Catching Up

Every week, my reminder software pops up with "blog post". And every week for months, I've deleted it. I don't completely understand why I've been unable to write until now, but I think a big part of it was losing Gryffin so suddenly in July. Here's my write-up from what I posted on Facebook on July 6, 2012 when it happened:

Gryffin 

Ch. OTCh. Grousemoor Gryffindor UDX OM1 MH RE WCX; RL3

June 6, 2003-July 6, 2012

photo by Karen Taylor

Tuesday (July 3), Gryffin didn't quite finish his dinner. Wednesday, as I prepared to leave town to attend a seminar in Ohio, he didn't seem quite right, and didn't finish his morning meal. I told my husband and son that I was worried about Gryff and to please keep a close eye on him. Thursday morning, Fritz took Gry

ff to the vet because his breathing was labored, and a chest x-ray showed several tumors in his lungs. By the time I consulted with the vet & Fritz last night, I stayed on in Ohio until this morning. Fritz said Gryff seemed worse this morning, so I came home, getting home about 1 PM. Gryff greeted me with enthusiasm, acting close to his normal waggy self. But watching him laboring to breathe throughout the afternoon, I knew it was time. I didn't want to wait until his wag was gone. Fritz, Ryan, and I made that last difficult trip with him and were with him at the end.

We had an amazing journey together, amassing a lovely collection of titles before and after his name, always owner handled and trained. But it is those memories of the little things of living with a goof ball Flat-Coat boy that will make me smile for now and always - "woo wooing" at me when he was really in a good mood; his happy huff huff huff when he was working confidently; his sticking his nose between my knees for an ear fluff; going all the way through my legs for his happy dance butt scritch; ending up upside down on the floor or ground in front of me, squirming back and forth, giving his back a good scratch; barking at me when I'd catch him being naughty; his love of swimming; his sometimes overwhelming desire to Go Do Something; picking up the food dishes so I could fill them at the next meal; his never flagging optimism and happy attitude. I've often said it's hard to be sad with a boy Flat-Coat around.

Gryff was my first dog to train seriously for field events. His love of the game - still evident at last month's National, where he did some brilliant work in the Steady Singles competition - showed me, who used to really dislike guns and dead birds, what a joy it was to learn this game with a dog with such heart and desire. He was such a lovely combination of steady when he needed to be and explosive as he'd leave the line to retrieve.

We attended the National together every year of his life, from California in 2004 when he was 11 months old, running his first field events and placing in the puppy sweeps class, until this year in Wisconsin, where he was 1st runner-up in the Steady Singles. He made it to the final cut in the 9-11 year old Veteran's Sweeps class. And he earned a 198.5 in our final Veteran's Novice class. It made me smile stepping to the line, gaiting him around the ring, and heeling with him. I am so very, very grateful we had that last chance to step out together and shine.

Rest well, Gryffy Man. You were a magnificent part of my life. You leave a gigantic hole in our family and in my heart. I hope there are plenty of ducks and swimming holes for you, wherever you are now.

"It came to me that every time I lose a dog they take a piece of my heart with them. And every new dog who comes into my life, gifts me with a piece of their heart. If I live long enough, all the components of my heart will be dog, and I will become as generous and loving as they are" (Author unknown)

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And so, what I thought was going to be "How do I retire this dog who doesn't want to be retired?" became "How do I go on without him?" In answer to that question, it helps to have been down this path of loss 5 times before with previous dogs. Many, many people say, "It never gets easier." Personally, I disagree. While it is never easy to lose a dog, there are things that made losing Gryffin less difficult. All three of my girls have had long, lingering illnesses, which in retrospect, are incredibly stressful. I despise that weight of "Is it going to have to be today?" that hangs over you. All three of my boys have gone very quickly, in a matter of days or even hours. While it is like ripping off a huge bandage, and hurts terribly, I find peace in knowing the suffering for the dog was much shorter. Gryff's last day with me was during that awful high-90's/low 100's heat wave and with his breathing already compromised, I couldn't make him wait another day. As I said before, I didn't want to wait until his wag was gone. While I do not in any way like having to euthanize my animals, I am very grateful that we have that choice.

