Cloudy

Well it was suppose to be cloudy. It was cloudy all morning but I couldnt go out to the field in the morning. So I went around 12:30 and when I got there, sunny. Never was cloudy again until I got back home. LOL But it wasnt that sweltering heat we usually have. So I decided to stay. Miley mostly stayed in the shade and I only had her do small sequences. So it worked out pretty well. I wanted to run her over the a-frame. She couldnt 2 hit. Weird. I have not idea why. The only thing I can think of is that it feels slippery to her. When I practiced the first few times, I had her just above the box and she had a hard time keeping her position. She kept sliding down. I decided to just go with it because we are going to a trial this weekend and I didnt want to make an issue of it. I would rather her run the a-frame this way but not sure how to teach that. She hit in the yellow every time, so I just rewarded even though it was more than 2 hits. Notice one time I said "touch", my word for stopping on the dogwalk. Ugh! Also, I removed the box on the last one.



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We did some short pinwheel and serpt. sequences. She did really well except when I pulled before she was committed and made her drop the bar. I need to be careful of that.

When it rains....

Its a cool day, well sort of. No sun so its a little bit of a break. I trained Miley this morning. We worked on the running a-frame. Meagan thought I should put the box back on the ground and work on decelerating but her still 2 hitting. She did very well. I , did not. I added other obstacles to make the grid box work more realistic. What I found out when I watch the tape was, I'm sending her over the jump with my inside hand and outside leg. I couldnt figure out why sometimes she was turning the wrong way over the jump. I wonder how long Ive been doing that. Im not sure I will ever get this all figured out. Here is some of the video of the grid work.

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( apparently I dont know what day it is???)

Yesterday we worked on 270's, serps and threadles. And also just running by jumps and not taking them unless I cue them. She had trouble with that if she was to my right but not on my left. Weird.

After training we came inside. I was sitting on the couch and I heard Miley yelp. I got up quickly and went to her. All of a sudden she was trying to poop, in the house. What the heck? So she pooped and then ran out the doggie door. I thought maybe she had eaten some plastic, which she has done before and can be painful coming out. But I checked her poop and it looked normal. Then I went outside to see what she was doing. She had pooped on the deck and it was loose. Otherwise she seemed ok. She came back inside. About 30 minutes later I closed the back door and took a shower. Well I guess while I was in the shower, she had to go again. Where did she go, the old carpet, any of the numerous cheap throw rugs all over the house? Nope, on the new carpet that I had put in last year in the living room. Its blocked off with X-pens ( so no dogs could vomit or use the bathroom on it) but they are in a zig-zag pattern. Well where it zigged in, that small patch of new carpet, looked like a good spot. Ugh, that figures doesnt it? I cant have anything new or nice because either the dogs or kids wreck it. Ugh. Anyway, I cleaned it up. I dont think you can see anything. Im not sure why she yelped when that happened, it was just so weird. And then pooping inside when the back door was open. She seems ok this afternoon.

More running a-frames

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She is putting in more than 2 strides when Im behind her. Hmm, does anyone know if thats ok? I really want a 2 stride hit but when she is collecting she needs to put more strides in. At least she isnt jumping off before the yellow but she might do that.

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Here she is more extended, so she only does 2 hits.

More box work

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The a-frame is set low. Miley is doing three hits on the down side. I know that when she gets to a trial, she gets high and will only do 2 hits. I need her doing 2 hits on the down side at home. So the DVD suggest to move the box up on the aframe to get the 2 hits. Then slowly you move the box down, inch by inch, until they are in the yellow. The video is of the first day with the box up higher to get the 2 hits. It freaks me out a little that she isnt hitting in the yellow but I have to be patient. LoL Not my strong point.
I tried LM "touch and go" exercise. LoL You set up a pinwheel and you have to touch the upright of the 2nd jump and then run away. It was pretty funny how slow I am. I think my dog was laughing at me. I also tried the one jump with just lateral motion and she wasnt to wide coming around the jump except for one time.

My daughter , Stephanie, set up a blog. http://www.timetobreakfreeartist.blogspot.com/
Thats the link , but its also on the side bar of my blog roll. Its about her artwork. She has posted some of the things she has done at school this year.

Weaves and a-frames

I went out to the field today. Even at 8am, it still feels hot. By the time I was done, sweat was soaking thur my shirt. At least tomorrow's lesson will be inside.
I worked on a jumpers course. She did really well. Our first run thur she just went in at the second weave pole but other wise perfect. I started looking thur my book on the trials we have been to. We seems to do better on outdoor trials on grass and do the worse on indoor on dirt. I wonder if its because we mostly train outside on grass and she feels this is how its suppose to be or is it the different running surface or it could be me. LoL

After I was done running the jumpers run I decided to test if I could get some distance away from the weave poles and her not pull out. WhooHoo, success!
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We also worked a little on the box running a-frame. I started her higher up on the a-frame and she is hitting in the box but I would like it to be a little deeper. Ill have to talk to Meagan about that. I wonder if she will go deeper once she is truly running the a-frame and has momentum to carry her through. She still jumped the box one time. I feel she is still unsure of what she is suppose to be doing. Every once in a while she will creep down into a 2o/2o.

