Moe Strenfel-Foundation Training for Agility-The road to a perfect partnership

Anyone who knows me knows I have my addictions, and one of my more harmless addictions, or at least I think it is harmless.....sort of.....is dog training DVD's. A friend of mine is scheduled to go to a seminar given by Moe Strenfel this month and it is on foundation training, so I really thought it would be something that I would not get that much out of and decided to save my money for something else. Another friend does have the DVD and because I was curious and I hate to miss out on anything-I borrowed it.

YIKES, there is some really, really great stuff. I thought it would be another DVD showing how to train equipment, and get dogs used to movement, that type of thing. WELL, there is more to this video then equipment skills for sure-this is a great DVD! Moe shows how to do a lot of flat work so your dog understands handling maneuvers, I love how she showed to break down front crosses and teach the dog where to be. The third DVD (it is a 3 DVD set) has some great stuff on how to teach rear end awareness and develop core strength using stools of different sizes, balance discs, and what she calls "pods". Nice exercises. Since I am teaching agility class this month I did see some things I am going to use.

I was surprised to find some good ideas even for my dogs that are well on their agility path. I did not get to sit and devour this DVD since I have an agility class to teach (where I am going to try a few things I saw).......but I did skim through it and am going to take my time with it tomorrow to really watch it and take some notes.

What a difference from last weeks class..thank heavens!

whoo hooo!!! I had Deanna's class tonight, and it was a MUCH better class then last week's barkfest Lizzie treated everyone to. I hired my kids to take the little Liztard and put a blanket down over her crate when she made any noise, and take it up when she was quiet and throw in food when she was quiet. She actually did really well, but I can not believe how much food the kids ended up throwing in, but.....small price to pay. Well, I paid for all that food, a shake to reward the kids and I did have to pay them an hourly fee, but it was quiet in class, and hopefully Liz is learning something.

The other great thing was that just a few weeks ago I was getting so discouraged because it just never seemed I saw good lines or figured out the best way to go on a course...well, things just seem to be popping in place. Tonight, just to toot my own horn, I figured out a couple of sequences and set what I thought was a really nice line--I was channeling Alicia, looking at the dogs path and which was the turns worked best for the dog, and no one in class was running even close to what I was doing-they were all turning around the jumps the opposite way from where I was going to turn. Our turn came and it went off without a hitch, then it came time for the class to discuss...well, lots of ooohs, and ahhhhs, when Deanna explained the whole course and the second time everyone ran the way I had run the first time. The great part is that it all feels like it is making so much more sense again-the last few times I felt like I totally saw why a certain path worked and it made so much sense-I just saw it without overthinking things and confusing myself. I might get this yet!!!! Next week I might be wandering dazed and confused again-but tonight it felt really cool to feel like I had a handle on it.

LIz/Breeze some teeter brush up...

After the accident Breeze has been bailing off the teeter mid teeter pretty consistently, something was bothering her. I started doing some teeter work and this is a new game I just starting trying yesterday. This is some of the height work that was on the Wendy Pape teeter video. I would DEFINITELY NOT do this with any dog that did not have a LOT of plank work and back end awareness, and I did stay right next to the dogs. It was just funny because this is the third try at this little game. The first time Liz was a little weirded out, Breeze had her nails out and was not at all comfortable. I just lifted them up to the end position and fed, fed, fed, then lifted them down. By the second time Liz broke free and went running up the board, and Breeze was OK, by the third time both dogs were really into it. Anyway, I just have been trying to get the dogs really driving to the end of the board, but they have been slowing a little bit at the pivot point, so I had been working with the teeter permanently going down and working on getting them to drive to the bottom, which was working somewhat. I like this because as far as treat placement- there is a piece of duct tape-taped to the end of the board and the dogs can not see it when they get on the board, then I put spray cheese on it and I can deliver the treats from under and in front of the board or on the tape, and they really seem to get the forward position and driving to the end with just these couple of sessions. Cherry is not good enough on the plank for me to feel safe letting her do this, more plank work for her first. I can just put Cherry up at the top though and feed and it does not bother her at all, I just do not trust her not to quit paying attention, spazz out and let her feet go flying all over the place, she is an excitable girl!

