Celebration!

One year ago this weekend, I agreed to take in a deaf Jack Russell as a foster. At first it was only supposed to be temporary - through the holiday weekend. Then it turned into something more long term. Finally, it became permanent. The little diva was here to stay.

Hokey - one year ago

Even then, she was a little cheeky

Hokey one year later - isn't she gorgeous?

To tell the truth, at the beginning of this month, I began to have doubts about where her agility training was going. Suddenly, she seemed not to have much interest in working for me. I began to ponder what I'd done to "ruin" her interest and also wondered if she might be hurting somewhere. As time went on, things got worse and she didn't seem to show a lot of interest in doing much of anything at all. I noticed her stomach was upset nearly every day; she had more interest in eating grass than doing her business every time I let her out in the yard and I found myself giving her pepcid on a nearly daily basis to settle her stomach. But she also seemed lethargic. Then I noticed her nose was running a bit and she seemed to be sneezing even more than usual. She's a sneezer to begin with, so I hadn't  paid much attention at first, but when combined with her other symptoms, I started to suspect spring allergies were afoot. There was a suspicion that she may have been exhibiting allergies when she came to live with me last year. My vet gave me a dosage for OTC allergy meds and Hokey seemed to respond, but it was hard to say for sure whether it was a response to the meds or just something running its course. Given that her symptoms were a milder version of last year, I decided to put her back on the allergy meds to see if they had any effect. I am happy to report that they worked their magic and within a few days she was completely back to her normal terrier self. I was so relieved that her behavior wasn't related to agility training.

Hokey modelling her new harness

Now that the weather is warmer, I'm spending a lot more time on cross-training. This involves playing little games in the backyard which may or may not include some agility elements, trick training, doing exercises for strength and flexibility, and going for lots and lots of walks. She LOVES to go for walks!

Here is an example of one of the little games I made up to play with her using a cheap plastic small patio table:

And here is Hokey showing off one of her newest tricks:

But best of all, I decided to enter her in her first agility trial. While I don't feel like she is quite ready for prime time and I'm still working on getting her contacts trained to where I would like them, I figured a couple of CPE runs at level 1 at a location that we had just been for some training the previous weekend would be a good way to dip our toes into the water, see what we need to work on, and celebrate our first year together. I chose to enter Hokey in jumpers and full house because a) they were scheduled back-to-back first thing in the morning b) I don't have to worry about contact obstacles in jumpers and c) full house is a make-your-own-course point accumulation game so I likely wouldn't have to do contact obstacles and even if I did, I feel like I can probably get a passable A-frame or dog walk out of her at this point (I did end up throwing in one of those "passable" frames since it was kind of on the way to the table that, in that game, stops the clock). I am happy to report that she Q'd and blued in both runs AND because those two level 1 classes are paired, she also finished her first agility title - CL1-F! I couldn't be more proud.

Here is the video of her jumpers run; her first run in a trial ever:

Her full house run didn't go quite as smoothly - she discovered the ring crew and decided to pay a visit both between the 2nd and 3rd obstacle and then again at the end as the buzzer went off and when I needed to get her to the table. However, in both cases I was able to get her back on task and was able to run the entire course I'd mapped out for her and then get her to the table, so it worked out fine. Just something to work on with my social butterfly.  

Hokey's first agility ribbons

Considering that one year ago this weekend, she was slated to be euthanized for being "unadoptable" due to her deafness, we have an awful lot to celebrate!

Trick Training - The Leg Weave

More than anything, I love training my dogs to do tricks. It cements our bond as we engage in a positive & fun activity together. Here is one trick my dogs find particularly fun: Leg Weaving!

You don't need to be involved in agility or have a set of weave poles in order for your dog to strut some fancy moves. How about training your dog to weave in and out of your legs?

Here is Poppy demonstrating:

Here she is again in slo-mo:

And Ollie strutting his stuff:

This isn't a hard trick to train - I train this one completely by luring and working step-by-step over several days time. I've been working on teaching this trick to Hokey for a few days now.

The first step is to have your dog sit & stay in heel position. Hold a treat in the hand on the opposite side from your dog. Step forward on the leg opposite your dog and stand still. Release your dog and, using the hand with the treat, lure them between your two legs. Make sure they end up next to the forward leg. The dog should be pointing forward as if it was going to move on ahead. This is where you want your "reward zone" to be - i.e. the place where you give the treat- do not reward for any other position. Here is Hokey demonstrating this first step:

The next step would be to take another step so that the dog is being rewarded for going in between your legs twice before it gets the reward. Again, make sure your dog is next to the forward leg and oriented so that it is pointing forward before giving the reward. Here is Hokey demonstrating this 2nd step:

As your dog begins to understand the game and is consistently moving into the correct position, you can add steps. Here is Hokey starting to put it all together. I am still luring her with my hands and she is hesitating between each step. As we continue forward in her training, the movement will smooth out and I will be able to fade the luring hands.

As your dog gets more experienced and smoother at this, you can add a turn. Here is Poppy demonstrating what this looks like.