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Im almost done with the LM foundation seminar VOD. Thank goodness. Its starting to feel like a chore. LoL I think if I had more time to watch it, I wouldnt feel so much pressure to get it done. But then you may not get what you need out of the seminar if you wait to long between session to finish watching it. The last part is easier to watch because she is demonstrating her training methods with a dog and then they analyze it and talk about the information that you are giving the dog. Most of the time I have to rewind to see it because I missed it the first time. Its hard to watch what she is doing and what the dog it doing. I guess its a good thing that I can rewind it , if I was at the seminar I couldnt. LoL

Thoughts

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I still keeping Miley at just above the box and bouncing it. I want to make sure she really understands the "hit it" command. She didnt jump the box once but she isnt running yet either. So will see what happens when she starts running.


Next Im working on keeping Miley in the poles. She tends to pull out if I speed up or if I start to pull away. I used the Ready Treat to keep her in the poles. It worked well. But it got me thinking that your dog has to disregard your motion cues when training that. Is that ok? So then I thought, well you rear cross the poles and that doesnt mean turn when in the poles. So its probably ok.
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I see the AKC has put out their new changes in agility. Most of the things I dont care that they have changed. But some of the things will make it hard when you trial in more than one venue. They have changed the chute lenght to 6 feet. I guess that is to prevent getting tangled in the chute but Im not sure it was necessary. They changed the table to just having all four feet on, no sit or down. Well that's great for most people. Maybe someday Miley will get on the table. LOL They lowered the tire height. So my dog jumps 12 inches and the tire will now be at 8 inches. But when you train in other venues this doesnt happen. So now is my dog being set up to crash the tire because she isnt expecting the higher tire? I did like the rule that if you dog falls off the ascending ramp of the dogwalk or a-frame, gets tangled in the chute or crashes the tire , you have the choice to put them back on the obstacle and then leave the ring. Or of course you can just keep going. They also changed the ribbing in the tunnel from 6 inches to 4inches. Im not sure why. But it will cost the club a lot of money to replace all the tunnels. Ugh!

Ive been watching Linda Mechlenburgs VOD foundation seminar. She has really lowered the price. It is now only $75 . It was $175. And you have a week to watch it vs 48 hours. Ive only seen about 45 min of the 6 hours but so far its been good for me. Right now she is discussing the 6 basic cues. She talks about natural cues that your dog reads and teaching cues. Natural cues your dog instinctively knows and you dont need to teach. Something I found interesting. She talked about shoulder pulls and how they dont really work. ( I think that is what she said). And the reason your dog will turn with a shoulder pull is because of your stopping of motion and not the shoulder pulling. Interesting. Shoulders ,a lot of times, cue extension which is why your dog takes the wrong tunnel entrance even when your pulling with your shoulders. Im looking forward to the rest of it.

Sorry , just a-frame stuff

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Here is some more a-frame stuff. I practiced with the box part on and part off the a-frame today and yesterday. That she got easily. Once I put the box on the a-frame you will see she had a couple of problems on the first few hits. There are also 2misses later on. Not complete misses but one foot wasnt in the box. I didnt notice it until I watched the video.
Tomorrow Im going to help out with an agility demo in Charlotte. Im also going to have Miley have another chiro adjustment. Nothing is wrong but the chiro thought she should see Miley again this week. Its been hot as heck lately. In the 90's and humid. Ugh! Ive been trying to take the dogs for a walk in the late evening. They act like its a death march. I hose the dogs down at the front of the park. Im sure people think Im mean because Guiness acts like such a big baby. Miley doesnt like it but at least she tolerates it. So tonight I just bagged the whole idea of a walk.

