Last month we were very fortunate in having Greg and Laura Derrett doing seminars in NZ. I did Laura’s puppy seminar with Sharky and found it to be very valuable. Following are some of the extra things that I learnt from Laura that I have not already covered in a previous article
It’s yer choice – idea of this is for dog to learn control, and to ignore toys/food unless you say it is ok to get it. Start with a closed fist full of tasty treats with hand in front of dog. Dog will usually use their nose and paw to try and prise treats out, but keep fist closed. When dog backs off, then give the treat from your other hand. After a couple of times of this, you may be able to hold your hand open with food showing, if dog comes to get food, then close hand. Dog will quickly realise that to get food, he has to make a choice to leave it, and it is then your choice to give it to him. You can graduate to placing bits of food on the ground around your dog, without him helping himself. This can be very handy when training with food or toys around, as your dog will realise that he can only get them once you say so. Some dogs can take a while to get this, but as long as you are patient and consistent it can pay huge rewards later.
Reinforce nose touches – I have only been doing these around my stairs for my contact training lately, but when I did the standard nose touch on the day of the seminar, realised that I hadn’t been reinforcing it enough because Sharky’s nose touch was pathetic. Since then I have concentrated on using the nose touch on my hand to get Sharky into position before doing my ladder work, always treating for a good hard touch, and he is now a lot better. I had Sharky neutered a few weeks ago, and he was extremely sore, but still wanted to be working, so I just did heaps of nose touches which made him use his brain, but not his sore back end. Laura suggested doing nose touches with a full bowl of food beside the dog, then also reinforcing the “it’s yer choice” game.
Restrained recalls – these are great games for getting your dog worked up about getting back to you. Get a friend (or if you don’t have any, the nearest person that you can find!) to hold your dog, walk away from dog holding a toy in front of you, then when friend lets dogs go, run away as fast as you can. Dog should run to catch up, when it does play tug with the toy you are holding. You can play many variations of this game – run away from dog, but when you decelerate, dog should also slow down. If stationery when dog is let loose, then he should stop when he gets to you, and look for the toy. Can also throw another toy forward as a decoy, dog should still stop when gets to you and play with toy you are holding. All of this enforces the value that your dog gets from playing with you, and should be heaps of fun for both of you.
Reinforcing release cue – although Sharky knows his release cue is “tack”, in some situations I can say “tack” and he looks at me as if to say “are you sure”, “is that really my release word?” Then I know that I haven’t been reinforcing it enough. I try and do this often by playing with toys in the backyard, releasing him to eat etc, but sometimes it is not enough. Then I need to have a concentrated session on rewarding him for releasing on “tack”. I can do this by having him sit, then when I say “tack” and he gets up, I click and treat for the movement. If I do this a few times, he is very quick to release because he wants the treat.
My articles might be getting a bit boring talking about control, release commands etc, but it is so important that you have this basic focus before you get anywhere near agility equipment. If you do not have this, then spend a few weeks playing round with your dog teaching these basic skills, and I would be sure that your future agility training will be more successful than it would have otherwise been.
So back to what I am training at present. Sharky is now 11 months old, and I have not done any training on jumps, weaves or contact equipment. But, as soon as I think he is old enough, I will be able to train him very quickly because I have very good basic control and focus. His contact training on stairs is going very well, and I have begun to fade out his nose target.
Following are 2 photos of Sharky on his stairs, and you can see the behaviour that I am expecting – regardless of where I am, he should be facing ahead, 2 feet on stair, 2 feet on grass, doing multiple nose touches on his target. Again, I have taken these photos while at home by myself (not having friends, or passersby to hassle!) so Sharky has been offering this behaviour while I have been to the side and front trying to get a pic at the right time. These stairs were made specifically for training this behaviour and I have been lucky enough to borrow them from Nana Neilson who has a vested interest in the training of her grandson! Prior to having these, I did use the steps on my back porch which would have worked as well. To start with, I put Sharky on the bottom step and asked for one step down with a nose touch on target. I graduated to driving down 3 steps to the target over a long period of time then moved back to only one step when I first started fading the target. I expected the same behaviour when I faded the target – hard multiple nose touches on the ground – but tended to reward a lot, often with only one touch rather than waiting for 4 or 5. I try and be in different positions – beside the stairs, running forward, and also releasing him from top of stairs while I stay behind. The idea of this is to encourage Sharky to be comfortable driving into position while he is in front of me. I also have been a bit more dedicated in taking my travel plank to shows so I can train in different places.
I also am currently training on cavaletti, front crosses round poles, restrained recalls, crate games, and circlework.
I will explain circlework in the next article and the value of this ,as well as discussing the different ways of teaching weaves. I have decide to teach weaves using weave-a-matics, partially because I think it will suit Sharky, and partly because it is a method that I have not used before, so am keen to try it out.
Monday, November 3, 2008
Saturday, August 9, 2008
Friday, July 25, 2008
Sharky's Diary Chapter Five - Written January 2008
Sharky’s Diary – Chapter Five
Well the Christmas break is well and truly past, the first agility show has been and that has given me a bit of a hurry up to think about my training with Sharky. I have been very good over the last week giving him lots of time, so long may that continue!
One thing that I have been doing with Sharky since he was a puppy is concentrating on his rear end awareness. It is much easier for a dog to manoeuvre itself around an agility course if it is aware that it has 4 different legs, and how to make them all work at the same time. This may sound silly – surely a dog knows how to use it’s legs? The easiest way to explain this is to try to walk an adult dog through a ladder lying on the ground, or get them to walk backwards away from you. Many dogs find this difficult as they are not in the habit of lifting their hind legs separately, driving from the front and letting the rear end follow along.
