Sooo....

I may have been a bit slack in blogging what has happened...

A week out from our test date I ended up sick as, well, the proverbial dog.  Possibly sicker, considering the dogs were obnoxiously chipper and enjoyed repeatedly shoving slobber-covered toys in my face while I was splodged on the nearest horizontal surface in a puddle of non-coherence.  (I love my dogs but I admit my sense of humor wasn't at it's best when I cracked an eye open to discover the taste in my mouth was a combo of slobber-and-carpet-crud-marinated plushie... shoved there in an effort to get it thrown. Ta ever so very girls!)  I slept like a narcoleptic, passed out when standing up (hellooooo gravity!), had a lovely visit with my Meniere's as it flared up and food was a Very BAD Idea to see... or smell... or think about... or acknowledge the probable physical existence of.  Fantastic for when you're on a to-the-day deadline to train a nice stinky-food based trick right?

The two days before I was quasi-well enough that with about a bottles worth of chest rub stuffed up my nostrils to block out the scent and a medicine cabinet worth of 'better living through chemistry' I was able to get in a few 10 minute sessions in a public space for the first time without hurling.  Dogs hey?  What boring, normal, positively sane lives we'd lead without them to do wacky crap in the name of training for!

The upside of it all is that Ms. Cleverpants lived up to her name and did the trick despite our lack of proofing.  Phew!  We found out on the anniversary of her sister's passing she got in.  Something to smile about was very welcome on a day that's been drowned in tears and spent in our Rainbow Bridge memory garden painting. Hopie's had her first lesson of foundation and was so excited that the next day anytime I was even remotely near the door she'd dash to the training bag and then the door while bouncing like a loonie so I think she may have enjoyed herself a tiny bit.  LOL

And tomorrow we're off for the first flyball comp of the season... whole buckets of yay over getting to be back out doing stuff with my best girlies again!

My name this week...

is...

Clever McCleverpants.  And I can hold the hotdog just like a dumb-bell without nomming it!

While this one got lost in her own back yard and howled her little heart out till mumma came and rescued her. 

 

And these two were just plain mischief!

  

Breakdown of the hotdog retrieve, for anyone interested.

Steps mainly follow:
Pre-req for good understanding of 'zen' related food refusal (self control, impulse control), front and finish

I'm deliberately not spelling out steps on some of the skill-sets as there's thousands of others who've covered it well and truly, except where I've done things in a way I want to remember.
1.) shaped retrieve of dumbbell
a.) pick up and take the correct 'bit' of the dumbbell instead of picking it up from other areas
b.) pick up and hold from hand - no duration/distraction at this point
c.) pick up and bring shaping from just lifting off the ground to normal carrying height and then bringing it, duration, distraction, distance
d.) teach to release specifically into the hand and not any other location properly, duration, distraction
    d.1.) backing up to hold from hand duration and distraction (seemed more natural progression)
e.) add in distance,duration, distractions to Whole Picture
f.) stim cont
2.) chaining and proofing retrieve with front and finish and proof those for distance/duration/distraction
3.) introducing 'hotdog' in a "can't eat it" form (frozen and either in a PVC tube if your dog is persistent (has a grip that's hard enough to break plasticwrap) like Sierra or in plasticwrap if they're easier (like Hope) and introduce as a substitute dumbbell and work the idea back up.  Work on a take and hold with the froze/pvc hotdog, starting brief and working up duration
5.) begin unwrapping small bits of the end, zen work with no sniffing/licking/grabbing the tempty bits and work on take and hold, up duration
6.) unwrap more and more progressively until you are working with the unwrapped frozen hotdog.(This is where Hope is at atm.)
7.) add in carrying it over a distance
8.) pick unwrapped froze hotdog off the floor and bring it
9.) switch to partially thawed, then raw, then cooked cool, then cooked warm hotdogs (dogs may transition easily and jump from froze to cooked or need the transitions)
10.) put it all together so that it's a formal start position, send out, retrieve and release

We will also have to proof this for the hotdog having icky sawdust on it as well as the test will occur in a horse arena which the floor is compacted sawdust.  (Blerg!)

The reason we're not a bit further is I was training when tired and my timing in marking was um, just a fraction of a hair late.  Which I noticed when (you get what you reinforce) my dog started deliberately relaxing her jaw allowing it to roll out after having a nice firm hold, while I tried to get duration extension!  *sigh*  Oh well, easy fixed, just no more training at midnight! ;p

Ye Olde Hotdog Retrieve

Okay, so it's not a real hotdog because I'm a special sort of snowflake and that would make me gag which is hugely counterproductive.  However Miss Hopie is being taught the hotdog retrieve (using a 'just as tempting but not-hotdog sausage') as our trick for getting into agility classes at the end of the month to prove I can train and she can learn.  It's easy enough to teach and hopefully it looks swish enough for us to earn enough points to get in to the training center because I really, really don't want to wait ages before testing again and would vastly prefer to just be able to train.  The whole trick will involve her going out to hotdog that is thrown as if it were a dumbbell in an obedience exercise, have it retrieved, front and handed over neatly before finishing.  It's coming along pretty well at the moment, I'll try in a few days to get a picture of her being a clever bean. :)

By George... I think the girl has GOT it!

Well... that may be a tad (okay, a lot) premature BUT having been working on Hopie's dry skills I have to say we've already seen some very HAPPY results which is awesome.