Because of who he was, most of my memories of Gryffin simply make me smile. He was such a goof ball. When he was younger, my boys called him 'Disney Boy', because he always had that Disney character look on his face - happy and optimistic. At some future date, I might start writing down some of those memories to share in one place.

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In the 3 months since then, I have mostly been concentrating on field work with Sonic and Little, who came home from the National with me to continue her field work. Little is pretty much through her field basics. We have another week or so to work on 'Swim-by', which can't be done locally anymore because it's gotten too cold. She has quite a bit of the skills needed for it, now we just need a good pond in which to do it, time to do it, and warm enough weather to do it. She is pretty much done with Double T. I am planning to get her started on Pattern Blinds, one of the early steps in the Transition stage of training. I'm not sure how much longer I'll keep her this year - it depends on how much longer I can make myself go outside and train!

Just last weekend at the Ann Arbor Dog Training Club's fall trials, Ty came off her 3+ month vacation and finished her UDX on Friday. 

To show it wasn't a fluke, she QQed again on Sunday. All 4 performances were fun and without any big errors. She is just 7 points from her OM2, which I hope to get done at next weekend's Marshbanks trials. She just needs ONE solid Q to do that. After that, we'll coast. I do not have getting an OTCh on her as a goal anymore, but if we can have that much fun in the ring with relatively minimal training, I'll keep showing her.

Three weeks ago, at 13 months old, Sonic earned her 1st 2 Junior Hunter legs with very solid performances. Her duck handling left a bit to be desired, but it improved from day 1 to day 2. The next weekend, she earned her WC (Working Certificate) at the Marshbanks test. She is now the youngest dog to title for me. I moved her up to the WCX the next day, not with any real expectation that she'd be able to do the whole thing (a triple on land, double in the water, honor on the water, all off leash), but to see how she would be going to the line off leash and no collar. While she wasn't rock-solid steady while the guns and birds flew, she DID wait until I sent her, a very big accomplishment. She couldn't find the flier go-bird and eventually 'switched' - a big no-no - and went and got the middle bird. If she was more experienced, I wouldn't have let her continue, but as it was the last test of the season and she's so inexperienced, I let her get that one, then the left one, then resent her to the flier on the right. She still needed help from the gunner, but did get it.

Last weekend, Sonic earned her 1st Rally Novice leg with a generous 97 and 3rd place. Showing her made me appreciate how well trained Ty is :-). Sonic is a keg of dynamite. She has so much energy, she really needs a hard run every day. I gave her a hard run before we left home, but she was still over the top. To her credit, the middle half of the course was very nicely done, with nice attention. She really did as well as I could expect. Here's a link to a video of her performance:

This has gotten long enough. I hope to be back again much sooner than 3 months!

The Rest of the FCRSA National, 2012

This is long. It may be that no one but me will ever read the whole thing. I thought I would keep writing during the National, but obviously, I didn't. Once we got home from the National, life continued on its crazy path, and I couldn't settle down to do this write up until now.

When I last wrote, it was after the first day of the FCRSA National, when Little 'jammed' in the Unsteady Singles, and Gryff was one of 4 dogs invited back for a runoff Saturday evening for the Steady Singles Championship.

I scratched Gryff from Saturday's Master test, wanting to save him for the runoff. He looked just a bit off before running the 4th series on Friday, and I didn't want to use him up before the runoff.

I ran Little in the Junior test on Saturday and she did a fine job, earning her 4th pass and her JH title. We were done with that by 1 PM or so, so we went back to the Expo center and T3 for the afternoon. I have to say, I will long remember that afternoon, savoring the anticipation of participating in the runoff that evening. Here's how Gryff prepared (having a nap in the crate in the trailer):

One of the wonderful things about the Steady Singles competition is there is so little pressure on the handler. Other than doing all you can to get the dog aimed in the right direction so they have the maximum chance to see the birds fall, once you release the dog, there is nothing else you can do. When compared to a Master test, where you have to be ready at any moment to blow your whistle if your dog gets in trouble, this was so relaxing. Yes, of course I was a bit nervous, but I would say overall, it was one of the most enjoyable field tests I have ever run in.