The first step is to get your puppy trotting through a ladder. I used the metal ladder that is in my garage – not the most ideal but seemed to work for Sharky to get the initial idea. A wooden ladder can be a bit easier, and often does not have rungs as high as the metal one. Your dog should trot through with head down looking forward, and should not bunny hop through the ladder, twist his head to look at you, or rush towards the end of the ladder to get the treat.
To get your pup walking through ladder, stand with you on one side, and pup on other. When pup puts feet inside the rungs of the ladder, click and drop a treat within the rungs. Then step across to the other side of the ladder. When pup is happy crossing the ladder, move to one end. When moving from one end to the other, it is good to click which the dog is still within the ladder and drop a treat within the rungs. If you always click and treat at the end of the ladder, you will encourage your dog to rush to the end to get the treat. The idea is to have your dog trotting confidently from one end to the other without rushing. This can be done at an early age as long as you have the attention of your pup. Do not lure your pup through the ladder. He should think about what he is doing, and then offer the behaviour to get the click/treat.
Once your dog is confident on the ladder, you can introduce caveletti work – often used with young horses to encourage balance. The cavaletti are low jumps which can be in a straight line or semi-circle. When your dog is more experienced, you can vary the height and distance to encourage him to watch and think about each step to be taken. Cavaletti can be made out of many things. I started using crushed coke cans placed on bricks with poles balanced on top. Below is a closeup photo of this, as well as Sharky completing them. You can see that even though Sharky is trotting round a slight bend, he has his head down and looks balanced.
Another idea that I saw recently used pool noodles strung together to make a lightweight ladder. This has the benefit that it can be used one way with the rungs very low to the ground, or up the other way the rungs are higher. These noodles can be purchased from The Warehouse and are easy to cut into lengths and tie together. Following is a photo of this, as well as Sharky trotting through them. The fact that I took these photos while at home by myself should give an indication of how happy he is to trot through the cavaletti. You can also purchase small cones and punch holes in the sides to put poles through as another idea or use that good ole Kiwi ingenuity to come up with your own plan. It doesn’t matter what the cavaletti are constructed of, but in general a normal jump pole across the middle is good. Personally I would not use actual agility jumps for this exercise because they are harder to move around and get close enough, and your dog might get a bit confused about whether they should be trotting across or jumpingthem.
I recently attended a seminar on “Maximising Performance of the Canine Athlete” run by Rachel Dellar of Hydropaws (http://www.hydropaws.co.nz/) and Charlotte Rundgren of Dynamic K9's (http://www.dynamick9s.co.nz/) where I got some of these ideas from. There was a lot of information given on this seminar about exercises to improve both the adult dog, and also to start with your puppy. Rachel and Charlotte will be holding another seminar near Hamilton before winter starts and you can contact them through the above web-sites.
In an earlier article I talked about perch work. This is another excellent idea to -encourage rear-end awareness. You should ask the dog to rotate around the perch both ways. It is possible that he may more stiff to work one way than the other. If this is the case, ensure that you work that side more often.
You can also teach your dog to walk backwards away from you. Make sure you reward for baby steps as this can be a hard thing to learn. You want your dog to think about what he is doing rather than walking into him to force him to move away. If you are sitting down, and your dog takes one step backwards, click and throw a treat between his front legs. This means he has to take more steps backwards to get the treat with is further reinforcement. Again you want your dog to move backwards confidently using each leg at a time rather than bunny hopping. Once your dog is able to perform this exercise, you could try and get him to walk backwards up a flight of stairs. This requires very good awareness of the rear-end, and you should ensure that your dog is physically strong enough to do this. Do not overdo this training, and take it just one step at a time (joke?).
Another exercise I have done with Sharky since he was about 5 months old is working around 2 stick in the ground poles. To start this work, I put up the pole, moved Sharky towards it and clicked/treated when he moved around the pole. He quickly learnt that I wanted him to walk around it. Then I was able to move further away and send him around the pole. Once he was confident with that, I added another pole and now send him round one pole then the other. This enables you to practise front crosses with your dog as well as training an “out” command. I don’t always do front crosses, sometimes get him to go round the 2 poles in a circle rather than a figure eight. Sharky loves this exercise, and I mark the finish of it with a “yessss” at which time he hoons towards me to get his tug toy. Without intending to, I have created a huge drive by saying “yes” which I think will be very useful when I start training the weaves. Following is a photos of the poles that I am using – great quality purchased from my local soccer shop for $6 each (photo 1010548). I have just recently found this shop in Hamilton which has a lot of agility equipment for soccer players which can be adapted for dog training. The shop also sells equipment on trade-me (yes I am slightly addicted!).
Thanks to those of you who have given me positive feedback about this article.
Well the Christmas break is well and truly past, the first agility show has been and that has given me a bit of a hurry up to think about my training with Sharky. I have been very good over the last week giving him lots of time, so long may that continue!
One thing that I have been doing with Sharky since he was a puppy is concentrating on his rear end awareness. It is much easier for a dog to manoeuvre itself around an agility course if it is aware that it has 4 different legs, and how to make them all work at the same time. This may sound silly – surely a dog knows how to use it’s legs? The easiest way to explain this is to try to walk an adult dog through a ladder lying on the ground, or get them to walk backwards away from you. Many dogs find this difficult as they are not in the habit of lifting their hind legs separately, driving from the front and letting the rear end follow along.
The first step is to get your puppy trotting through a ladder. I used the metal ladder that is in my garage – not the most ideal but seemed to work for Sharky to get the initial idea. A wooden ladder can be a bit easier, and often does not have rungs as high as the metal one. Your dog should trot through with head down looking forward, and should not bunny hop through the ladder, twist his head to look at you, or rush towards the end of the ladder to get the treat.
