Steak and Weaves
As part of Payton’s re-training (to rule out any gaps in our training as issues in the ring), I’ve decided to start over with the 2x2s. In order to make them really awesome, I’ve also decided to use steak to train them.
Today was our first session, the “entry” pole not totally wide open, but open enough to make it an obvious entry. I worked the arc, alternating success with entries high on the arc with an easy, straight on, flat out entry. His success rate was quite high although at times when we were high on the arc he’d enter the second set, possibly because they “look” like weave poles and the open entry doesn’t. We’ll go with the former in the name of re-training.
Although it’s funny to even call it re-training, because, as I mentioned to a co-worker, he always knows what weave poles are in the backyard. Is it re-training, or is it supplemental training? Proofing? Desperate attempt to get my dog to Q? What should I technically call it? So I’ve decided, for the fun of it, to call it Steak and Weaves.
We have three nice steaks I picked up cheap at the grocery store last night, so those will be sliced up and grilled and used for our further work. We also have some jump work and more contact proofing to do, so I need to work out a new training schedule for him. We have just under two weeks to get some additional training in before our seminar, so hopefully we’ll be able to make some advancements and rule training gaps out so we can be a little more direct with our seminar adjustments… but in the meantime… STEAK AND WEAVES!
Training Challenge 9/17/12
As you know from Weavin’ Wednesday, last week’s schedule changed to suddenly include weave pole training for P. Surprise! Well, we’ll continue that this week. Maybe I can teach the baby dog to weave before there’s snow on the ground?
Auggie is having fun playing in the six weave poles as well. I don’t really need to work on his poles, they are his best obstacle, but he does enjoy them and it never hurts to refresh, so I’m letting him play after Payton.
M – W – F
Session 1:
Jump work
Set Point x3
Straight line x3
Straight line with height x3
Session 2:
Tunnel rear crosses (A)
Weaves
Session 3:
Weaves
T – R
Session 1:
Jump work
Set Point x3
Straight line x3
Straight line with height x3
Session 2:
Weaves
Session 3:
Table (A)
Weaves
Saturday and Sunday are Auggie’s last agility trial ever, so I will probably not take the time to train P during that weekend… I will be slightly preoccupied.
Training Challenge 9/10/12
I’m trying to get back into the habit of weekly updating. Monday is for the training challenge, I’ve got a new feature for Wednesdays, an idea for Thursdays, and Sunday needs to be for our weekly wrap-ups again.
So to kick it back off, here’s what this week looks like:
M – W – F
Session 1:
Jump work
Set Point x3
Straight line x3
Straight line with height x3
Session 2:
Tunnel rear crosses (A)
Retrieve (P)
T – R
Session 1:
Jump work
Set Point x3
Straight line x3
Straight line with height x3
Session 2:
Weaves (A)
Copcop (P)
Sat
Session 1:
Jump work
Distance grid – x4 out, x3 back in
Progressive grid x3
Session 2:
Sequencing (A)
Baby sequence of tunnel-jump (P)
Sun
Play day! Whatever we feel like doing. May involve taking P to the lake. Unfortunately our “beach” lake is closed for the season, so no more swimming for us both, but he can play at the other lake which is close to home.
Training Challenge 8/13/12
Okay, these are going to be pretty tough to keep up on. I close on my house NEXT WEEK. Holy crap! From there I have a week of vacation but it’s likely going to all be spent working at the house, getting the major Must Be Done Now things all taken care of before we can move in (like finishing the fence in the backyard!)
This weekend was incredibly cool weather wise, hence why Henri came to pay us a visit. The cool weather will be good for working at the house, but bad for other fun things I had in mind – like continuing working with Payton on swimming to get him ready for Dock Dogs. I need to cart him off to the lake again and do another swim in deeper water. I would really prefer to do this when the weather is above 70 degrees! Let’s hope for some hot weather coming in the next few weekends.
As a result of continuing craziness, I’m just going to continue to make general goals instead. Last week I took a break from teaching “into my arms,” mostly because I visited a dermatologist for a full body scan and she asked me “What did you do to your legs?!” in a horrified voice – what I did to my legs was ask my dogs to jump up in my lap. They may be small but they don’t do anything halfway and I had a ton of bruises, including a few really big ones, all over my thighs. So I took a little break to let some of the bruises heal before I started adding more bruises, lest my thighs become completely black, blue, and yellow.
