Turning Blind Search into an Obedience Exercise

Ever since we started having practice at the new field, Kane has been having issues with the blind search. At the old practice field, we only had 2 blinds, and we always ran them the same way (there's our problem, I know!!!!).

Kane got used to the helper being in the blind that was closest to where all the people were. Now, the people hang out near blind 3, with the helper in blind 2, so when I send him, he runs around blind 1, hears my call and next command to "Revere!" starts going towards blind 2 and then he turns back towards blind 3 (where the people are.) This results in a down and we do it again. We've tried with the helper popping out of blind 2 and slapping with the stick, and when he hears/sees that - he goes full speed for blind 2. Then we do it again and he goes for blind 3. I asked Richard if he thought my dog was stupid (lol), and he said no, he's just "being stupid." Well, we can train past that!

Enter the "retraining the blind search" session. A few of my friends already do this from scratch with their dogs, and I think that is a great method. Their dogs learn to run blinds with rewards and positive motivation. The idea is to get the dog to run around an object (be it a tree, a blind (if you have one), a cone, a barrell, a garbage can....whatever ya got) that is indicated by the handler pointing and issuing the command. We are doing this at practice as well, but I wanted to reinforce it by training it at home (where I don't have access to a trained helper), so we're using positive marker training instead. Here's what I'm using to start with:

A tree.

A tug.

A ball (= reward)


A dog that wants to train. :-)

Kane likes the ball A LOT more than the tug, so my proposition to him for this exercise is " If you go around the tree and bring me the tug, I will let you play with my ball." We started out just a few feet from the tree, we heeled to our starting point and I made him sit while I went around the tree and placed the tug where he couldn't see it.

Then I went back to him, pointed my arm like I do on the field and said "Revere!" The first time wasn't all that great. I could tell his brain was going "But where's the blind, mom?" I ended up grabbing his collar and running with him saying "Revere, revere, revere!" until he saw the tug. Then I quickly backed up, said "Kane, come!" and when he saw me and was running towards me I threw the ball behind me.

The second through eighth time were much better. I even increased our distance from the tree a little bit. We've been doing this pretty much every day in the past week.

At practice, I am using the "Kane, come!" command as he rounds the blind, and then I make him come to me before continuing on to the next blind. I use the remote collar if he does not listen to me. It went pretty well this past weekend, but I need to make sure he comes and sits in front of me before the next step. We stepped it up to 3 blinds at practice and only once did I have to put him in a down.

Kane's impression of NASCAR - rounding the blind at a 15 degree angle!

Eventually he will come to me, sit in front of me, and I'll give the heel command to turn towards the next blind and send him to that, call for him to come to me, sit in front, heel around and send again.

I think this is good for him. Whereas previously he has seen protection as a big game being played on his terms, he is now learning that he must do what I ask of him. It's noticeable also in how he carries the sleeve all the way back to the car and even doing a victory lap around the car with the sleeve. He has never done this before - choosing instead to drop the sleeve as soon as he gets to the car. Now I have to tell him Out! to get him to release the sleeve. It's almost as if now he feels like he did the work, and he earned carrying the sleeve - it's his price!

Oh and this week I got a nice bloody lip courtesy of my beloved dog. We did a recall from a walking down, and I placed the ball under my chin, intending to drop it as a reward for a correct front sit. Well, Kane decided himself that his front sit was pretty darn good, and he went for the ball....I'm sure to all the onlookers it looked like he was going for my throat....lol. Anyway, he bumped my teeth and created some internal and external holes in my chin. Nothing that needed stitches, but made for an interesting conversation. :-) I can't whistle!!!

We've been tagged!

Kane at 7 weeks. Hard to believe he was once this little....

Warning: This post has (almost) nothing to do with schutzhund training. :-) We were tagged by YD over at YD's A Little Bit of Everything blog and her doggie girls Samantha and June to do a "Doggie Bucket List" - meaning everything Kane would like to do sometime in his lifetime.
So here it is - after all, it's good to take a break from training every now and then, right? Right.

Kane is now writing the rest of this. Pretty good typer, he is.

