Just about a Year

Or it would have been had I posted this on time! So it's like a year and a month - whatever!!

Baxter started trialing and got his first Q last year on 31-Aug.

I am SO happy with how far he has come and how we've grown as a team. I'm pretty happy with me for sticking with the sport as well and growing as a person/trainer. Granted, Baxter isn't as difficult a starter dog as some people have had, but it's easy to start out with something and then decide that it really isn't for you.

I love it when there are photographers at the trials! I got one of each of the boys @ Medicine Hat! Photographers Album

Aside from guarding the hotel room, he was fantastic at the Flashing Canines trial last weekend. We came home with 2 Q's; his first master standard and his first master snooker. But, he tried in all his runs AND he hit all his weave pole entries and didn't pop out. I also got fast weave poles (we can get single stride weaves at home and are working on transferring that to other venues) in his qualifying master standard run. The things we've been working on are improving!

We had a couple little bobbles here and there, what I'll refer to as "baby dog" (and possibly baby handler) mistakes. I front crossed on the flat to push him onto the dogwalk and instead of going up the dogwalk plank he went beside it in a standard run. He missed a jump because I drifted a little bit laterally away from it in one jumpers. Then we both buggered up a backside of a jump in the other jumpers. But we're getting there. I have a happy dog who wants to work for me in a trial. THAT is what I care about, the rest will come with polishing. I didn't get lost on course either, which I am happy about!

Notice I don't mention either of our gamblers runs though. Those were just sad. First run I tried the mini's on, and he wasn't terribly successful. Not only did he not want to work away for the mini, we also didn't get the super awesome main gamble either. 3 jumps, 2 tunnels, 4 multi directional obstacles. It was like a gift!

So. I changed my plan after some advice. Stop worrying about the mini's. Plan a nice speedy path to wind him up instead of struggling in the first 40 sec which is going to pretty much guarantee me a melt down in the final gamble. Ok. Makes sense. I think we did better in the second gamblers run - except for Mr Excitement jumping a dogwalk contact >< That final gamble was hard though, out to 6 weaves, twice and some jumps, only a handful of dogs even got to the weaves, only one did the gamble correct but over time. We weren't any of those dogs!

So I need to break down distance work to not such a distance I think, and get it solid there. In our distance class we took I usually had to step over the line to get Baxter to read the handling right. If that's what it takes in a trial, that's what it takes. I'd rather step over the line and help him get it right than for my handling to be unclear and teach him not to trust it. That's the plan for now anyway. Gamblers is going to be the hardest thing for us to master, but I knew that right from the beginning when it took forever to even get our first gamblers Q's.

Even though he is doing good in agility, I'm thinking about dropping him into veterans once he turns 5 in January. It still feels like a little bit of a cop-out right now, but if he needs a couple extra seconds to qualify when he's trying I don't think I'm going to stay in specials until he's 7 just to make the a point of doing it "the hard way." I guess I'll see in Jan. We're in Steeplechase this Wed and I'm curious to see if he will make time or if he'll still be over.

Motivation

The dogs and I spent the weekend in Medicine Hat for the last outdoor trial of the season put on by Flashing Canines. It was a great trial and has given me lots of blog fodder! Before I start on the good stuff tho ...

...Irritation is motivation

I think I am sufficiently motivated enough after this past weekend to put a stop to barking at noises.

They look so cute and innocent ...

Rewind a few months. I went to get Spencer measured at a trial, just to practice and get used to it. It went badly, he was terrified and actually growled at the judge - not quite the way I wanted things to go. So we worked on that really hard. I made a little PVC wicket and he got "measured" and "petted" on the back and neck by the wicket every couple of days while he worked for his meals. This weekend he was great for measuring. Although I'm sure it helps that they had thin metal wickets and a female judge instead of huge PVC ones and a male judge.

I'm talking about this why? Because this weekend was the first time I've stayed in a hotel and I was pretty apprehensive about taking all 3 dogs with me. When they're together pack mentality is quite apparent, if one dog reacts to something even if the others individually are fine all 3 turn into little lunatics. Penny is very vocal while Spencer is really high strung, so I usually don't have both Chihuahuas with me - especially in new situations.

I guess it wasn't THAT bad (then again, I wasn't the people in the room next to mine, so who knows?) The 3 hour car ride had the boys pretty out of sorts and Baxter was a bit stressed by being in a strange place. I'm glad I came up the night before instead of making the drive the morning of.

The hotel put us in the very last room in the hall, the one right beside the door to the stairwell that also has a outside door. Instead of having a nice little handle you press it was one of those doors with the bar across it. You know, the ones with the bar you hammer on and smash into the door to open it. It's quite noisy. You can hear it from in the room ...

I had hoped that all the camping and staying in my parents trailer with the dogs would lend itself to a easy hotel stay but between the room location and being in a strange place, none of us got much sleep that night. I even crated and covered the smaller ones together in hopes it would keep them quieter. Didn't quite work.

Saturday night went better maybe because they were falling asleep on their feet from the day at the trail, but again, when people started moving and thunking and bashing around on Sunday morning starting at 5:30 the dogs would get a bark or two in before they would shush.

