Yoshi and Trek
Training Diary - January 2009
By Ellen Clary
(reverse date order)
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Sat Jan 31
Yoshi herding. This time I worn my older running shoes instead of
boots since it wasn't that muddy and so I could better keep up with
him. That helped. HTrainer3 wants me to fight with him less
and stay with the sheep more. We worked on outrun flanking.
Putting him in a stay, walking to the sheep, releasing him with "out"
and if he chooses a side to go on, then I go in the other direction to
let him work. What he's not supposed to do it run directly at the
sheep which just scatters them, so I hang for a second in front of the
sheep until he chooses a direction.
We worked a lot on sit and stay but one time when I went and caught him
from a broken stay, she said that since he was doing an excellent
outrun that she likely would have let it go (choosing your
battles.) I said that I didn't yet have a good enough eye for that
but would work on it. (Herding has a lot of different things
going on all the time - this makes it way harder than agility or
obedience.)
We were generally successful but still struggle - me in
particular. I still have trouble staying with the sheep and
dealing with him. More experienced handlers just take the sheep
somewhere and manage to keep him properly at bay (I've had 5 different
people handle him successfully so the trouble is all mine. I've
decided to not enter the Corgi herding trial in March as there's no way
that I'll be ready and I'm not setting foot in a trial situation until
I am really ready.
Mon Jan 26
Yoshi walk. Went smoothly, he carefully looked at several dogless
pedestrians including a mail carrier, and was fine. He did see
Mady and Darwin the BC. He's a bit rough on Darwin and I made him
approach slowly. He instantly knew Darwin was a BC and gave him a
pass, but he things that male BCs are a personal chew toy and Darwin
may not appreciate that.
Trek walk. I put on my new running shoes so we ran for half of
the walk and funny how she wasn't towing more anymore. I managed
to tire her out. On the way back, the school yard was empty so I walked
her through it for the first time and she wasn't being freaky about
it, probably because it was quiet.
Sun Jan 25
In the morning, Yoshi and I sat and watched Toby Treva's cat
Heading home. I was going to be stopping by Lori's house but it
would add 3 hours onto my drive home and after snowshoeing yesterday
I'm really not up to it and Lori says that the snow on the pass
inbetween her and I and making things slick.
Trip was smooth. One thing to note is that at a rest stop in
Dunnegan, Trek was terrified of the noise of the freeway as there was
no sound barrier between the parking lot and the freeway. Her
hindlegs shivered and she was trying to dash back to the Scion and her
crate. I put her back and had Yoshi pee and then drove over to a
quieter place by the Jack in the Box but I still couldn't get her to
pee but she wasn't bolting to the car.
Sat Jan 24
Terri and I went snowshoeing on Shasta, and the dogs stayed with
Treva, Terri's mom. Generally it was fine, except for Trek
finding a hole in the fence and running right over to the Scion which
fortunately we hadn't taken. Treva couldn't get a hand on her and
she kept dashing from one side to the other, until Treva thought to
rattle the door handle and Trek rushed right over and she caught her.
Treva said that Trek just knew that's were she had to be and that we
would then appear. It's so unusual for Trek not to come, but I
underestimate just how bonded she is to us and how she fears that
disappearing. Though she doesn't have serious separation
anxiety. We can leave the house without her haveing a problem
about it though that's with her being surrounded by familiarity.
The first time I left her with Mark and Jan, Trek was just beside
herself with anxiety, though after about 1/2 a day she improved and
she's generally fine about being over there and plays well with Cameo
and Cooper.
Fri Jan 23
All of us are going up to Redding to see Treva and also for us (Terri and I) to go snowshoeing at Mt Shasta.
Had dinner at Robin and Greg's which was delicious. Robin, who
will be joining us for snowshoeing, had encouraged me to bring the
dogs, but after hearing that one of her two dogs was a JRT X with some
dog issues then Yoshi was left at Treva's and I'm really glad I
did. Izzy the dog was ok, but kinda strange around Trek and took
advantage of the fact that Trek would disengage and try to get
away. Twice I had to go rescue Trek in the backyard as Izzy had
chased her out there. No aggression, more just stay away from my
mom, my house, type of nonsense.