From my division, Joe Skorupa and his wonderful brown boy Zip! was the other dog chosen besides Gryff. From the other division, Karen Peterson and her very experienced girl, Polaire, and Bunny Milliken and her very inexperienced girl, Teal, were chosen for the runoff. Karen decided to scratch Polaire, because she was coming off several months of rehab for an injury.

The runoff consisted of two water marks across the Bunny Pond. The running order was Gryffin, Zip!, and Teal. 

We ran the right mark first. It required one re-entry. As Gryffin approached the point of re-entry, he responded in a too-familiar fashion, and ran around the ear of the bunny, snatched up the duck - he knew exactly where it was - and then, remembering lessons past, swam through the ear on his return. Naughty boy! As he did that big run around cheat, it made me mile and shake my head. He has always been a terrible cheater, so it wasn't surprising. On the 2nd mark (the longer one), he did the 1st re-entry, and then, by gum, ran around the other ear of the bunny at the last possible instant. And then he swam coming back. I figured at that point, we were out, but I frankly didn't really care. I was just so pleased to even be in the runoff.

Joe and Zip! stepped up, and much to my surprise, Zip! cheated nearly as badly as Gryffin on both marks. I thought his line through the 1st pond was better than Gryff's, but there was not a dramatic difference in their performances. 

Next, Bunny and Teal ran the marks, and Teal followed in the older dogs' bad foot steps, and followed that naughty path around the bunny ears. Teal also had more of a hunt on each mark.

The judges decided they needed to see more work, but having seen all 3 dogs cheat so badly, opted for a land mark. We moved to a different field, and as the daylight faded, we stepped up to run the last mark. It was about 180 yds out, 2 gunners throwing left to right. There wasn't much between the mound we ran from and the final cover patch into which the duck was thrown. Gryff took an excellent line almost all the way there, faded left, hunted in and around the gunners, and came up with the bird. Zip! hunted more to the right of the bird, and came up with it faster than Gryff did. Teal flew out and overran the fall and hunted in the next field for a bit. So the judges were presented with 3 very different performances on the final bird.

The comraderie was simply wonderful. Everyone was supportive and personally, I had a great time, as did Gryff. 

Left photo by Xan Latta (that's Bunny Milliken in the foreground) Right photo by Candy Ferner

The results were announced later that evening at the field banquet. As I suspected, Joe and Zip! were crowned Steady Singles Champion, and Gryffin and I were 1st runner up, and Bunny and Teal were 2nd runner up. Here's Gryff with his huge ribbon.

With this result, anything else we managed at the National would be icing on the cake. It was the thrill of a lifetime to get to run Gryff on those runoff marks, and results were a complete joy.

On Sunday, I helped marshall at the WC (working certificate) land and ran Little for her WC title. The test was very straightforward, and almost all of the dogs passed the land. Sonic did not get to run any of the field events because she had come in season 2+ weeks before, much to my huge disappointment.

The next evening, I showed Gryffin and Ty in the Veterans Sweepstake. Both made it to the final cut - Gryff was one of 7 at the end of the 9-11 year old Dogs and Ty was one of 6 at the end of 7-9 year old Bitches (out of over 30 girls). As I was gaiting Gryff around the ring, it just simply made me smile. They both really enjoyed their time in the ring, as I did. While neither got a placement ribbon, it was still a thrill to be in the ring at the end.

The next day was obedience day. Frustratingly, after lovely heeling, Ty failed to respond to my sit signal for the umpteenth time in Utility, the only serious mistake she made. It meant my hope to finish her UDX were dashed. However, she did manage a Q in Open B, something I hadn't managed since showing Treasure years and years before - Gryff never Qed in Open B at a National, and Ty hadn't before this year. We lost a runoff for 2nd place, but we accomplished one of our goals for the year - to qualify in a regular class at the National.

Sonic was in puppy sweeps that afternoon and we got a 3rd place in her class. She was a lot of fun to show, and not too wiggly for the exam.

Wednesday was Versatility for Ty and Veterans Novice for Gryff. Ty was simply dreadful, making me very glad she was going to be on obedience vacation for several months. I hadn't done all that much obedience work with Gryffin, but he had a delightful performance and earned 1st place with a very fine 198.5. Here's the video of that, our final ring performance together:

On Thursday, Sonic was my only dog entered, in the regular 9-12 bitches puppy class. The judge checked Sonic's bite multiple times, made a negative comment about it (it has been level for the past several months, but looked to be a tiny bit undershot that day), but then made a nice comment about her lovely head. But we were excused with the 1st cut. 

