Training good news/venting thread.

Fred discovered he has a behind today we spent a few mins working with his food dish and he was starting to pivot round it!

Took some time, at first he thought I was clicking for some silly tap dance (which was very cute, must get him tap dancing lol).

Huzzah!

I'm teaching Elsie go outs, and she's doing really great, except sometimes she decides to do a figure eight between me and the cone on her way back.

I shouldn't laugh at her confusion, and I know the solution is to take a few steps backward and make sure she's solid first, but it is really funny.

Fable's resource guarding is getting better. She never guards from me, but she gets very upset if any other animal goes near her when she's eating. This morning I (accidentally) dropped some loose kibbles and Fable and Millie ate them from the same spot without Fable fussing at all. My little spaz happily shared with Millie. It sounds like such a tiny thing, but it's the first time it's happened in about a year.

Pan had an awesome session doing some FR leg bites on my friend. If she could only realize that strange men can be fun too.

I have been working really hard on getting the heel position I wanted and in the last week it's finally come together. Couldn't be happier! Some video as I am super proud of my girl

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBrY8_OuYSU

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yx6hXSSfsHA

She was super revved up to work when I bought her out, so her backwards heeling was messier than it usually is. However can't fault her enthusiasm!

Mia's nosework alerts are coming along very well. We had a really good session this morning and she's really really great to watch work.

Summer.... is still realizing she can search other places other than my training facility... She keeps stopping and offering me tricks.

I've always thought that the pinacle of dog training was to have the ability to walk your dog off leash (and of course, have the dog respond to your cues whilst doing so). Cohen has always been reliable off leash in parks but I didn't trust her near the road.

I just moved to a more suburban area with several parks/paths nearby where I walk the dogs off leash. Vehicle traffic is minimal, so one rainy evening I decided to see how Cohen does walking down the road off leash, and she did wonderfully. Since then I've been taking her out off leash to the nearby park in the mornings and she continues to impress me. She'll walk at heel, she'll notice but not chase squirrels, she doesn't stop to sniff, she ignores passing dogs. I've been reinforcing her heavily. I'm totally over the moon about it. She clearly understands the cue to walk at heel vs. her release of "go play" when we hit the park, and she'll dash off and run happy circles when we get there.

I think the change of scenery plus her coming up on 4 years old is doing wonders for laying the groundwork for good behaviour. And the training too, of course. It's nice to feel like I can start to live life off leash like I've always wanted. I didn't think it'd ever be possible with her.

Now, I know she's still a dog, and that mistakes happen, trust can backfire and leashes are there for more reasons than just keeping the dog at arm's reach, so I don't plan on abusing it. It's just a great feeling to be able to meet previously unattainable goals like that.

I'm making this live again

I took out the clicker and some treats for one of our daily training sessions a couple days ago, and Wesley started offering a really nice, animated sproing into a stand from a sit/down. 'Stand' has never really stuck in his brain (tried to target train it multiple times but he never caught on), and really pleased that this appeared out of nowhere, lol.

Good job! Stand is tough for me with some dogs!

Tonight, Squash recalled past a dude that was hanging out at the open (gated) warehouse door watching our class for awhile (I think he was one of the other people's SO). He slowed way down and watched the guy as he walked by him, but he didn't stop and he didn't veer, and he ended up where he was supposed to be in a nice front. <3


ALSO there is a dog that comes to class sometimes, a young malamute, and I think he and Squash need to get a room or something. They seem completely enamored with each other. Tonight Squash had a bit of leash frustration not being able to reach him before class started, but then did the most perfectly attentive figure eights (and being the post) with that dog in his group. <3 <3


He's the best boy. BEST. BOY.

Gaby stayed in a sit today when I asked for it. I've put barely any effort into it... I'm going to fall into the lazy trainer rut again if she keeps this up! :rofl1:

Ah well, gooood girl Gaby!

So proud of both Artimis and Talon today. As part of our new plan for socialization as Talon is going through a fear period (we hope) and well....Art's never been good with people and we've slacked way way too much socializing. We are going to take Talon to my school every morning to socialize and just hang out, and we are taking Art in the evenings to work on him ignoring/greeting people.