Wed Jan 21
Trek ODTC class. She was much more settled this time. Did
some heeling and was fine with the noise (mostly - the door still makes
a huge rattling sound). Was afraid of some jump poles placed in
front of the jump but eventually was able to cope, stays were pretty
good, dumbbell is improving, and what really impressed me was that her
stand for exam was almost as good as I can get in the living room.
Mon Jan 19
Yoshi walk
while we were on the driveway having just exited the house I saw a
person and a dog running by. I had fortunately 1/2 second warning
to prepare (if you can call if that), before Yoshi saw the dog and
pitched an absolute fit. In situations like this there's no time
for food so I slide my hand down the leash and get his collar (the
sliding down the leash is important when there's a moving dog target),
get a hold of his collar or scruff, get the other hand on the other
side of his head, kneel down,hold him facing me with his back to the
dog, and tell him (over and over) in the calmest voice I can find that
he's ok. He's is completely whale-eyed, crying/whining, trying
disparately to spin around or just look, but I keep (calmly!), guiding
him with my arms to look back at me. This approach is more
modified Brenda Aloff than CU, but when doing what Leslie calls Damage
Control and then you're penned in, it seems to work the best.
Then a poodle or white PWD standing on a bicycle trailer (!) that went
right by us. It was so out of context that Yoshi didn't see the
dog at all and seeing that it wasn't a good training opportunity,
turned Yoshi so he wouldn't see the dog.
Next was a couple of small dogs walking the other direction on the
opposite side of the street. Yoshi stiffened but when asked
turned around to me and relaxed a little and ate. While he ate i
let him see the dogs again and he then decided to (try to) lunge and
bark and whine and etc. I had my hand on his collar so he wasn't
going anywhere and got him to quickly go back to eating.
Last was near home with a larger light colored dog approaching the
corner we were at but up the street and an additional house width
away. Yoshi looked at the dog and didn't immediately
react. I got him walking in the other direction just fine but not
willing to let a training opportunity walk away stopped him and let him
look at the dog again. He tensed and I turned him back and put
food on the ground and as he ate it kept putting food on the
ground. When he finished that we started to walk away and he
couldn't resist getting a bark in there but wasn't panicked at all,
just opinionated.
The difference in his small vs large dog reaction is pretty
dramatic. For small dogs it's almost like a prime directive for
him to react strongly. With larger dogs he's very much like the
Gary Larson "The Far Side" dog that on seeing an alien decides that he
may want to skip the usual barking frenzy (I wish I had an online
reference for that one.)
HTrainer3 and I were talking and we both agreed that it seemed useful to
have a steady larger dog around in the case of reactive smaller
dogs. Of course Yoshi started treating them like his own personal
playthings then 9which is pretty much what he was doing in the Yoshi in Love video), so you have to be careful.
Sun Jan 18
Yoshi Washington Park Walk
Improving, not perfect at all. Getting even more specific on his
reactiveness. I'm not insisting on sit but getting it as a
default behavior.
Fair bit of lunge, hit end of short leash (or my arm if I have him by
the collar), then with effort, gets ahold of himself and sits in front
of me - often without my telling him to. He knows what to do we
just have to keep working on impulse control.
Saw Sophie and Ivy, and Cathy and Jesse and Abby. They all seem
to be doing well. Both describe some stalling out or other issues
as well. Plateaus seem to be an issue with CU dogs. Yoshi
is so much better than he was but no where near ok. What's
interesting is that while I had him further away from the fence we were
about to be only about 40-50' away and there were other large dogs that
appeared and he was ok. Then two Cocker Spaniels showed up and he
immediately tensed to lunge and we went further away. Later on he
was able to watch the Cocker's and be ok.
Trek walk by elementary school
Frightened of the clanging of the basketball and the fence rattling and
the kids voices. We're going to have to do more of this
Fri-Sat - on vacation
Wed Jan 14
Yoshi Walk
Saw one small dog that he didn't see until I let him see it. As
usual, he wanted to lunge, but I had him by the collar and made him sit
and eat which honestly he was happy to do so. Unfortunately the
dog disappeared quickly, so not much work done on that. It does
have me wondering if sit is necessary as it is such a struggle to make
him sit sometimes - I currently think so (since he has to do it in
herding anyway), but it's another step. If I could get him to
reliably stand and eat that would work but I like sit (hard as it is
for him) and it's incompatible with lunging.
