Great job so far everybody! But again, please see as many videos of others as possible and read my comments to others too - the more you read and the more videos you watch, the easier it will be to understand what you're going for and see it in real speed too.
Anyway, here is your new list:
1. gradually make that plank/set-up higher&higher, still jackpotting the best hits, but make a criteria for a jackpot somewhat more strict and at this point also stop clicking misses and almost-misses, even if the dog is striding equally. Jackpot really good hits only. It's no problem if the dog still gets the toy on every try, just take it immediately when he comes back. When it's good, praise and tug and when it's especially good, be especially excited and play especially enthusiastically 🙂 And yes, dogs are smart enough to know the difference.
2. as the dog is probably already searching for the plank better, slowly start throwing sooner&sooner. Don't rush it, but you eventually want to throw that soon that the dog is technically running to a static toy. But again, you don't want to get there sooner as in 3 weeks as it's only then that we'll start using a static toy - you do want to throw it for those 3 weeks more! It's better to throw somewhat longer if necessary - usually not an issue with BCs, but with my PyrShep puppy, I needed to throw VERY long to keep the speed and forward focus - if any of that gets weaker when you start throwing sooner, go back to whatever gives you back the speed and forward focus, we can deal with the rest later!
3. as you are still throwing a toy, your movement and position probably won't affect the dog's performance - but just to be sure, do try to run with the dog here and there, just to check if that's correct. If it does affect your dog's performance, add movement gradually, by first walking slowly along, then walking faster, running slowly etc. You don't need to do it on every try, especially not if it doesn't affect the performance, but do try it here and there.
4. another difficulty we can slowly start introducing now is changing starting position of your dog. If you use a low DW, you can use different approaches instead. Don't use the best spot all the time anymore, but vary it a little bit. If it makes their hits too bad, go back to the good starting position. But bad hit here and there is good, that's how they learn the difference between what gets rewarded and what doesn't.
5. new trick: shape a dog to go with all 4 feet in a box that is ideally as long as he is. Then gradually use smaller&smaller objects, your goal is the dog is standing with 4 feet in a small bowl. Good for balance and rear legs awareness! Also, teach backing up with you standing still, by throwing a reward for them first for one step back, then two and then add more&more distance. Great for rear legs awareness and coordination!
This dog walk is from todays trial, 9.24.11. I am THRILLED with it. It was fast and fun and hard to see from behind the tire but I do believe I see nice hind leg separation lower down in the contact. One more dog walk in tomorrows class then it’s back to my plank work!! Was very happy with his effort!
That sure looked GREAT!!! Great extension on down ramp and great hind feet separation in the contact! Now we just need to get it every time! 🙂 Good luck for today too!
That did look great! And to get it at a trial when the energy is so much higher 🙂 that’s great!
Hi Sylvia and classmates,
I have video of my training with Twitch. Once I raised my wooden board more than 3-4″ I was getting too much bend in the board so I now have my board & carpet laying on my dogwalk ramps which are side by side on cinder blocks. The height that we’ve progressed to is 10.5″. The first 7 tries are from a tunnel approx 15′ away, #8 set up in front of the tunnel. The next 6 tries are the following days practice, the first was a send to the tunnel and the remaining were set-up in front of the tunnel. I’m using “yes” as my verbal because I’m not good yet coordinating the clicker and throwing. In addition to the “yes” I am playing/jackpotting as the reward. In regards to what I saw, the first 3 were good, then she changed her striding…hitting the board deeper which causes her to reach for the ground. In response to what I saw I tried to help her by taking the speed of the tunnel away. I plan to stay at this height until its consistant.
We are working on the new tricks. I had to start with a laundry basket and the box we went to she kept offerring a down so I now need to get another box:)
Try to cut your videos so that we can see the dog in all the frames, it’s really pretty boring to see just a plank (or throwing)… -- in slow motion…
Anyway, you can take a plank and carpet off and use the DW ramps side by side now. I would put them on a table though to change her striding because if she jumps too deep on the plank, then she can’t get the next stride in and leaps. Also, pay attention to her hind legs. I can’t always see them as your legs are on a way, but sometimes, she definitely keeps them closer together as you would want to.
Thanks for the comments. Sorry it was so boring. My husband was traveling so I had the camera on a table. I’ll practice with your suggestions and send you new video.
