Thursday, January 26, 2006

WYRIWYG or What You Reinforce Is What You Get

For anyone who may have wandered across this and is wondering what the heck it's all about, this is a record of training sessions of my dogs.

I have three dogs:
Cade - 8 yo Italian Greyhound neutered male, red and white, total ham, lives to eat, thinks the world was created to adore him and is way too smart for my own good. Has his CGC but hasn't done much since. Retired from agility training years ago due to a hip injury in a lure course practice.
Isabella - 8 yo Italian Greyhound spayed female, red and white, was rescued from a puppymill and is a bit quiet and nervous still
Sierra - 3 yo Aussie Shepherd spayed female, red merle copper and white, sweet, soft, a bit of a sookie girl but wants soooo badly to please. She's also a total gut and the 'innocent' of the group. (The Italians are coniving little shysters who spend their lives plotting evil and mayhem... *G*) She has her CGC and her U-AG I but we moved overseas so she's spent over a year off in quarantine/horrid pregnancy/demanding baby.

We're aiming to get Cade into obedience trials and Sierra into obedience, agility, endurance and freestyle.

Sierra
Sit - 15x/session
Trial 1: 2:28.32
Trial 2: 1:46:28 offering a lot of bows and downs
Trial 3: 1:28:52 less offering, distracted by Nic and Laurent
Trial 4: 1:18:91 distracted by Nic, offering a lot of bows
5: 1:17:93, less bows
6: 2:03:86 lost treat under door, Cade got out of crate
7 1:25:39, lost treat under chair, must learn to toss neater
8: 1:18:09 .
9 ran out of treats, jackpotted and ended
10 ran out of treats
Conclusions: she is loosing time chasing down treats as the skid all over the floor. She is also orienting to my front, sitting no further than 5' away from me and returning to me to do the next sit. May be a problem for distance sits and sitting in other positions. Need to work her on distance and orientation.

Cade Sit x15 per session
Trial 1: *PLOP* "It's too bloody hot..." (Fair enough, it IS 34C!)

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