The first task we focused on was one of our biggest - the stock stick, which had gotten to a point where she saw it and was already anticipating pressure before we even got to the paddock.  She's not bothered by sticks or stick like objects in general or in other contexts - so I could use literally the same one as a target wand, run it all over her body,as a prop for freestyle, for fetch etc. so it was purely the fact it'd come to represent an (albeit usually considered mild) aversive.  That's been the biggest turn around as well - madam is a wiggling, waggling ball of happy eager dog she usually is and moves off it without issue.  Hopefully this will transfer over nicely to non-bucket flocks once we've got latency and distance more where I want them.  (Yes, I'm going to proof this to death before reintroducing it and pondering on how to structure the reintroductions so that I can maintain nice fine slices of single behaviours. LOL)

The next we worked on was a basic cast out.  She already knows that - well in so far as we'd worked her before and she knew 'get around' meant get your bum out around the sheep and start fetching even if it was too fast, too close in to them etc. so not really what I want as my ideal cast!  I started with a basic one anyway to get it firmly on cue and in relation to our flock-o-buckets before I started tinkering with increasing the width she was running out relative to the 'flock', the spaced-ness of her flock and then combining that with my distance from the "flock".

So it went:

• flock close together, me close to flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
• flock close together, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
• flock close together, me standing 1m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
• flock close together, me standing 2m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
  And so on to get me standing back further from the flock.  Then we spread the flock:
• flock spread .25m apart from each other, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m foot of the flock
• flock spread .5m apart from each other
• flock spread 1 m apart from each other
• flock (which had a population explosion at this point *G* and gained a few dozen members) spread .5 apart from each other, me standing .5m away from flock, cast out and going within .5m of the flock and so on so she had to go around a 'big', semi 'loosely grouped' flock
  Then those sheep started being further away from me.  They went back to being fewer (about half the flock took a tropical vacation...) and closer (it's cold out) but instead of being 1-2 m away, they were 3-4m away and then began drifting apart again.  At this point, now we're working on getting her further back from the flock.
• flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within .5m of their 'bums' 
• flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within .75m of their 'bums' 
• flock spread .5 m apart from each other, me standing back 1-2m, her going around within 1 m of their 'bums' and so on... 1.5m, 2m, 2.5m, 3m etc  Then they started spreading apart again... so the flock was 1m apart from each other, me back 1-2m, her having to work progressively wider around their bums.  Basically I want her to be comfortable doing what is asked regardless of how far I am from her, how far back from the sheep she is working, how far back the total space from me to the sheep and the sheep to her is or how wide spread they are that means she has to arch out wider to maintain the wider 'space bubble' around the sheepies.

We've got it firmly from the left going clockwise but not so much from the right going counterclockwise.  That'll be our next task.  I also want to be able to have her keep going (if cued) fully around as she's wanting to come to balance and stop, hesitating if I cue her to keep going and I suspect there will be times being able to push her off/past balance will be very useful to be very comfortable with.

We've also got 'back' down pretty well - very confident on her part, complete with occasional hind foot kicking chutzpa.  LOL

We've got 'look away' and 'look bye' (turn your head and shoulders out in the direction, to widen the angle of her path when she's cued to move) pretty well too. Bye is not as solid as away and she'll sometimes offer away still so we need to go pick it apart a bit.  Probably (maybe?) to do with handedness as well?  That does link with walk-on and we've just started chaining look away + walk and she's got walk-in (straight in) pretty well.

With regard to walk in, I'm pondering teaching it from her being oriented to different directions - ie 2 o'clock, 4, 6, 8, 10 etc. on a radial but debating where exactly I want to consider the 'target spot'.  We've enough on our plate it can wait but I'm pondering away anyhow.

It's a fun experiment for us anyhow and hopefully getting us closer to where we need to be.  It's also a fair bit of thinking of how to restructure things and getting some much clearer/more precise definitions of exactly what I want for the ideal/perfect/finished behaviours in each case.

Two-fer-one

It's distraction proofing AND reality tv for cows!

No, we're not doing herding - we're proofing down and sit-stays with maintaining attention and focus while mum is at a distance (pics taken with 30x zoom) for several minutes and the cows just happen to decide to assist with distraction proofing.

 "I know it's there and I'm ignoring it, I'm not falling for that old distraction and loosing my click!"

(Okay mostly... covert glance!)  Meanwhile apparently watching us train is the cow equivalent of Big Brother and really, reeeeeally fascinating because they all come over and right up to snuffle.

"Mum - that reward better be bloody good!  I'm ignoring it and I'm staying put but I'm getting COW SNOT on my BUM FLUFF!  Cow. Snot. On. My. Bum. Fluff!"

Later on, while we were doing some of our herding dry work I didn't realize the curious cows had come over.  Being hard of hearing and it being somewhat windy I had no idea there was a small group right behind me.  Hope did and at one point when I went to send her around instead of going where I sent her, she went around behind me.  I whirled around wondering if she hadn't lost her marbles only to see the cows fetching at me. Hope was very chuffed with herself after weeks of working dry only to FINALLY some real work!  Little monster!

Hope's sheepdog-type plan rough draft thingiemawhotchie

So... best intentions aside I haven't blogged for weeks. 

However lots has been going on.  With Hopie we'd trying to figure out how to train herding using R+ based training wherever possible and to teach her to become more comfortable with human applied pressure for pressure and release.  I felt like her instincts were keen and she loves the actual work but the only real sticking point was in her not faring well with even very, very, very minor aversively taught approaches.  I had some basic ideas but fleshed it out with a discussion from some lovely folks and (hopefully!) between it we've got a good plan going.

So here is the attempt to write out the plan (something I've been remiss on...) for her and some of what we've been working on.  Worst case, it doesn't improve things but we're no worse off and best case it may work super for us. (Certainly hope so!)  Either way for a dog for whom the tools 'inside the box' aren't bringing out her best game, 'outside the box' however oddly nontraditional it appears has little to loose.