To get your pup walking through ladder, stand with you on one side, and pup on other. When pup puts feet inside the rungs of the ladder, click and drop a treat within the rungs. Then step across to the other side of the ladder. When pup is happy crossing the ladder, move to one end. When moving from one end to the other, it is good to click which the dog is still within the ladder and drop a treat within the rungs. If you always click and treat at the end of the ladder, you will encourage your dog to rush to the end to get the treat. The idea is to have your dog trotting confidently from one end to the other without rushing. This can be done at an early age as long as you have the attention of your pup. Do not lure your pup through the ladder. He should think about what he is doing, and then offer the behaviour to get the click/treat.
Once your dog is confident on the ladder, you can introduce caveletti work – often used with young horses to encourage balance. The cavaletti are low jumps which can be in a straight line or semi-circle. When your dog is more experienced, you can vary the height and distance to encourage him to watch and think about each step to be taken. Cavaletti can be made out of many things. I started using crushed coke cans placed on bricks with poles balanced on top. Below is a closeup photo of this, as well as Sharky completing them. You can see that even though Sharky is trotting round a slight bend, he has his head down and looks balanced.
Another idea that I saw recently used pool noodles strung together to make a lightweight ladder. This has the benefit that it can be used one way with the rungs very low to the ground, or up the other way the rungs are higher. These noodles can be purchased from The Warehouse and are easy to cut into lengths and tie together. Following is a photo of this, as well as Sharky trotting through them. The fact that I took these photos while at home by myself should give an indication of how happy he is to trot through the cavaletti. You can also purchase small cones and punch holes in the sides to put poles through as another idea or use that good ole Kiwi ingenuity to come up with your own plan. It doesn’t matter what the cavaletti are constructed of, but in general a normal jump pole across the middle is good. Personally I would not use actual agility jumps for this exercise because they are harder to move around and get close enough, and your dog might get a bit confused about whether they should be trotting across or jumpingthem.
I recently attended a seminar on “Maximising Performance of the Canine Athlete” run by Rachel Dellar of Hydropaws (http://www.hydropaws.co.nz/) and Charlotte Rundgren of Dynamic K9's (http://www.dynamick9s.co.nz/) where I got some of these ideas from. There was a lot of information given on this seminar about exercises to improve both the adult dog, and also to start with your puppy. Rachel and Charlotte will be holding another seminar near Hamilton before winter starts and you can contact them through the above web-sites.
In an earlier article I talked about perch work. This is another excellent idea to -encourage rear-end awareness. You should ask the dog to rotate around the perch both ways. It is possible that he may more stiff to work one way than the other. If this is the case, ensure that you work that side more often.
You can also teach your dog to walk backwards away from you. Make sure you reward for baby steps as this can be a hard thing to learn. You want your dog to think about what he is doing rather than walking into him to force him to move away. If you are sitting down, and your dog takes one step backwards, click and throw a treat between his front legs. This means he has to take more steps backwards to get the treat with is further reinforcement. Again you want your dog to move backwards confidently using each leg at a time rather than bunny hopping. Once your dog is able to perform this exercise, you could try and get him to walk backwards up a flight of stairs. This requires very good awareness of the rear-end, and you should ensure that your dog is physically strong enough to do this. Do not overdo this training, and take it just one step at a time (joke?).
Another exercise I have done with Sharky since he was about 5 months old is working around 2 stick in the ground poles. To start this work, I put up the pole, moved Sharky towards it and clicked/treated when he moved around the pole. He quickly learnt that I wanted him to walk around it. Then I was able to move further away and send him around the pole. Once he was confident with that, I added another pole and now send him round one pole then the other. This enables you to practise front crosses with your dog as well as training an “out” command. I don’t always do front crosses, sometimes get him to go round the 2 poles in a circle rather than a figure eight. Sharky loves this exercise, and I mark the finish of it with a “yessss” at which time he hoons towards me to get his tug toy. Without intending to, I have created a huge drive by saying “yes” which I think will be very useful when I start training the weaves. Following is a photos of the poles that I am using – great quality purchased from my local soccer shop for $6 each (photo 1010548). I have just recently found this shop in Hamilton which has a lot of agility equipment for soccer players which can be adapted for dog training. The shop also sells equipment on trade-me (yes I am slightly addicted!).
Thanks to those of you who have given me positive feedback about this article.
Sharky’s Diary – Chapter Four
Sharky’s Diary – Chapter Four
At this time of the year I am so pleased that I put in a lot of time with Sharky in his first couple of months – he is now 8 months old. I have been very busy with work (yes horror of horrors, I have to do something to fund my dog activities!), and have not had a lot of time to spend with him. I am pleased to say that I have achieved all the basic things that I wanted my pup to be able to do ie:
Be toy motivated
Be food motivated
Have control around doors, in the ute, feeding time, on lead etc.
Be well socialised so has a nice nature around other dogs and people.
Is happy to offer a variety of behaviours
Travel and sleep happily in the ute
Because these things are second nature to him, it makes life so much easier when I don’t have as much time. I have lots of toys spread around the back yard, so can pick one up at any time and practise his waits, releasing him to tug on the toy. I do this anytime I think of it such as when I am hanging out washing, picking up dog poo, getting the mail etc. It only takes a couple of minutes, but because I do it so often Sharky gets a lot of reinforcement.
I have done crate games with Sharky (based on Susan Garrett’s methods), and that is very good for building drive and control. Recently I decided that I wanted Sharky to wait in a down while I trained my other BCs because I am too lazy (or I should say, don’t have the time!) to get out a crate out. Cannon is very noisy and enthusiastic while he is being trained, so he was a good distraction. I started with sending Cannon over one jump to a toy, then immediately rewarding Sharky with food for holding his wait, then releasing him and playing tug. I built up on that, rewarding Sharky often and praising him for his wait, always giving him a really good play time after releasing him. I can now train Cannon for 10 mins or so with Sharky waiting patiently.
