Anyway dying is neither here nor there. LOL. Back to the training log. I love Google Docs. I use Google Docs for everything. I have tons of spreadsheets in there with various things, tracking the dogs’ weights, their registration numbers, bank account information (nothing that will get you my bank account numbers though lol), packing lists, etc. I love sharing the packing lists with the friend I usually travel with, makes collaborating on packing dog junk a lot easier!

So I’ve been experimenting with Jet’s obedience training lately, and finally decided to keep a training log. So here it is, and it’s on Google Docs, and you can’t edit it, but you can view it. Granted there’s not much in there right now since I’ve only just started it. But here it is:

Jet’s Training Log

I thought about embedding it into a blog post but then though naw, the link should be fine. Of course it’ll only be as useful as I make it, and if I use it, so we’ll see if I can keep using it. I get lots of anxiety associated with doing things on a regular basis, so we’ll see. I’d like to make some charts out of it too but I haven’t figured out how yet.

I’ve been doing some obedience training on my own mainly because when I train with someone else, I tend to shut my brain down and not think on my own. This also goes for other things in my life.. work is one of them. If someone leads me, I’ll just follow and do what I’m told. Sometimes I need to be more aware of what my own actions are, what reinforcers I’m using, and to do that I have to do things on my own. And hopefully this tracking sheet will help me see trends and other things. So Jet and I have been working on various things with toys and play instead of treats, and I’ve gotten some good information about what Jet will work for and what he won’t. I have some video, but I haven’t uploaded it. I get shy about talking about what I’m doing, so sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t, and I just haven’t been all to chatty lately.

Anyway, I’m sure I’ll be changing that spreadsheet over time, but it’s what I have now.

Jet's Third Birthday!

Next week Tatum gets one as her made-up birthday is May 1st.

For now, Jet gets to enjoy his.. well, all the dogs do, since it’s a big pizza and Jet would burst if he ate it all!

Levi's Ramp

Oh well. it’s supposed to snow today anyway, and it’s a good thing to take it easy. I might actually lay low on the obedience with Jet for a while and just be at home and rest and take care of myself. I think I took a break from mourning Levi, too, and last night it crashed back on me again. I really miss him so much. The house is not the same. The house will never be the same again.

So we’ve decided to leave the ramp in the back yard. Mainly because Jet and Chase have this new not-so-fun game where they stare at each other and get all excited and then go flying out the dog door at top speed. And if the ramp wasn’t there, they’d probably crash hard onto the cement. Maybe it’d only take them one or two times to figure it out, but we don’t want them to get hurt. So the ramp is going to stay for a while. Maybe we need something like an elo touch to get them to stop but I’m not sure how that would quite work.

So life goes on, slowly, taking it easy, loving the four dogs that we still have.

Chase

The biggest change I think has been Chase. He’s the oldest now (8.5 years), and he has space issues with dogs he doesn’t know. He will attack without warning when we go out and he’s too close to other dogs. He will still do this. He always hated having foster dogs in our house. So he’s the happiest one of them all that we no longer foster. He’s very relaxed at home now and, strangely enough, he’s becoming our mediator dog. Chase and Levi never got along. Levi would grump at Chase on a regular basis.

But now Chase loves to play with Jet (he did before, but he’s more relaxed about it now). Chase plays with Tatum too, and kinda tolerates Muffit. Muffit barks at Chase when he (Muffit) wants to play, which annoys Chase to no end. But after years, Chase is showing lip and teeth when he gets annoyed. We think that Chase’s warning system was punished out of him before we got him. So he’d just explode without warning. At home he gives warning now (he was giving warning before Levi died too). Chase hasn’t started a fight at home in probably over a year. It’s quite nice.

Jet has been having issues with being unable to stop when he starts fighting. I believe he learned it from Levi. Jet didn’t learn a good way to tell another dog that he’s been hurt or he wants something or needs another dog to stop something. I blame Levi, and myself, of course. Hopefully we’ll work this out. But anyway, a couple weeks ago Jet was going off on Chase, and Chase just stood there in the back yard with Jet latched onto his cheek. This is HUGE for Chase. Before, Chase would have fought back and not have stopped. But now, Chase is like our medium dog that has taken on the role of smoothing everything over. It’s really cool.

Anyone in a multi-dog household understands that dogs fight. It’s what they do. Our dogs have good bite inhibition and don’t break skin. But they sure sound mean. And they don’t fight without reason. People yell at each other, dogs growl and snarl and fight. And our house is kinda small, so the dogs are close together a lot. Maybe we need some wood pergolas to lighten things up, but we can’t afford anything now!

