Canada Day Long Weekend - Spencer's Adventure

It's weird doing things without all the dogs - especially day trip type things. I feel naked. And bored. I didn't have my camera either, so no pictures = feeling even more naked!

This weekend some family invited me out to Lake Newell (think Brooks, Alberta) to go to the beach for the day since it was supposed to be crazy hot out. Since we were going to the beach to hang out (they don't allow dogs on the beach) and I was going with family with small kids who weren't bringing any of their dogs I wasn't going to bring any of mine either.

However, busy outdoor location with lots of dogs and people affords some good training opportunities to work on reactivity and the beach also has a boat launch area that dogs are allowed on the beach at (so dogs can swim or at least be tossed in the lake to cool down) - so I decided not to pass up a decent opportunity and I'd bring just one, so I could still relax and chill at the beach if I wanted.

Since Spencer needs positive exposure to situations like that, but is also the quietest and happiest in a kennel he got to come along.

So proud of my baby dog! His behavior was nothing short of phenomenal! Or at least that of a "normal" well behaved dog.

When we got to the campground he was good with my 3 y/o neice running around. He's not 100% with children and he isn't off leash with them, but we've been working on counter-conditioning kids and it's starting to really pay off. Their erratic motion and noises still scare him, but he bounces back looking for cookies.

He was a little worried and quieter than he would normally be without one of the other dogs to back him up, and I would have brought both boys but then poor Penny would be lonely and sad. However, he still was a good little dog and said Hi nicely to my 14 y/o cousin and my Aunt. Didn't bark/freak out at either my cousin or my uncle which I thought he might do. He was also mostly correct in his behavior with their dog (he snarked once when she got near his kennel but otherwise ignored her.)

He was so good in fact that I just leashed him to his soft sided kennel and left him loose in the shade when we went to the beach. (The kennel was tied to a tree in case he tried to take the whole thing for a walk somewhere.) I could see the site from where we were at the beach, but he just laid in his kennel and was quiet - not even barking at or with the dogs in the next site when they started barking.

To break up just laying on the beach we went for a walk and met/ran into a 12 week old great dane puppy. I was talking to the owner from about 10 feet away and Spencer was a little amped up about the puppy but quickly re-focused and sat quietly. It defiantly helped that the puppy was calm, but to not have any outbursts out of Spencer was fantastic behavior for him!

We also tried going swimming again. I'm super happy that it was a success! The last time he tried to swim out in the Pass he had a hard time picking his toy up in the water and scared himself. So I went hunting for a floating toy that would hopefully be easier and found a floating Chuck-It bumper. I just wasn't sure if he'd swim to retrieve something other than a super high value toy like Yellow Ball. Not only was he happily swimming to retrieve the bumper, he was playing tug with it on the beach despite the distractions of strange noises and people near by.

During supper he just voluntarily laid and slept in his kennel again, it was a pretty long day with a lot of action for him. He made me look like a fantastic dog trainer though, especially since my "problem" puppy/dog was behaving better than my aunt's 6 year old dog was. It also makes me happy that what I am doing is working - it's just harder to see results when all of my dogs are together and they are behaving with pack mentality.

The Definition of Insanity;

Repeatedly doing the same thing, expecting a different result.

You have to change what you're doing.

Chances are if you are encountering an obstacle on your dog training journey, you are not going to be able to "work through it" by doing more of what you are currently doing.

On one hand, I know this. With Spencer I have learned that if he doesn't understand what I am asking of him to break it down and try to "explain" it in a different way. Often removing that problem behavior from context entirely to work it out. 

On the other hand, I obviously missed a couple of steps. Trying to work through shut down in the same way. The sport of agility tends to push having a toy motivated dog. Having a toy/tug motivated dog is supposed to help them work through fearful situations because they are more aroused/excited/focused on tugging with the toy. 

Which is fine. 

Until they shut down and won't play in public. Then it becomes less of a "Don't wanna, don't hafta" moment and more of a "I CAN'T because I am too worried" Pushing play just causes Spencer to disengage entirely, and because I have pushed it play isn't always fun anymore. Such a fine line between "working through" shut down and causing more of it.