Oh, the taping was o.k., static camera is perfectly o.k., but when you’re editing it, cut it so that we only see the parts where the dog is actually running the plank 🙂
Hi Sylvia and Classmates!
The weather has been raining here and I’ve been away at school, but we’ve gotten a few sessions in the past few days. Here’s where we’re at!
Teresa & Believe
Yeah, 5 strides are risky for her: if things don’t go exactly right, she is too high… She is running nicely, but doesn’t seem to do any adjustments when necessary, so I would try to challenge her some more to teach her it’s important. Try challenging her by starting her from different approaches to DW and also from different points of DW as such, making big deal out of nice hits. You can also try to work with a static toy after a tunnel or jump some to then be able to switch to a toy, thrown only for hits (next lesson topic) -- that might make her think more.
by different points of DW do you mean starting her on the horizontal or different spot on the DW itself?
I mean to sometimes start her at the beginning of a down ramp, sometimes in the middle of DW, sometimes beginning of horizontal plank… -- and everything in between.
I thought so =) Thanks!
Hi Amy, Spur looks GREAT!
Huh, I just tried to post a comment, but it didn’t seem to post. Trying again -- Spur was perfect at the trial this weekend. I wanted to show you we had a 90 degree turn off the DW with a lovely off course tunnel straight ahead. He was AWESOME and did great!!! He was second in that class only to our current National Champion!! 😀
Thanks Pamela-Cooper for your awesome videography!! Nothing like a fellow RDW student to know how to video it!!! 😀
I know we still have a lot of work to do, his success has been between 70-100 going into nothing, but he very much loves to train it, so it’s not really work!!!
Wow, congratulations! That sure was a great hit and a really nice turn!
Wow, that was a great turn off the DW! It’s so nice to see all the work paying off at a trial 🙂 Congratulations!
Hi, No problem Amy, it’s fun videoing you guys and you looked great this weekend! This is the same course with Coopers brilliant 90 degree turn off the dw with that ridiculous tunnel sucking them in. I am beyond THRILLED with Cooper getting his contact and making that turn especially since we haven’t done any turn training yet. He had some funny striding I think because I was hanging back and moving laterally and usually I drive hard forward. But we still had some hind leg separation so I really was thrilled. And he won his class 🙂 Back to our plank work and no trialing for 2 weeks.
Congratulations on the win! That contact with the turn was sure great, amazing!
Congratulations! The two of you looked great! Beautiful DW.
Hi Silvia and classmates, I’m posting video of Saga’s progress tonight. The set-up is the same as it was for Twitch--board & carpet on 2 ramps that are side by side, the height is 10.5″. When I first began to raise the ramp height Saga experamented with one and two hits. Once she worked through that she has been consistantly 2 hitting. There are 2 videos. The first is a send to a tunnel apprx 15′ away with a straight on approach. The next video shows a send to an angled jump so she has to square herself up for the plank, again she has a 12-15′ approach. I’m not sure how to progress her from here. Thanks.
YAY!! Good job on your editing. I have to admit I ran out of patience and couldn’t finish watching Twitch’s video with so much slow motion of nothing, LOL!! And I LOVE Twitch! I’ll watch it later, though. Thanks for the nice comment about Spur. I think you saw him at his worst and that was pretty bad, so he sure has changed. I credit the RDW work a lot to his improved attitude. 😀 To think I almost quit with him!
This may seem silly but thank you and Amy for your editing comments. It is obvious that I am still not very comfortable with the program. Take care!
-Sondra
Great, those last tries of both videos were perfect, I hope you made a big party for those two! I think you can raise the planks some more now, but also start to search for a table or something similar so that you can build an up ramp for your next set up. You can also remove the additional plank and carpet now to get them used to run on DW planks as we’ll soon be switching to a single plank. And yes, great editing too! 🙂
Very nice! Beautiful low hits near the end!
Hi Silva,
This was our second session on the low dog walk. The first one went much better then this time. We had more leap offs. Reviewing the tape I think it’s my position? She was running thru the tunnel to get some speed up. Just doing straight entries right now.
Judi & Lira
Geez Judi, I thought she looked GREAT! (to my untrained eye!!) Silvia will weigh in, I’m sure, but it looks to me that you’ve been able to progress very quickly, with still alot of accuracy!