My husband and I aren’t sure who is highest ranking dog anymore. It’s probably Tatum, our only girl. But it could be Muffit, he doesn’t put up with anyone’s crap. It’s not Chase, he’s just the middle ground dog. And I don’t think it’s Jet either, even though he’s intact. Though we think Jet wants to be. It’s one of those flowing easy going packs that just get along. It’s quiet and nice. It’ll be interesting to see how a puppy throws them all for a loop again. Chase will probably have the hardest adjustment, he always does, but hopefully he’ll adjust quickly.

Denise is a motivational trainer. She isn’t a clicker trainer, but does occasionally use markers. She’s not a compulsion trainer. I kinda think she just fits into her own category. I’m not going full-on clicker training with Jet. But I’m going to do motivational training. No compulsion. But I’ll remove reinforcers if that works best. There are consequences to not working. But I won’t use pain, either.

Jet’s problem is he works beautifully with treats. He falls into heel, head up, nice focus, sits on the halts. But when I don’t have treats, then he doesn’t work. So this weekend I took him to an obedience trial. He was in Beginner Novice and Rally Novice on Saturday, and Beginner Novice on Sunday. He Qualified in all his runs, but his work was not what I want. And if any of it had been off leash, he would have wandered off or sniffed like he’s done in previous trials. I want him to work regardless of the leash. And I want him to want to work. I want him to enjoy working and interacting with me. And I will admit, I don’t subscribe to the belief that if you keep taking them into the ring, eventually they’ll just figure it out and work. I think they’ll learn bad ring habits and will end up getting worse.

When I was warming him up I didn’t use treats. In the past I would have whipped out the treats to get his attention. I don’t want to do that anymore, because I can’t bring treats into the ring. So when we warmed up he didn’t seem to know what to do. Either 1) he doesn’t understand, 2) he’s nervous, or 3) he is holding out for treats. (A friend suggested – maybe he doesn’t understands he’s supposed to sit regardless of the distractions.) (If there are any other options of what the reason may be, I will really appreciate comments!)

I would tell him to sit, and he just stared at me like he didn’t understand. I told him a second time, he still looked at me. I leaned down and said sit in a more sturdy tone, and he sat. Three times to respond to a sit cue is not acceptable.

I don’t really think he was nervous. Maybe he is. Maybe I’m a bad handler because I’m not completely sure if he’s nervous or not. But when I did eventually get out the treats, he fell right into heel and sat on cue. So I’m thinking, with Jet, he either doesn’t understand, or he’s holding out. I’m leaning toward thinking that he’s holding out.

I’m not going to start with the sit or the heeling when I train. Or any exercises. What I’m going to start with is getting him to enjoy working just for and with me. Below is a video example of Jet not playing with me, or even responding to me, when the environment is too stimulating. This is from Saturday, I took him outside to see if he’d just play. I didn’t get any treats out. I wanted to see how he’d respond. As you can see, he basically ignored me and air scented. Old instincts kicked in and I walked him over to see if we could see what was up, though Denise said that may be a bad idea. And it didn’t do Jet any good anyway. And really he wouldn’t be able to ever visit whatever it was, so probably I shouldn’t have taken him there:

Outside Training

Here is a video of training and warming up indoors. He’s better, but he still frequently looks away from me. I want constant steady attention. Those who have done or watched the high level competition obedience will know what I mean when I say I want his complete focus. I didn’t get it here with play. I would have gotten it with treats:

Inside Training

So I’m going to start with some play and focus work in my front yard.

The plan is, go out the front door, see what his attention is like. If it’s not what I want, we go back inside and he lost the opportunity to work. Then we try again in 30 minutes or so.

Jet really does love to work. He loves to play and interact. But usually when we go out the front door, he thinks we are going for a ride or for a walk so it’ll be interesting to see what I get. It might be a hard environment. I could do this in the back yard, but he is comfortable and likes to play in the back yard… however, if we consistently have less than I want out front, I’ll go out back.

So that is the first step. Front door, play, see what I get. I won’t use any treats. I may use some toys, depending on what I get.

Then I’ll move this same routine to a park or a ring setup. Take him out of the crate, if he interacts with me and works, cool. If not, back in crate, he lost the opportunity to work.