This concluded our 2012 National experience, one to never be forgotten:

Gryff: 1st runner up in the Steady Singles; made final cut in Veterans 9-12 dog; 1st place in Veterans Novice.

Ty: made final cut in Veterans 7-9 bitches; 3rd place in Open B.

Little: JAM in the Unsteady Singles; finished JH title; earned her WC title. She also got 3rd place in American Bred, but that had nothing to do with me :-).

Sonic: 3rd place in her puppy sweeps class.

Ty's 8th UDX leg & Sonic at 9.5 months

I am camping at the Toledo KC obedience trial this weekend with Ty and Sonic. Ty earned her 8th UDX leg this afternoon... slowly but surely, we are getting there. She NQed on a whole bunch of exercises in the 1st Utility class, some of it because she was so excited she wasn't thinking. We had a couple of firsts today: it was the first time Ty has Qed twice in Open on the same day, and the 1st UDX leg that wasn't the first (or only) trial of a weekend. We lost a 1/2 point off on the 2nd sit stay for shifting, which cost us a tie for 4th in Open B. But 1/2  point off sure beats 30! She is over halfway to her OM2. That and her UDX are my two goals for her. Someone asked what other goals I have for her once those are done, and I said, "None!"

I'm so happy with how well Sonic handles the obedience trial atmosphere. She's excellent in her crate, sleeping much of the time, quiet otherwise.

A couple of months ago, I was entertaining thoughts of entering her in Rally Novice at the National (which starts June 15). Then she was with me at a May 12 trial, and I attempted to do pretty simple concepts like sit and look at me, and heel for a few steps, with just a buckle collar (if we are around other dogs, I usually have a pinch collar on her because she is SO blasted strong and can move like a rocket and drag me somewhere fast. And I'm not a small person). I quickly forgot about Rally for this year's National :-). But today, I have to say, she was improved from that 3 weeks ago trial. We have been working very, very hard on walking on a loose leash, and when it is just the two of us and not too much else going on, she is greatly improved.

Yesterday evening after dinner, I took her out for session of my 20-treat exercise. I was pleased to see it took her just 2.5 minutes to look at me that many times. This is down from 3+ minutes the last time I did it. Today, I had her out in between Ty's classes in a big rec center building, playing tug some, and working some attention, fronts, and pivots. She was much more focused than at the May 12 trial.

I am running her in 3 field events at the Specialty: the Unsteady Singles (a judged competition whose rules are a bit on the vague side :-)), the Junior hunter test, and the WC (Working Certificate). She has to do a simple double for the WC, with marks at 40-60 yds. She did her first "cold double" last weekend. A "taught double" means you throw what becomes the memory bird first as a single, so the dog gets to retrieve it once, then you throw it again,  followed by the "go bird" to make it a double. A "cold double" means both marks are thrown right away, without teaching her the memory bird first. We did some more cold doubles on Wednesday. Each time, she did the 1st double without help. On the 2nd one, she needed some help, but so far, she always leaves my side, which is unusual for dogs at this stage, at least in my (limited) experience. I think it has helped a lot that I have taught her the mechanics of doubles using Pat Nolan's Marking and Memory drill. We've got a pretty well established set of cues that I use reasonably consistently.

Running the first cold double did make me realize that, while her marking is quite good, my control of her is poor even with a pinch collar and an e-collar. We have been working all week on pivots and self-control with bumpers on the ground nearby. When she pivots well, I send her to retrieve one of the bumpers.

While she is in no way guaranteed to pass the Specialty tests, I do think she will be better prepared at 10 months than Gryff was at 11 months, when he attended his 1st Specialty. It helps that I have learned a thing or two since 2004.

Sonic at 9 months

How can my baby girl be 9 months old already???

