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!
Last call for 
My husband is making my table as we speak but he’s making it out of wood and it will be 24″ tall and non adjustable so I’m thinking I should wait a bit longer before I bump him up to the 24″ height?? Currently he’s running this at 17″. Thanks!
Yeah, not perfect… Maybe he could do a smaller one and then you can make it taller later by putting something under it’s legs?
Weird, Silvia… I just looking for my vids and your answers (they used to be on page 3 of this RCII, Lesson 2), and they are all gone now? Any clues?
Hm, I can’t find them right now either, but they can of course move: after people on page 1 and 2 add more videos, yours are moved further, but I checked some pages further and don’t see it either…
Hi Silvia,
did some more box work and your advice to reward away from me for the full turns worked in the very first session. Watching back my timing on my clicker word could be better and I probably talk way to much as well. she’s only turning full one way so i’ll work on the other. Do you think i should name the box and perch work now as she has the idea of what she needs to do pretty well worked out. You’ll also see that when both the box and perch was out she turned in the box and sat with all four paws on top of the perch. i did reward these as she was trying to work out what she had to do but I know from past experience that if i’m not very specific she will do the trick that she wants to do (and why shouldn’t she if I’m not clear in my instructions). Anyway she is really enjoying the tricks
Hopefully get some vidoe of her on the a frame flat out over the weekend.
thanks
Tracy
Very cool! She is so fast with her pivots! You can definitely name both now.
Hi Silvia,
Here is Chloe. I have some bad tosses that get her leaving the side of the board from time to time -- that takes a few reps to correct but other then that she seems to be running nicely. Included some of her box work.
http://upload.youtube.com/my_videos_upload
lisa
She is too cute in that little box! The running looks pretty good, but the board is not ideal… Maybe you can switch to normal planks now that won’t bend and raise it a little bit more? As she is so small though, you’ll soon need an up ramp soon too.
oops..here is the link to the video
lisa
It looks to me that Synergy is getting more confident and starting to leap the apex’s. She missed 2/10 times whereas before today she was 100%.
Not sure what to do next. I love that she is more confident and also finding the ramp even with various entries (cut off on video but she is seeking out the upramp).
Cool, she is doing great, but a different set-up (low DW) might be better at this stage as the apex is not so tempting to jump it there. But she sure is very well coordinated to be able to do what she is doing without falling! 🙂
Well, I should have read this before going out this morning because, guess what? She fell. I got so worried cuz she slipped and banged her hip into the table. She limped for a few minutes but seems fine now. She is going to rest today now while I build the low DW for her. We will start low DW this week.
Oh, so sorry to hear it happened… Low DW will be safer I think, considering her style.
It was a rough week! I had major computer problems and it seems we went from carpet to raised ramp and all went bad. I don’t have all of those runs but have now been able to access most of the week of changes--now that I have finally watched them--they don’t look too bad—thought there for a while maybe only Dock Diving was going to be our sport.
First clip is the first attempt at a raised plank after a tunnel and caused complete panic--from me—not her--she is very happy to do this over and over again! There might have been 3 hits even close--we have lots of leaping and less rear leg separation--lots of happiness!
Next video is my resulting panic--so I moved the plank up on a 16 inch table (sorry--don’t know the metric) like she had been used to and added a stride regulator—and things were even worse! (Yes Silvia, I heard your voice all the way here in the States and dropped it back down!) After lowering it back down and playing with moving the stride regulator to several different locations— MUCH better!!! I left in the one (or two?) where she knew I forgotten to put the food in and stopped…smart dog!
Yesterday—new stride regulator (not a towel) and good hits and more importantly --better striding. Sorry about the white legs!
Today—a bunch of good hits--some bad ones—I need to cut the pool noodle down so the stride regulator can be better attached. I did try moving it.
Will try to get video of box game later in the weekend.
Beginnings are always hard, especially with retrained dogs. And as you tried million different methods already (plank work, hoops, stride regulators, stopping etc.), it’s normal the dog is confused, so I would take it slowly and work on a carpet some more if necessary. But you definitely need to decide for one method and stick with it. How do you plan to fade stride regulators?
Just trying anything at this point--since she is a baby dog and everything went well until she went outside and opened up to flying over the Aframe and off the dog walk.
The flying off the end sent me to trying the stride regulator and yesterday after moving it quite a few times with no real change in result, I just removed it.
For an experiment, we did try a few runs with an extended plank— and she never leaped. (see beginning of new video)
As for fading the stride regulator--if I could find a place where it worked I would fade it out by making it smaller and smaller but I don’t know that it helps--was just trying to find something that stopped the leaping and waiting for some feedback from you.
Trying everything is never a good idea. Things went wrong because she was never running full out: on before-it-went-wrong videos, she is clearly collecting at the end because you’re controlling it with body language -- and that never works on a long run. The same with stride regulators. They don’t give you any understanding and I yet have to see one dog with reliable RC on DW trained that way… So instead of trying everything, I would systematically teach her to run, first on carpet, then plywood if a plank makes her leap, then raised plywood, then a plank etc. Short-cuts (such as managing the contact, hoops, regulators etc.) only take the goal further -- they obviously did already.