The secret to getting a nice consistent wait is to reward often. I have seen a number of people lately with pups who have “wriggle bum” issues, rather than knowing they should sit still. My view is that this is because the handlers do not reward regularly enough. It is not a sin to give a pup 10-20 rewards at a time for maintaining a position! It is important that your pup does not move towards the treat if you are trying to get him to hold his position. To fix that, hold out hand to pup, if he moves, quickly move hand back towards you without giving him the food. He will quickly realise that he is not allowed the food until you say so. A useful control game that you can also play is having pup in the down position, and putting a bikkie on the floor on front of him. If he moves towards it, remove the food. Only let him have it once you have said “ok” (or whatever your release word is). This reinforces your release command, and also emphasizes the point that you are in control of the food/game.
And for those readers who are having a wee snigger about my lovely waits with my bestest boy Cannon, all I can say is that I should have trained him a lot better, and I am not ever going to have the same issues again! Part of my issue with Cannon is that he gets anxious about me leaving him. I have practised waits with Sharky in lots of locations with lots of distractions from an early age. He is very relaxed about being left because I have made it so clear what he is supposed to do, have given him heaps of rewards, and it has always been based on positive training. Occasionally Sharky might misunderstand and move. If this happens he doesn’t get a reward, generally I just look at him, he thinks about it a bit, then moves back to where he was in the first place. Because I spent so much time ensuring that he was very focussed on me in the early stages, Sharky has a huge desire to please me and that makes him very easy to train.
Last month I said I would describe some issues that I have had with teaching contacts with Sharky, and how I have resolved them.
To start with on the stairs, Sharky did not look down and focus on the target, so when I released him he did not drive into a nice hard nose touch, because he wasted time looking at the target first. I started doing lots of nose touches on his target away from the stairs again, re-creating his enthusiasm for the game with lots of verbal encouragement, and rewarding for quick touches.
When using the travel plank, I would hold Sharky by the collar, say “ready ready go”. Then he should have run onto the travel plank from the side, into the 2o2o position with a nice hard nose touch on his target. Often doing this, he would dawdle into the 2o2o position which is not something I want in the future. I corrected this by stopping holding his collar. I had taught him to release toys by holding his collar, and think he was a bit confused. Now he runs around my body onto the travel plank.
At times I repeat too many times with myself forward of the travel plank. Then Sharky starts looking forward to the toy and the release, without the nose touch. I correct his by doing rapid reinforcement of the nose touch while in the 2o2o (ie click and treat for every single nose touch rather than waiting for multiple touches). I also try to send Sharky ahead of me so he nose touches the target while I am still behind him.
At times Sharky has not understood what I am trying to teach him. My command for the nose target was “touch” while my release command was “tack”. These were too close together, and it took me a while to realise it. I wondered why Sharky was not doing a very fast takeoff when I released him on “tack”, and I think it was because he was wondering if he should be doing a touch or a tack. Since I changed the command to “nose” he has been a lot better.
I hope to have time over the Christmas holiday break to remember all the things that I was supposed to be teaching Sharky, and sharing them with you in the new year.
Pics to go with Diary
Have just realised that I have not included the pics that have been part of the Chapters when published in the gazette. The next few posts will be to update them.
Friday, June 27, 2008
Sharky's Diary Chapter Three - Written November 2007
So, you think you have good food and play drive, a reliable wait, and your dog offering behaviours? Then it might just be time to think about how to train contact equipment.
There are many different options as to what you can train. A common method used currently is the two on two off behaviour – 2o2o. The idea is for the dog to have the front feet on the ground and the back feet still on the contact equipment with a stop until you release him. This is the method that I currently use with Cannon and it has been quite effective. My intention is to teach Sharky this method as well, but I want to go further with him and teach a constant head position ie so he looks forward when in the 2o2o position rather than turning his head around to look at me.
Other options include 1rto (1 rear toe on, supposed to be easier for the dog to reach that position), 4 on the floor (dog lying on ground just beyond the contact, also easier on dog’s body), running contact (a method taught by using a touch it board), and the most popular method at present, telling the dog to walk on, then running to the end of the contact and screaming your particular preferred words - grass, spot, wait, stop, by crikey dicky, you just wait there you @#$&, or in some cases just unleashing an unholy yell and see where that gets you! Now that might sound funny, but if you get to watch an entire class of dogs (which you do if you are lucky enough to be judging them), in an intermediate class there might be at least 50% of handlers who use the 4th option. And surprise surprise, it really is not that effective.
With Cannon, I taught the contact behaviour well, then got a bit carried away in the ring for a while and found myself saying “grass, wait bob”. Seemed logical at the time – grass was 2o2o command, then I wanted him to wait there, and then I wanted him to bob his head. The bob was because if he did not descend the a-frame with his head lowered, he found it hard to balance with some of the slippery painted ones that we are fortunate not to see anymore. When I heard this on video I thought “how ridiculous” and stopped saying anything except “go go go” because I figured that Cannon did really know what he should be doing our problem was me confusing him in the ring. Our contacts then went back to being very reliable again. At home I do a lot of clicking and reinforcing him for the 2o2o behaviour.