We met Darwin, my neighbor Mady's new rescue BC. He is a very
nice dog though still just settling in (poor guy was a stray hit by a
car - he had a broken leg - dragged himself into a rancher's sheep
pasture and settled down by two other BCs which made for a puzzled
rancher - "wait I have two BCs"). Yoshi was a bit pushy since he
thinks all boy BCs are his personal playthings, so we limited the hello
time, but it was a good meeting. i then put Yoshi away and we
worked on finding a treat that Darwin would eat. I had some
chicken liver left over from a chicken I roasted last night and that
was a big hit. He also ate Natural Balance Lamb and the liver
kong stuffing, and after all that the Solid Gold treats which were
lamb. At first he wasn't sure about eating out of my hand
preferring instead the container but eventually would take treats from
me.
I'm going to try to get Trek to ODTC class tonight since she's been harassing me to work.
Trek ODTC Class
Wide-eyed home school kid does her first full ODTC class. She's
been there once before but only did part of the class, also been to one
of Lori's. This time she was way intimidated by seeing Ariel, one
of Hazel's St Bernards. I was going to have them meet but forgot
to. I had her in a down and she was doing ok, but then a friend
came in, set up her dog beside us and then dropped the prong collar
which clanged in the way that Trek really hates but has to get used
to. Since she was obviously freaked by all the activity, I stayed
beside her for the rest of the stays. Then the heeling with dogs
heeling around and Hazel calling out commands and Trek simply couldn't
concentrate and wanted to leave, so we just sat in the corner and ate
goodies.
This month they're focusing on jumping. Cool. Lucky break
for agile Trek. After getting used to the strange looking jumps,
she did great and with two jumps if I wanted one stride inbetween the
distance for Trek is 6'2" apart.
Recalls were great. Hazel tells me that I shouldn't have my feet more than shoulder width apart as that's a deduction.
Stand for exam was nervous and wiggly of course, so I stayed beside her
and had Hazel come up and do the novice level "exam." (just touch the
back some).
Dumbells, I used her toy and she did ok. Nearly as good as in the
living room but tends to drop the toy sooner. Getting there, no
rush as that's an open exercise.
Figure 8's. Now that was interesting. Poor kid had never
heeled past a seated dog before. Everytime she was supposed to
walk beside a dog she ducked around on the other side of me (wish Yoshi
did that - my life would be so much easier then). I
gave up on the dog on the inside part and just ran a race track around
Patricia and Giles and Zanna and Barris. Just when that was
working along walked by Tasha and Callie (Mallenois) working in another
group, and Trek ducked behind me on that as well. Hazel had Tasha
just stand there while Trek walked past and I rewarded her (Trek).
For her first full class she did pretty well and it shows me what we
need to work on. I worry about her getting all freaked out again
but I think it's good for us to work through and I would feel bad
taking Yoshi as the jumping would be awkward with him on leash and
there are a couple of dogs I'd be concerned about so I'll wait till
they're done with this month before brining him back.
I'm wondering if another Rally class would be good for him as that's all on leash yet there are dogs around.
Tue Jan 13
Yoshi Walk
No dogs but it's really interesting see just how vigilant he is.
If a person is approaching carrying something like a shopping bag or
wheeling something he stands up on his toes, ears erect and stares
until he decides that whatever is with them is not a dog and he looks
back at me, relaxes some, and almost smiles (mouth open tongue
wagging). He seems quite happy when he does this, doesn't really
seem too stressed once he figures out there's no intruding dog.
Trek walk - pulling me less and figuring out that it's to her advantage to not do so.
Cathy came over - we need to put a door bell back in as she knocked
twice before coming to the side which these days is hard to get to.
I made Yoshi sit and he really didn't want to. I asked for the
cream cheese and they he was reluctantly willing to sit and eat.
The sit in particular he really didn't want to hold, he so wanted to
stand.
Yoshi Herding
I'm just now figuring out that it's a real challenge to have two
performance dogs who are ready to start trailing who are in different
disciplines. I could do it but I'm also trying to get much better
at skiing and training for mountaineering which makes things a real
juggling act.