Ah well. Something to work on. 

Toys. Fading rewards and Building ring behaviours.

We had a great time today spending most of the day out at Wet Noses. Spencer and I are starting to click as a team in the face of distraction, which is good, because he's entered in his first trial in 2 weeks!

It will likely be the last outdoor trial of the season and may be a *little* bit early to begin to trial Spencer. However, I want him to have a good experience at his first couple of trials and outdoors is easier for him. Less weird echos, not so crowded. No dogs that attack the front of their crate when you walk by benched right by the entrance to the arena. Outdoors makes things easier when you're a soft, fragile little dog!

Spencer is also comfortable enough (at Wet Noses at least) to full out play tug with me. The kind of toy obsessive tug that I get at home when my little guy isn't worried about his environment.

What I'm working on right now is fading out the toy being on my person or at least visibly on my person. When we run courses or when we work drills, I usually am holding his toy. So he KNOWS it's there. He doesn't track(stare) the toy as he works, which was a nice side effect of training weaves by 2x2's, but he's anticipating earning it. When he can't see it, he's not as sure about working.

Baxter didn't do this, but then he was training for much longer and I primarily used treats with Baxter, only using his cherished ball to teach that burst of speed at the end through the finish line. Treats build value in a behavior, but toys build drive for it. With Baxter I've had to work on re-building his toy drive due to the focus on food rewards. With Spencer I am working on keeping both toy drive and motivation for food intact during training. Not focusing on the "easy" one to the exclusion of the other.

We've done a lot of small handling drills and double box work so he's used to frequent rewards to create enthusiasm and drive for the behaviors. So I'm lengthening the sequences we run before he earns his toy. We're not up to running a full course without a reward yet. If we're not there by the trial, that's fine, I'll just do partial courses and then have a party with him.

I'm also juicing up nose touches as a rewarding behavior. They're already pretty rewarding, but now I randomly jackpot them as well. Why? So in the event my soft little dog shuts down on a agility course, I can ask for a hugely reinforcing, easy behavior that he loves to do.

Yes, it will get us (me) faults for touching the dog, but it can be my "toy" on the course until we can get off of it to get his reward. It will also enable me to positively influence his frame of mind to get one more obstacle done with focus and enthusiasm so we can get outta there and not reward shut down or other stress behaviors by just leaving. As the truism reads, plan for the worst and hope for the best! It's also just plain fun =D

Just passing by

Where'd it go?

Tongues

Tibby or not Tibby?!

That was the question. However, the CKC agrees with Tibby and I've finally gotten Baxter's PEN!

C'mon easy agility! Erm, did I say that out loud?! Excellent may not actually be easier, but at least to get there is quicker than moving up to Masters in AAC. Fewer skills to master as well. No distance skills (Gamblers) or crazy handling (Snooker) needed. Just Standard and Jumpers with Weaves.

Last night at Wet Creek was not so easy agility. I struggled with all sends in Gamblers. Obviously I'm doing something he doesn't understand in a trial. Or maybe he was just hyped and thrown off by the venue. We've also gotten to point where Baxter's 12(ish) obstacles in the opening is going to be really close for qualifying points in masters and I need to work on being able to send to mini's, which he also struggled with. When working on our distance skills I'm also going to work on obstacle value.

On the positive side though, his weaves in gamblers and in relay were good, and quicker! Not quite single striding but not plodding through the poles either. I'll absolutely take that over a Q!

He was doing very nice in Snooker too, until my brain melted and I didn't think on the fly. I didn't try to pull him off a wrong obstacle with motion (ie serp arm) as well as a verbal. He might have pulled off of the wrong tunnel if I had thought to stop forward motion and pull him away from that entrance with a serp. I'll have to try to set that up again out in practice sometime. I find I'm also a little hesitant and look sort of lost in videos, which doesn't help him be confident of what I'm telling him to do.

I also discovered I use Baxter's nick name more than I thought.

I was talking to some people at the trial who were in town from Vancouver. One of them was a younger girl and she introduced her Sheltie, Bonny and then said "And this is Snickers, right?" Close and a cute name, but not quite! The thing is, I seem to be calling Baxter "Snackers" a lot.

In my defense, he came to live with me with that nick name, thanks to the rest my family and his fondness for food. It also starts with a S ... so when I screw up on course and call the wrong dog name Snack and Spence aren't terribly dissimilar, right?!? Maybe they don't notice! (yeah right!)

My boys! <3

The Grass is Greener ...

Like the title says, Grass isn't always greener on the other side; it's greener where you water it. (thank you Justin Bieber)

But seriously. Things just don't fix themselves. If you want what someone else has, you've got to work at it! And isn't the journey just as important as your destination?!

Working at it, we have been. I recently discovered drop in outdoor training at Wet Noses. It's fairly close and convenient to get to with nice equipment, 2 agility rings and a great online reservation system. It is CKC heights (4, 8, 12") not AAC (6, 10, 16") so the dogs are jumping some funny heights and equipment is a little different but it's close enough. We've been heading out a couple times a week to play.

