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New Year : Jan 2017 Training Logs

5K views 61 replies 8 participants last post by  AmberSunrise 
#1 ·
The new year!! May all your brightest dreams come true :)

Plans, goals, accomplishments, brags, questions anyone for Jan 2017?
 
#3 ·
I'm bummed out today because this week I had an opportunity to do two fun matches (one set up with times and rings and number of people as a real trial + one at a different location), as well as meeting up with friends to train.

Between work and me dealing with some bug (minor fever and sleepathon today) - I missed out on all of that. :(

Jan should be a quiet month. No obedience trials. Limited classes usually because of weather and or people being away.

I am working on our weak areas though throughout.
 
#4 ·
This morning we had some quick sessions :)

Finch: Reinforrcement Zone, Hand Touch, Sits, Downs (oops she forgot!), some short heeling & some recalls
Faelan: Heeling, signals (with cheese on floor to his side), 360 left & rights, fronts, scent articles -- really nice
Towhee: Heeling with fast pace to normal, 360 left & rights, fronts and scent articles -- really nice
Brady: Heeling, signals with cheese on floor -- he really had issues with this so I need to work it more -- 360s to the left & right and scent articles. Except for signals he did a really nice job.
Aedan: Heeling (nice), 360s to the right & left (nice), fronts (nice), drops from the front with food - he needs work on this bit I don't think it was the food, I think I need to work it more often and we finished with a small scent article pile -- he is not ready for me to take breaks from training this LOL

Overall, happy sessions, Now off for some hikes!
 
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#5 ·
Articles w/both boys done twice each article . Well done even the turns in place were good and Hombre was 50/50 on straight turns and f+f. Each boy did long down stay when the other was working articles , both stayed. After articles Hombre and I worked the " take it.- hold it - out" exercise and today was quite good only mouthed the glove on the first one but he released it on my order every time so progress is being made. Club tonight after two weeks off looking forward to it.
 
#7 ·
Training went better at SCKC today at least with Nugget who only worked Open but he was excellent . We also had a few MSFE by various people no anticipation by either boy today. Now the other side of the coin Hombre who today would have NQ utility because he was given the #1 in the DR and instead went for #2 but I called him off with a loud NOOO and he came back to me , a repeat was done and it was a success. Tomorrow is spa day and they need it .
 
#8 ·
Last couple days no training, just threw Frisbees in the yard. Penny caught 4/6 throws yesterday, much better than usual. This is because I suck at throwing the discs, not because Penny can't catch.

First class at the new place. Not impressed with the way class is run - multiple dogs allowed loose to warm up on equipment at the same time. Honestly I was a bit shocked. I was told to warm Penny up and I thought the other dogs would be leashed - so wrong. She was on the dog walk and another dog trotted onto it and went nose to nose with her. Penny was amazing, sniffed the dog but no growling. Told the other owner she can be fear aggressive, guess they didn't believe me since they still left it loose. Before I could get her to a safe place it went up to her again and there were warning snaps. I don't blame her at all, my fault as a handler.


Next week at that place Penny will be crated unless needed to run a course. If this doesn't work, I'll just do the run throughs there since the last thing I need is her to be scared/insecure in the ring.
 
#10 ·
Leave its with Penny running full speed at her bumper, very nice responses.

I tried to see if Penny would bark in the backyard with three jump lead outs. One simple, one curved - never tried a lead out with curved jumps before and she took them perfectly. Wouldn't bark at all, maybe I need to take the jumps to a soccer field.
 
#11 ·
last night training with Nugget went very well his utility run only had a couple flaws front weren't too bad but his go outs might have cost a point or two . Open was again excellent only thing my instructor said was a slow return on BJ and a front was off on ROHJ. I made a poor about turn again something I need to fix.
Hombre did everything but again wouldn't release the glove. He is a long way from being competitive but he is fun and again beautiful go outs the best of any dog I've ever had. Hombre and f+f aren't anywhere near what I want but his heeling is nice and he is I think getting a little better with attention on me.
 