Turns out that the Southern Calif Corgi Club is having a Corgi only
herding trial that would be just too fitting for Yoshi so a road trip
is in order:
From a letter to Mark:
Hi Mark, Hi Terri,
I don't know if you remember or not but at the [Corgi 2006] Nationals, the second I
handed Yoshi off to Debbie for his first HT run, Jerry Pratt and a
cowboy hat sporting, rancher type friend of his started giving me no end
of grief (polite term) for not handling Yoshi. I protested that I had
no experience and didn't know what I was doing. and Cowboy Hat said:
"Look at him, ANYONE could handle him [to an HT]" I kept whining, but
they held firm.
Well guess who's the trial chair of a Corgi only herding trial down in
S. Calif March 21-22? Yup, Jerry. (Jerry knows I'm an experienced
agility handler, so feels perfectly justified in giving me hell.)
I asked HTrainer3 (Y's herding teacher) if Yoshi would be ready for PT by
them.
She says: YES (In fact there's an AHBA trial she wants him to do in Feb)
I say: Ulp
Let me know if you want to go. We can split a hotel room (no camping -
bummer) and I'm sure we can crate the boys on opposite sides of the room
if that's necessary.
Premium is attached. Location is Lake View Terrace in the Angles
National Forest just off the 210 in LA.
Ellen
Mon Jan 12
Yoshi Walk
We are gradually making progress. Saw one dog crossing his path at a 4 house distance - no reaction - excellent.
But the big thing is that 2 dogs and a person were ambling slowly right
towards us. They were a block away so I had a lot of time to
thing about what to do. I considered just leaving, but wanted the
training opportunity especailly since I had the squeeze cream cheese
with me.
First we crossed the street and then practiced some sits. As they
got closer Ikneeled down and took his collar, I positioned myself
inbetween him and the other dogs. He saw them and wanted to react
but I held his collar and fed him cream cheese which he ate.
We've done this before, but he seemed a touch less stressed - perhaps
struggling a little less. It makes a huge difference having me in
between him and the other dogs as the main thing appears to be the
visual stimulation. Once again, he is making a huge effort to
maintain. I should try this after giving him a Pet Ease tablet,
but that means that I have to get there 20 minutes before his
walk. Guess I could get home, fix lunch, eat and them take him on
a walk. Worth a try.
Debbie and I are talking about maybe having Trek drop in on Porsche's
Power Paws class which is Tues at 6pm. I'd have to take off work
at 4pm to do it, but it would be fun to do every so often.
Sun Jan 11
Yoshi Walk
Saw lots of dogs (Deliberately walked him at 4pm so we'd see a lot of dogs).
Did more than one time of race across the street to set up to sit and
watch a dog and eat. It was really hard work for him. He
will sit and eat but if the dog is moving eventually he won't be able
to stand it and will try to lunge where I then wrestle him back in a
sit. Threshold is about a street width plus a house width, it's
great, you can see him relax when a dog is past that distance.
With one dog he reacted and then we were able to chase after them and
do some parallel walking successfully.
He does better when I have him by the collar and massage his
neck. He of course does best when he can't see the dog, but I
want him to see the dog - to make it initially easier I should go back
to turning his back to the dog - but he's such a swivel head I'd have
to be hanging on to him. Unfortunately I can't control the
distance as well on the street as in a park setting, but we're getting
better at it. Poor guy he's really trying, but isn't quite able
to pull it off yet. I know he can do it but still needs
work. Need to go back to carrying the cream cheese.
Trek walk
Worked on heel and close (walk by my left side), did great until
the turn for home then she wanted to drag me especially since a dog has
been barking at us and he liked it when I threw him treats. I
usually don't feed strange dogs but if feeding them is a solution to
them pestering me I figure all is fair.
Her heeling is great - if I tuned her stand and not popping up after I return after a long down I could get her CD.
A CU_Dogs post of mine:
> We've had a remarkable influx of hawks in our neighborhood over the
> last few days, and I've been trying to decide if I should begin to do
> LAT work with Flim as they fly overhead, or if I should agree with him
> that it definitely merits a lot of barking and running back and forth.
Not to be flip but...
It depends on the size of your dog.