The past month has been spent almost entirely on field work-related training. She only got to swim once in April, and she had apparently forgotten how to swim horizontally. She is still splashing some, and it seems to worsen as she tires, but it is mostly relatively efficient. We've been working 'progressives' in the water, which means someone is throwing a series of single marks farther and farther away from her. I think she's gone between 50 and 60 yds in the water on her longest swims. Here she is on her longest water mark last Sunday. She had some problems at the end of it because we had thrown 4 ducks into the strip of cover, and the duck scent was attracting her. She did work it out in the end, which made me happy.

We are still mostly working on her swimming straight out with as little chance to cheat (for you field newbies, cheating refers to a dog who runs around water instead of taking the straightest path to the bird through the water) as we can manage. She's had several lessons on 'get out on a point and get back in the water beyond the point to get the bumper, then get out and back in again.' She's only required a couple of gentle reminders from the gunner that, no, she shouldn't try to take the land route back. I'm not fooling myself. She'll figure out that it is an option at some point.

I've only been at home one of the weekends since I wrote about Sonic at 8 months. Lots of travel. I presented a seminar in Texas, which meant I flew, so the dogs stayed home under the care of my husband and 19 year old son. The next weekend, we - the 3 Flat-Coats and I - drove to Maryland to present my On Beyond Novice seminar for the Catoctin KC in Frederick. I hadn't done this seminar in a while, and it was fun for me to be able to concentrate on the advanced exercises. It was gratifying to have so many people in attendance who have attended previous seminars.

The next day, I had the privilege of getting to field train at Pat Nolan's grounds, Lily Pons. Unfortunately for me, Pat wasn't there, but it was very fortunate for him because he was presenting a dog training seminar in Korea. I trained with Linda Reynolds, who I had first met 3 years before doing some field training at a FCRSA National. She told me about Pat back then. We were joined by two others, one with FCRs and one with a Lab and Golden. I've watched YouTube videos of Lorraine with her dogs as young puppies demonstrating several of Pat's early puppy training ideas. I talked to Linda about more of Pat's ideas, and I learned some new drills that I've been putting to good use with Sonic. My favorite is Pat's "M & M" drill, which stands for marking and memory. It turns out my yard is a gold mine in terms of this drill. Essentially, you throw multiple bumpers at different objects in your yard - a tree, a bush, a chair... - and that helps the dog remember where to look for memory marks. Sonic enjoys it and it is helping me stretch her out a bit on her ability to do doubles and triples without anyone helping.

We have been working quite a bit recently on Sonic's Force Fetch. We are up to working on 'Walking Fetch', though I keep debating with myself whether we should be there or not. When she is picking up a bumper that someone else throws or that I throw fairly far away, she mostly picks it up nicely. Doing up close ones, she often seems to go for an end. But all in all, I think we are moving in the right direction. Last month, she was reaching down to the floor for a bumper at meal time. She'll now pick one up and deliver it to my side. Sometimes, her pick ups are good enough that she can deliver it without dropping. Other times, not. She has had several chances to retrieve birds, both pigeons and ducks, and she thinks they are splendid. She is more willing to hold onto a duck when exiting water than a bumper, so we might be able to manage the required delivery to hand in the Junior test at the National next month.

Three weeks ago, when I finished the two sections of Maneuvers I was teaching, I had Sonic out and had her do what the class dogs were doing, which was checking on their ability to do the various directional maneuvers they'd been learning without a treat in the trainer's hand. I was pleasantly surprised at how well she is understanding most of them. Her ability to side step to the left when in heel position is poor when my hand is empty, though it was improved Thursday afternoon as compared to Tuesday evening. She can do all of the others with my left hand empty, and some of them with little or no hand guidance at all.

We've done a bit of work on a formal Novice recall. I pulled out a platform to use for her to come onto to front, and that took some reminding. She learned to get on a platform at 8 weeks, but I guess I haven't had her on one for a couple of months, at least not for fronts.