So the areas of trouble for her mainly include:

Behaviours not fluent before being asked for at working level
Dry training had been in the plans for awhile and after talking to some people who have taught working/trial dogs with R+ I came away even more certain. I decided to start dry until many behaviours are fully/very very highly fluent so I can focus just on the dog, without also having to contend with a number of other independent minds who are not stationary and more difficult to reset for multiple finely sliced reps of the same behaviour. The dry-work has the benefit of being able to practice single behaviours in well split easily achievable criteria in a controlled setting which allows the behaviour to become solid, low latency and have significant duration, distance and distraction proofing added to it rather than try to attain those on the fly with the sheep and concurrent with everything else.  Likewise you don't have to rely on other half-trained behaviours at the same time. ;)

Some of this is not new or exclusive as certainly there are a fair few well known working dog trainers who teach a down/stop/come/flanking dry. I'm also wanting to teach to higher standards:
* come in (pretty self explanatory)
* back (move directly outward from the sheep 'target'- not sure if I want this to simply be stepping back or actually turning around or if it even matters... pondering atm!)
* directional modifier cues (not flanking commands - turning out the whole head/shoulder orientation to widen the future trajectory)
* walk  - meaning along whatever path your head/shoulders are currently facing until told to do something else. I'm thinking that this can get paired with directionals - walk on, walk up, walk by, walk away) for when I specifically want her to do the movement at a slower than normal pace.
* outruns
* angles to come around sheep on - has previously been something of an issue
* and while not intended to be taught on cue per se but shaping angles for casting out on stationary objects at increasing widths and distances, proper shaped flanking

And maybe other stuff as I think of it or when I trip across the need for them in levels beyond started.  She does know many of the cues in the obedience/general context very well but the plan is to practice even those in a herding context and at distances to help them become more as high quality/lickitysplit/'no matter what' as they are in other areas.

Distance 
One of the things we were seeing consistently was that she while she was okay giving the sheep some distance she wanted to work relatively close to me and became uncertain if the sheep's distance meant she was asked to work further distances relative to me.  Doubly if she was at all uncertain.  As well as making it difficult to teach/refine behaviours, it also meant she tended to quarter in and bring the sheep up too close to me for comfortable movement to stay within that relative distance and may also affect lining up for obstacles. 

While I've varied my rewards quite a bit - food, toys, games, planted environmental rewards, opportunities to access things - it seems I've unintentionally trained her that there is a 20-ish meter zone that she is to work in and expect reward delivery within relative to me.  (Since so far nothing we've trained or done has really required a functional/reliable working distance beyond that beyond a recall.)  Because of that and how sensitive she is, working outside that distance especially where the behaviours are not trained to fluency is worrisome.  While for most dogs this may not be significant, for her it's a problem.  While not directly applicable to herding general distance work may extended her safe/familiar/rewarding/comfort zone so that if there IS a stressor added it's not on top of uncertainty due to distance.   Likewise generic (non herding specific) distance (remote?) reward delivery to ensure she is aware that rewards can be delivered at that distance regardless of relation to me.

Pressure
Hope is incredibly sensitive to social approval and her perceiving it to be withdrawn makes her anxious.  She is surprisingly confident with external pressure (ie that applied by the sheep and cattle in general or individuals in specific) which speaks to it not being pressure in general she is over sensitive to.  Because of this, I do not believe (natural) pressure itself is the only issue, the timing of the pressure or the degree of it but rather the combination of the behaviours not being fully trained ones and the pressure (coming from human/stock stick) being taught as an aversive to 'correct' her into guessing right to get the release.

The direct seeking-in I think is more of an appeasement behaviour over not knowing what is wanted, anxiety re: distance and anxiety re: aversive pressure and an attempt to use a fall back with a high history of being 'right' everywhere else in life.  Actions like shooing her out, withdraw eye contact or continuing to request a yield (continued pressure) becomes perceived as failing to be able to appease. The more appeasement is withheld the harder the dog tries to appease and the higher the stress raises, until shut down will be the inevitably hit when NOTHING is going to be able to make things right.

Yielding - Central to the pressure issues imo is that at the moment the yield with a stock stick is taught with P&R being taught as a mild aversive.  For most dogs combined with the heavy draw of the sheep it is mild enough that especially with precise timing in the application, the yield gaining removal and the amount of pressure being applied on an 'as mild as possible' basis for the individual and ideally passively (ie the pressure is held at the lowest possible useful level, so the dog can't gain access but is simply waited out vs successively applied increases of pressure) the dog works through any stress.
    For some dogs like Hope, even mildest aversives are enough to be significantly off putting but there is no reason the action (yielding) or reacting to pressure must be taught with an aversive.  That was the 'reframing' context I was dithering on!!!  The same action (move off/yield to either SS pressure or body signal pressure) can be taught in a slightly different manner utilizing R+ to shape the yield and then delivering the reward at or just beyond the peripheral zone.  (ie delivery in place or tossing behind/on the outward trajectory the dog may be asked to move next).  The result should be a dog who is comfortable with the pressure being applied as positive information - which was pointed out to me (I'd not realized, not being that far along) may be very useful in more advanced classes where you are sorting/shedding or instances where you want to have the dog come into the pressure you're putting on the stock.  I likes!

So that's where we are now, working on the dry stuff and then going to start scouting around for a few new sheep who are veerrryyy docile and like to stay together quietly and some quackers now that we can. :)

the continuing adventures of an adorable Demonbaby

This week, we remember the other poor neglect cases in our training a bit more... in the face of "taking the puppy out every 15 minutes" and spending most of our time out socializing to every person/place/noise I can wrangle and/or playing, their training sessions have been um... well... kinda not... (On the other hand we've done several towns, heaps of people, footing surfaces, the vets 2x and are rocking the mobility aid socialization gig!)

So they are all remembering where they were in stands, Hope is recalling she has a bum and she needs to tuck it for her left about turns, Rin is practicing everything because she's Rin and does everything at warp speeds.

On the cute-adorable-all-kinds-of-wonderful puppybreath front...