I know the Papillon folks have to be really careful around bird of prey
If Flim is above 20 lbs, then the decision is up to you. If you decide
to just let him race around and bark then I'd put a word for it and then
recall him and then release him to race around again (Premack). I do
this for squirrels. BarkBarkBark [I see there's a tree squirrel up
high. So I stand near his path and] "Yoshi here." He comes (well he
does now, if he doesn't then fun's over). I hang on to him for a
second. Then I release him and say "Get that squirrel." BarkBarkBark.
"Yoshi here" Etc. The squirrel's are always in the trees (no squirrels
are harmed in the training of this dog). On walks, we occasionally see
then down lower and it's so out of context that he doesn't react and we
get to play LAT on them.
I have Corgis, so while I don't have to be super careful around medium
size and smaller birds of prey (like Cooper's Hawks who are looking for
smaller birds, and don't give a pigeon's tailfeather about my dogs) and
we don't have eagles around and we don't go challenging Turkey Buzzards
who are munching on something dead, I do have to watch out for larger
predators like raccoons, because tough city raccoons can be really
aggressive.
So we LAT
- squirrels
- small. medium size birds (particularly for Trek who has a predatory
streak)
- cats (well, we try)
- dogs
- cows
- horses
- children
Yoshi herds so we don't need to do LAT on sheep. or goats. We would LAT
deer if they routinely saw them (once in a very great while one will
swim over, but that's a rarity).
We don't LAT
- raccoons
- coyotes
or anything out to get us, like uncontrolled aggressive dogs (never
happened), mountain lions (never seen one fortunately), etc
If I were loopy enough to want to do LAT in the middle of the night, we
could LAT the occasional possum that they'd frightened into playing dead
but possums have sharp teeth so I'd rather the dogs just leave them
alone (not to mention I'm usually not in the mood for such drama at the
time of night they see possums.
Ellen Clary
and Corgis Yoshi ("Squirrel!") and Trek ("Bird!")
Mon Jan 5
Yoshi Walk
No dogs, but what was notable is what doesn't set him off. He's
from Virginia and is completely unfazed by someone using an
umbrella. Another thing is that since it's fall, there are tons
of leaves on the street and the city is vacuuming them with a giant
vacuum. It's quite loud and while he checked it out pretty
carefully we were able to walk right past it. Trek would have
been a complete basket case.
Trek Walk
She's getting better about walking beside me, except for when a car
honked right beside us (I think it was on accident), she wanted to drag
me home. Since the car was long gone, I insisted we work on heel
instead and after a while settled down enough to work.
Pondering Trek's agility career
She's ready. She's really ready. Well until something else happens, but we'll deal with it.
I need to plan out her competitions for the next few months.
Mostly AKC and some © and a little CPE. I need to look up the
AKC requirements for the Nationals. It obviously won't happen
this year but I'd like it for next year. It's interesting to me
to have a dog who's really just starting out and have consistently
placing at the AKC Nationals (more than one) as a goal, but also aware
that I shouldn't put too much pressure on her as she doesn't do well
when I do. I'm aiming high, but I think we have a good shot at it.
The AKC Agility Nationals this year are March 27-29 in Concord NC
The requirements for this year (12/01/07-11/30/08) are 6 double Qs and 400 points:
Also by accident came across the requirements for qualifying for the Agility Invitational here: http://www.akc.org/invitational/top25/agility/
It's pretty steep as you have to be in the top 5 of your breed, and there are a whole lot of Corgis competing.
Criteria is based on:
Top MACH Dog formula (Double Q's x 10)
+ MACH (Master Agility Championship) points that dogs have earned
during the qualifying period
The qualifying period for this time is: July 01, 2008 to June 30, 2009
Which is kinda odd as the competition isn't till December, a dog could
qualify and then get hurt or even pass away during that time in
between. This year it was in Long Beach, CA.
The bummer about focusing on AKC is that all my mixed breed friends
can't play (YET - it will happen dern it), and that makes it less fun,
but AKC is the venue that Trek has the best odds of doing very
well. She will also do well in the other venues but in USDAA she
has to be in performance (because it's silly to make a 10.5" dog jump
12" if they don't have to. When asked if she can do it I say
"Sure, but she's not going to win anything doing it." Plus I don't like
to make her do it except in practice where we're working on jump
form.) CPE she jumps 8", but it's with a whole passel of much
taller dogs. With AKC the cut off is 11" for the 8" class (a
relatively recent change) which makes her idealy suited for it.