Things I have done in my lifetime:
Bitten Richard (our trainer) numerous times.
Been used as crowd control by a police officer (I was 1 1/2 but apparently already intimidating enough)
Gone down the road with my head out the sunroof (I do it all the time)
Bite holes in tires (wheelbarrow, now we have one with solid tire)
Peed on every tree in the yard (yep, and they're ALL MINE!)
Swam in the lake (didn't really like it)
Bit a hole in mom's exercise ball (she let me play with it!)
Chased deer
Chased canadian geese
Chased rabbits
Chased cats
Chased anything small and furry that moves fast
Slept in a tent
Gone hiking and carried my own backpack
Snuggled with mom on the couch
Licked away mom's tears when she cried


Things I'd like to do:
Sleep upstairs with mom and dad in their bed.
Lick Stars and Stripes, mom's cats. Oh, come on....one little lick wouldn't hurt them??!!?
Chase a squirrel up the tree
Eat that stick of butter of the counter.
Beat up neighborhood chiuaua that pees in our yard.
Catch one of those pesky deer.
Get a Schutzhund III title (that one was from mom)
Prove to mom I can do the long down (hers too)
Go with mom and dad to Sweden to meet everyone there.
Convince mom and dad that I NEED MORE CHICKEN!!!!
Raise mom and dad's kids when they have them

Have a baby sister or brother so that I can show them all the trees to pee on.

Walk mom down the aisle when her and Sean get married in October (I can't wait!)Leyla, Mom and Me. Leyla belongs to mom's exbf.

No right turns allowed

This past Saturday we had practice at a temporary new field in Morrisville, NC. A new field near Claremont is in the works, but they have just cleared it, evened it out and seeded it so it's not functional yet.

In obedience, we first did a long down while Mike was working his rottie Jazz. I used the remote a little heeling onto the field, but then not at all. Kane did well. He had a line on which I was loosely holding about 10 ft away.
He looked at me most of the time, unless Jazz was running and then he looked at him. Yeay! :-)

On our obedience, the feedback from friends was that during our turn on the field, Kane was very forged. (This means that he had his head and front wrapped around me, resulting in his butt being swung out and not parallell with my body.) This also forces his body into my every time I bend my left knee.
The suggestions were to only do left turns for a little while when working obedience during the week. Left turns will force my knee to bump him HARD and eventually he will stay away from it.
Another suggestion was to use a long stick and lightly smack his left back flank to make him straighten out more.

We did a little heeling during our walk on Monday morning (@ 5:30am), and he was not forged at all. So I wondered if the stress of having the remote collar on, and the stress of being in the long down, makes him forge because it's a way for him to have body contact with me as much as possible??

I posed this question to some good friends, and here's a collection of their answers:

C: Hey, just because you’re awake enough to do OB at 5:30am doesn’t mean your dog is! He was probably in correct position because he was tired and wanted to go back to bed, poor Kane. You’re never going to ask me anything again are you?
I know when correction comes with my dog he does in fact want more body contact with me. This became very apparent when I was correcting him for crowding and it produced worse crowding. I had to use the prong collar very gently and correct him straight away from my body and even give a light verbal ah-ah as I corrected to help him get the point. The forging baffles me a little, but you seemed to relate it to his way of having more body contact, so that would make sense. The only other time my dog will crowd and actually will forge is when he’s in very high drive and doesn’t want to contain himself. This is a very different picture than when he’s leaning on me because of corrections. Can you tell the difference with Kane? Is he more or less drivey on the SchH field or at home? As for a solution, I agree with the left turn theory. You can also take your right knee and raise it, cut across your body (left leg) and knee Kane in the chest/under the chin. Just whatever you do, make sure you get the desired response and then reward for it quickly. Make the left turns, sudden halts, or knee kick a game so he wants to fix himself and get a reward. If the problem is stemming from the e-collar correction, it’s all the more important that your “fix” be a game. Even slowing down your walk and givingvery gentle prong tugs while saying ah-ah might do the trick.
J: . . . you know how dogs revert to old habits that you've fixed when they're under stress? Maybe whether from the long down or the new field, Kane was going back to his old bad ways because he was less comfortable than he was on your walk this morning?

J: (after many e-mails back and forth asking questions about whether I had a ball in my vest-pocket at practice (yes) and whether I had a ball on Monday morning (no) and whether I was wearing the vest on Monday morning (no)
You could try practicing on your walk with the schutzhund vest and ball in it and see what happens. I'm sure he can smell the ball

L: I would try what Carrie and the people at the club suggested to you but would also teach a side heel and a backward heel so that he doesn't anticipate the heel as always a moving forward or a turn but rather he thinks where your left is and what it is doing.