New Teeter DVD from Wendy Pape

I am watching a new DVD-it is

Wendy Pape's Teeter From Start to Finish

First off we have a pretty good teeter performance, my dogs love the movement and have always been pretty good. After the car accident Breeze has been more freaky and something about the teeter is scaring her for the first time, so I started retraining the teeter bit by bit to get her confident and not worried again. When I was first watching the video, Wendy is not training the teeter how I trained the teeter so I was not sure I liked the video, but the more I watched... there are some things I found very helpful. One thing Wendy does is to teach all the elements of a fast, safe teeter seperately. So you work on the approach and teaching the dog to load properly on a plank on the ground. Goodness we are doing a lot of plank work lately, and the plank has moved into being one of the most valuable pieces of equipment that I own! LOL. Then she teaches the bang noise and being comfy with that, she teaches the movement seperately, then HEIGHT, which is something I had not really trained for before, of course the end behavior is taught and then putting the whole thing together. She also has a chapter at the end on how to train really large dogs. Wendy also addresses the different positions and why you would chose different positions for which dogs.

The one thing that I realize is that I had been having an issues with Chloe she was starting to load on the teeter from the side more and more, so Wendys method of training that is a pretty easy fix, and I had noticed my border collies were stopping more and more right at the tip point and they had never been afraid and I just noticed a little slowing and was not sure what that is about, but now I am thinking it is because I had never really taught and desensitized for the height of the obstacle. That is the one thing that I do not think is addressed quite as well the way I origionally taught the teeter. So I took the dogs out this morning and sure enough Breeze was scared of the heigh, Liz was a little uncomfortable, not bad but a little worried and Cherry could care less about the height-good ol' Cherry.

The other thing I really appreciated that Wendy really addressed was the placement of rewards-she uses duct tape at the end of the teeter so the dog can not see it as they load, and then have to have their head down and straight, and she uses some spray cheese on the tape. Now how clever and easy is that??? I think that is the other thing I have not been as careful at making sure to reward with the head straight ahead and low.

Little Lizard is no longer for sale...A little Premack seems to go a long way....

Well, I might have to keep the naughty Lizard after all. There was no class today, and I had to pick up raw food from the Co-0p which is right by the yard so I deceided to take Liz and work on the distractions today. Ever since she discovered those durn gophers in the yard she has had trouble concentrating and seems to have taken a big step back wards. I got to the yard and I made sure and got everything out and set up BEFORE I got the Liz. I started with some mat work, and working on clicker training homework for the tricks class-because she really likes that stuff and stays connected. When she got bored I just sat in the chair and ignored her, and it only took a tenth of a second before she was coming back and asking to work again, whooo hooo! I released her to explore the yard a few times and I got a killer, fast, driven recall, so all was good. Then she noticed the gophers....and the durn thing was sitting there poking his head out of the hole teasing Lizzie. I deceided to do a little Pre-Mack conditioning...there is a fancy definition of the premack principle, which states that more probable behaviors will reinforce less probable behaviors. In other words if someone wants to do an activity they will perform a less desirable activity to be able to do the activity they want to do, and actually over time they will have the same value for the less desired activity as they did for the more desirable reward. I deceided to put it to the test, to get a mole, Liz had to do the poles! If she did the poles, I let her go chase the gopher! By the end she was getting the idea. So, it might seem like a little thing to have her doing the weave poles, but to have her doing them and not taking off with the gopher sticking his head out and right next to where we were working, that was HUGE for a distractable little Liz.

Breeze gets an A+ at the vet, and a possible explaination about our weird contact behavior...

Breeze saw her holistic vet, Dr. Modglin yesterday and got an acupuncture and chiropractic treatment. The vet said Breeze actually looks pretty good. She had some signs of discomfort but really not any more/less then she usually has when she comes in for an adjustment. It has been almost three months since her last adjustment, and we have increased her level of training, a LOT, and she has started trialing and has trialed or done fun matches most of the weekends. Her shoulders did seem to have some signs they were being bothered but I am pretty sure that is because we have been doing contacts and I am going to have to retrain some of that because she is not using her back end to stop her on the Aframe she is using her shoulders to absorb all the shock of stopping. The vet did agree that it looks like it is possible the reason that Breeze is stopping in the position she is on the dog walk and Aframe is that it hurts a bit to stop using her back end and she has found that by running down not slowing herself down and just using her shoulders to stop herself and then her back end swings to the side with the momentum to be able to stop.....that maybe how she has found it is easiest way for her to stop on the contacts. That would explain why she is so intent on laying sideways at the end of the contacts. I am going to have to do a lot more thinking and training on this contact stuff.