#12 ·
Hombre qualified in both utility trials today earning his first two utility legs but it sure WASNT PRETTY.
Nugget earned 24 OM POINTS a UDX leg toward a UDX4 and 1 OTCH POINT with a second place winning a runoff in open out of 14 teams and a 4 th in utility but again the go outs cost 21/2 points knocking us out of the OTCH points. He now has 61 OTCH POINTS.
 
#14 ·
Nugget again today got a UDX leg toward a UDX4 getting 3 rd place in both open and utility, he scored a 196 in utility and a 1971/2 in open but I really thought the open score was at least a 1981/2 or 199 as he nailed the f+f but the judge took a 1/2 point off of every exercise but s+d. Two OTCH POINTS were earned out of utility bringing total to 63.

Hombre GRRRR was just bad and blew gloves amongst many other mistakes and steadily acted up.
 
#15 · (Edited)
Congrats Nuggetsdad!

Loretta Mueller seminar was today, it was great and I had a lot of fun. I learned about tracing a dog's line with my eyes instead of looking straight at the next obstacle. There was a ton of other information too.

The Penny specific issues we worked on were visiting people, anxiety barking - a ton of it - and grabbing her leash.

I've been working on her not grabbing her leash for a month without any improvement. I was told to teach her to tug with it after a run to relieve stress so I guess I'll see if this works better.

At the end Loretta had about twelve people stand in a semi-circle around us with Penny leashed. Penny was so, so good - even had them squish in close to us and clap really loudly and she just sat there hyper focused on me.

After that exercise we did a course with a total of 12 people, either one or two people at the sides of multiple jumps, and in one case someone sat in the middle of a "u"-shaped tunnel. It's the most people-distracting exercise she's ever done for agility and she was fabulous. She checked someone out slightly on the way back, but at least that wasn't when we were running the course.
 
#16 ·
Congrats NuggetsDad :)

Well, little Finch is back at Sunfire; it was a blast and I kept her until practically the last moment! But she sure kept me on my toes LOL

Too busy to post & keep up with competition training, but I would not have traded one moment (even the work out glove, scrub rag, curtain grabbing, hair band stealing moments) for the world!

Now back to training my regular crew.
 
#17 ·
This morning I had the dogs trying to beat each other into the training room :)

Their sessions were a mix of precision and motion to release any stress !

Front work with extreme angles.
Heeling with flow intermixed with pocket hand precision
More extreme front games
Signals (Aedan had distance drops) with high expectations ( room is small though, so not a lot of distance) intermixed with food tosses and personal play rewards

Fun
 
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#18 ·
Sure wish Hombre would start to show a " little " maturity. Training at club without distractions he did ok till people started coming in then he went into puppy mode jumping or at least trying too on people. His attention on training also went out the window as it did at the three trials this weekend where he was very close to being out of control. We did the DR and again he was reluctant to giving me the glove -he just doesn't get it that if he gives it to me praise and a treat are his otherwise a correction is on the way. Nugget deserved a day off so I left him home and concentrated on the " Challenge ".
 
#19 ·
No more classes for me at the freebie place. I'll probably take the Act 2 Test they offer there but then stick to the run throughs. Even with Penny having her crate, I wasn't able to have her crated the whole time like I planned.

Too many dogs let loose to play at the beginning/end of class, and several dogs being loose at one time within ten feet of each other for class exercises.....

I was so focused on what was going on with the loose dogs that I wasn't very aware of what was happening in class at all. I'm sure they thought I was a little slow in head because they had to keep repeating things to me and calling me over to a certain station.

Penny's going to turn into a nervous mess if she keeps going to classes at this place, it just isn't a good environment for a dog like her. She did have a nice meet and greet with a Border Collie.

I did work on some nice distance sends to her crate from 20 feet away, and then either closing the crate or leaving it open and walking away 20 feet.
 
#20 ·
Good choice :) I really, really dislike classes where the instructors let the non-working dogs not be under control and/or encourage dogs to mill about & worse meet n greet! Teaches the working dog all manner of bad things
 
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#21 ·
This morning we worked under the distraction on nearby food !! The dogs all had issues.