I don't know Kane well enough to say whether a nick from an e-collar would make him forge or a strange place would affect him.

Some dogs will touch you on the heel to avoid loosing your leg from being corrected until they figure out that it doesn't help them as you turn into them and bump them as you move your leg up and over a little.

I would also let him know maybe a command to fix it. I use close with mine and usually start that as I move to the side or step backwards and want them to follow that leg. I would reward right away for the position as soon as he came into it.

When you heel him and have the ball have you taught him to work with proper heel position with the ball in front of him? Where he can see the ball and still hold eye contact on you.

He shouldn't break a heel position even if the ball or other distraction is in plan view but be focussed on you.

If that's the case I would go back to teaching him a "game" that the toy is yours and he works for it while it's in his view. That way regardless of what you are wearing or where the toy or food is his attention is on you.

Don't I just have some awesome friends with great advice?! Without them, I'd be so lost.

On another note, we (well, Kane) ran three blinds at practice which was new. Here's a small pictorial of that. Up until now, we have only been running two blinds so he's gotten used to the helper being in the second blind. It was amusing to see his face when he came around the second blind expecting the helper. :-)

Here we are at the start. Me pointing out the blind.

On his way into blind # 2...See the excitement on his face?
"I'm gonna get this guy......"

Still excited....coming into blind # 2

"Where the heck did he go????!!!???"

"Aaahhh....there he is!"

"I'm coming to get you, Jack! Just you wait!"

Smackdown on the Long Down

The smackdown look. He does this sometimes now when another dog runs by.

If you're a faithful i-schutzhund blog reader, lol, you know that Kane and I are "this" close to being ready for the BH. Read more about what the BH entails on this fabulous site. By the way, BH is also called Traffic Steady Companion Dog Test.

A big part of the BH is the obedience routine, which I have no doubts that we will pass. During the obedience routing there is another handler and dog who are doing a long down at the side of the field. The handler walks their dog to a spot on the side, the dog sits when they halt, the leash is unsnapped after ok from the judge, the dog is told to lay down and the handler walks 30 paces forward away from the dog and remains standing with their back to the dog until the other dog has finished their routine. Being good, mom!

Kane's issue is dog aggression and wanting most of all to run for the other dog when it runs. We also have the possibility of the OTHER dog breaking and going for Kane, which would be just as awful. So, we've been giving Kane the smackdown on the long down. Love the headline. :-) This entails a long line being tied to a lightpost and then we do a controlled heel to where the clip on the line is, stop, attached the line, heel a few more steps. Then I unhook the leash (which is done in trial) and give the down command.
I then walk 20 paces or so away from him and stand with my side facing him so that I can still see.
He does, of course, still have the remote collar on.
This doesn't sound like fun, and it isn't. But I need him to be know that if he breaks from that long down, I will be VERY, VERY upset. The trick is to use the remote collar consistently and always in conjunction with a command. When he complies, he is always rewarded.

Interestingly he has done quite well the past few times, we've had 2 dogs that he's not used to (Thanks Nick and Sammy!) and also Nobi whom he does know. Nobi even likes to catch his ball or tug and run close to Kane during his "victory lap." Kane stayed down and I was very proud.Nobi catching a ball!

The idea is to continue this every time we have practice, and then continue some more with no line, but still the remote collar, and then without.

Wish us luck!

A Protection Training Routine - Video!

Notice the drop of drool from Kane's mouth....lol.

Greeting Schutzhund Friends!

A Happy New Year to all of you and I hope everyone had a good holiday. Kane got a (ginormous) box of (extra-large) Milkbones for Christmas and I think he liked it because right now he is sitting outside the pantry hoping I'll walk in there and get him one. :-) Brat.

My wonderful friend Jackie has a fabulous new Nikon D90 SLR that also can do small movies. Below is a protection training routine from Jan 3 that she took of me and Kane. There are a bunch of clips together. Below that is a synopsis of what we are trying to accomplish and what I see as the things we still have to work on. Suggestions are always welcome.

Clip 1: The first run of the blinds. You can see that he thought about going to the right of the blind instead but changed his mind. Dogs are supposed to search the blind in the same fashion, so I think we would loose points for that. He is doing that less and less though. As always you can tell his level of engagement from the barking when he's quite a ways away from the blind. There is a marked change in position from almost center in front of the helper and then continuously moving to the right. I'd like to work on this, but I've yet to ask Richard what it's all about.