Since the car accident where Breeze's side of the car was hit and her crate dented in from the impact, she has been afraid of a lot of things. It is very hard for her to relax, she has a teeter issues and she has always loved the teeter and will play the teeter bang game but will not do the full teeter. She flattened out and would not move at the NADAC trial and was shaking because she saw a hammer, she is afraid of her crate anywhere near the car, and if she hears a wire crate being collapsed she will just run and will not stop. Dr. Modglin gave me some amino acids that might help her calm down while I am working on desensitizing her to these things. She has always been a little spacey about life but this car accident brought that to a new level, poor thing it would be hard to live with the constant stress she seems to be feeling, so hopefully the medication will help take the edge off and make it easier for her to break that anxiety cycle.

I finally got my car back after the accident last night...weeks after they promised it would be ready, and would you believe there is still a panel on the inside that is not on? They said they will put that on when they get one, but you would think they would have ordered one a month ago, wouldn't you? I am just glad to have my agility mobile back.

Breeze gets to go to the vet today...not her favorite place

Breeze physically has been looking great, well....actually Breeze has been looking great every other way too! Anyway, I have not seen any weird steps, she is doing a lot more work then she has ever done, she is jumping 16 inches and I still do not do nearly what I might with any other dog but a lot more for her. Breeze is not knocking any bars, things are mostly looking really good.

One thing I have noticed though is when she jumps on to the bed it seems like she doesnt pick up her back foot all the way, and she will get caught on the side of the bed and fall back down. A couple of times when she is doing things like that I have noticed the same type of thing....and it worries me given Breeze's hip dysplasia. Does she hurt and doesnt want to pick her foot up all the way because it is uncomfortable? Is she getting more arthritis so when she is not warmed up then it is like when they have troube getting up and that is what is up with jumping on the bed? She has been doing this quite a bit lately, say for about the last few weeks, and at first I just thought it was a weird isolated incident and she just got in a hurry and was not paying attention.

I am taking Breeze to my holistic vet this morning to have an accupuncture and adjustment done and see how the vet things she feels. I think it is about time to get another xray, I had planned to have one this summer after Breeze got to full activity and had been doing agility for awhile and see if there were any changes since last summer.

dog for sale, really cheap!

WARNING: FRUSTRATED RANT COMING UP: I started a class here in town with Deanna while Alicia is on vacation, just to get some more practice in and because usually Liz will work there nicely. I thought in light of her back sliding in her ability to listen and do agility, that might be a nice little class for her to work on her focus and get her back on track. It was a cooler temperature night, which felt nice, and there was a lot of wind, which always seems to make the dogs act spacey. Well, the naughty lizard was HORRID! REALLY HORRID! First off she barked like a banshee continuously, it was horrible. The class is pretty late so I could not let her do that because of the neighbors and it was dark, so I ended up having to take her out of the crate. Usually as soon as we get there she does that in her crate but as soon as she sees I will not run back and get her until she is quiet she stops, but not last night. I had to sit and hold Liz and Breeze the entire time which made walking the courses pretty impossible, not to mention having to have someone else hold Liz while Breeze was running. It was just very embarrassing to have her showing such horrible behavior. Then when I let her run some sequences, the little turd ball just took off. She would not come to me either, she did not do a full out zoomie but she did for the first time in a LONG time evade me and try to avoid me getting ahold of her and did take off a short distance. Well, that was the end of her working for that sequence, and I tried a few others but she just sailed around the jumps and was a total spazz and then took off running away. Today I am so frustrated with her and today I do not want to be patient and look at the progress she has made or look to the future, I just do not want to do agility with her at all at this moment. My car was not ready AGAIN today, which is just ticking me off it was supposed to be done weeks ago, and there is a new scratch on the rental car, which I did not do and I think got there in the parking lot at the trial, but gosh if I had my car when I was supposed to I would not have to worry about that. I could not put Liz in the car when she was so horrible because I had the rental and not my suv that has a nice crate for her.
We had just made such great progress and I had been feeling like she was almost there and on Sunday when I brought her to the trial with us she was sooo good, just as good that day as she was bad today....