More a-frame work

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So I skipped a few steps when doing to box a-frame work. Oops, poor Miley. When you are trying to retrain from a 2o/2o to a running a-frame with the box you need to break the stopping motion of the 2o/2o. You do that by putting the dog into the 2o/2o position ( no verbal cue) then put the box on the ground in front of the a-frame. Release her to the box by saying "hit it". Put yourself in all the handler positions. Once she gets that, move her up a little on the a-frame and start again sending her to the box. If she stops in the 2o/2o position, wait her out . (Miley didnt have that problem)
So I started this evening wanting to just do a few running a-frames. Just to see if we still could run like yesterday. Uh, she couldnt. Didnt get it right once. Crap. Meagan had emailed me and told me to watch the DVD again esp. the stuff on retraining from a 2o/2o. Why didnt I do that first? Uh because I know better. Lol
Sometimes Im hard headed. So after the failure, I went inside and watch the DVD. Oh, now I see the problem.I couldnt figure out why she wasnt recognizing the box on the a-frame when I said "hit-it". Once I put the box on the ground in front of the a-frame she started recognizing the "hit-it" command again. I didnt watch any more of the DVD so I wouldnt push things. Who me? Never. LOL Thanks Meagan.
Today was Nurses Day. At school I got a wonderful basket and a 20 dollar gift card to PetSmart. Best nurses gift Ive ever received.

Running a-frame work

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OMG you wouldn't believe how long it took for us to get this. She was great on the ground work but as soon as I added the a-frame she couldnt do it. Sorry all that junk is on the ground but I was trying a different things to help her understand. I think we were at it for one hour, but not constantly. A lot of time was me moving the a-frame to different heights. Meagan wanted me to do it on a flat on the ground a-frame but my a-frame can go completely flat. It has this bar that runs down the middle so I tried to put some stuff under the apex to make is slightly elevated. That didnt work. I finally got the chains hooked at the lowest point I could. She still wasnt getting the bounce across thur the box. She either walked down the side or went into a two on /two off. I really dont remember what made her finally get it. I do know I had to put the second jump a little further down pass the apex to get a one hit into the box. She isnt running really fast but I think its because she is thinking about what she is doing. I hope she doesnt throw up from all the treats.

Practice

I went to the field last night. We set up a open jumpers course to run. Miley did really well. She did drop one bar on each run. Hmmm.... The end of the run was an off side tunnel entrance after a few straight on jumps. Of course we didnt get it the first time. So I worked one jump, use off arm cue and call her, reward. Then again. Then when I got her the next time I sent her into the correct tunnel entrance. Then next time I ran the whole course she got it the first time.
Right before I went home I ran the course some what backwards to practice getting into the weaves at speed. Since several of the courses this weekend had that and we were unsuccessful at it. The good news was as Miley is coming out of the tunnel she is looking at me. The bad news is, she was looking at me and missed the weaves. I really had to hang back and show no motion to get her locked onto the weaves.


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I did just a little box work. I made the left turn into the grid work softer (per Meagan suggestion) and she had no problems.

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Grid work

I added some more grid work to the running a-frame box. I rewarded three times for bad hits. I was on a side and couldnt see she wasnt hitting correctly. Im going to have to work on that turn into the grid. All three missed were the same turn.



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Box work

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Here is more box work for the running a-frame. Nothing to exciting to watch. Of course its exciting to me but probably not to you. LoL.
Yesterday we went to the field and practice. I ran some small sequences and mostly worked on me trying to keep going when mistakes are made. I was pretty successful. I think she only circled maybe once or twice. I worked a lot on moving downs too. I have a long way to go on that but she is getting better. But once her excitement level gets to high, she cant down. But I defiantly see improvement.
I bought myself a couple of new things from Clean Run. I bought that book, "Agility Right from the start". Ill let you know what what I think. I also bought a "Ready Treat". Im having to condition Miley for the noise it makes because she was scared of it at first. Ill try to post some video soon. I case you dont know, "Ready Treat" is a treat dispenser. Its much, much smaller than Manners Minder but can only dispense one treat and then you have to refill it. But for me thats ok. It can hold any treat you want, so that was important to me. But its half the price of Manners Minder. I also bought some liver treats but none of the dogs are to excited about them. Hmmm....

Last day of vacation

Today is the last day of vacation. Tomorrow I go back to work. Boooooooo! Its been raining since last night and Miley is beside herself with boredom. I did walk them this morning before the rain started up again. Guiness wouldn't go for a walk. I got him to the street and he wouldn't move. He has never done that before. I have walked him every morning for the last 3 years. Sometimes he doesn't go for the first half of the walk, but usually when I come back with the chihuahuas, he is waiting. Today he wasn't waiting but he did come for treats. But like I said, when he got to the street , he wouldn't move. So I put him back in the house and just took Miley. I did give him some pain medication with his breakfast. Then about 1 hour later, I took Miley and Guiness to the park to walk. He did that with no problems. His blood work was all normal, but we are still waiting on the free T4. So, I'm not sure what is wrong with him. He just seem like he doesn't want to do anything but lie on the couch. No limping except his usual limp that no one can figure out what is wrong.

Below is the video from yesterday, I think. The box a-frame is looking pretty good. I'm made a new box that fits the dog walk and have started training that too.