So the goal for this year will be get into Excellent B, which I think is very do able
JWW - Jumpers With Weaves
NA Novice 3 Qs NAJ Novice JWW
OA Open 3 Qs OAJ Open JWW
AX Excellent A 3 Qs AXJ Excellent JWW
MX Excellent B 10 Qs (can earn MACH Points at the same time once you're in both Excellent B class - std and jww)
MACH 20 double Qs (Q in both Std and JWW) and 750 points
Details:
In order to acquire the MASTER AGILITY CHAMPIONSHIP title, a dog must achieve a minimum of 750
championship points and 20 double qualifying scores obtained from the Excellent B Standard Agility class and
the Excellent B Jumpers With Weaves class.
Championship Points (CP’s) 750 CP’s required minimum
• 1 (CP) point is awarded for each full second under standard course time. (No partial points are awarded.)
• Dogs earn points from the Ex B Agility Class and/or the Ex B Jumpers With Weaves Class.
Placement Multiplier
• Dogs placing first in their class double their championship points.
• Dogs placing 2nd in their class receive 1-1/2 time their standard
championship points. (All fractions of points are rounded down.)
I double checked on Move Ups and they are done at the discretion of the
club. Most of the AKC trials I enter are managed by Lorie Abbott
so a check of one of her forms will let me know.
I was thinking that I wanted to do Saturday only entries for a while
(since it's ski season), but given that I want her to move up quickly I
probably should enter both days.
Sat Jan 3
Herding at Pescadero.
Besides one other instinct test we were the only ones there which means
that Yoshi got a lot of attention. (And I got a lot of lecturing).
Spent most of the first session working on Stay and then
stop/sit/down. She wants me to enforce the beginning Stay every
time as he's in the habit of breaking before I'm all the way to the
sheep. I put him back on a long line and she stood on it.
Hitting the anchored line just once made the rest of his stays
great. Too bad I don't have a way to do that by myself, but he
has a great Stay away from sheep. If he breaks when I'm by myself
I'm to chase him down and take him back to the same place (we did
this a couple of lessons ago and it worked great - he just needs to
learn that even with a new day the same rules apply.)
Terri was nice enough to come and video tape so I have over 1.5 hours of tape to review.
She thinks that since he's an upright breed that having him sit is
easier than a down. I can now get a sit fairly easy now.
Down is harder but doable.
Herding is the first place I've seen were sit and sit-stay are
different, and I should probably tell the sit means stay people that.
I'm just now figuring out that in herding, you say sit to effect a
pause, the dog is allowed to get up from that after sitting. It
looks like a horrible bad habit but seems to work. I spend time
making him fully sit and it slows things down which is a problem in
herding.
I'm still having trouble walking with the sheep and watching him.
The rock filled bottle on the end of the PVC pipe is nice for making
him behave, but it's not fast enough for me to work. I've ordered
another very lite wand with a nice handle and will try a version of H.
Glyn Jones' method of using a white plastic bag. I'll just tape
it on the end.
The next session was more seeing how he flanked. He seems to
prefer the "Go Bye" direction but if I am in his way he'll switch to
the away side. We really haven't been introducing it much just
saying it if he's already doing it. He still charges directly at
the sheep and at the last second swings out and we need to have them
wider. It's funny as I'm seen him do good flanks in the past and
occasionally he'd do one.
Trek was here also and in an empty pen we did a lot of obedience
exercises. She's scary good at it, and with a little more work on
stand and figure 8's which she's never done before, and not springing
up after the long down),
she can get a CD. I don't know about CDX as while I'm teaching her some
of the skills, she'd hate the out of sight sits and downs.
Just for fun we put Trek in with some of the school sheep and once I
got her attention, she basically said "Oh all right." Circled the sheep
twice, changed direction when I asked her to, circled them two more
times, checked her watch and with job done went off to sniff.