Faelan, Towhee & Brady had signals (no heeling)
Aedan had heeling and recalls

The food was purposely close and the rewards were heavy when they succeeded :)
 
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#22 ·
Nugget worked utility exercises at SCKC yesterday and did another fine job not perfect but close. Hombre just did open exercises in no particular order and is improving , his attention on me and LISTENING and OBEYING a lot better than at the trials this past weekend where he was a very very bad dog. It's going to be quite awhile before he is entered in a show even though he only needs 1 leg for his UD I'm not going to allow him to make me lose my temper again over his poor conduct. This boy has a lot of growing up to do.
 
#23 ·
Jupiter and I are starting Advanced Puppy tonight. I've kept up on everything but heeling over the break, so we will only be a bit embarrassing (I hope!).

I am hoping to get his CD this year, though I've always promised myself that I'd train my next dog to be ready for his CDX before entering Novice competitions, so that he'll be REALLY good.

But I'm not sure I'll be that patient.

:)
 
#24 · (Edited)
I remembered to take Penny's bumper to class for the weaves. It worked so well! The bumper must be her highest value toy since she shot through the weaves just like she does in the backyard. She did pop out at pole #11, but she still got a big reward since she's never done fast weaves for more than 6 before. Second time through she didn't pop out early. =)

Penny's anxiety barking reduced noticeably by the end of class using Loretta's leash tugging method to relieve stress and stopping to reset when she barks. Her desire to snag the leash drops too when I let her tug with it. She only needed 2-3 resets to run a course without any barking.

There was an unexpected distraction in the form of rain water running through a central column in the building that serves as a drainage pipe. A tunnel I had to send her through wrapped right around it, so when she came out of the tunnel she started circling to to figure out what the heck that noise was. It only took a quick second for her to focus back on me.

We are both so much more relaxed at our regular, non-chaotic training facility.

This is completely unrelated to training but we have a Shar-Pie in our class now. It's neat to see less common breeds in class.
 
#25 ·
The other day the wind blew over my ring gates so I went out to put them back up only to find that 3 of the feet were broken as the ice storm earlier had frozen them to the ground then the 30-45 mph winds blew them over and the pvc SNAPPED . Hombre did articles yesterday well but he still wants to refuse giving up the glove.. Nugget had another day off as the yard has ice all over it and the street too has ice on it and a lot of salt so heeling practice is out. No club tomorrow as I need to take my daughter for radiation and the time conflicts . I'll be happy when winter is a memory.
 
#26 ·
Practice CPE trial today. It's at the "freebie" place but it was amazing how at a mock trial everyone was magically interested in keeping dogs crated or under control.

There was noticeable stress/anxiety in Penny that faded quickly after the first run. I'm happy with how well she did just with her mental state. There's still progress to be made, so I'll wait and see what happens with the other fun matches.

At one point I was lined up to run next for a course and a Golden squeezed through a gap in the fence. Penny was really chill about it being in her space. I saw it sniffing my bumper so I threw it, and the Golden took it right to its crate, lol. I was hoping that's what it would do since I didn't want Penny to get uncomfortable. That's the closest we came to an unwanted loose dog today.
 
#27 · (Edited by Moderator)
Just an exciting announcement - okay maybe just for me and the involved parties but

... drum roll please ...

Plans for Towhee to become a grandma have been approved :) :)

Specifically to a boy who has just begun trialing (he was being held back while waiting for maturity). Titan x Towhee 2013.

The boy is fairly local (NJ) and he shares many of his mama Towhee's traits with drive, energy and an exciting dogality. He, like many of Towhee's kids, is on the lower side of the standard but agile and built for performance as well as just being good looking. As mentioned he is an active and driven boy.

The girlie is more laid back and at the higher end of the standard - with a novice handler she is showing well in both UKC conformation and AKC obedience, quickly earning both her CD and CDX and now learning/being proofed in Utility. A quick learner with a willingness to please, she is also a lovable & loving girl and even loves & lives with chickens!.

This is just exciting to me -- oh, the sire to be littermates are excelling in dog sports - HITs, dock diving, some hunt tests and tracking, one of whom is already accumulating OTCh points so yeah, I think its' exciting :)

Requested by the girlie's owner, approved by Mike & Barb after the genetics were reviewed and approved by the sire's owner. Still only in the planning stages but Woot Woot :)
 
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