 Skill-set stuff: mostly the same things but where we were working primarily in relatively non-distracting settings or where if the environment did have distractions they weren't immediate (as in under 1m) we're now starting to add some distractions for the behaviours she does at a decent duration

• crinkling a wrapper (so HARD, she LOVES crinkle toys!)
• rattling the food container, pieces on the ground one by one while she holds
• small/brief movements with toys around her
• me moving around - so stepping back/left/right 1 step, waving arms, shifting weight etc
• asking for increasing duration near people getting a trolly at the shopping center or where the doors are opening and shutting as people walk in/out
• while other dogs are walking around her at home and at club
  
  As she gets better at ignoring each they get progressively longer, louder and more attention grabbing. (wrapper 1 second in pocket, longer, 1 second out of pocket, longer, in moving hand, longer, with a flourish etc.  I've totally slacked off on stand, I just find it boring for some reason so that's currently our worst.  (Erm... same as the adults actually...)  Targeting I've started adding a tiny bit of 'you have to search for it' by placing a smidge around a corner.  The bite hold is stronger on tuggy, she is SUCH a little tug freak!  Retrieving has taken a bit of a dive - not unexpected as I was just grabbing a voluntary behaviour rather than teaching it properly - as she's determined she can keep it.  So voluntary object exchange will be played with a lot this week.  Restrained recalls, walking recalls and running recalls are all featuring heavily.  Manners stuff is just more of the same for now.
  
  Meanwhile I'm not the ONLY one teaching her things... Rin has been demonstrating the 101 Places Border Collies Don't Belong (But Go Anyway)
  
  

The past few days have been a bit of a blur.  "Cold" turned "chest infection" along with "totally lost my voice".  Poor Lily and Nic also had it as did La, so we all pretty well curled into balls, took ample amounts of  medicine and bonded over seeing who could hack up a lung first.

Unfortunately 7-8 week old puppies (age per the vets opinion) have little respect for wishing to quietly hide under the covers till the nasty bugs are gone so we've mainly been working on stuff at home.  We have gotten out to socialize some more today (finally!) and visited Paky and Gembrook as well as visited the vets to practice having a once over and standing on scales.  We've discovered the secret to socializing with men - go in the morning when all the tradies are getting their coffee!  GOBS of socialization to guys today! 

Our coolest socialization moment this week goes to this great big fella in full bikie kit - the jacket, the liberal use of chains, the tatts, headgear, sunglasses and massssivveeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee beard, muttonchops and mustache.  He looked like someone you'd NOT want to meet in a dark alley but instead crouched down and cooed at her softly while asking to give some treats, telling me he'd just lost his dog this week and we'd made his day watching her be so clever and sweet.

She is becoming a lot more active and into everything, so the real fun begins!  She reminds me a lot of Cade actually - a bit of an old soul in that little fur jacket and similar traits.  Watching her as she checks out the cows echoed Cade's reactions to the young and curious horses we had around our place in Michigan.  When she is wild she is willlldddd and when she has had her fill of running she sits with me soft and serious-eyed as she considers the world.  She is a comfort seeker - give her a cozy blanket or a lap and she's curled up under your jacket.  She seems very paw oriented as well - loves to whack things, scuttle them and bat them before taking a massive pounce.  She seems deeply loathe of all things cold and wet and detests her poor princess paws getting wet.

Skill-set stuff:

• sit and down at about 30 seconds duration (assuming quiet area, that goes to about 15 seconds out and about reliably.... though I was very tickled when she offered +30 seconds holding while very intently watching a tempting fluttering candy wrapper in town today before I decided to mark it while the marking opportunity was still good!
• stand at about 5 seconds reliably (without shifting feet or offering targeting behaviours)
• touch - now includes 'hit' (feet targeting), nose-to-palm and touch plates.  Touch plates are on the floor and at a short distance pretty well! (1 meter) 
• watch me - about 14 seconds, a bit more in a non-distracting setting
• tuggy - bite is still wanting to be very regrippy when she's very excited... I think it's the size of the bite surface though - hard for her to get back into a good grip position so I'm looking for a thin but softly braided one.
• picking up an item (keys, rubber kids toy, tiny ball)
• bringing back a thrown item
• polite release (let go when requested and pop yerself into a sit kid) even while highly excited (aka in feral SHARK PUPPY MODE... dundun dundun dun dunnnnnnn....)

Manners stuff:

• zen work
• jaw/tooth grip moderation (iow jaw-wrestle games, very softly with mums hand thanks!)
• body handling - focusing on head (reaching down toward, tugging lightly on the collar, putting head through things like the collar or circled fingers and examining teeth/eyes/ears etc)
• LAT on the kittens (wrestling mobs of kittens are just SO TEMPTING to join... and then sit and yap at when they fail to respond to play bows and offers of tuggy)
• environmentally cued sits while walking on lead when mum stops (pretty good unless there is something fairly distracting)
• environmentally cued sits when people reach down to pet (about 60% of the time un-cued so obviously still plenty of work to do - made harder by the fact I'm usually trying to keep tabs on a free-roving 2 year old while teaching this!

Indoor play for a rainy day...

Well since it was bucketing rain most of the day and my shoulder is still sore (although much better - bless my chiro!) I found the third set of clothing my 2 year old needed changing into courtesy of flinging herself in the mud enough we broke out our indoor goodies!  After hosing them off we had our ever faithful BOXES.  Boxes are wonderful things for amusing 2 year olds and puppies alike - you can crash them, tumble them, hop into them, push them over from the inside, bop at the flappy lid bits and doors cut into them, hide in them, use them as tunnels, bash your toys around in them and chew them to shreds without mum becoming the least bit upset.  (Somewhat abashed if you happen to have 2 feet instead of 4 but not upset!)  I am certain the nice people at Bunnings think we are a special brand of crazy with the amount we get from them every week but you just can't beat a box in the bun/dog/kittens/kids opinion!

When I was called to pick up La from school after he spectacularly crashed and burned hard enough to register even on his limited sense of pain (well, at least a bit... 3 hours later we're explaining to him he oughtn't bash about and jump out of trees on a strain... *sigh*) we also brought out the ball pit balls in the kiddie wading pool and our newest find -

Check it out!  TWELVE dollars at Bunnings!  It's a tunnel and a hidey hole and it ROLLS either when you stand on it like this or run amok inside like a giant not-quite-spherical hamster ball! They amused themselves with this for the better part of 2.5 hours before dinner!