This week I am going to work on shaping a retrieve with Payton using the bumper. It would be helpful if he brought his toy BACK to me after I throw it into the pool, right? Right.
Speaking of doctor’s visits and horrifying things, two weeks ago Auggie peed all over the floor inside after having just come in and peed outside, so away to the vet we went for another urinalysis. The urinalysis turned up lots of blood and bacteria yet again. So Doc suggested a cystocentesis, which for those not in the know of bladder problems, is where they inject a needle into the bladder and draw a urine sample directly from the bladder. This gives a sterile sample, as opposed to a free catch which is not considered sterile. This was sent off for a culture and sensitivity…
which produced absolutely nothing. NOTHING. So the urine in his bladder is fine. This means the problem is below his bladder. Urethra? We really don’t know. So today Auggie is here at work with me until our appointment at the university vet clinic, where we will attempt to learn something. Anything. Also where all of my moneys will disappear. Our new house is going to be furnished with a cheap butterfly chair I bought on clearance from Target many many years ago, and my Nintendo Wii sitting on the floor in my living room.
So that’s our week. Training and some expensive vet visits. Whoo-hoo. Away we go!
Training schedule for 7/30/12 and our big news!
Well, last week’s training went kind of crappy because I was involved in something else going on… the big news I hinted about in the last post…
We’re moving!! Because I bought a house!! Ahhhhh!!
There’s some work to be done after close before we move in, but we should still get some nice time in the fall to work in the backyard! Payton is super lucky to get to learn all kinds of things in our brand new HUGE backyard, which has the space for all my jumps, a full-size dogwalk, a full-size a-frame should I decide to upgrade from my mini-aframe, and pretty much anything else we could ever want. I could even give him an underground pool if I wanted to! (That is, however, not on my to-do list.)
Even more exciting – this means Miss Pepper gets to move in permanently! Hurraaaaaay!
Not a terrible time for Auggie to be retiring, overall. The money I would be spending on his entry fees is instead going to go towards doing some stuff on the house, and it will take some time to get Payton (and Peppy) ready to trial and my finances will have rebounded by then, so financially everything seems to have happened at about the right time. I have mailed in Auggie’s entry form for our last trial and have a Pinterest board to plan his party. I was a little sad filling the form out and mailing it in, but I know this is the right thing to do. Besides, with our brand new yard, Auggie will have plenty of room to run and play at home without any of the pressure he gets from trialing. All positive!
This does unfortunately mean Miss Georgie will lose her best buddy, half-Uncle Payton, and her grumpy Uncle Auggie (I admit to calling Auggie “Uncle Auggie” just about all the freakin’ time now) – but she will get to come over and play and train with us! So once again, still positives here. Besides, that means once she’s lonely, my parents will decide to get another dog for her to play with. ;>
All good stuff. So in light of this, my training schedules will probably be a little crappy because I have a lot going on the next few weeks and into the fall as we do some fixing up on the house and of course the actual move. I’ve decided to keep up the general training idea for now. Payton got one solid session of “grab the bumper,” which turned into an incredible fetch session with Georgie, who is now the proud owner of her very OWN bumper since she loved ours so much. However I don’t think his “grab the bumper” is where it should be. We’ll keep working on it, and Auggie could do with some extra “grab the bumper” training too.
Besides that, I’ve decided – against my better judgement, much like when I taught Auggie “speak” and now have a dog who yaps at me while we’re clicking training just in case “speak” is what I’m looking for – to teach all three dogs to jump into my arms. Payton and Georgie I believe can do this easily. Auggie is the only one I’m not sure about. He can jump higher than I think, as he has proven while running up to agility practice jumps that are set for big dogs and taking them in his excitement before I can reset them to his jump height (I believe 22″ is the highest he’s done) – but I’m not sure if this is really something he can do for me given his physical limitations. It might be a “jump into my arms as I kneel” trick for Auggie. We will work on it, and hopefully will be able to finish our last agility runs together and wrap them up with that trick. (And hopefully my eyes won’t be so full of tears I will miss catching him!)
So that’s our plan this week! Keep working on “grab the bumper” and start “jump into my arms.” No clue what to call the latter one yet. “Don’t kill Mama?” “Don’t throw out my back?” “Careful, Mama is still increasing her bar weights at the gym?”