(Same as always.) She can and will do it if asked but it's so not
her thing.) She's been on sheep 6 times now. Breeders
Kathleen and Rick said the first two times were great and the third she
didn't want to do it. My experience is that the first time (in
the round pen) was fine, the second time in a larger pen was complete
disinterest, and now this one (in a semi small pen). She does not
need sheep like Yoshi does. She'd rather work with me in agility
or obedience. She'll put up with sheep if it means working with
me but she'd rather pass. HTrainer3 says that if I wanted to do
sheep with her (since she obviously has the skills/instinct just not
the motivation) that she would add in more stops to keep Trek from
wandering off. I think I'll happily pass I'm just thrilled
that she prefers agility.
In the Lighten Up People category. A dog behavior email list I'm
on (not CU_Dogs) is talking about the dog defending a bone from his
hind leg (the one that shows up on America's Funniest Home videos)
clearly has a severe neurological issue and really isn't funny. I
disagree. Yes, the dog has a major neuro problem and yes, at the
exact same time, It's really funny. Trish King, who deals with
the serious topic of dog aggression for much of her work day, loves the
fact that I can find humor living with an aggressive dog (that would be
Mr. High Maintenance himself) and make fun of it here. I replied,
"Well if you can't laugh at the circumstances what can you do? Go
crazy?" Just because it's a serious topic doesn't mean that it
isn't funny. Really funny sometimes.
HTrainer3 thinks that a lot of his misbehavior comes from his over the top
herding instinct. We both agree that Corgi's like Yoshi benefit
from spending time with larger non-reactive dogs as pushy Corgis will
run right over smaller breeds. I had Yoshi meet her GSD Rogue and
they were fine together. Of course it has to be a solid large dog
and I would supervise the interaction or the Corgi risks being killed
(I was sent a link that describes this happening to a very stressed
pushy over the top Corgi.) Corgis were bred to herd COWS, that
requires a lot of chutzpah for a short dog, it's no wonder their
behavior can be a pain in normal life.
Fri Jan 2
Rest day. Save for hose chasing.
Watched some of Lynn Leach herding video "All Breed Herding: The Next
Steps". The narrator (not her) talks about getting a stop by
putting the sheep in a corner. I'll have to try that. They show 8
level of stop and this is the first one. They also talk about
teaching walk up on a long line the exact way that I've been doing that
a few people have told me won't work. I feel vindicated and I'll
talk to HTrainer3 and see what she thinks of it. Most amusing thing
about the video is the first dog shown being slightly naughty was a
Corgi. :)
Thu Jan 1
Happy New Year
Rented the agility field in the morning and took both dogs. It
works well to switch off dogs so one dog gets to rest when the other is
running. Trek is doing really well. Worked on rear crosses
(good), teeter (great), distance work (coming along), broad jump (still
wants to jump up on it but will jump over it if we get a run at it and
I emphatically say O-ver - it's funny the teeter was next to where I
put it and she would hop up on the broad jump sometimes). Did
have her sniffy moments but I was able to call her off of them.
Once I'm confident in her consistency, we'll start working on
speed. I very much agree with Susan Garrett that Accuracy comes
before Speed. Spent time working on the lead out pivot (where you
lead out and assume the position of a front cross) and she's starting
to get that my extended arm means take that jump, but I can't be too
lateral or she'll run around the jump.
Yoshi seemed to enjoy himself and wasn't constantly scanning.
He's out of practice and Trek has now passed him in skill level, but he
still has the basics, but I don't run him at speed as he seems to
stress if I do. After a while he seemed to go on overload so we
just played fetch with the rabbit tug toy.
This brings up. Since Trek is used to bringing back the tug n
treat to me to open it, I can now use the smaller rabbit fur tug toy
which is easier for her to carry. She does the same behavior of
bringing it back to me for a treat but it's much less struggle.
Plus we play tug as well. By accident I found a way to increase
her tug intensity when I was later trying to wash it off with the
backyard hose. She's nuts about the hose, and bites at the water,
hence at the tug toy as well. We both got soaked - mostly her.
Archive - Go to:
2008
Yoshi
and Trek Training Diary - Dec 2008
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and Trek Training Diary - Mar 2008
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and Trek Training Diary - Feb 2008
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and Trek Training Diary - Jan 2008
2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Dec 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Nov 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Sep 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Aug 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Jul 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Jun 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - May 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Apr 2007
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and Trek Training Diary - Mar 2007
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Yoshi and Trek Training Diary
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2004
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Training Diary - May 2004
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Training Diary - Apr 2004
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