I also finally uploaded a vid of her from her on her 3rd day here (so 6week-ish old) trying to find a free editor that works with mov formats to put the clips together.

Random funny out-take shot - Kiah does a Tasmanian Devil impression!

Saturday and Sunday quickies

Saturday was rather boring as I've got a nice cold going and played narcoleptic half the day - waking up basically enough to feed and water everyone and ensure the kids weren't running too feral.  We did do some basic training with Kiah (yep - it has a name!) and Rin but other than that not much.

Sunday we loaded up on cold meds, loaded up the dogs and went to training.  So the girls got their runs in flyball and obedience and Kiah had an absolute blast - she got to meet some of her future flyball team-mates (Collie, Sheltie, Poodle, ShihTzu, Lab, JRT, Border Collie, Golden, various mixes), see the flyball box (ohhh... that is COOL!) and chase a ball and play tugs.  I managed to injure my shoulder (thanks Rin!) but still got through stepping in to teach an intermediate class and Hope's flyball before going home.  Really, really pleased that Hope was pulling some very close crosses with Maddie flawlessly and Rin was handling crosses, position changes and dual lanes like a pro!  Should make September start with a bang!

At home with Kiah did a few quick-bursts of the same stuff we'd started working on manners wise a few days ago, some restrained toy fetching and worked up her tuggy as well.  She got SO revved up with the tuggy which has little 'flappy' bits she went into zoomy mode and just ran in great laps for about 20 mins before flopping over.  Then we did some cardboard box games - we had a flat piece of cardboard she 'surfed' on while I pulled it around the floor - I'm thinking that'll be a favorite game, a 'tunnel' to be sent through/recall through and a small box to bop around the house with her paws like a hockey puck.  I also used an old computer keyboard and some bubble wrap as "weird surfaces it's fun to walk over" and had her jumping on and walking around on them, sits, drops etc.  She is a funny little nutter!

On her second day after school drop off she spent the early morning toddling around after us.
She met:

•  the kittens more fully and learned that 4:1 are not odds in her favor with curious kittens.  Whichever she was sniffing the other two or three would be patting her tail.
• the sheep and our neighbors visiting cows and jumped up for a better sniff but without being over the top excited.
• gardeners with linetrimmers, leaf blowers and pruning sheers as well as hard-hats and protective goggles
• various people at he hardware store, grocery and a park, cafe
• plastic door strips on a shop that was closed, with Lily flipping them about and making all sorts of ruckus while I encouraged her to push them with her nose and investigate.

We had several tuggy sessions and introduced the idea of running out to a thrown toy (small rope bone and plastic baby teether) and bringing it back, again with polite releasing. More work on basic sits and downs, touching etc.  We also worked a bit on bite inhibition (aka YOUCH! needle teeth hurt!) playing very gentle mouth games with my fingers.

Friday after school drop off she met:

• various people at Coles, the shopping strip and neighborhood in Pakenham and in Gembrook - not many men unfortunately.   
• a community van which is equipped with automated lowering and raising ramps for wheelchair users which they were very nice in letting us go up to and have a meet-n-greet.
• the 7-9's class at La's school as well.
  Manners wise we continued with sits and downs, making them downs from sits and sits from downs as well as continuing with targeting introducing a target plate.  We continued with retrieving thrown toys (soft tuggies and plastic teething rings) as well as tuggy. We introduced the idea that if she wants to get out or into her pen she needs to sit and be polite.  We introduced a bit of doggy zen, object trading, some basic body handling (light 'pinches' on the webbing between toes, feet, ears, lips, collar holding/tugging etc), some short and light restrained recalls and eye contact.  She's been absolute gold with her house training, not a single accident and only one time using the newspapers provided in her pen - which was really my fault as I had the choice between taking her out when I saw her looking fidgety and chasing the naked-wet-soapy 2 year old who was streaking through the house on her way to merry mayhem, so puppy got ploinked in her pen till I caught and nappied the 2 year old!

 As you can see a busy puppy is well behaved by default...

Rin 2.0

Over the past few months we'd been considering either bringing another working dog like Rin into our family because she is such a little treasure and so fun to work with or else a smaller dog as I miss having a littler dog around.  We eventually decided that it was probably better to put off a small dog for several more years (3rd in line after 2 more Aussies) and get the working dog now because a little dog would be more likely to get run into in the wild play my girls enjoy just because of the size difference and it would be nice for Rin to have someone around her age (not quite 2 yrs now) to play with given Hope (4.5) and Sierra (10) are past the puppy/teenage sillies and want to lay down after a good play instead of imitating an energizer bunny.  After looking at several dogs, I found a litter of Border x Kelpies who needed homes and looked very much like Rin and a week later went to visit with the girls.  This little cutiepie is who we all chose.

She's not named yet but her nickname is Demonbaby... anyone want to guess why???  (That's midsnarl with the tuggy. LOL)

She is super clever and in her first day home had about 200x reps in which she picked up the basics of a sit and down with about 15 seconds duration (reliably, occasionally a bit more) as well as targeting with a target wand with two bumps.  She's been started on building tuggy value and learning to take it only when told, with a nice balanced bite and letting go politely when told.  She met her collar and the leash and discovered she could walk politely.  Not bad for 8 weeks old and 24 hours home after not being off a farm before!