My intention with Sharky is to teach the 2o2o behaviour really well, and then not require a particular word to command that behaviour; he will just assume that position until I release him from it. At this stage I am going to teach him to nose target while in the 2o2o, expecting multiple nose touches until I release him. There are several benefits of having a nose touch as well as a 2o2o:
• by giving the dog a job with his nose, he cannot be twisting his head around to try and locate his handler – much easier on the dog’s body
• the dogs weight is then transferred to his hind end, as he cannot maintain his balance with head down and weight on front
• the nose touch should add speed as a dog cannot run as fast looking sideways as it can looking straight ahead
• dog can be released straight ahead from the contact with a lot of drive if he is already pointing in the direction where he is going
So, how to teach it – based on the method developed by Susan Garrett………
To teach the nose touch, I used a round plexi-glass target (like most training tools, very easy to order from www.cleanrun.com). I started teaching a nose target on my hand, and clicking for a very hard touch (should have a nose wrinkle). Once I had a solid touch, then I started holding the target in my hand, and over time lowering it to the floor. I only clicked for a hard touch (with nose wrinkle), and to start with, I kept the target in my hand so I could judge how hard the touch was. Once Sharky was confidently nose tapping, then I withheld the reward after the first nose tap, and he then tapped again. By doing this, I built the behaviour so he is offered multiple nose taps.
It is easy to rush to the next stage, but if you are starting with a 7 week old puppy doing this sort of work, then you have oodles of time to ensure that you get the exact behaviour before you move on. Once you have a solid touch, then you can put the target on the ground. The idea is not to get your dog to run to the target, but to be stationary with the front paws not moving.
To teach the 2o2o I started teaching as per last month’s article with a small stool or perch. Sharky has been happy offering a 2o2o position on most obstacles I put him front of him for several months. Now that he has a solid nose touch on his target, I started moving him to my stairs. Ideally you would have a set of stairs constructed with 4 to 5 steps up each side, and a table top in the middle to use for your contact training. This will not look anything like the contact obstacles, and means that any mistakes will not later be associated with real contact equipment. But, if you don’t have a friendly handyman around, you can start off using steps around the house. I have 2 steps to my deck which I am using at present. I started rewarding Sharky in the 2o2o position, and checking that he still understood his release command in that position. Then I moved on so that he was on the bottom step with the target on the grass. Ideally he should have his head down focusing on the target so that when I give him the command “nose” he drives into the 2o2o position with multiple nose taps until I release him. The first nose tap is the critical one – it should be a hard tap with a nose wrinkle for a reward.
When away from your own house and stairs, you can use a travel plank to practise similar exercises. It is named for its portability, and I should be taking it to all shows with me to encourage me to train it regularly! Following is a photo of Sharky on his travel plank, and as you can see it should be fairly easy to construct. The idea of the travel plank is not to get the dog to run the length of it and stop, it is more for him to jump on from the side and then into the 2o2o at the end of the plank.
Next month I will continue with tips related to this method of training contacts, and also talk about some of the pitfalls that I have already encountered.
Fiona Ferrar
There are many different options as to what you can train. A common method used currently is the two on two off behaviour – 2o2o. The idea is for the dog to have the front feet on the ground and the back feet still on the contact equipment with a stop until you release him. This is the method that I currently use with Cannon and it has been quite effective. My intention is to teach Sharky this method as well, but I want to go further with him and teach a constant head position ie so he looks forward when in the 2o2o position rather than turning his head around to look at me.
Other options include 1rto (1 rear toe on, supposed to be easier for the dog to reach that position), 4 on the floor (dog lying on ground just beyond the contact, also easier on dog’s body), running contact (a method taught by using a touch it board), and the most popular method at present, telling the dog to walk on, then running to the end of the contact and screaming your particular preferred words - grass, spot, wait, stop, by crikey dicky, you just wait there you @#$&, or in some cases just unleashing an unholy yell and see where that gets you! Now that might sound funny, but if you get to watch an entire class of dogs (which you do if you are lucky enough to be judging them), in an intermediate class there might be at least 50% of handlers who use the 4th option. And surprise surprise, it really is not that effective.
With Cannon, I taught the contact behaviour well, then got a bit carried away in the ring for a while and found myself saying “grass, wait bob”. Seemed logical at the time – grass was 2o2o command, then I wanted him to wait there, and then I wanted him to bob his head. The bob was because if he did not descend the a-frame with his head lowered, he found it hard to balance with some of the slippery painted ones that we are fortunate not to see anymore. When I heard this on video I thought “how ridiculous” and stopped saying anything except “go go go” because I figured that Cannon did really know what he should be doing our problem was me confusing him in the ring. Our contacts then went back to being very reliable again. At home I do a lot of clicking and reinforcing him for the 2o2o behaviour.
My intention with Sharky is to teach the 2o2o behaviour really well, and then not require a particular word to command that behaviour; he will just assume that position until I release him from it. At this stage I am going to teach him to nose target while in the 2o2o, expecting multiple nose touches until I release him. There are several benefits of having a nose touch as well as a 2o2o:
• by giving the dog a job with his nose, he cannot be twisting his head around to try and locate his handler – much easier on the dog’s body
• the dogs weight is then transferred to his hind end, as he cannot maintain his balance with head down and weight on front
• the nose touch should add speed as a dog cannot run as fast looking sideways as it can looking straight ahead
• dog can be released straight ahead from the contact with a lot of drive if he is already pointing in the direction where he is going
So, how to teach it – based on the method developed by Susan Garrett………
To teach the nose touch, I used a round plexi-glass target (like most training tools, very easy to order from www.cleanrun.com). I started teaching a nose target on my hand, and clicking for a very hard touch (should have a nose wrinkle). Once I had a solid touch, then I started holding the target in my hand, and over time lowering it to the floor. I only clicked for a hard touch (with nose wrinkle), and to start with, I kept the target in my hand so I could judge how hard the touch was. Once Sharky was confidently nose tapping, then I withheld the reward after the first nose tap, and he then tapped again. By doing this, I built the behaviour so he is offered multiple nose taps.
It is easy to rush to the next stage, but if you are starting with a 7 week old puppy doing this sort of work, then you have oodles of time to ensure that you get the exact behaviour before you move on. Once you have a solid touch, then you can put the target on the ground. The idea is not to get your dog to run to the target, but to be stationary with the front paws not moving.