Of course if this doesn’t really work, then I may have to reassess again. I am not going to use treats. I’ll video our sessions so I can see what works and what doesn’t. I need to break this down. I need Jet to play and interact with me. Can’t bring anything into the ring but me and Jet. So if we don’t have a good play routine between the two of us, we are screwed in the ring. And I don’t want a dog that wanders off or sniffs. Jet is capable of really beautiful work. I just need to make sure that the play and the work are both rewarding for him. I want him to be happy while we do it!

If you are interested here’s Jet’s runs from Saturday:
Beg Novice, 186 1/2
Beginning Novice

Rally Novice 82. I thought it was a fair score.
Rally Novice

I didn’t get Sunday’s Beginner Novice on video. He did better, but still not what I want. He got a 191 on Sunday, which I also thought was a fair score.

So if anyone is interested I’ll be documenting Jet’s training over the next while, and hopefully things will work! I’ll put all these up with the tag Jet Obedience.

Jet and Dare

Denise is one of the very few purely positive, motivational competition obedience trainers in the entire country. As a few of us sat around at dinner, we came up with a couple of other names but now I don’t even remember who they are. And I’m talking about Competition Obedience… not just dog trainers or clicker trainers etc. Most competition obedience people still use correction methods thrown in here and there. I have too, but I really want to do what Denise does instead. She is amazing at how well she can come up with ideas to solve problems in training.

One of the biggest things that is sticking with me from the seminar is how so many people are not ring ready for obedience. They train with toys and treats then one day decide to compete and they haven’t done any training without toys or treats or corrections and they expect the dogs to perform well in the ring. Well, that’s not my experience. LOL. She said she even has had a class that is for being Ring Ready. Six weeks of setting up a ring, and all you do is enter the ring, play play play, then leave. So the dogs know that going into the ring is a good happy thing. What to do when you walk into the ring. Have an idea and a plan. Make it happy. I got some good ideas of what to do with Jet.

Basically Jet gets stressed in the ring, so I want to change that. So my plan will be to walk him into the ring, then whip out his new toy and play. Then leave. Do that a couple of times. Then go into the ring, maybe do a dumbbell retrieve, play play, then leave. Then add another exercise that he likes, play play, then leave. So every time we go into the ring it’s a really good experience. Add some “ready… ready… ready…” during and after heeling, to get his excitement up. Do push backs and run. Lots of play and having a good time.

I can even do portions of these things in competition. Like at the end of a heeling pattern, after the judge says Exercise Finished, I can say “ready… ready…” then burst into a run and run to the next exercise. Or do a push back and a touch high. Things to keep him up and happy. It’ll be fun to try. I am probably going to try a couple of these things this coming weekend, as for some weird reason I entered him in Beginner Novice, even though I don’t think we are quite ready. But it’ll be a challenge to me to see what I can do to keep his mood up and keep him happy.

I hope I took good notes, I haven’t looked at all of them yet. Maybe I need a clevis pin to keep them clipped together. I did get some video but I won’t share it. Denise asked us not to, and so that’s okay with me. I’m just glad I have it for my own benefit as I train in the future.

I also entered Chase in Grad Open and that should be fun. Chase is naturally higher in drive so hopefully he’ll be okay through all the exercises. I don’t know if he’ll Q, but it’ll be fun to be in Grad Open and see how he does.

I’m still thinking of a collie puppy, too, and running through my mind the things I can do for foundation work on a new puppy.

On a sad note, tomorrow, March 23rd, will be one month since Levi died. Ugh. time flies. I’m still not used to him being gone at home. I still miss him very much.

Jet Running

I hope the weather is good for the drive, too. It’s supposed to be rainy, but not snowy. I need to bring another pen and pad of paper, I wasn’t prepared at the Chris Zink seminar. I better write those down and stop at the store. I also need some snacks.

This picture of Jet is one of my favorites. It’s actually clear and in focus, and he’s having such a great time at the park. I put this picture on one of my stainless steel watches that I got from a company that lets you upload and put pictures on things. I really like the watch… though it’s hard to see the hands to tell the time. I sure can see my sweet boy Jet easiliy!

I did agility last weekend, which was good therapy, and Jet got his MXJ and Qualified in every run. He is such a good boy and we had a lot of fun. I made a ton of people cry over Levi, but they all understand. They understand the bond we have with our dogs. I’m very sad, and hopefully I’ll be able to go a whole day, sometime soon, without crying. But it may be a while.