ignored distraction and thus avoided frustration.   We had and still have the time to work on this and don't need to rush to meet some arbitrary timeline.  I had a plan when I changed gears and started ignoring distraction and I still do.

My instructor's recent advice was to use timeouts when Gimme is distracted.  I find that troubling, especially since the week before she told me she thought Gimme "lacked confidence" regarding nosework experience.  I realize that timeouts are pretty mild as punishment goes, but it is still punishment nonetheless.  The nature of punishment is that it operates like a shotgun, suppressing many behaviors in addition to the one you are aiming for.  I'm not inclined to risk using punishment, no matter how mild, in the context of nosework and possibly diminishing Gimme's enthusiasm for the game.  I remain unconvinced that the abstract characteristics that identify container searches (items on the floor in a line) and vehicle searches (wheels on things) can be easily understood by dogs.  Therefore, I can't in good conscience punish Gimme for something she may not have the cognitive ability to understand - that just isn't in my definition of fair.

My plan is to continue what I'd planned all along and described in last week's nosework post.  We'll be leaving in a few minutes for class and it'll be interesting to see how much Gimme retained.

Also, I thought I'd describe the fun way I've been tormenting Gimme - with training goals in mind,  working on her listening skills and learning to deal with distraction/frustration.  I'm using her Kong ball, which she looooooooves, especially when filled with peanut butter.  Whenever I have possession of Kong-ball, she finds it very hard to listen because she's so jazzed up and distracted by the possibilities.  So while she's very distracted and frustrated - she is also highly motivated to win.

I've gradually made my possession-of-the-ball more difficult, as follows:

     ball on the desk - PB in reach in kitchen

     ball on desk - PB right next to it

     ball with PB in it on desk

     next step will be ball in my hand with PB on the desk

     then ball in my hand with PB in it

     then on the floor, etc.

I've also carefully increased the difficulty of the cued behaviors from simple single behaviors to a sequence of four behaviors.  I went to four because she was giving me the Kmart version (cheap imitation of the real thing) and then running over to her ball.  In a word, she was making her own decision about when she should get rewarded instead of listening for the click.

We play this game when I am doing something else, like getting dressed in the morning or folding clothes.   If she gives me the right response first time to the cue(s), then she gets the ball to enjoy.  If she is wrong, I go put on my bra.  Next, pants, next shirt, sock, other sock...  or I might fold another item of clothing.  Between each of them she gets another chance to get it right.  She IS getting better at this.  In the context of this game she is learning to deal with both the distraction that the ball presents as well as the frustration of not getting the ball when she makes mistakes or when she thinks she should.  Its hard work to focus through those, yet she's having fun and is motivated and determined to win.  I sure enjoy seeing her progress, which makes it fun for me.

One interesting thing I've noticed since we started doing the sequence of four behaviors, is - whether she is successful or not depends partly on how I say the cue.  If I say the cues with a bit more emphasis, she is more able to hear and focus.  I'm not talking about yelling or even speaking loudly, more like the difference between "down" and "Down".  I'll be looking at that more in the next few training sessions.

Sheer Brilliance

Certainly the title says it all.  I free-shaped a forehand pivot on "the brick" a 7" diameter octagon made of 2" thick wood.  It's painted blue and has sand texture.  Gimme is very very good at her pivot.  Tonight I decided I needed to get in gear and fade the brick prompt and get this on a simple verbal cue. 

So thinking to take a shortcut, I cut a 4" octagon of blue paper.  We did several warm up pivots with the brick, then while her back was turned I moved the brick and replaced it with the paper.  When Gimme turned toward me I cued "pivot" and waited to see if she'd make the connection. 

She looked at the paper, looked at me, looked around and spotted the brick on the arm of the couch where I'd laid it.  She jumped on the couch, knocked the brick to the floor and then neatly did the pivot where it landed!

I've always said you have to be smarter than a dog to train one... with this kid there are definite times I wonder if I measure up. 

Anyway, this weekend, I'll cut a brick out of 3/4" thick wood and some thin panelling and get them painted.  While I'm painting, I'm going to paint some sandpaper too.  So I'll be able to fade from the brick to a thinner and then thinner one.  From there to sandpaper bricks, in gradually smaller sizes.   

I will save all these, because I really want to get the forehand pivot in the other direction, as well as rear pivots.  Meanwhile, I'll continue pondering my place in the universe.