The down and out are so-so but they will improve in the next clip.

I've been working on the quiet command at home this week, because as you can tell, he's not minding it now (when we walk back to starting position.)

Clip 2: Second run of the blinds. This time he comes in even better center, but still moves to the right. He likes that elbow section of the sleeve. I think because it is less stressful to bite there, he doesn't have to look the helper in the eye that way.

Clip 3: Here we are heeling in a left-hand box around the helper. I'm having some issues with him not properly heeling in protection. He is very distracted (obviously) and keeps looking at the helper. We will continue to work and I'm positive we can get through it. The feedback from the team is that I need to reward him sooner for a few good steps and not wait so long. The reward for good heeling is, of course, a bite. :-)

Clip 4: Now Travis is in the blind. Brave man. We are heeling in front of the blind, working on the same issue as in the previous clip. You can tell Kane looks at the helper every time we walk by the blind. We then set up for the escape bite (for now I leave him in a sit).

Clip 5. Set up for another escape bite. Now Kane knows what is coming and I'm having some problems making him sit in heel position. Nice grip on this one, but then he will not out the sleeve without turning the remote collar up, way up.

Clip 6. Another escape bite. This time, instead of slipping the sleeve, the helper does a freeze (stand still and drop sleeve down) at which point Kane should respond to my Out command and go into a hold and bark. There is a little bit of growling, but he does out on one command both times.

Clip 7. Another escape bite. This time, he needs two commands (and a remote collar nick) to out the sleeve.

Clip 8. We set up for the side transport with some barking, which is not good. Kane's side transport is good, but it looks like he is bumping the sleeve with his nose (not allowed) and he is crowding the helper. He should heel to me, but look at the helper.

All in all, a good training session! Thanks for watching!

Girls (& Women) to the Worlds Roadtrip 2008

We had a blast during our roadtrip to Florence, KY for the WUSV 2008 - the World Championship in German Shepherd Scchutzhund. Although we all missed our dogs terribly (and I'm pretty sure everyone but Carrie spoke to their dog(s) via phone...lol), it was great to see all the teams competing and to see this level of dogs.

It gave me a whole new appreciation for where I am with Kane, and most of all....an appreciation for how difficult the Voraus (sendout) is. :-)

Thanks to my compadres for letting me sit in the back and get some knitting in while we were travelling. :-) Here are some pics:

Beautiful scenery in WV. Hey wvfarmgirl!!


The sign when we arrived said "German Shepherd Dog Show"
Haha! Not exactly....


Since the Swedish team was absent, I cheered on my fellow

Scandinavians; the Norwegians, Danes and Finns. Here is

one of my favorite Norwegian dogs, Kustmarken's Yatzy,

doing the retrieve on the flat and making sure I get a good shot.

Here is the same dog doing the bark and hold. End score was 248,

Tracking 76, Obedience 92, Protection 80

Good catch by helper.

Bacteroides Sera from Finland with Susanna Tunturi
came in 8th place with a score of 89,95 and 95. Nice!

Bacteroides Sera doing the bark and hold after escape.

Bacteroides Sera waiting on her protection score: 95!
(and I wish I knew finnish so that I could ask where
that weirdo kennel name comes from????)

Now, it can be argued over whether this heeling is correct
or not, but it was beautiful nonetheless. Javir vom Talka Marda
from Germany with handler Michaela Knoche.

I'll never get Kane to do a finish like Javir,

but it was cool to watch!

I got some great shots like these....

....and then some shots like these.... :-)

Blitz v. Felsenwaeldle during the escape.

Winner with 97,95 and 96. :-)

Tired but happy! We had a great time!

9/14 - Keep on Tracking

The thing with tracking is.....the more you do it, the better it goes. This tracking session was back in mid September.

On the advice of Julie, I was tracking Kane at close to 24 hrs hungry and he did SO much better than the previous weekend. He did not go swirling off the track anymore, his corners were better and the downs on articles were faster. I'm lucky in that Kane's articles have always been nice, straight and he does it on his own. :-)

This time, I had run out of hot dogs, so I tracked with treats and I had cut up pieces of smoked deli ham in the article rewards. It's good to change things up a bit every now and then.

Coming soon - a report from WUSV 2008 in Florence, KY. The Girls (Womens) Roadtrip to the World Championship in Schutzhund. Or as the sign said when we first got there: "German Shepherd Dog Show" LOL.