Show me your Teeth!

Our last two protection practices have been devoted to working on Kane being quiet during protection. He can bark or whine a little, but constant barking needs to be saved for the bark and hold, and for whining....well, who wants to listen to that?
In order to work on this, Richard got Kane a little extra riled up. I ended up with this series of pictures courtesy of Maggie borrowing my camera and shooting some pics. Amusing, aren't they?











In the end, we got some good grips and Kane did really well on being quiet, so I'm happy!

Retrieves on the Flat, jump and A-frame. Check!!

I'm an A-frame pro, mom!

Can I just say how proud I am of my awesome dog??!!!??

As you know, faithful readers, we have been struggling with the dumbbell for quite some time. I wanted so badly to keep this a motivational exercise (as opposed to forced, which DOES work for some people, and I am using in some parts of protection), knowing that it would take us longer to teach it this way. And it did. It's taken probably close to 9 or 10 months to get to this point.

At practice this past weekend, Kane did retrieve on the flat, retrieve over the jump and retrieve over the A-Frame. All with the dumbell. :-)
Now, we've not perfected it yet, but 90% of the work is done. I have to learn to throw the dumbbell (learn how it flies through the air to make it go where I want it to go), we need to up the level on the jump to get it to competition height (one board away), and the A-frame needs to slowly be brought up to the correct height (which is 6ft, I think). Right now, we're at about 4 ft. As far as the 9-10 months go, I'm also not a consistent trainer. I try to work with Kane every day, but sometimes I'm just bone tired after a long day at work, or we do something else etc. So the same method could have worked quicker for someone who has more time.

Nice air in this jump!

On the advice of my friend Julie, we started doing "hold" dumbell exercises at every mealtime. In the beginning, Kane would take it from my hand and hold it. He chewed a lot at first, not liking how it felt in his mouth. Then we would progress to taking it from me at different heights and positions (up, down, left, right), adding more difficulty to the "hold" part (to where I could lean back and he wouldn't let go). If he let go, or did not pick up, we would calmly start over again. He could see his food bowl with all that yummy chicken waiting for him during all this. Boy, did he whine!

"...and then you put your paws together like this"

Finally we got to where he would take it from me, sit where he was while I moved backward, and on command he would bring it to me and hold it. Then he would let go when I said "out."
Julie also recommended I play little keep-away games with him. I would get the dumbbell out and walk around talking to it, throwing it up in the air, and all in all, acting like I had this great toy that he couldn't play with. Then I would throw it and race him to it. If I got to it first, I played with it for a few minutes, and if he got it, he got to keep it for a few minutes before I would run backwards giving a recall command. Worked like a charm. My boy is a jealous player, always wanting to have the best toy....

The last piece of the puzzle was to do some attraction play with the dumbbell while Kane was on leash being restrained by someone else. I would stand just out of reach while running back and forth moving the dumbbell around asking Kane if he wants to play. Then I would throw the dumbbell and say "Bring" while it was still bouncing and the person helping me would let go. Kane loves to chase anything that moves, so this was a good way to have him shoot like a rocket after that dumbbell. Thanks for the tip, Richard!

Retrieve on the flat. Yes, that is me underneath all those clothes. It was cold!

I'm hoping it may be a bit warmer next weekend, and if so, I'll try to shoot some video of the retrieves.
Richard says we're on our way to some high scores, and since he claims he reads my blog, I'm going to hold him to that! At least in obedience! lol.
Thanks to Julie for the awesome photography! :-)

An important job

As you can see from this picture, Kane has had a very important job to train for. He didn't get any title, or get judged on his performance, but I will tell you he did wonderful. I couldn't have asked for a better friend to walk me down the aisle. :-)

Nice full grip!

We're back to training regularly now and things are going well:

Tracking: very well, we're up to hot dogs every 15 steps, and he even skips a few of those. He is very dedicated on the track, going footstep to footstep, pulling me along. We are both getting better at corners. Me remembering where they are and him finding them. Sometimes I just have to trust him...lol.

Really, Kane is a sweet dog!

Obedience: Our patience with the dumbbell is paying off. We train before every meal, pick it up off the floor, bringing it to me, taking it from me, holding it hard, outing etc.

The new thing

Protection: Still working on Kane's grip. It'll never be great, but we don't want him to loosen it or shake and growl too much. For protection obedience we heel around the helper in a left hand box. Usually Kane is very forged, but Richard had me try something new: when he does well, grab the tab leash, take a step forward with my left foot and pivot to my right and say "packen" so that Kane has to go around me. Then he will anticipate this (!) and not forge and be read to go around me. :-) It works quite nicely so far!

You laughing at me??? Look at all my nice teeth....who's laughing now???!!!

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!

7/17 - A Vacation does a (dog) body good

Run, Kane, Run! (this is the part he loves!)

Our trainer was on vacation for a week, so between the previous practice and this one, we both got to rest up for a little bit. Apparently it was just what he needed.

His heeling was excellent (still have a line on him though). But he is responding really well to remote collar corrections. Starting to forge a little, but I was told it's a sign of wanting to please, so we'll see....

Kane is finally (FINALLY!) starting to show improvement in the bitework. He had the best grips he’s ever had during this session. Full grips, as hard as always, and more towards the center of the sleeve.
Even Richard was impressed…..I was, of course, ecstatic. Go Kane!

6/28 - Protection and Heeling

We didn't get to track this morning, since I was running a bit late. However, we had a very good obedience practice! Kane paid good attention during heeling and his left turns are getting really good. I make sure I step with my left foot and give an eye marker to the left before I do so. It's amazing how quickly they pick up on that.The walking sit is becoming much faster. I'm stepping down with my right when giving the command and off with my left. I also inhale a bit more before I give the command. I have to watch that with my breathing though. I've noticed that when we practice in the backyard during the week and it's hot, I tend to breathe deeper and harder and he sometimes thinks I'm about to give the SIT command during heeling. lol.

We had a good run at protection as well. We ran a blind about 3 times. I could tell that Kane thought about going around to the right instead of the left when reaching the blind with the helper. He didn't, but he was growling as well. He had good outs and pretty good grips today. We also heeled around in a small square pattern with Julie helping me with remote collar corrections (thanks Miss J!). When we had 5-6 steps of good heeling I gave him my bite command and pointed toward Richard - i.e. the bite was a reward for good heeling. It got better and better and the fourth and last time was really good.

Small crowd at practice today. A few people are on vacation, visiting family and so on. Had to leave early for my godson's birthday party, but we had a good practice. It was hot and humid today, about 97 F.