To teach the 2o2o I started teaching as per last month’s article with a small stool or perch. Sharky has been happy offering a 2o2o position on most obstacles I put him front of him for several months. Now that he has a solid nose touch on his target, I started moving him to my stairs. Ideally you would have a set of stairs constructed with 4 to 5 steps up each side, and a table top in the middle to use for your contact training. This will not look anything like the contact obstacles, and means that any mistakes will not later be associated with real contact equipment. But, if you don’t have a friendly handyman around, you can start off using steps around the house. I have 2 steps to my deck which I am using at present. I started rewarding Sharky in the 2o2o position, and checking that he still understood his release command in that position. Then I moved on so that he was on the bottom step with the target on the grass. Ideally he should have his head down focusing on the target so that when I give him the command “nose” he drives into the 2o2o position with multiple nose taps until I release him. The first nose tap is the critical one – it should be a hard tap with a nose wrinkle for a reward.
When away from your own house and stairs, you can use a travel plank to practise similar exercises. It is named for its portability, and I should be taking it to all shows with me to encourage me to train it regularly! Following is a photo of Sharky on his travel plank, and as you can see it should be fairly easy to construct. The idea of the travel plank is not to get the dog to run the length of it and stop, it is more for him to jump on from the side and then into the 2o2o at the end of the plank.
Next month I will continue with tips related to this method of training contacts, and also talk about some of the pitfalls that I have already encountered.
Fiona Ferrar
Friday, May 30, 2008
Sharky's Diary Chapter 2 - written October 2007
Sharky’s Diary – Chapter Two
It has been suggested that a small section about me might be appropriate at this stage. I have been involved in agility since 1993. I have trained 8 dogs of my own and have attained the following titles with them - 6xADX, 3xADXGold, 5xFD, 3xCDX and 2 Agility Champions. I have participated in dog sports of agility, obedience, flygility, dancing with dogs, and a brief interlude with tracking. I have been on the agility judges panel since 2000, was Treasurer for Waikato Agility Group for a few of years, Deputy Zone One Representative for a couple of years, and NALA Treasurer/Membership Co-ordinator for far too many years (over 10 anyway).
My goal in starting this diary was to make people aware of some of the early training that you can do with pups. I am happy to answer questions about my training methods and possibly will be able to direct people to other trainers in their area. This diary is not supposed to be a comprehensive list of everything you can teach your pup with step by step instructions.
Anyway, enough about me and back to Sharky (Rainstar Shark Attack).
Next month I will explain how I intend to teach Sharky to do contact equipment. But, before you start thinking about this, it is very important that you have a few basic skills with your dog first.
1. Be able to play tug with your dog in any place at any time. So whenever you are in a different place, or there are different distractions make an effort to get out your toy and have a play.
2. Your dogs should understand how to wait, and know what their release command is.
3. It is very helpful if your dog is used to offering behaviours. To get your dog to offer behaviours, you need a clicker, food, and patience. There are many web-sites and books which explain how to train with a clicker, but the easiest way is to get someone you know to show you. Once your dog knows what the clicker is, the next step is to put out your object (footstool or whatever), and wait. When your dog does anything to interact with the object, click and treat. This could be looking at it, advancing towards it, touching it with nose, or foot etc. Once dog knows that you want it to do stuff with the object, they generally get quite carried away with offering different behaviours around it. The funniest one that Sharky had was when I put a bucket sideways on the ground. He thought what I wanted was for him to put his head in and scratch at the bottom of the bucket at the same time. Was hilarious to watch, and I did click him for it, but what I had originally wanted was just the head in the bucket. The reason I reinforced the behaviour was because it was so funny, and a good party trick.
As an example the photos following show a couple of different things that Sharky will do with a footstool (purchased for $9 from The Plastic Box).
The action in the first photo when he has got his front feet on top of the stool is a perfect position to start his rear end awareness work. Click when your dog’s feet are on the top of the stool. Once the dog is confident and happy to put his front feet on the perch, move on to pivoting your body slightly to encourage him to move his hind legs around. As soon as one leg moves, click and treat. Generally it doesn’t take long for the dog to realise that you want them to pivot their hind legs in both directions around the stool. The idea of this exercise is to be for your dog to know that it has rear legs, and to start to think of where to put them.
The action is the second photo is where he has his back feet on the stool – the 2 feet on the stool 2 feet off the stool (2o2o) contact behaviour that I eventually will want to teach. I like to reward this behaviour often, and wait until Sharky lowers his head before I click and treat. Eventually I will want to shape his head position as well as where he has his feet, and this is a good start. When you click and treat, you are clicking for the behaviour, and rewarding for position. So when you give your treat, make sure that you offer it down low if you are wanting to encourage a low head position. If you always treat your dog in the 2o2o position when his head is up, then he will assume that the position that you want is with his head up.
If you do not have good food and play drive, a reliable wait, and dog offering behaviours, then it is well worth while delaying any other training until you have achieved this. You will find that training a dog with this focus will take far less time, and be more enjoyable than a dog that doesn’t. You can teach all the other agility stuff later, but getting these basics right is extremely important.
Next month, those damn contacts!
Fiona Ferrar
It has been suggested that a small section about me might be appropriate at this stage. I have been involved in agility since 1993. I have trained 8 dogs of my own and have attained the following titles with them - 6xADX, 3xADXGold, 5xFD, 3xCDX and 2 Agility Champions. I have participated in dog sports of agility, obedience, flygility, dancing with dogs, and a brief interlude with tracking. I have been on the agility judges panel since 2000, was Treasurer for Waikato Agility Group for a few of years, Deputy Zone One Representative for a couple of years, and NALA Treasurer/Membership Co-ordinator for far too many years (over 10 anyway).