Spencer's running contacts are a work in progress, but at least he isn't afraid of the equipment. Teeter games are also progressing. So far I have just been using toys with him, but I think next time out I'm going to start using food in tossable containers  to see if that changes his focus and enthusiasm at all. Right now he's still a little spooky with it being a strange place. He will offer play, but it isn't with the same insane enthusiasm as he displays at home so transferring value to agility is not a quick process.

Baxter's weaves are getting better and faster. Hopefully this will carry over into trials. We work on various gambles as well. His running contacts are solid, I just hope to speed up the performance a little.

Yay weaves! (picture by Jay Collins from spring Fionavar K9 trial in Olds)

Penny is surprising the heck out of me. She's doing really well playing on the agility courses! Working on manners during walks has had some positive carry over in other areas. Being rewarded for giving me attention and not sniffing the ground for food or alarm barking is finally paying off. It's quite cute to see. She'll even play ball in the backyard with her tiny little hollee roller ball - the only ball I've found that is small enough to fit in her mouth.

We went to the Go Dog Go games trial last weekend. I'm a little sad that I couldn't do the camp, but the trial was fun. Baxter ran well despite the heat. We got another Jumpers Q, last run of the day, so that was lovely! I managed not to get lost on course and handle like I walked it, so I was happy with that.

Starting over with a puppy might give you a different starting point and make things "easier" in the beginning, but in the long run you will likely end up right back where you are if you don't change what you're doing to cause the issues.

I'll just keep thinking of that as I read Hyper Hounds updates on Spryte's first litter of puppies! I might be a little jealous of how good of a start those puppies are getting, but now was really not the time for a puppy. Everything that Kim plans to do with those puppies to give them a great start as stellar little dogs may cement Shelties as the next breed I get - specifically one of her puppies. It would be nice to start a puppy without a socialization/confidence deficit for once!

Silhouette Girl

High Five

Strech!

 When I saw these silhouettes of my girl the corny commercials for the yogurt that helps you loose weight, specifically the silhouette brand, just sprang to mind. Penny could absolutely be a model for how the silhouette of a chihuahua should look. They are actually supposed to have a waist! Not look like an overstuffed sausage on legs. When she was in to be spayed, the vet gave her a nasty body condition score of 1 - emphasizing that she was REALLY thin, which she is not.

She carries her extra weight on her shoulders/chest like a Boston will and starts to chunk up there before her ribs ever get any more fat cover. Lean is not skinny/starving/underfed. You can't see hip bones or ribs through her coat, you can just feel them - as opposed to not being able to find them under the fat.

Wiggles

Dog-gone Long Weekend

Am I ever late in posting this, but better late than never! Without further adue ...

If I would have planned it right, I would have sent the paperwork in for Baxter's CKC PEN a long time ago and entered the AKC (Alberta Kennel Club) show that was at Spruce Meadows this weekend. As it was, I still went and visited/watched but the dogs weren't entered in anything. I wish I would have been though. Nothing like watching agility to make you want to do it more - or to comment in your head how your dog could absolutely do that course! Plus it was a gorgeous venue.

CKC agility starts off a lot easier than AAC agility not having weave poles in novice standard. It makes me a little jealous. Jump heights are a little different though, so Baxter is likely going to have to be jumping 8" instead of the 6" he jumps in AAC. It was interesting seeing some of the people who are regular fixtures at AAC trials in a different environment as well as all the different people and breeds.

Saturday evening I took Spencer out solo for some urban training on the boardwalk by the lake. He did fantastic. Even when a small dog was growling and barking at him from about 10 ft away as its people dragged it along he just sat beside me and alternated eye contact/watching the dog. We also practiced some impulse control games that we do with yellow ball on the off leash portion of the path.

The part I was happiest about though was when a crowd of people walked by. I had put Spencer into a sit off to the side of the path through the off leash area because sometimes he is weird with strangers, especially if the strangers aren't dog people. He had his leash on and I was standing on the end of it just in case he reacted badly. But he didn't move, just glanced at them and then back to me. The people commented on how well my little guy was trained. Woo hoo! I'm not just imagining progress!

To top it off, since it was late and the boat launch was deserted, I took him over to see if he would swim. I didn't have to encourage him at all, just waded out with his ball and he was right there paddling away. You could have knocked me over with a feather - and not just because of the super slippery algae covered cement ramp I was standing on! Good dog!! Out of my immediate family's 8 small dogs, I have the only 2 that will swim without being put in the water.

As I commented to one of the vendors at the AKC show, I have chihuahua's but they're not the Paris-Hilton type dress-me-up-and-put-me-in-a-handbag-landsharks. They're real dogs, just shrunk!

With that in mind, Penny came out to agility practice at Wet Noses on Monday. Sometimes I feel a little guilty that I spend a lot of time and effort training the boys while she gets less attention. I make a effort to do one on one things with her and have little Penny-adventures, but she doesn't play like they do or come to agility things like they do. For having never seen full size contact equipment or a 12 foot chute - she did really well. She was sniffy, which is her norm, but she actually ran with me and had a good time getting cookies.

All in all it was a dog-tastic dog-gone long weekend! Way too hot, but still a lovely 3 days off.