Combined Post--March 6&7
March 6, 2025
Millie Starts. Four short start tracks, each roughly 125 yards (60-75 first leg, 50-60 second leg), laid exactly to the pattern of scuffs and food drops shown in the exercises, except that the last and oldest track was double-laid. Partly-cloudy, 53°, moderate to fresh breeze. Humidity ≈40%.
I changed the orientation of the tracks from what I have been doing, to see if she was doing things from habit. Odd-numbered tracks started in the short direction of the field, while even-numbered tracks started along the long axis.
I'm not going to go into a detailed play-by-play of each track, but will make a few general observations.
Starts on 1, 3, and 4 were pretty convincing. I was especially encouraged that the longer tracks created little difficulty at the start. Track 2 gave her some trouble. The area where we were working was badly rutted, and that seemed to give her some temporary trouble, but she recovered.
She is having trouble making transitions from different types and lengths of cover. She did do very nicely on the first track negotiating various types of cover, some of which was very rough. But on the second track in particular, and other tracks to a lesser extent, she shows some confusion going from medium/long grass to short, manicured grass. This is something I want to address, because it seems to happen a lot. She almost always works it out, but I'd like to see less of it. On the last track she too the turn about 2 yards too early (which I didn't realize until I rechecked my map), but came back on her own, which I liked.
Article indication. She found and indicated each article in her own fashion, which was good, but I am now trying, gently, to get her to give me a down. It will take some time, but I do hope that she will get the idea as we go along. (Frankly, I would not have wanted to sit, let along lie down, in the prickly cover on tracks 2 & 3!)
March 7 -- Article game on lawn. I let her hunt around to find 9 articles (each wrapped around something very tasty). It took her a minute or two to realize what was going on, and I had to give her a gentle down on the first one. After that she started dropping down at each article and got appropriately clicked and rewarded. The only thing I am a bit worried about is that she seems to be dropping down to have a better angle for working to get the goodies out of the article; do I need to wait until she gives up and looks at me before I click and reward?
Track 1: lovely start. Changes in cover were nice. Turn was perfect. Your silence was golden! Article-sucked. Ralph, her ‘old way’ is no longer an option. By my count, 18 seconds passed between her stopping and the down—that is too long for any dog to make the association between the article, the behavior, and the reinforcement. You know where the article is—move up—get right behind her as you approach. You need to be at 4 ft when she gets to the article. The INSTANT she stops and her nose touches—cue the down and IMMEDIATELY hand to article, palm down etc. also, I’d treat the start article like an article—we are changing behavior, and it should be consistent. You can slack off in a year when she’s hammering her articles, but until we decide that’s ok, please treat all articles—including any turn marker she stops for—as an article.
ReplyDeleteTrack 2: ruts are hard—for any dog. This is a place the challenge of the track requires a change of plan. Stomp/scuff/baby steps (all of those), through the ruts, with food every 2-3 scuff steps. Leave a TON of scent and food. This track didn’t give her trouble—this track required, because of the conditions, that she work hard to figure it out. Let’s not evaluate success based on if it looks ‘perfect’ but rather did she stay committed and solve the problem? YES, she did. Ideally, you would have moved to follow a bit/a lot sooner, to support her efforts. Us moving tells the dog they are correct—so train, don’t test. Support her so she gains confidence in herself. Turn marker—see comments from track 1. Her changes of cover aren’t bad. Again, stomp/scuff/baby steps with frequent (3-5) food drops. And move up—support her forward motion. Darn, Ralph broke his silence is golden rule-/and that was a nag, it wasn’t helpful at all. THANK YOU for insisting she down, you handled that perfectly. If Samson can down in greenbriar, she can down in cut hay.
Loved the 3 hour old start. The change in cover required her to work a bit—that’s fine—but again, scuff stomp food into it would have built her confidence. Turn was a bit harder, good information to have. NOTE: you kept turning your head in the direction of the turn. Let’s not do that, it can become a cue. Stare ahead, or look down! Again, good job insisting on the down—refer to comments on track 1
Articles: let’s repeat this exercise. She’s getting it, but it’s not there yet!
2 things: on the track-/make sure the sequence is verbal ‘down’ with Ralph completely still, and then the hand to article sequence. The verbal must clearly happen before any movement from you.
ReplyDeleteArticle game: let’s help her on the first one so she knows what game you’re playing—so nose touch, “down” hand to article (if needed). That way she will know the plan (since she goes outside other times and finds stuff for which she’s not reinforced(
It’s March 13….I know you weren’t thrilled with her articles on Tuesday….hint, they should have had food in them. I know Michele may have advised against…PLEASE stick with me. I’d love to keep seeing daily training videos.
ReplyDelete