Jump Solution

Kirby and I have been taking agility classes for appx 2 years now. I think. Anyways, jumping has not been one of Kirby's strong points. Well, he can jump just dandy if it's strait up into the air or to catch a Frisbee. When that is the case, it's like Kirby was born on springs for legs. But 12" agility jumps?  90% of the time, he just blows them off.

I'm not laying all of the blame on Kirby though. I'll take half of it, becausemy handling skills are nowhere near perfect. My positioning probably made him think he didn't need to take that jump.  But once my handling improved, the jumping did not.

Our agility instructor, Rick, put his thinking cap on. He pulled me aside and gave us some homework. I have a few agility jumps at home. I was to start with one. Set up Kirby as usual. Instead of treats though, he told me to keep a tennis ball in hand. After Kirby was released and I was certain that he was committed to taking the jump, I would mark it 'YES!" and throw the ball. 

This worked almost immediately and during the first night we were able to add a second jump. This actually ended up failing about half the time, so we went back to class and discussed with Rick and he tweaked our homework a bit. Now I was to send him off to jump and mark/reward, but each time I started backing up and moving out. This was teaching distance. There was a time when I would have to turn really close into the jump to force Kirby over it and prevent him from coming into my side and blowing it off. We had no distance. But soon we were able to add jumps and I could begin on either side from a good distance away. 

We have absolutely not 'mastered' the agility jump, not by any stretch of the imagination. But we've greatly improved. By the next class, Rick said it was like he was a completely different dog, taking most if not all of the jumps he was asked to!

Switching from treats to a tennis ball had huge effects on the agility course. We have since begun using it elsewhere, and I'm kicking myself for not doing it earlier because I'm sure we would have advanced a lot quicker. 

As long as the black dog is having fun though, it's alright by me. And I really enjoy our agility classes. I've always had really nice classmates and it's educational to watch them work as well and pick their way through their own issues and come up with a solution. Sometimes it helps me, sometimes it doesn't, but may help somebody else. As long as I can afford it, I will likely continue taking classes even after we begin trialing. While I will technically be taking the same class multiple times, they are never the same. Paws Abilities trainers have always been excellent at looking at the individual team and breaking each class down to fit the needs of it's students. Our main focus for our last Intermediate Agility classes was jumps and handling skills. We are beginning Intermediate Agility again and those 6 classes will probably focus on something completely different. That's the beauty of it.

Pawsitive Vybe Seminar

Over Memorial Day weekend, we attended a four day long training seminar with the trainers of Pawsitive Vybe.  This is our third year attending the PVybe camp.

If you are not familiar with PVybe, it's a dog training studio that was founded by two sport dog rockstars. They are positive trainers and they focus on, well, everything. PVybe is HQ'd in New York, however it currently has branches in North Dakota, Wisconsin and Florida as well.

The focus of our camp this weekend was Disc Doggin (K9 Frisbee). It's kind of become our 'survival kit' to make it through the long Minnesota winters. We have something huge to look forward to every spring!

We worked on a ton of things over the course of the weekend. But the one that stood out to me the most was actually a very small thing. In learning this sport and playing with Frankie, I was unintentionally making things very difficult for us. At last year's camp for instance, we didn't have a Scoot. A basic, relatively simple move that has your dog do a 180 in front of you and back up through your legs from front to back. So Apryl worked with us using treats and from there we traded the frisbee until we had a Scoot. Well, in order to keep getting the scoot, I would scoot her, then automatically turn to the right and toss a disc out in front of me. That was her reward, as well as a setup for a throwing sequence. So this year, as we worked on new Scoot moves, it was discovered that now I had conditioned Frankie to always come out to my right, making it difficult to take this setup move and apply it elsewhere. It was very frustrating for me (in a good way).

Another example is the 'Go Around', where I signal Frankie to run around behind me on my right and come flying forward from my left. This was the very first 'trick' in disc that we ever learned!  So for the last four years, when I signal a Go Around, a disc is going to be thrown in front of me. That has just always been the case.  So when Ron wants Frankie to Go Around and then immediately do a Leg Over, it's almost impossible to break her of this habit that I spent four years creating.