So, we'll try something else and come up with a new plan.

A reward needs to be rewarding for the dog! 

Also, Penny was sad she's been left out lately in the photo department.

2013 AAC Regional Championships

I didn't post much about this leading up to it since I didn't want to stress out, over think and obsess.

Last weekend was the AB-NWT AAC Regional Championships put on by OC Agility and held in Riviere Que Barre (think North Edmonton.) This was my very first Regional event I've attended as a competitor and I ended up entering both dogs. Baxter because he was ready and Spencer because he'd be there so I figured I might as well run him and see how he did, no expectations. 2 years ago when 2x4 Agility hosted Regionals in Calgary I volunteered, but it's a little different as a competitor.

We ended up staying in a hotel which was a gong show in and of itself, but lots of friends ended up staying on site. I'm not sure which I will do in the future, the dogs aren't the best in a hotel. I'd done some work on not reacting to strange noises after the Flashing Canines trial last Sept in Medicine Hat when we stayed in a hotel for the first time but obviously not enough.

The trial was a great time, and I think I heard someone say that it is the largest Regionals as of yet in Alberta. It was crazy. Over 300 dogs running to qualify for Nationals which are also held in Edmonton this year.

Since I've never been as a competitor before, the format of Regionals surprised me a bit. I knew it was 3 rings running at once, but I didn't realize what kind of down time there was between runs or how relaxed it would be without having to work the trial and volunteer. I also figured that running order would be similar to local trials that go small to tall regulars to special/vets, so either 10" Regulars are first and 6" Specials last or vice versa and then flipped for the second day. Not so! This time it went tall to small back up to tall. Day one with Regulars starting and day 2 with Specials/Vets. So this meant that Baxter and Spencer were running with less than 10 dogs in between them!

Both boys did excellent. I am so proud of  their performances and how they both not only held up under pressure but exceeded my wildest expectations of them.

Pretty Baxter

We didn't run in the warm up trial, but did get up to the trial site around the middle of it on Friday to wander around and chill out/set up. In hindsight I think it might have been helpful for Spencer to experience the new contact equipment before we ran on it, but Baxter adapts pretty well to everything.

I LOVED the open walking of the rings. So much time to think about handling and decide/plan. I didn't stress overly much about the gamble and came up with good plans for my dogs in all the courses. The increased time to walk and think/visualize etc was awesome. I ran the courses more confident and faster than I have before in a trial. It was a great feeling. I knew what I wanted to do, marked out exactly where I'd do those crosses. I changed handling for Baxter vs Spencer (a well executed rear cross in a strategic location with Baxter gets really nice results.)

Since both boys were so close together I ended up moving one of our crates over to in front of the ring we were in and then swapping the dogs so I wasn't sprinting to and from benching at the camper! It worked out much better than I thought it would and was way less stress for me.

Baxter ran clean in 3/6 runs. Both jumpers runs were very nice and well under SCT, as was his clean standard run. Weaves were a little slow, but still clean. Second standard was a refusal on the weaves. He hit the entry and then popped the second pole. Otherwise it was also a beautiful run. He was reading my handling beautifully. In the first gamble he got the one of the mini's twice and might have gotten the main gamble if not for my handling.

Gamble 2 was our last class on Sunday. By this time the weather was doing some very odd things and little torrential down pours would blast in from the north, hit us and then blow over in 5 min. One of these hit shortly before Baxter was due to run. Since he doesn't care about the rain I didn't really think anything of it and my first clue should have been when the judge asked me if he was okay to run. The rain was driving in pretty hard and you can see on the video that Baxter is not the happiest camper to be running let alone doing distance work in the ugly driving rain. He did send out to the teeter right into the rain driving in and I am exceptionally happy with that! The next time we have the option not to run in icky weather, I'm gonna take it.