In her first full day home she went to: school 2x, pet store, nursery and on a walk around the grocery store
She met well over her "10 new people a day" and included little kids/older kids/older teens with hats/elderly people and using prams, a trolly, a zimmer frame, a pair of crutches, a cast on the leg without crutches and two mobility scooters which she made one ladies day by jumping up unafraid into her lap when she was called.

a rather perfect (somewhat soggy) mothers day

Mothers Day started here with me sneaking out with the three girls for training for "mommy time" while the kids got their surprise ready.  Nothing better in the world than time with my girls and coming home to the kidlets and a warm (and DRY) house!  :)

After flyball we started the girls on obedience.  We're trying to get back into practice as I'd intended last year to start trialing in obedience with them before we got totally sucked in by flyball. (To be fair we achieved FD, FD-X, FDCh and AFDCh so it's not as if we weren't having fun. *G*)

Initially a few weeks back I was told Rin would have to wait a few months for an opening in foundation (intended to teach novices how to train) because of recent structure changes made her considered "new".  Likewise Hope would have to test in on the next test day because of our extended break.  I said I'd just test both in at competition level classes instead.

When I came back last week we were thankfully able to bypass that all together and both did well where I popped them in and garnered a lot of comments... such clever girlies. :) This week we had small numbers, basically instructors only (read: few people are mental enough to think training in the rain on mothers day seems like rockin' good fun) so after flyball we had the option of running in higher levels than I've trained for at home or going home.  Naturally we decided there were a few centimeters of fabric yet to be totally saturated and stayed!  Rin was bumped 2 levels up from where I thought she should be and surprised me by getting compliments in everything but a blown stand-stay! (Poor dog, she loves to catch raindrops from the air so that was tough ask when those raindrops were just TAUNTING her by falling all over!) Hope got bumped up to CD level and did pretty well if not perfectly polished in everything except not tucking her bum neatly in left-about-turns.  They even gave us a taste of some more advanced exercises I gather are for higher levels - a broadjump and return (I thought she'd be confused but she did it very nice) and a send out to a box the dog must sit in before coming back out over a jump to you. (pretty nice but I'd not want to push it more than the meter and a bit I was sending from atm)  But I still get all melty when I present them with something they've never seen and they manage to fool everyone into thinking we know what we're doing!  Such clever, clever little poppets!

When I got home the kids were bursting with tea, cards, flowers, a love-heart La had decorated with 'lots of jewels and diamonds and sparklies', a new set of framed handprints (we do this every year, so I have a little collection of growing kidlet prints) and a big beautiful plant for my rainbow garden.  Between the kids and dogs (oh dear, those needed DRYING too...) I got clambered all over by the littlest members as well... little puddins have helped write this by batting at my fingers on the keyboard with their little purr motors going for the first time!  Isn't it just fantastic?

Nice try Pointyblackdog...

While training with Sierra, both Rin and Hope were outside.  I could see Hope near the door staring at it and attempting to beam the message into my head to let her back in or at least notice she was doing the behaviours very, very nicely and merited some rewarding.  Rin, noticing that standing at the doorway was not working any better this time than the previous attempts, took a slightly different tactic.  When I gave the cue to Sierra I heard a ruckus of scrambling sounds and a thunkity-whump near the kitchen window.  Perched neatly and determined not to be ignored (surely if I saw how wonderful she was I'd relent and play obedience tricks with her instead of the red dog!) stood Rin with her rear feet on the bin and her front paws on the window ledge.  You guessed it - the cue we've been working on tweaking this week is "stand". 

Jaak Panksepp

Behind somewhat behind the times at the moment, I recently had his name mentioned, thought a lot of his stuff sounded really interested and went off on a google quest.

Oh. My. How have I not known this guy as anything more than the person involved with the discovery of rats laughter??? (Which I remember reading at the time and thinking, "Well yes that makes sense in a species with a complex social structure, though it's cool to see it proven.") Affective neuroscience? Fascinating stuff. I have been trawling through the video lecture materials and have a feeling the next few days will be crammed with video downloads and ordering material from the library!

An attempt to define...

A number of times over the years people have mentioned to me they wish their dogs would act a bit more like mine. (Obviously these people have managed to avoid their crazy ratbag moments... LOL) The implication is that their dogs are just too (silly, wild, crazy, stubborn, insert something) to act like that which simply isn't true. I point out that Hope didn't naturally come with these skills (no dog does - nor any person for that matter, hence the terrible twos in most people and the fact that some people have yet to learn it as adults!) but rather we train for calm focused attention.

I always seem to get met with dubious and disbelieving stares though and queries as to what I mean by that and then fumble around trying to explain. It encompasses a lot of things, much of it simply how we do things in daily life as really the same basic foundations that make your dog well mannered in daily life are the same as those on the training field. The two biggest overall concepts though I find myself reminded of are that you get what you accept and you reinforce what you accept intentionally or otherwise. That includes impulse control, self control, self restraint and the ability to bring oneself down from an excited emotional state! If you accept a dog who pulls and barks nonstop and is out of control as just how things are, then by virtue of not reinforcing sitting, quiet, self-restraint, emotional regulation, attention and manners - you not only allow those things to be self reinforcing and well rehearsed you are essentially training (however inadvertently) for them!

Calm, attentive focus requires attention on their partner (you, who are also required to give it back), self-control and self-restraint, deference based in trust and mutual respect in your relationship and partnership, an on-of-switch so they can utilize the high drives when they need to and turn them back off in situations where a couch potato is called for. (May have to revise that list as I'm sure after I mull it over I'll remember stuff I've forgotten to add.)

For anyone who thinks that Hope naturally came that way though or her personality is inclined toward it may I submit Rin. The insane-o teenage working Border Collie with a less than stellar start who was given up because she was, well... an insane-o teenage working Border Collie with a less than stellar start. She is rapidly learning the same skills and she came to me as a untrained 1 year old with a history of humans being fun at times but generally irrelevant to getting what she wanted in life and sometimes an out and out hindrance to be gotten around. Rin was a dog who was working for her own interests and had little inkling why anyone else ought to matter to her let alone have their desires be deferred to. She also had a wonderful set of bad habits that led to her owner feeling he had to find someone or put her to sleep. These included:

• pulling on lead and lunging while scrabbling desperately towards whatever caught her eye (oxygen? that's for whimps...)
  