To sum it up, that small thing is learning how to break up things that I've engrained over the years. Frankie can be a tough cookie to work with sometimes. She's incredibly smart and insanely driven for the disc. But after enough repetition, she will begin to see the shortcuts and she will not hesitate to take them.

For this upcoming season, I've laid out my goals.
#1 - Perfect my vaults and rebounds
#2 - Create a freaking routine!

For the past three seasons, I've relied completely on my brain. And that hasn't always worked out in my favor. I tend to 'wing it' when we step onto the competition field. While other, more successful disc doggers can go out and I can tell you just about every move they will make and the order in which they will do it. That's called a routine. And the nice thing about routines is that once you have one, you are no longer 'winging it'. I'm tired of winging everything. My anxiety over competing has only increased every season, not subsided as I'd hoped. My confidence is not building as I gain experience.

I learned much. But now I need to figure out how to put it together.
Overall it was a great weekend!  I felt like we had tiny breakthroughs and now we're ready to disc dog for real.

I Heart You, Man...

The Hills Are Alive...

No, they really aren't. But I couldn't think of a good title right at the moment.

I've been away for exactly one month today. Not away away, but like away from the blog. Whoops.
I didn't forget. I actually have a lot of things to talk about!  But I am so lazy sometimes...

Anyways, today I wanted to share a photo of my handsome Labby boy, 'pre-sportdog' if you will.
Before I discovered dog sports and realized the importance of maintaining my pet's weight.  I can't seem to maintain my own weight. But that's something I don't really want to talk about right now.

Jake.  Pre-sportdog. I'm not proud of this at all, btw.

Look at those rolls. He's like a pudgy bear-dog. Today, Jake is trim and can hike with the best of them. There are no rolls that sag over his collar. He actually has a neck now.

Thank God for dog sports. I can't believe I was one of 'those' people who let's their pets suffer this way.

Overfeeding is just as bad as underfeeding in my brain!

Hey, it's hump day!  Holla!

Lights Out

I legitimately made an attempt to work on yesterday's goals. I got out my dusty bait bag. I chopped up the Nature Balance roll stuff and mixed it with some small kibble. I got out the necessary tools for each animal.

I sat on the couch to eat dinner before I began training.

Before I know it, there was a BANG! and the power goes out. Pure blackness. There was not a single thing to be seen. The streetlights had gone out, the neighborhood was down for the count. My phone was dead, so we used Red's phone light to get a dozen candles lit. We gated the dogs in the foyer, just to keep any crazy animal on candle stuff from happening, then we stepped outside to see how far it went.

The neighborhood was eerily silent, and adding to the creepy effect was the fact that the moon was full, huge and spotlight white. We could see our neighbors in their homes shining flashlights around, so I knew Red couldn't blame it on my hairdryer again.

Finally the utility trucks showed up. So did the cops. A blown transformer maybe?

So anyways, we didn't have any power. And judging by the number of trucks that arrived to crowd around the pole, we wouldn't have power for a while. Red and I pulled out the cribbage board and played by candlelight. Eventually, it was time to get ready for bed. We brushed our teeth and fed the dogs by candlelight. It was kind of relaxing actually. We crawled into bed and as we blew the last candle out, the power came back! 

Thinking back on it now, I actually could have used this incident as a training opportunity. Kirby was oddly alarmed by the sudden outage and was very 'Aussie Alert' until we went to bed. He began barking as soon as the power went out. Going from a fully lit house with the TV on to complete silence and dark did not make him happy. Anytime a car drove by or anything he went on full Aussie Alert Bark, groaning and pacing. But I was too preoccupied finding candles and looking out the window at the utility trucks.

It did bring up another thing to add to Kirby's training list though. He has some anxiety stuff that we need to tackle. We stayed pretty calm last night, to the point where it was kind of humerous. So I dont think our actions were making him tense.