Great job!
Hey Anne! She had a bunch of fly offs starting around the fourth run thru but overall hitting the contact more then missing it. It going pretty good so far. Too be continued…..Summit doesn’t do as well. Very dependent on my motion…Thanks for watching.
I think it could be the ball that distracts her, you often throw too late. Try to throw much sooner as that, pretty much as soon as she is on a DW, we’re going to early throws in this lesson anyway. The good thing is you still got many very good ones, so don’t forget to immediately mark those with a click and/or excited “yes” to make a bigger difference between the two.
I think you are right. I started throwing the ball as she approaches the DW or just on and it’s working better. Should I be changing my postion? Standing still or running forward?
For now, you can do whatever gives you best results and once you get close to 100%, add challenges, one by one: different handler positions, approaches to DW etc.
I had to chuckle to myself -- watching you reminded me of myself LOL. Plus, my first session on a more raised DW went much better than the second one and I only had the second one taped too 🙂 . In any case, you two look really good.
Hi Silvia,
Remember two days ago Synergy fell with the two plank and table set up. I rested her for two days and this is her first attempt at full length DW. What you see in the middle is two crates for support. I didn’t want it at all wobbly. She is going a little slow because I think she has to build confidence since the fall and also since this is first time on this long obstacle:-) I was still rewarding her hits in yellow, even though she was not at full speed. What do you think?
Thanks,
Marla
I think she did GREAT for her first time on DW! With more speed, those hits will get even deeper, but yes, you definitely want to reward those hits too, some were great! To get some more room after the DW, you could make that tunnel straight, 90 degrees to the DW. Very cool!
I did a few more after this video and she was holding her right leg up (from falling a few days ago). I took her to the vet today and she took x-rays. She said that she doesn’t think anything is serious but her knee is very swollen. SO, she is supposed to be on crate rest for a week with ice 4 x a day. Then walking for a week before returning to agility. So, we will be on break for the next couple of weeks. Then when she is ready to train again I will be going to nationals and gone for two weeks. So, probably no more video from us for at least a month:-( I hope we can catch up when I get back end of October.
Oh, so sorry to hear she really got hurt on that fall… I sure hope she is back to normal soon, I’m sure she will have no problems catching up! Good luck for nationals!
Thanks. I’ll keep watching everyone’s videos and reading your comments so we will be ready to get started again end of October.
Just remembered this class was not on break yet, so we’ll make 2-week break next week when we leave for WC anyway, so you won’t miss much.
I hope Synergy’s knees will heal quickly -- poor girl. She did very well in the above video however, even with a bad knee. I am sure you two will be able to ‘catch up’ in no time -- look at me, it’s my second RC class and I am now finally ‘catching up’ to lesson 2! 🙂
Hi Silvia,
We tried our first session over the flat A frame last night.
I rewarded 1,2,4,5,8,9,11,14,15,16 & 17. I didn’t reward 3 or 10 as definite misses. I didn’t reward 6, 7, 12 or 13 as I thought they might be accidental and close close to the edge of the contact area. she seemed to do these all at full or near fill speed. My position and timing of throwing the toy does effect her running.
Should i stay in one position till she is really solid or keep trying to move postion to see what is most likely to make her miss. at the minute it seems to be me beyond the contact.
Thanks
Tracy
Cool! I agree with what you rewarded. For now, I wouldn’t challenge her with your position etc. yet: do whatever gives you best hits and once you have 3 successful sessions like this one in a row, you can switch to two DW planks side by side, raised a little bit. I add challenges once I already have some more height, for now just focus on nice running and select for the best hits.
Hi Silvia, sending the film from my first session on the full dw. As always when something is new she looks a little insecure. The hindfeetseparation is bad in the beginning but is getting a little better in the end. I also saw that I have to fix the downramp better. But I am not sure what she is doing coming over the first apex. It looks like she is loosing the balance or something. Should I just go on hoping that she will geting used to it?
Sure, that went perfectly o.k. for the first session on full DW, running on that horizontal plank is scary for many dogs. I think she will get back to her normal running in a couple of sessions more -- so tape then again and send again to see how she is doing once she gets more familiar with DW.