My dogs completely amazed me today, they did so fantastic! I wasn't with Talon, my BF took him while I was in class, but he said Talon did really good. He was a bit unsure of a few people, but when he realized he'd get treats/pets he was all for it! The worst he did was back away a bit. He went up to them willingly when they got a bit lower, less intimidating! YAY! ^_^

Artimis just was sooo good. He walked by a bunch of different people, bikes, big guys, all without much more than a glance. He didn't bark/huff at a single person! I'm amazed with him today honestly. We haven't socialized him other than the dog park in longer than I feel like mentioning lol

So yeah, yay my dogs! ^_^

Cameron hates my brothers new girlfriend- she is reactive with guests at home (perfect angel in public, demon in the house). Anyways, we do sessions with Cam on leash and gf treating when I click. My brother hates Cam for being such a beast, but last training session Cam would sit and wait for treats without barking. She could lie down, the energy was totally different from the non-stop barking pulling growler dog we started with. And she just calmly went to her crate when we were done

It was a good training night tonight, dogs seemed to be a bit on edge but settled nice while I was teaching. Then I was able to work the 3 young ones.

Tonight Java (11 month old malinois female) worked in an obedience group class offlead for the entire 1 hr class. It was an advanced group so it was a good one to test her, but she made no mistakes, no visiting or nervous snooping. She was pretty relaxed and handled herself well. So that was a success for us, little tear in my eye - my weirdo nervy reactive puppy is all grown up. She had pretty good heeling, nice and attentive, didn't drop her head at all, but we need to fix up our turns. I think we need to work on clarifying what she targets because the issue is a hesitation I think from some confusion. She went down on the long sit.. but it ended up being a realllly long sit (6-7 minutes at least), probably longer than she was mentally ready for as I don't work her in group class every week. But good experience for us overall

With Wiley (2.5 year old malinois male) I did some work on his french ring hurdle. He is really (finally) working hard to pick up his feet to clear this. In French Ring 1 (first level with jumps), the bar is set at 1.1 meters (~43 ") for full points, and they have to clear it twice. I also had a friend around to rehearse food refusal (dog must refuse food thrown at him in an out-of-site down stay - in the rules it actually says if the food lands in his mouth, they must spit it out to get their points). He did good, didn't budge or sniff. Then they have to heel through the thrown food upon return. Needless to say he won his much-coveted ball on that exercise.

Slice (5 month old toller female) worked in an earlier group obedience class, since it is my friend's class, I use the setting to do as I please with the puppies I raise, just focus and engagement. She was challenged tonight but had many many many good decision moments. This girl is a bundle of friendly energy and wants to visit every dog and person who notices her. I really really appreciate her effort to contain herself. She did some group stays with a dropped leash, and then recalls, and I tried a formal one and she nailed her front and finish. Super pup! When the class was switching over, we stayed in the room and worked on 2o2o on a box and sends around a cone to the box. One of the harder things for her is committing to the "obstacle" (wrapping around traffic cone here) which involves turning away from something she really wants to see after running full blast towards it. It was a challenging thing to ask but she did have good success.

Hudson decided to take off across the yard when the UPS guy drove by. Someone is never allowed to roam around the yard with just a drag lead. Ever. Ever. Ever. Again. Ever.

There was a painting last weekend at a show I went to that looked JUST like Hudson. I did a double take.


And as for Fred. He was soooo good in the garden before. And he's good on our walks. And was pretty good at the agricultural show on sat, lots of people and dogs. And tonight in a village hall with about 4 other dogs... Was a total sh1t

Well... Not total, but the SMELLS oh the smells. I didn't exist.

And we have his bronze cgc test next week

That's awesome. Probably a BC though, not many ESs in your part of the world.

Tomorrow is a disc dog comp we are going to take Talon to. I'm expecting a meltdown in training with the way he's acting lately >_< I'm just hoping to make it through the comp without my dog running out of the ring. *fingers crossed*

Click

This is Cali's progress on her beg trick, she just needs to get the right muscles now, because she knows what the command means now. Although if she gets excited and starts anticipating, she'll stand up on her hind legs instead of sitting on her haunches.

We did a bunch of blind hides this weekend with Mia. She did really fabulous and I can read her alert so well. Blind hides are much more difficult to do than when you've set them yourself. She did fail at one whih my sister set right at the back of the trash can. But the other 9 or so she got right away.