**LIGHTBULB MOMENT**

Okay, and in writing that last paragraph, it occurs to me that Kirby has some light reactive stuff in the past. He always has, and it was pretty intense right when I adopted him, but with the help of Tania from House of Misfit Dogs we had pretty much knocked it out almost completely. Kirby doesn't like fire. Candles. Okay, I see where we went wrong. There is my lightbulb moment for the day. I woundn't know that Kirby doesn't like fire except for the fact that when I use the clickey lighter thing anywhere near him to light candles, he barks at me and gets that insane look in his eyes. It's odd that he in no way associates that with the treat clicker??  Interesting....

Gotta love a lightbulb moment.

You Gotta Have Goals!

Since beginning this blog only a short time ago, a small space of my brain has been watching and storing bits of information in regards to my animal's behaviors. I've been picking up little things that I can start working on.  So here is one thing for each animal that will begin today.

Sylvester ~ Introduction to a target clicker stick

Maggie ~ A basic sit.

Kirby ~ Kirby actually has a lot of basic obedience on him already. He would probably excel in it if I gave him the time. But I have no patience for 'that' kind of obedience, so I'd rather put those talents into trick training. Who knows, maybe I can teach him to fetch me a beer! Today we will begin shaping with an empty plastic bottle.

Jake ~ Jake has a lot of basic obedience on him too. But his is very rushed. In fact, if there is even a hint that I might give him a crumb of whatever I hold in my hand, he will launch through his entire hat of tricks. So we will begin slowing this stuff down.

Frankie ~ Standing on her hind legs.

If you're lucky, I will manage to get some of this on video. Either the beginning examples of what I'd like to change, or the change itself.

Kitteh Revenge

I hear it all the time. 'Revenge is not an emotion or instinct that animals can grasp'.

I say that's crap. There is nothing you can say to me that will convince me that my cat doesn't plot and get revenge.

I will say, however, that I roll my eyes anytime somebody tells me their dog takes revenge for things. Dogs are a creation of God. Cats are a creation of the devil.

Sylvester is a greedy creature. Not in the way of my Labrador. He's greedy, too. But in a different way. Sylvester believes he is entitled. To the following things:
Food
The couch
The recliner
The other recliner
All overstuffed arms of said furniture
Food
Every rug in the kitchen
A personal wait staff
Food
Bubbles baths of champagne
Food
100% of my attention, even though there are 5 other beings in the house that require my attention
Food
Food
Food

If Sylvester doesn't get these things, he makes me regret it.

Example; Last night, I was running low on cat food. So he got a smidgen less for dinner than normal so that I'd have enough for his breakfast and then I could grab a new bag today. Well apparently Syl counts his kibbles every meal, because as soon as he was finished, he whipped around, yowling and following me around for more. (After a normal meal, Syl generally sits down on a rug, licks his chops, cleans his paws, and uses his litter box). 

This morning, I awake to an angry Red, who immediately insists that I look at his chair, and then look at the loaf of bread I bought over the weekend. I groggily glance at his recliner, which has some mysterious orange stuff spewed all over it. Then I make my way to the kitchen and discover that Syl has knawed through the bag and chewed the tops off of no less than 6 slices of bread.

I return to Red and tell him that it appears as though Kitteh got into the bread and then later realized he ate way too much, and being too lazy to get off his compfy perch at the top of Red's recliner, blew chunks all over the chair. And I wouldn't doubt for a minute that Syl then went on to snooze for a good 6+ hours, happy with life in general. But not yet satisfied that he'd gotten revenge.

No, the revenge part comes when he gets to watch me from his perch, on my hands and knees trying to clean up his mess with a rag.  Before I've even touched my first cup of coffee!  That, my friends, is the ultimate feline revenge.

Don't you dare try and tell me that cats don't understand what revenge is. They do, and they know how to carry it out with a scary kind of flawlessness.