Agility 4.6 summary, Petco trip

Guess who is now weaving 4 poles?!

He needed some extra steps to be able to link to the two sets of poles together. My instructor had me stand onside between the two sets, and rotate as he entered the first pair to direct him toward the second. I believe that Chimera interpreted the shoulder rotation as a 180 cue and would come through the second pair of poles backwards. He did this so consistently that I knew that I had to change the set up or he wouldn't figure out what to do before he totally lost drive and confidence in the first pair of poles.

The first thing I did was rotate the second pair a little bit (as my instructor suggests keeping them lined up from the beginning unless the dog has trouble). No go. So then I broke protocol and decided to backchain the exercise. I positioned Cai right before the second pair, rewarded him for going through a few times, and then positioned him as if he were leaving the first pair and sent him forward. This was the missing link. After some practice starting from the left side of the second pole, I was able to get rid of the rotation on the second pair, and then get him started from the entrance to the poles. At this point the two pairs are lined up like competition poles and he is consistently going through when started onside, and we're rotating farther into offside.


The other things we've been doing in class is longer sequences of jumps and tunnels, using pulls (lots of 180s and 270s lately), threadles, and serpentines. It is so fun to be running with the dog! I have to make sure to give my cues early (as most novice handlers do, I wait too long because I'm watching my dog!).

Next week we are starting session 5, which is contacts. At this point, my plan is to have Chimera do a modified running contact by lying down immediately after getting off the a-frame and dog walk. I have been using a rectangular piece of yoga mat as his target. Early on, I made the mistake of allowing him to go to the mat and turn to face me as he lay down on it. SO BAD. I should have taught him from the beginning to run to it and lie down in the same direction as he was running. So lately I have been making a chute from a wall and an xpen and using that to force him to lie down in the correct direction. He will do it if I am ahead, next to him, or in front and laterally to the side. I need to still work on it with me behind him. I have also started putting a contact trainer flat on the floor in the chute.

I am a bit nervous to start teeter work since my last dog, Dragon, had trouble with the teeter despite an excellent wobble board foundation. (I could put my foot down on the high end of the board and toss him up into the air, and he would give me the "where's my treat?" look.) He taught me that it's important to have LOTS of various interactions with the teeter rather than just focusing on building the end behavior. For example, the thing that helped him get past the pivot point the most was having me and another person on opposide ends of a lowered teeter, and calling him back and forth across it. He didn't have to do anything besides run along it and get used to the pivot point at speed. My previous instructor made a face when she saw this, but I was convinced that it was an important foundation game. By the time we get to competition, the dog will have had lots of practice doing a final, correct teeter behavior which has been proofed against any temptation to run back along the teeter, and will be following my handling to the next obstacle.


In other news, on Wednesday I took Chimera to a Petco to work on his reactivity. He's at the point now where, if I'm ready to stuff chicken in his face at that initial sighting (or sound of) another dog, we can practice BAT in a large store. There were no dogs the whole time we were there! So we practiced his tricks in this new, distracting environment. He did very well! Sounds would distract him a lot, like someone going through the employee door, or a squeaky toy, or footsteps behind us. But we practiced heeling (pivots and outside turns), fronts, stays with me going just out of sight in another aisle, waving, backing up, and (once we were in the parking lot), barking on cue.

I've been using "beep beep" for backing up and "speak" for barking, but he started to confuse them and then combine them. So I switched to "woof" for barking, and he recognized it right away. Now I just need to get rid of the barking while backing up. I may end up switching that cue to "back".