Hi Silvia & classmates,
I had a challenge with Dazzle. He had difficult time to stay on the plank, perhaps because I threw else. Now I looked back I saw on video that I also was very present. I tried different things, run along, send him to a static toy (#9 / 10) I finally grabbed the ball thrower (#11) and then there it was again, much better!! Some more reps with this setup, before going to the next setup??
Goed zo Bianc en Daz! Jullie gaan lekker!! 😀 Tot morgen? (FHN Made)
Well, you could definitely try with an up ramp as it might be easier for him to stay on it that way. But pay attention to hind feet separation, we lost some of it… Look at rep.15, when his hind feet hit after the plank…: that’s a kind of a hind feet separation we want to see on a plank too!!!
I didn’t see we lost hind feet separation, how do we get that back. Of course by jackpot it, but I can’t really see it when he is doing it in full speed.
In your previous response you said the next step was to use table, horizontal plank, downramp. Is it better to have upramp, table, downramp? Give us that more hind feet separation? I prefer the last setup, then he doesn’t have to jump all the time.
Thanks again!!
I think you’ll soon need at least 2/3 of a DW, but yes, if it’s easier you can go to up ramp-table-down ramp for a short time first and then simply go to low DW. I think we lost the hind feet separation when you switched to a single plank: you can maybe try to do half of a session with double board again and see if it comes back. Could be he just needs more confidence on a single plank to do it.
Hi Silvia,
This is yesterday’s session, it was before I read your replay 😉 I will do a session with double plank and will end with this setup, also I will try it with one table, now there are two, maybe that offers him to do a better stride??
He tries to do the downramp in one jump what give a major leap. In this session it was nothing to jackpot. One or 2 tries I missed that he was in with one paw 😉 But he shows more hind feet separation 😉 and then he jumps off , that’s last is a shame!
Hi Silvia,
We did a session with double downramp plank (# 1 t/m 4) and I think it really worked!! After that we did a few reps with upramp, smaller table, downramp. It is much better now, don’t you think?
I don’t fully understand what you mean by 2/3 of DW. Is this setup not 2/3 of DW? Do you mean horizontal plank, downramp with this. If this setup is important then I certainly will do that, then he have to jump 😉 noproblemo!!
Looks good! Low DW next 🙂 12 was nice -- three feet in -- definitely a jackpot!
Cool, definitely much better hind feet separation! I think you don’t need a double plank anymore, but yes, maybe another set up… Maybe simply try a low DW?
Hi Silvia
I have a few samples of Mercy’s last few recorded sessions. He is in a pattern of hitting the down ramp high with his front feet and missing or hitting high in the yellow. He isn’t showing or offering an understanding of criteria any more. I read the thread on the importance of the dog understanding criteria and your other comments, but went back to review and couldn’t find it. I could not put the first vid in slo mo, as it went blur when I did. On two passes, it looks like Mercy switched leads on the down ramp.
Barb
Well, he is in, so those were actually o.k… But definitely try to challenge him some more now by different approaches (you can even start him on a DW or from a sit stay right in front) that require different stridings to check if he can adjust and hit every time. I wouldn’t worry as long as he is in, but I would definitely jackpot the lowest hits.
OK thanks! I have not tried those two approaches, but will. Thanks for your ideas.
Barb
This is a new place, new type of floor and he was starting from a sit. So not too surprised at the result as it was not much different than the first vid. It looked to be the same hit on the down ramp that he has been offering. So I wonder your suggestion on how we should proceed
Thanks
Barb and Mercy
I think those were too many challenges at once: new DW, inside, slippery floor, starting from a sit stay… Of course, you should take every opportunity to try a new DW, but do try to help more. In this situation, I would pull a (straight) tunnel next to the wall so that he starts as far as it gets and with more speed, throw a ball in advance AND try not to be so much in front that you’re then already turning towards him and staring at him: he looks back at you then and leaps. Turning towards the dog on RC is not a good idea anyway, especially not with a soft dog. You can add those challenges one by one on a known DW, but definitely make it as easy as possible for him to succeed on new DWs.
Thanks Silvia
I was a little hesitant to put him on that DW or throw a toy because of the floor, but the floor really did not present a problem to him. I turned to see if he hit the yellow, not thinking about the problem that it created, so thanks!
We will continue on!
Barb and Mercy
I know, it’s always tempting to see the contact, that’s why I usually plan it so that I’m behind and can see it without turning. When I happen to be in front (or need to be in front because of a sequence), I don’t even look, it really can make them collect and end too high. So considering all those things that made it really hard for him, he actually did pretty well! 🙂
Thanks
Mercy thanks you too, for pointing out that he really did well in spite of his partner….ha Nice how you can put a positive spin on things and that sure makes me feel excited to get out and keep trying to get it right
Barb and Mercy
I’m sure it will get easier with every next new DW!