My goal in starting this diary was to make people aware of some of the early training that you can do with pups. I am happy to answer questions about my training methods and possibly will be able to direct people to other trainers in their area. This diary is not supposed to be a comprehensive list of everything you can teach your pup with step by step instructions.
Anyway, enough about me and back to Sharky (Rainstar Shark Attack).
Next month I will explain how I intend to teach Sharky to do contact equipment. But, before you start thinking about this, it is very important that you have a few basic skills with your dog first.
1. Be able to play tug with your dog in any place at any time. So whenever you are in a different place, or there are different distractions make an effort to get out your toy and have a play.
2. Your dogs should understand how to wait, and know what their release command is.
3. It is very helpful if your dog is used to offering behaviours. To get your dog to offer behaviours, you need a clicker, food, and patience. There are many web-sites and books which explain how to train with a clicker, but the easiest way is to get someone you know to show you. Once your dog knows what the clicker is, the next step is to put out your object (footstool or whatever), and wait. When your dog does anything to interact with the object, click and treat. This could be looking at it, advancing towards it, touching it with nose, or foot etc. Once dog knows that you want it to do stuff with the object, they generally get quite carried away with offering different behaviours around it. The funniest one that Sharky had was when I put a bucket sideways on the ground. He thought what I wanted was for him to put his head in and scratch at the bottom of the bucket at the same time. Was hilarious to watch, and I did click him for it, but what I had originally wanted was just the head in the bucket. The reason I reinforced the behaviour was because it was so funny, and a good party trick.
As an example the photos following show a couple of different things that Sharky will do with a footstool (purchased for $9 from The Plastic Box).
The action in the first photo when he has got his front feet on top of the stool is a perfect position to start his rear end awareness work. Click when your dog’s feet are on the top of the stool. Once the dog is confident and happy to put his front feet on the perch, move on to pivoting your body slightly to encourage him to move his hind legs around. As soon as one leg moves, click and treat. Generally it doesn’t take long for the dog to realise that you want them to pivot their hind legs in both directions around the stool. The idea of this exercise is to be for your dog to know that it has rear legs, and to start to think of where to put them.
The action is the second photo is where he has his back feet on the stool – the 2 feet on the stool 2 feet off the stool (2o2o) contact behaviour that I eventually will want to teach. I like to reward this behaviour often, and wait until Sharky lowers his head before I click and treat. Eventually I will want to shape his head position as well as where he has his feet, and this is a good start. When you click and treat, you are clicking for the behaviour, and rewarding for position. So when you give your treat, make sure that you offer it down low if you are wanting to encourage a low head position. If you always treat your dog in the 2o2o position when his head is up, then he will assume that the position that you want is with his head up.
If you do not have good food and play drive, a reliable wait, and dog offering behaviours, then it is well worth while delaying any other training until you have achieved this. You will find that training a dog with this focus will take far less time, and be more enjoyable than a dog that doesn’t. You can teach all the other agility stuff later, but getting these basics right is extremely important.
Next month, those damn contacts!
Fiona Ferrar
Saturday, May 10, 2008
Winter exercise regime Cannon & Fiona
My plan is to get Sharky trotting on the other treadmill beside Cannon once he is a bit older. At present I bike with him walking on the treadmill.
Friday, May 9, 2008
Sharky's Diary Chapter One
Sharky’s Diary – Chapter One
Sharky was born on 10th April 2007 and is a black and white Border Collie bred by Keri Neilson. His mother is Relko Let it Rain (currently competing in agility), and his father is Astra Cap (an imported working dog). Having had a fair bit of success in dog sports with my dogs, and a number of people interested in what/how I train, I thought it could be interesting for people to read about my training goals, methods, and Sharky’s progress.
My dogs are all pets and live inside. My reason for getting a pup was that 4 of my dogs are getting older, and I wanted another dog coming on to compete in agility. My ultimate goal at present with Sharky is to be an Agility Grand Champion, so whilst he is still a pet, all my training is aimed at achieving that goal. Hopefully I won’t be setting myself up to fail, but the first step to achieving a goal is to set it, write it down, and then identify the required steps and barriers to achieving it.
Following are things that I want to ensure that Sharky is able to do:
Be very toy motivated – makes training much easier. Sharky has had lots of toys whilst still at Keri’s place, and plays every day with me with a range of toys.
Be food motivated – some behaviours are easier to train with food than toys.
Have control around doors, in the ute, feeding time, on lead etc.
Be well socialised so has a nice nature around other dogs and people.
Is happy to offer a variety of behaviours when faced with a new situation or obstacle (eg a box, stair, bucket etc).
Travel and sleep happily in the ute in 1 big open area with my other 5 dogs.
My ideas of training are based on various books/videos, and a lot of information gained from the seminars I attended with Susan Garrett in 2006 and Greg and Laura Derrett in 2007. There are many other people in NZ who have knowledge of the methods that I use, and most are happy to share information. I generally use a clicker for training as it makes it easier to mark the exact behaviour that I want repeated. I always have food in my pocket when moving around anywhere with Sharky so I can reward him for coming when called, having his attention on me etc.
When Sharky first came home, it was fortunate that I had shows for the next 3 weekends that I travelled away for. This has given me the opportunity for heaps of controlled socialisation, and for training in distracting environments. I really noticed how many people called out to my pup and wanted to meet him. In general I tried to not allow Sharky to meet other people or pups until I had called him away, and rewarded him. It would be very easy to end up with a pup that tugs on the lead, tries to meet every person or dog that walk past, and jumps up on people. If you are at a show and see a pup, please try to be aware of what the owner is trying to do with the pup. For confident pups, it is often better to talk to the owner and ignore the pup until it is calm.