And Ollie demonstrating the leg weave with turn:

And for the lazy trainer - how about just standing still and letting your dog do all the work? Here is Poppy demonstrating a figure-8 leg weave while I stand still.

Shaping Up(date) & Bonus Trick

This past week was not my best (to put it mildly). And it was a busy one at that. I have lots of ideas for new blog posts, but the chaotic nature of my life is getting in the way of bringing them to fruition.

Finally taking a break from the chaos of this past week. As always, my dogs are there to lend support.

In the meantime, I thought I'd write a brief update on Hokey's progress with shaping. Last month, I recorded Hokey's first free shaping session and wrote a blog entry about it. In that session, I was shaping her to simply put two front feet inside an upside-down frisbee. Since then, we've progressed to 3, then 4, feet in the frisbee. Here is a demonstration of us working through the process. Again, since she is deaf, I use a hand flash as my "clicker". I have to be fast and try very hard to make sure she sees it. Here, I start by hand flashing for putting her back feet on the frisbee. Next I reinforce for movement of one of her front feet backwards so that eventually there are 3 feet in the frisbee. Finally, the fourth foot moves back - the goal - and she is generously rewarded.

As usual, Hokey catches on to the game quickly and offers the behavior consistently and repeatedly as shown in the following clip.

Soon I will be moving to a smaller frisbee.

In the meantime, I am teaching Hokey a TON of other things, including some tricks. Here she is learning to roll over. I teach this by putting her in a down then using a treat to lure her into the behavior by letting her nose follow the treat I'm holding as I slowly move it over her back. As soon as she completes the behavior, I release the treat.

And yes, I talk to her a lot even though she's deaf. It's part of the bonding process for me and I'm sure she can "hear" me, or at least recognize my intent, in her own special way.

Back Up That Booty!

Developing a sense of body awareness is an important skill in the foundation of an agility dog. I play a lot of free shaping clicker games which involve touching targets with different parts of the body or placing themselves in various positions (e.g. 101 Things To Do With A Box). I begin this early in my dogs' training so that by the time they start working obstacles, their proprioception is pretty well-developed. One of my favorite exercises for building rear-end awareness is to teach them to blindly seek out and climb objects behind them using their rear legs. The following videos, starring Ollie and Poppy, show the steps in this process. Just keep in mind that this is done in incremental steps - don't rush it. Dogs learn best when the training session is kept short (in this case, ~5 minutes) and repeated often before moving on to each new step.

First, I teach my dogs to back up so that both their hind feet are touching something flat on the ground. Since it will not see what it is backing onto, the dog will need to be able to feel a distinct difference between a correct position and one that is missing the mark. Therefore, it is important that there be a marked contrast in texture between the target where they will be placing their hind feet and the surrounding area.  Since I'm training on carpet, I use a flat piece of cardboard as my "target". If I were training on a wood, linoleum, or some other smooth surface, I would probably use some kind of non-slip mat as my target. With my use of the cardboard here, ideally I would affix one side with a non-slip surface in order to stabilize it on the carpet so it wouldn't slide around too much. I haven't done so here and you can see it sliding around - especially with Poppy as it goes shooting away from her at the end.

Here is Ollie repeatedly backing onto the cardboard: 

My dogs are already used to playing games where they need to move and place different legs in certain positions, so they know to reach around behind them to find things without me giving them any kind of verbal or visual cues. However, if your dog is not already used to playing body awareness shaping games, you may need to lure them into the correct position the first few times. To do that, have the dog stand directly in front of you with the target lying on the ground just behind the dog. Step toward your dog so that it moves backwards. As soon as BOTH back feet are on the target, click and reward. Repeat this several times. Once your dog seems to "get it" stop stepping toward them and see if they will step back on their own. Click and reward all successes. Once you have had several successful sessions, you can start to build distance so that they need to eventually take 3 or 4 steps back before their hind feet hit the target. Build this distance gradually over a few sessions.

Here is Poppy backing onto the cardboard. Generally, her preferred method of succeeding in this game is to cheat by approaching the target head on and then doing what I call a "swimmers turn maneuver" - kind of a pivoting hand stand where she kicks up her hind legs and swings her rear end around into the correct position. Here, while the target is flat, she is not quite so dramatic, but she does approach the cardboard once head on and then turns around into the correct position. I do not reward her for that.

Once your dog is consistently backing onto the flat target, you can start to add some height. Here I use a low box turned upside-down. Here is Ollie:

And here is Poppy. Notice, once again, that she tries the head-on approach a couple of times and doesn't get rewarded for it.

I did not feel the need to add several videos of the next steps, which basically involve increasing the height of the target. I use gradually increasingly sized boxes. Whatever you use, just make sure it's relatively stable so that it won't move around or be knocked over while your dog pokes his back feet around and hoists himself up.

Eventually you can add a verbal cue or hand signal to tell your dog back. Trick taught. Now go crazy entertaining your friends by having your dog walk backwards up a variety of objects. My dogs will walk their hind legs up just about anything - including people. Here they both are using my standard go to obstacle for this - the sofa:

Have fun & happy training!