I am including her in the stay groups in my 3 sections of Novice Practice each week. While her sit stay is still wiggly, her physical changes that have happened in the past month - being far less cow-hocked - means it is much easier for her to keep her back feet set wide enough to hold a sit. She still likes to flop over, though it is far less frequent. Her down stay is decent, though she does like to flop over on her side and streeeetch herself out, or turn upside down. But that is something I've seen before:

Ty in the Open B down stay at the 2009 FCRSA National

Photo by Cathi Winkles Photography

We've done my 20 treat exercise on multiple occasions in several different locations. She is very interested in her surroundings, and it usually takes her several minutes to voluntarily look at me 20 times. I've also started doing a bit of heeling in other places. I showed Ty in obedience at the Midland KC trial last Saturday, and I hauled T3 there to get it dewinterized, as well as to try out camping at an obedience trial. The hauling is a PITA, but I do like having it at the trial. Friday evening, I did some obedience work with her outside the trailer. The video isn't very good - I couldn't figure out any better way to prop up the iPad - but you can see a bit of what her heeling, fronts and finishes are looking like. In the section on fronts, some people walked by with several dogs, which distracted her in a major way, but not for too long.

I am planning to enter her in 3 different field events at the National - the JH, the WC, and the Unsteady Singles, a club event that just happens at most of the FCRSA Nationals. I think she'll be considerably better prepared than Gryff was at his first National field events, when he was 11 months old. I'll also show her in the Puppy Sweeps and regular puppy class. Last week, I briefly flirted with the thought of entering her in Rally Novice at the National. When I had her out to do a bit of work at the obedience trial Saturday, I quickly changed my mind about that hare-brained idea. I'll be busy enough the week of the National - I'm running Gryffin in the Master test and the Steady Singles. I'm showing Ty in the Veterans Sweepstake, Open B & Utility B, and possibly the regular Veterans 7-9 month class. I'll probably enter Gryff in the Veterans obedience class. Maybe the Veterans Sweeps, though I'm not sure I want to show that many times.

Last Tuesday, after doing all of the demonstration work in my Heeling and Come & Stay classes, when we got back to the house, she seemed like she was getting the zoomies. I took her out in the back yard, and she ran and ran and ran and ran great big circles. It was like all the concentrating on the demoes was making her brain explode, and she needed to run it off. Tonight, I took her out after class was over and let her have her run. She is fast... and it is a bit unnerving when she is coming at me full speed ahead. Her accelerator works great. The brakes... well, we are working on them!

My plan for the next month is to stretch her out on her land and water marks, keep exposing her to different concepts in the field, make more progress on her force fetch, do some conformation practice, throw in a bit of obedience work, and keep enjoying her for herself.

Growing puppies

If you read my last post (Sonic at 8 months), you might remember that I wrote about Sonic's floppy sit. "I think the biggest issue  is that she is very cow-hocked right now, and I think she just can't physically hold a non-flopped over sit for too long. I just have to be patient with her and wait for more maturity."

I wrote that on an airplane bound for California on a Saturday. When I next tried a sit stay - I think it was 3 days later? - she could suddenly sit with her back feet more widely spaced, which means she could and can hold a longer non-flopping sit stay. While she is still "hocky"(her back toes point out and her hocks point in vs. the typically more desireable, at least for the conformation ring, toes forward, hocks backward), she is less dramatically so. So I'm reasonably confident that continuing patience on my part and physical maturity on her part will take care of the problem. Well, some work on building strength through training will also help.

This has reminded me once again that she is, after all, still a puppy, and will go through a lot more growing before she's done. It's just not the dramatic, "wow, she looks different every day" growth.

I am in Maryland, leaving soon to start Day 1 of my "On Beyond Novice" seminar. I haven't done this one in a while, so it should be fun. I was in Austin, TX last weekend (no dogs) also for a seminar. All this travel has meant frustratingly little training time for my dogs. I did have Sonic out during Week 6 in my Maneuvers classes. I have everyone do a checkup of how many steps or turns can they do of each maneuver without food in their hand. I was pleasantly surprised at how well Sonic is doing on all except side-step left, which was her least understood directional. She has very nice understanding and control of her body, which you can see her starting on YouTube (sorry, I can't seem to add links easily on my iPad).

Sonic at 8 months

Sonic at 8 months

Sonic is a very active puppy, already 23.25" tall and at least 56 lbs. She is strong. Very strong. I shudder to think what it would be like to walk her on a leash if we hadn't been training consistently since she was 8 weeks old. We practice it just about every day because of our walk to and from the training building.