• jetting away the second she could and only coming back when she felt like it (Bless her owner, not only did he not teach a recall he taught her to run away when approached as a game!) With her previous owner this meant they'd find her 4-5 km away.
  
• obsessively scanning for anything even remotely able to be construed as edible to steal, counter surfing (as well as landing on the stove, poking her head IN the oven etc), mugging people for food they were holding (carrying a sandwhich on the plate? now you see it, now you don't...) and once snatched you'd need the jaws of life to regain possession of
  
• screaming if her collar was touched (and I mean with a single finger) loudly and blood curdling to the point at one event one day I had a number of people and a comp rep come dashing to our tent to check the poor dog wasn't being horribly mangled and hacked to pieces with a machete. Primarily because she feared it would mean being locked up again.
  
• she could not abide being confined - crates, small rooms and cars resulted in screaming-fits and bashing around the back of the car boxing the windows trying to get out because she had a history of being locked up all day, out for a few hours and then locked up again.
  
• an impulse control that would've made a gnats look wildly impressive
  
• a tendency to randomly eat carpet/linoleum flooring/walls/furniture if you weren't looking, even if appropriate and high value chew items were available (whoops, couch arm fell into my mouth ma!)
  
• and despite being a good natured, personable, fun loving, happy-go-lucky little gem of a sweetheart that I was head over heels in love with - all the social graces and politeness of an Ork.

Suffice to say after the first few days my husband was a bit dubious that my mental faculties were in working order every time I enthused to him what a cool dog she was.

The first time I took Rin out on lead (mind this is long after we'd worked on manners at home - we always work in babysteps!) she wanted to pull. And pull. And bounce. And whine. And eat her lead. And paw her collar off to get loose. And play Gandhi and flop over. And croc death roll. And pop up, lunge and pull. And attempt to drag me off after one unlucky pull succeeded in knocking me flat on my bum. And screech that glass shattering excited screech Border Collies seem so talented at when she discovered I was hanging on. After having spent so much time perpetually locked up, in a new place with so many potential things to do and see and sniff and jump on and chase had her in hyperdrive! As far as she was concerned I was a minor obstacle to get around rather than the person who could give her access to all these wonderfully cool things if she cooperated with a few rules.

We were in the parking lot and we stayed there, far away from everyone. The first thing we did was reinforce "mom opening the car is a cue to plant my posterior and wait because it is the only thing that will ever, ever, ever work to get me out!" That was very hard work when her poor little brain was just smoking in overload and considering she'd never HAD to put any pause between impulse and action in her prior life.

When we had some self restraint in the car she was invited out and immediately lost her brain again, dashing headlong towards all the interesting things once her body felt that rush of forward momentum. (And yes she'd had a very solid bit of exercise beforehand!) Unfortunately for her as she discovered she was on lead, so after an initial tanty she remembered herself enough to reorient back to LLW and I reinforced attention with our "Rin Would Jump Through Flaming Hoops For This Stuff" level treats. We sat to play with eye contact while standing, eye contact while sitting, eye contact while laying down and laying on her side with eye contact. We played with a few tricks and targeting, sticking with simple and known behaviours that alternated between active and calm/passive ones. From an outside perspective it probably looked like we were achieving a fat lot of nothing sitting there and goofing around. When we went to training the first time we missed out on her entire actual training classes - the cost thrown away on that fee and a 45m drive a pittance compare to the cost of teaching her ill manners could WORK... SOMETIMES. (Slot machines work sometimes too... and idiots all over pump coins into them knowing full well sometimes isn't likely to be this time because MAYBE it will be.) We lathered. We rinsed. We repeated. We moved to walking in small circles and patterns in the area. Over a few weeks we got progressively better and were able to work up to becoming progressively closer, occasionally having moments where she'd forget herself in the excitement and we had to move back a step or two before quickly regaining ground.

She would still get excited (the joys of working with motion sensitive hyper-environmentally aware Border Collies) but we simply used that as an opportunity to reinforce calmness and attention. Not only was I looking for her ability to engage me rather than be drawn by the environment but I wanted her to learn she could retain the ability to CHOOSE to engage me over it. The ability to choose and be in control of herself rather than taken for a ride on the neuro-chemistry of her impulses.

We'd already done quite a bit of doggy zen and related games so she had some basis of familiarity. Zen would include some of Sue Eh's stuff, bits of Susan Garrett's It's Yer Choice which we've used the techniques of for many years before they were given a formal outline and name and other bits and pieces. Likewise with Karen Overall's Relaxation Protocol.

We did McDevitt's Look At That games, as well as the old standard eye contact (which completely apropos of nothing my brain insists amuses itself by chirping "Look at moi Kimmy!" instead of LAT when I do it). We played rev up and rev down games and combine them with zen. I'd introduce the tuggy, rev her up by dangling it and teasing, waving it and running off hiding it, razzing it over her toes and ears, dashing and zig zagging it, tossing it in the air and catching it before giving her the cue to take it. We'd play hard and then cue out, with a big reward and lay down - sculpting the time it took her to gear down from a big one to brief. The quicker she relaxed under my hands, the quicker we'd get back to the game and bigger it'd be when it came.

We played with marking muscle relaxation, when she was laying there on her side and watching the other dogs, I'd lay my hands on her and softly but firmly draw a long stroke on a leg muscle or along the lips or eyebrows and mark and reward the action of the muscle relaxing under my hands. (Not the relaxed muscle but the act of of it releasing it's tension under my fingers.) I use this as a Conditioned Relaxation response later on, where I can touch them on the shoulder or midsection and their bodies flop over already relaxing before their brains even take time to think on it.

