I am taking "Agility in da House" through FDSA, and the first game is about stays. And what would you know, my in-person trainer wants me to work on down stays with Rigger. What can I say? I don't really like working on downs and stays, so this seems like the perfect impetus to do so!
I will say... he's not doing as awful as I was thinking that he would. Of course, this is in my low-distraction boring home training room, but it's a lot better than I was expecting. He broke several times, but self-corrected, so I think we will get it with some more practice!
Here's video from yesterday.
And today's round. I pushed it trying to see what he would do without the mat as a location cue. The answer: not as good! We will work this some more and see how solid we can get it before adding in the next stay games (which do look fun1) And tomorrow I will start on turns.
I am currently working on "Zen Bowl" behaviors with Rigger. Here's the end goal: be able to have treats in a bowl on the ground that I can release Rigger to for reinforcement, without him choosing to self-reinforce in-between.The idea is that it gets the rewards off your body, so that you can do things like competition, without the dog thinking "no treats on person, no reason to work". In the case of something like an agility trial, the bowl would be placed outside the ring, and the dog is rewarded after the run. So I've been recording bits of the practice that I have been doing to see how it's going and what I need to tweak.
So here's step 1: teaching Rigger not to mob my hand for treats. We've worked on this in the past, so he's pretty good about it.
So then I tried to introduce the bowl. I gave it the cue of "pot", with the thought that I don't use the word much in casual conversation.
It went pretty good, but made me realize that I actually need to work on another cue, as well. Right now I use "yes" as my main verbal marker, but realized watching these that it has been pretty strongly reinforced for static behaviors: sit, down, stays, etc. So I am trying to refine that to mean "yes, that's what I want, and you stay there and I will bring the reward to you." The "pot" cue will mean "yes, that's it, go to the bowl for your reward". But I need a command to mean "yes that's right, come to my hand for the reward." Enter the cue "Hup". Also marvel at how well his station work and backing up has been going, and admire his solid two on/two off behavior!
And today it occurred to me that using his food bowl is probably not the best idea, since that has a long history associated with it of being able to dive into it the minute it hits the ground. So today I re-watched the video on how to do the early stages of Zen Bowl, switched to a square glass bowl instead of round metal (or glass), both of which he gets fed in, and have come to the conclusion that he probably does not know the "pot" cue as well as I thought he did and was previously cuing off the container more. So I may back it up a little bit more and repeat some of the association steps again from the second video.
So that's where we are right now. This is part of an FDSA webinar, so there will be a few more days of videos to come.
Ok... I haven't posted in the last few days. I have been training, just got hectic!
So, I tried the 2 x 2 for a few more days, and decided that the method just wasn't working for Rigger and me. I can see it working for a dog like a border collie, but Rigger just found way too many things to do with the poles, and it didn't seem like he was getting a clear idea of the job I wanted him to do. So I have gone back to doing the channel method, which has the advantage of being a "number of reps" based method, so the training sessions are MUCH shorter! The struggle here is convincing him that he needs to weave once the fences get backed off enough that he can run straight. Still, it seems like a better method. I don't have as much video as I would like, because the camera glitched and I didn't realize it.
He's doing good in his Saturday class. We're working on "sad dog", which he has gotten really good at. Need to build up the duration in class now.
And I have started up the Relationship Walks class at FDSA. Still working through the first lecture on that one. Initial "Watcha Doin" assessment:
He wants to be in the same area that I am. I have an L-shaped yard, and when I went from one leg of the L to the other, he would run over to be in the same area and then promptly ignore me to go sniff around the grass and other plants. He would occasionally glance my way, but spent most of his time working locations where the lizards like to hide. When I talked to the plant, he eventually came over to see what I was doing, but it took a while, and he promptly wandered off in search of lizards again. (My yard is very "healthy" with a large insect/lizard/other critter population, so there is pretty much always somewhere nearby that has critter scent.) When I went to the toy, he came over and sniffed it, but it was right next to Lizard City, so he quickly took off again to go work that.
So, he is more aware of me than I actually expected. I found it interesting that, while never actually trying to interact with me, he was apparently keenly aware of where I was in relation to him, and wanted to keep me in sight. What I would like is more focus and engagement from him. I'd like him to solicit work or play from me, and to want to choose me over the local wildlife. To be fair to him, I struggle with making myself more interesting than the wildlife! So there is hope that having more games to play may help with this.
I'm not seeing as much progress as I would like. We are still having fun, but I am not sure that he "gets" what he's supposed to be doing. I am going to give this a few more days, and then may go back to channels and see how that does. But first, 2 more days.
This session wasn't terrible. I clicked on some things that I shouldn't have (which doesn't help him understand!), but I get eager when it looks like he's just about to do the right thing and them messes up. The first set of poles is actually pretty good. It's the second set that he wants to blow past. So I may make them shallower again tomorrow and see how that impacts things. And move to the other side of the yard, just for a change of location.
It's been blazing hot out here, so we haven't done as much practice as I would like. And what we have done has been fairly late at night, so that the weather will be cooler. He does seem to be getting the idea. He's definitely thinking that he needs to go through the poles, but sometimes decides to go in entirely the wrong direction. But the systematic method does seem to have given him the idea.
Day 8 video:
So, based on that, I decided to try the double set again. And today it went much better! Still not perfect, but pretty good. I need more room than I have in that particular location, so I will probably shift back to the other part of the back yard. I think I am going to try the next step, which is either moving them closer together or angling them more. I'll need to check before tomorrow's session.
Well... first off, I don't think we will have this in 12 days. On the other hand, he's not a border collie, so things don't go as smoothly! But we had good progress today! Keeping it shorter and being methodical really seems to have helped. There was even one point where he started to go outside the poles, and then stopped himself and found the entry! So I am quite pleased with him. Got to around 11 o'clock before we ran into difficulty. So tomorrow is more of the same, going in the opposite direction. I should try this at a different location, but it's being so hot, and I am trying to think of a place that's fenced and coming up blank. I might try one of the dog parks, but that's iffy. I think about the open area near me, but it's got critters and scrubby weeds instead of grass. But I will think of someplace. And after doing weave poles, we worked a bit of 2 on/2 off, and some go outs. And I am beginning to learn when to use food (for precision) and when to use toys (speed and drive). Don't have that on video, but it was fun!
Cheese in the tug toy trumps salmon treats in the Manners Minder.
Shorter sessions are definitely better.
Start the camera AFTER the timer, or else it shuts the recording off. Hence only the one, shorter video. But we did three sessions.
I like his energy levels in this set of training. However, I am not sure he "gets" the idea yet. I know, the video I am following says to let the dog fail (so that they can learn the right thing on their own), but I'm not sure that he should be failing as much as he is. So, for tomorrow, I am going to go back and take a page from another "modified" version of this training and work the arc in a very systematic way and see if that gets him to understand that his job is to find the entrance and go through the poles. Right now, he is good at it if I am low on the arc, but still not getting the idea high on the arc. And I will take notes on where we have issues, success/failure ratio, etc.!