Our biggest achievement in the past month was completing the 7 "weeks" of Around the Clock Scent Discrimination. Weeks is in quotes because it isn't used as an exact time of 7 days, but rather it defines the stages that Janice recommends. The most I did any stage was 6 days for Week 6, which is the week you take away any cheese on the scented article. We worked articles every day for 33 days straight, something I've never managed before. We have only done them a few more times since, including using some fresh articles the last time we did them.

We have continued to work our field-related obedience, including walking with me vs. formal obedience heeling. The latter is stylized. The former can be on either side, and I  prefer that she is looking forward while remaining aware of where I am.  I continue to struggle with her not dragging ahead of me and pulling on the leash. To counteract the forging ahead, we do lots of sits. These have improved a lot this month. We also work on her finishing to either side, coming with a sit in front, sometimes close, sometimes a bit farther away. I'll also call her directly to heel from a short distance away. She seems equally responsive to my verbal sit cue and a whistle toot.

Cookie-toss sits are improving slowly. She is able to sit with little to no creeping toward me at about 4-6 feet. What I really like is that she is turning herself all the way around to face me before she sits, something Gryff has always been poor at. A straight sit should make accurate casting in the field much easier for her. I've learned that you can do cookie toss sits outside in grass. It just takes patience while they dig the treat out of the grass.

At each meal time for several weeks now, I've been having her hold a 3" bumper while I put the other dogs' food down and they start to eat. When we started this, she was very reluctant to even take the fat bumper, let alone hold one for any length of time. She has progressed to jumping up and grabbing it and sitting while I put the food bowls down for the other dogs. Just this week, I've started requiring her to reach down towards the floor, lift and hold it. This work  only adds about 15-30 seconds onto meal time, and though it is slow, she is making progress.

We have started force fetch, but haven't done much with it in the past couple of weeks for a variety of reasons.

I have started adding her to stay lines in my classes. If you've watched any of the scent article videos, you may have noticed that she flops over in a puppy sit frequently, a common occurrence with Flat-Coated Retrievers. I find that it helps some to put her rear end up on a 1" pad. This shifts her weight forward enough to reduce gravity's effect on her sit. When Treasure was a young dog, she had a lot of trouble holding still on sit stays. I finally realized at least part of the problem was that she was sitting with her hind feet so tightly under her that she was sitting on the outside of her hocks and with her front feet quite close to the back feet. This didn't give her a firm base of support, and thus she kept shifting.  Having remembered Treasure's problems, I've tried with Sonic what helped Treasure, which is have her do a small hop, lifting her front feet a small distance off the floor to try to spread her back feet apart some. We are only having modest success. I think the biggest issue  is that she is very cow-hocked right now, and I think she just can't physically hold a non-flopped over sit for too long. I just have to be patient with her and wait for more maturity.

Our work on field marking has been greatly inhibited by a couple of bouts of lameness. She was sore on both her left elbow and right hip the first time, and more recently, she has been limping on her right front. I had X-rays taken last Thursday but haven't heard from my rehab vet who recommended the X-rays, to see what she thinks. I have not been completely restricting her from running, but have mostly been letting her choose to run vs. encouraging it through our activities.

She was in her 1st real dog show on April 7. There was a Supported Entry by the regional Midwest Waterways FCR club, which means there were majors in both sexes. It was a bit touch and go whether she would be sound enough, but she was. She was the only puppy in her classes – 6-9 month puppy bitches – both in the Sweepstakes and the regular classes. This meant she got to go in the ring 4 times, which was very good practice. The half-limp tail that her litter all seemed to have now vanishes when someone approaches and she wags furiously. We managed credible stand for exams, and her gaiting was far better than in the puppy match in January. She mostly didn't look up at me, and mostly trotted. She had to let loose with some boings during the regular class,  but that's life with a puppy.

We have purposely worked my 20-Treat exercise a couple of times. Since I gave it as homework in my Fundamentals class last Thursday, I made a point of doing it the next day in the grocery store parking lot. It tooke her 20 seconds  to look at me voluntarily the first time, and a total of 3 minutes 40 seconds to look 24 times (yes, we are over achievers, doing 24 instead of 20 :-)). This was better than the 4-5 minutes to do 20 treats a couple of weeks ago. I will try to get her out another time next week (I'm traveling this weekend and next without the dogs), to set a good example for my students.