The general idea of all of it was that:
1.) even in the face of excitement you need to control yourself and stay aware of me as your partner (as I do you)
2.) I will give you the tools to do so and help you learn how and be a good leader and provider so we've built trust and our relationship so you can feel confident in deferring to me
3.) choosing me over the environmental distractions and self-controlled choices over blindly following impulses is something you can do; here's how and it pays well
4.) choosing to do so is the only way I will give you access to the other exciting things
5.) in the face of temptation a default known behaviour to center and ground yourself and relax
6.) if you need aid in gearing down I will assist you with the Conditioned Relaxer

It took several attempts before we went anywhere near the field or other dogs, let alone followed along with the drills when we went to training but in doing a lot of "nothing" sitting there we started laying important foundations that will make the training on the field that much easier and builds our relationship, builds trust reliance and partnership and continues to reinforce my value as the gate-holder of all fun and good things.

Unintentionally Trained

Anyone who is owned by an Aussie knows that it means you will never, ever be alone again. Humans, the Aussie Shepherd is sure, NEED proper supervision at all times or something awful is liable to befall them. Mine are convinced I'm particularly in need of a full escort and this annoyingly seems to include trips to the loo.

Unfortunately for them, I have an annoyingly human habit of not recognizing that The Evil Drain Monster might suck me down the loo when I flush and prefer privacy to a furry escort. The first several times they did it I told them firmly to shoo. They backed up, just enough to be out of the room so I could close the door. Having banished my valiant vanguard they then started laying down with noses and eyes pressed to the crack under the door. Again I had to tell them to SHOO. At which point they all back up exactly one step and lay down as near as possible without being ordered to scram. Now Luka, who is on holiday here has picked this up and I've realized when they took one step back, lay down and SIGHED dramatically in SYNC they've all picked it up unintentionally trained behaviour chain... oh the joys!

No Nationals...

For those who don't know Hope well, she is a very happy girl but somewhat dispostioned towards being anxious. It's something I'm very mindful of in training and one of the reasons I introduced and continue to manage her quite carefully in team competitions. I want her to be able to enjoy all the things she loves in life and to do that I have to deal with the anxiety as the monkey on our back. Initially with flyball we worked quite carefully in introducing passes over the hurdles as in doggy terms, a dog rushing at you full pelt and especially in a straight line is a weird, rather off-putting behaviour. Generally the only time they'd do it naturally is if it were a very young pup who was still learning their social graces or a dog with a serious and aggressive intent. So we desensitized, counter conditioned and gave her lots of room and reinforcement, wide passes with late releases and using easy going team-mates she loves. This worked really well and we'd progressed to right up the ladder to nice fairly tight passes.

At Hope's last comp in Euroa she was attacked as we were entering the ring. The dog was really worked up into a frentic state (a personal pet peeve of mine in flyball... people excuse all manner of out of control hyper aroused behaviour in the name of 'building drive' and then shrug as if there's nothing you can do about it) and to get to our start place we had to go by her which just tipped her over boiling point and she lunged at Hope, roaring and snapping out a tuft of fur. Hope's reaction was akin to, "Jeeze what's YOUR issue?!?" and I went into recovery and refocusing mode, which worked well enough that she finished off the comp without seeming terribly phased. She was concerned about that individual dog after but not overly so and remained fully operant, engaged, eager and happy. We found out later Hope isn't the first dog this has happened to unfortunately. I wasn't happy but figured at least it didn't seem to result in any major impact for Hope.

So we went to the next (Nationals team only) practice. I had it in my mind that if she was that stressed again we'd beg off but after a week of practicing chilling out we'd give her a chance at least. She saw this dog again and while they didn't run together at all Hope was stressed seeing her there. She'd be focused and eager for the run but then pull off the last two hurdles to avoid having to cross on the back-run. Our sub-captain who'd not been at Euroa was wanting tighter crosses and I was not willing so it wasn't much fun. At the end of practice the dogs were off lead for a play but I kept Hope with me. The other dog's owner tossed a ball which happened to bounce over and Hope had a major freak out, tucked her tail and bolted behind me cowering and shaking, then proceded to physically tow me back to the car spooking out and panic barking over her shoulder. I about cried, she's NEVER been so freaked out!

We kept everything calm this week and when I went to the next team practice. We didn't get much time in but I was so heartened to see her being confident and full of chutzpa, bouncing around, rolling on the grass like a nut, driving back over all the jumps full pelt, gleefully enjoying the tuggy and being her usual sunny self. Before I could go into much else I was pulled aside and told they'd decided to not to put us in for Nationals. Which is disappointing in one sense because I was very excited about it prior to all this but a relief in another because I wanted a few more weeks of relaxed time and positive practices before we throw a comp her way even with how well she was doing this time. While she's not affected enough to be considered a 'reactive' dog as such, ime one fo the worst things you can do in terms of working with such dogs is to start working them too soon after an incident instead of letting them fully settle out and that would be the case for her as well. Sooo... for better or worse, we're sitting this one out.

Meanwhile, on the way back I'd got a call from Mandi asking if I'd like another dog to run in flyball. Luka is her keeper from her first litter, about a year old now but she's not ready to start serious herding training with him. In the meantime, he's a busy lad and she figured he might do well with a holiday for awhile.

Dogs +1

Meet "Luka"... he's not mine, he's just come to visit for awhile and isn't he a handsome lad? His mum Mandi wanted him to be able to do some flyball and figured he might come for a holiday with us here.

He is such a typical Aussie personality! Obviously a lot of it goes to his being well raised and socialized but it never ceases to amaze me how adaptable our Aussies are. Picked up from his home where he lives with adults and teenagers and come into the midst of our crazy mob, taken to shops, nursery, school, hardware stores etc and he's not batted an eyelash nor set a foot wrong. He's slotted himself into the routine effortlessly, is full of gleeful bum wiggles, gets along with everyone without fuss and adores the kids... hey, short people who will love on you, throw your ball and play squeaky endlessly while dropping food frequently - what's not to love? They're taken with him as well, it took Lily all of an hour to start hollering "Here YUCA!" You'd never guess he just arrived or that he'd not been raised with kids crawling over him every day of his life. LOL

He's also rather taken with this whole flyball training thing. ;)