Sharky is currently 4 months old, and following is some of what I am doing in training:
Control – to teach a wait, all I have done is to ask Sharky to sit, down or stand and then fed him at various intervals of hopefully varying duration ie feed at 1 second, 3 secs, 6 secs, 7 secs, 11 secs, 13 secs etc. He is now quite comfortable holding his position for a length of time, but I still reward him regularly while he is in position.
Sharky is very keen on his toys, and not always careful about what his teeth are doing around my hands. It is great to have a pup who is keen on tugging, but they have to know when to give up the toy. Sharky’s command initially to give the toy up is me putting my other hand on his collar under his neck. To train this I would put the hand holding the toy on his collar while holding out a piece of food with the other hand. He quickly learnt that a hand on his collar meant that food was coming. Recently I have added a command “give” by saying this at the same time as holding the food out.
Release Command – it is very important for a pup to know what his release command is. Sharky’s command is “tack” and I have used this because it is part of his name, and different from other commands that I habitually use. My other young dog’s release command is “kay”, which is quite different. I use “tack” as a command to release Sharky from anything I have asked him to do. So if I ever ask him to sit, or down, I should release him from that. Of course I am human, so forget every now and then but the more I do it, the more it becomes second nature, and the better proofed that release command will become.
Crate Games - There are many benefits to this including teaching pup to be comfortable in a crate, learning to offer behaviours, learn control, increase speed and motivation.
That’s all for this month.
Fiona Ferrar
Sharky was born on 10th April 2007 and is a black and white Border Collie bred by Keri Neilson. His mother is Relko Let it Rain (currently competing in agility), and his father is Astra Cap (an imported working dog). Having had a fair bit of success in dog sports with my dogs, and a number of people interested in what/how I train, I thought it could be interesting for people to read about my training goals, methods, and Sharky’s progress.
My dogs are all pets and live inside. My reason for getting a pup was that 4 of my dogs are getting older, and I wanted another dog coming on to compete in agility. My ultimate goal at present with Sharky is to be an Agility Grand Champion, so whilst he is still a pet, all my training is aimed at achieving that goal. Hopefully I won’t be setting myself up to fail, but the first step to achieving a goal is to set it, write it down, and then identify the required steps and barriers to achieving it.
Following are things that I want to ensure that Sharky is able to do:
Be very toy motivated – makes training much easier. Sharky has had lots of toys whilst still at Keri’s place, and plays every day with me with a range of toys.
Be food motivated – some behaviours are easier to train with food than toys.
Have control around doors, in the ute, feeding time, on lead etc.
Be well socialised so has a nice nature around other dogs and people.
Is happy to offer a variety of behaviours when faced with a new situation or obstacle (eg a box, stair, bucket etc).
Travel and sleep happily in the ute in 1 big open area with my other 5 dogs.
My ideas of training are based on various books/videos, and a lot of information gained from the seminars I attended with Susan Garrett in 2006 and Greg and Laura Derrett in 2007. There are many other people in NZ who have knowledge of the methods that I use, and most are happy to share information. I generally use a clicker for training as it makes it easier to mark the exact behaviour that I want repeated. I always have food in my pocket when moving around anywhere with Sharky so I can reward him for coming when called, having his attention on me etc.
When Sharky first came home, it was fortunate that I had shows for the next 3 weekends that I travelled away for. This has given me the opportunity for heaps of controlled socialisation, and for training in distracting environments. I really noticed how many people called out to my pup and wanted to meet him. In general I tried to not allow Sharky to meet other people or pups until I had called him away, and rewarded him. It would be very easy to end up with a pup that tugs on the lead, tries to meet every person or dog that walk past, and jumps up on people. If you are at a show and see a pup, please try to be aware of what the owner is trying to do with the pup. For confident pups, it is often better to talk to the owner and ignore the pup until it is calm.
Sharky is currently 4 months old, and following is some of what I am doing in training:
Control – to teach a wait, all I have done is to ask Sharky to sit, down or stand and then fed him at various intervals of hopefully varying duration ie feed at 1 second, 3 secs, 6 secs, 7 secs, 11 secs, 13 secs etc. He is now quite comfortable holding his position for a length of time, but I still reward him regularly while he is in position.
Sharky is very keen on his toys, and not always careful about what his teeth are doing around my hands. It is great to have a pup who is keen on tugging, but they have to know when to give up the toy. Sharky’s command initially to give the toy up is me putting my other hand on his collar under his neck. To train this I would put the hand holding the toy on his collar while holding out a piece of food with the other hand. He quickly learnt that a hand on his collar meant that food was coming. Recently I have added a command “give” by saying this at the same time as holding the food out.
Release Command – it is very important for a pup to know what his release command is. Sharky’s command is “tack” and I have used this because it is part of his name, and different from other commands that I habitually use. My other young dog’s release command is “kay”, which is quite different. I use “tack” as a command to release Sharky from anything I have asked him to do. So if I ever ask him to sit, or down, I should release him from that. Of course I am human, so forget every now and then but the more I do it, the more it becomes second nature, and the better proofed that release command will become.
Crate Games - There are many benefits to this including teaching pup to be comfortable in a crate, learning to offer behaviours, learn control, increase speed and motivation.
That’s all for this month.
Fiona Ferrar
Friday, April 11, 2008
Birthday Party
Sharky and his litter mates were 1 year old on thursday, so we had to have a birthday party for them together with their half brothers. In this pic from left to right are Phantom, Stevie, Mother Rain, Edge, Sharky with Cash at the rear.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Sharky nose touches on A-frame
I have just moved from doing these on a set of stairs to this lowered A-frame. I am very pleased with the multiple nose touches, but this training has made me aware that I need to do more work with me running forward.
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