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crysania4Last night's class went really well. I was so pleased with Dahlia during it!
It began by standing outside the room watching the dogs in the previous class finish up. Dahlia was SO EXCITED to get into the barn and get going that she started to whine. Yes. Whine. My quiet dog who usually doesn't make a peep.
So anyway...there were NINE DOGS in class last night which is far more than usual (a few make-ups stopped by). We usually only have 5 or 6 in each class. Tina had a great plan for it though and had us out working quite a bit despite the number of dogs.
She divided us up into groups of three and had each group doing a different thing: contacts, weaves, and a jump grid.
Our group began on the jump grid, which was a simple straight line grid for stride. The jumps were all set low (I think at 8 inches?) and fairly close together. We've done this before plenty of times. Dahlia did fantastic the first time through. Then we did something new with it: we turned the jumps in opposing directions. It looked like this:
The goal was for the dog to find the straight line despite the jumps being tilted in crazy directions. Dahlia hadn't done this before so I wasn't sure how she did. She was right on the ball though and the first time through went over the jumps perfectly. The second time she went around one jump and then back into the sequence, but we did it two more times and she nailed it each time just a little bit faster than the time before!
From there, we moved onto weave poles and I was quite pleased with this! She struggles sometimes but this time she did really well and I managed to get the four poles fairly close together (though not all the way...there was an extra foot or so between the middle two poles). We're getting there. I can't wait until she can ACTUALLY do 4 weave poles! I really need to take those poles I got out to the park and do some work with them. I think if I just spent a little more time, maybe 5 minutes a few times a week, with the poles, she'd get there pretty quickly. She's starting to look like a weavin' dog!
The final thing we did (for this first section) was get on the contacts. We ended up with the dog walk first. I'm at the point where I'm ready to fade out the target so last night I
brought in the top from the soda I bought earlier in the day. It was clear so while there was a target THERE, it wasn't as easy to see. At first she was a little confused by it, but then started targeting it pretty good.
The last part of class was getting everyone out on the contacts they hadn't done so far. She had pulled out the dog walk, A Frame, and a (modified) teeter. Next up for us was the teeter. Tina had it set up using two pause tables...the one on the side we started on was the higher one. The lower one on the other side meant that the teeter had 6 inches or so to drop down to the pause table. She's very much into slowly acclimating dogs to the teeter. Get them used to a small noise and a small motion...then open it up for a bit more, etc. The goal with this one was to get the dog up on the pause table, go to the other one and call her across to you. I watched many dogs jump down off the table and go to their person.
But Dahlia? She went right across that damned teeter and wasn't fazed at ALL by either the noise or the motion. We did it several times and she was happy to do it each and every time. Go figure. What her LOVE the teeter.
The last thing we were supposed to do was the A Frame but somehow (and I'm not sure how) our group ended up with two people needing to be on the A Frame (the other woman must have done it twice maybe?). So instead we ended up back on the dog walk. This time I decided to see what happened if I removed the target. Well, Dahlia started down the walk, realized there was nothing there, and stopped and stared at me. I tossed the target on the ground, said "Touch!" and she went right to it. Then I picked the target up and did the same thing. Only this time when she was confused, I stood there and waited. And then she went down and touched her nose to the ground with NO TARGET THERE. YAY!! I had her get back up on the walk and this time she knew exactly what to do. Tina happened to be watching and said "Did she just do that without a target?" Yep! Yep she did. So now we're going to do some work with me being further away, in different positions, and with some motion. And then we get to start doing the full contacts! YAY!
So overall? Very successful class. I'm very happy with my girl.
It began by standing outside the room watching the dogs in the previous class finish up. Dahlia was SO EXCITED to get into the barn and get going that she started to whine. Yes. Whine. My quiet dog who usually doesn't make a peep.
So anyway...there were NINE DOGS in class last night which is far more than usual (a few make-ups stopped by). We usually only have 5 or 6 in each class. Tina had a great plan for it though and had us out working quite a bit despite the number of dogs.
She divided us up into groups of three and had each group doing a different thing: contacts, weaves, and a jump grid.
Our group began on the jump grid, which was a simple straight line grid for stride. The jumps were all set low (I think at 8 inches?) and fairly close together. We've done this before plenty of times. Dahlia did fantastic the first time through. Then we did something new with it: we turned the jumps in opposing directions. It looked like this:
The goal was for the dog to find the straight line despite the jumps being tilted in crazy directions. Dahlia hadn't done this before so I wasn't sure how she did. She was right on the ball though and the first time through went over the jumps perfectly. The second time she went around one jump and then back into the sequence, but we did it two more times and she nailed it each time just a little bit faster than the time before!
From there, we moved onto weave poles and I was quite pleased with this! She struggles sometimes but this time she did really well and I managed to get the four poles fairly close together (though not all the way...there was an extra foot or so between the middle two poles). We're getting there. I can't wait until she can ACTUALLY do 4 weave poles! I really need to take those poles I got out to the park and do some work with them. I think if I just spent a little more time, maybe 5 minutes a few times a week, with the poles, she'd get there pretty quickly. She's starting to look like a weavin' dog!
The final thing we did (for this first section) was get on the contacts. We ended up with the dog walk first. I'm at the point where I'm ready to fade out the target so last night I
brought in the top from the soda I bought earlier in the day. It was clear so while there was a target THERE, it wasn't as easy to see. At first she was a little confused by it, but then started targeting it pretty good.
The last part of class was getting everyone out on the contacts they hadn't done so far. She had pulled out the dog walk, A Frame, and a (modified) teeter. Next up for us was the teeter. Tina had it set up using two pause tables...the one on the side we started on was the higher one. The lower one on the other side meant that the teeter had 6 inches or so to drop down to the pause table. She's very much into slowly acclimating dogs to the teeter. Get them used to a small noise and a small motion...then open it up for a bit more, etc. The goal with this one was to get the dog up on the pause table, go to the other one and call her across to you. I watched many dogs jump down off the table and go to their person.
But Dahlia? She went right across that damned teeter and wasn't fazed at ALL by either the noise or the motion. We did it several times and she was happy to do it each and every time. Go figure. What her LOVE the teeter.
The last thing we were supposed to do was the A Frame but somehow (and I'm not sure how) our group ended up with two people needing to be on the A Frame (the other woman must have done it twice maybe?). So instead we ended up back on the dog walk. This time I decided to see what happened if I removed the target. Well, Dahlia started down the walk, realized there was nothing there, and stopped and stared at me. I tossed the target on the ground, said "Touch!" and she went right to it. Then I picked the target up and did the same thing. Only this time when she was confused, I stood there and waited. And then she went down and touched her nose to the ground with NO TARGET THERE. YAY!! I had her get back up on the walk and this time she knew exactly what to do. Tina happened to be watching and said "Did she just do that without a target?" Yep! Yep she did. So now we're going to do some work with me being further away, in different positions, and with some motion. And then we get to start doing the full contacts! YAY!
So overall? Very successful class. I'm very happy with my girl.