Spencer was amazing. So proud of my baby dog and how far we've come together. On Saturday I was a little stressed about him. There really was no nice field to walk the dogs in or throw their balls for them. The grass was dry and the weeds poked my feet pretty good, I didn't want my dogs tearing after a ball in that kind of lumpy field. Without playing ball it's hard to get Spencer to turn on and stop worrying about the dogs around.

I figured Saturday would be his better day because he was first and I could try to get him playing before his run. On Sunday he was 8 dogs after Baxter, so no time to play.

Saturday started with the gamble and he was a little hesitant, but did get a mini for me and he stuck with me. Jumpers was next and he still stuck with me. Got a silly refusal, but otherwise he was trying and not completely shutting down or stressed out. Standard was last and I tried giving him a couple pieces of his jackpot reward right before we ran because he was way to worried to play. That did it! He ran standard clean (no popped weaves!!) and 0.3 sec faster than Baxter!

Look, almost twins!

Sunday he ran a fantastic jumpers 2 and also did very well in standard 2. Popped the weaves like Baxter did, and that would have been his only fault except I stopped handling on the last obstacle (it was dogwalk to a final jump) so he didn't take it and cost us 20 faults. Oops!

Gamble was also our nemisis on Sunday. I should have paid attention to what the ring crew was wearing because of the retarded weather and adjusted my plan, because he is still a fairly reactive dog. I didn't. So I sent him straight over the Aframe to the double jumping into a ring crew dude dressed in dark grey with a black umbrella  and sunglasses on. He may not have noticed the guy normally but he was already a little unfocused and keyed in on a lady running outside the ring in the same direction we were. So of course he has to lose his little mind, charging and alarm barking. Huge kudos to ring crew dude for not moving a muscle!

Managed to finally get Spencer back asking for a nose touch and then deking out of it at the last second to send him over the dog walk.  Buzzer goes when he has like 2 steps left to complete the one mini I was trying for, but at least he refocused and was running with me again. Sends out great to the teeter, up to the pivot point and then hops right off not even waiting for it to move. I'd hoped he'd actually stay on it, but it was a faint hope =P

After talking to Kim a little bit on Saturday about mental management etc I hadn't looked at our scores or added up anything off the scribe sheets, besides tallying our gambles to make sure that was right. I didn't know the other 6" Special dogs or how they were doing since they weren't in our group and honestly, I didn't really want to know.

It doesn't change the results in the end. Knowing you need to make X points the next day to qualify, or beat that other dog just puts more pressure on you. We were running our best. I was pushing to make sure my handling was bang on and confident. Run it like you stole it right?! Pushing the dogs a little to run faster, turn tighter and not babysitting any of my contacts. If the training held it did, if it didn't, something to fix next time. It was fun! Seriously the most fun I've had at a trial. No worrying about the Q - I'm going to bring that mindset back to "regular" trials with me!

I knew Baxter should do well, especially after how well we were running the first day. I was hoping to hit in the top 3 (the podium.) With Spencer I had no expectations what so ever, tho I figured he should at least qualify since his scribe sheets looked a awful lot like Baxter's!

So, so proud to say that Baxter won the Regional Championships for 6" Specials with 448 points! He placed in all his runs, even that last disappointing gamble.

When they got around to announcing the regular aggregate scores (they did Specials, Vets, DD Vets first) I was a little zoned out. It was a *bit* late by that time. I was a little sad when they moved right into the placement ribbons without saying our name (1-6 place got a ribbon.) Oh well, I guess we didn't qualify, I was thinking. 10" Regular is a competitive class, there are 3 world team dogs in it and a double handfull of other really good, fast, drivey small dogs. I was shocked when they read out Spencer's name as 4th place. He just missed the podium! Holy shit!

Baby dog managed not only to qualify with 398 points (the next dog was just 2 points behind us!) But he took 4th place in the division overall and a third place for our Standard 1 run. THIRD!!!!?!? This was seriously the best he has ever run for me in a trial! He has come SO FAR from that little puddle of terrified 8wk puppy trying to melt into the floor.