A few days ago, I had two of my launchers out to do marks with Gryffin. I decided to do a short mark from each one for Sonic, to give her an introduction to watching the extra big throws. She thought the idea was splendid and did both marks very nicely.

She got to do her first X marking drill the next day. The gunner stands in one place, throwing 4 different singles. There are many variations on the order of throws. We did right angle in, right angle back, left angle back, and left angle in. She did a very nice 'check down' on the final mark.

I am hopeful that the lameness issues will resolve soon so we can do more retrieving work in the next month. There are of course many less strenuous activities to work on, but we both want to be out field training. It is hard for both of us to be patient!

Mini adventure with Sonic

Sonic and I are spending the night at the Comfort Inn in Plainwell, MI. I judged rally today For the Kalamazoo KC and will judge it again tomorrow morning, so here we are.

I'm happy to report that today's teams were far better prepared than the last time I judged in this area. I only saw one perfect score - and it was a lovely performance - but several other very nice displays of teamwork.

Sonic spent her morning and until I finished judging at 3:00 in her crate in the , with a few brief potty breaks. She hasn't been on too many trips without at least one of the older dogs along too often, so it seemed like a good opportunity. After I finished judging, I got her out to potty, then took her into the nearly empty building for some training. I had her on my rolled leather choke collar, which doesn't provide as much control as the pinch collar, but more than her buckle collar. We worked some attention - it was not particularly stellar, some maneuvers, and some brief stays. Phew, we have lots of work ahead of us.

After settling into our hotel room, we did articles. It is the first time I randomized the placement of the articles vs. having them in the regimented rows that is Around the Clock. She has been searching from a pile of 10 unscented plus my scented one. I took out one pair, since the pile looked different. It went smoothly, and included sends from about 15 feet away - the length of the hotel room. Except for not staying a couple of times while I placed my scented article, she did a spot-on job.

While waiting for my dinner order at Applebee's to be ready, we did another 10 minutes of work near the parking lot. I decided to see how she would do with my '20 treat exercise'**. It took her between 4 and 5 minutes to voluntarily look at me 20 times. Hmmm, there is something we need some more work on. The weather is back to being normal spring weather, i.e., COLD. 10 minutes was all my bare hands could manage.

After I finished eating dinner, we headed out behind the hotel to give her a run. We discovered a lovely flat grassy field, fenced on two sides, with small hills/mounds on the other two sides, with no one around. She had a lovely romp chasing bumpers and working on various field related skills, including delivering to hand to each side, which is much improved, I'm happy to say, staying while I throw a bumper, and doing simple double retrieves (I throw two bumpers about 90* apart, she retrieves one, then retrieves the other). This was all mixed in with fun retrieves without a stay.

That saying "A tired puppy is a good puppy"? Very true. She is sacked out on the bed nearby.

I hope to take her in the building again tomorrow for some more attention work after I finish judging.

** The 20-treat exercise is explained in The Art of Proofing.

ATC Articles Week 7

When I wrote last Friday, I was debating whether to eliminate cheese and/or wires before moving on to Week 7. I did indeed move on to Week 7 Saturday. Sonic did days 1-3 without error, so last night, after we finished doing them, I decided to just take off all the wires in preparation for today's work. Since I've been able to hear her sniffing, I was reasonably confident that she was using her nose vs. her eyes. I figured if it fell apart, I could put the wires back on and eliminate them more gradually.

The gamble paid off. She was 4 for 4 this evening. I almost stopped her on the last one, because I spaced out which was the right one (bad trainer!). But she knew. I think I'll do one more day like what we did today, then start to follow my advice I always give to my students:

• Lengthen the distance to pile out to the 20 or so feet required in the ring.
• Randomize the appearance of the article pile, vs. the regimented set up I use when teaching the articles with Around the Clock.
• Add a turn before the send. I have never taught a 'send direct', where the dog turns with you and goes directly to the pile, because I like the control the 'after a sit' method gives me.
• Add other people scenting the extra articles.
• Take the show on the road. Given that she did them in multiple different places early on, I am not as concerned about this as if I had done all seven weeks in the same place.
• Stop using the pair of articles I taught her with.

That ought to keep us busy for a while. I may or may not pursue all of that at this point. My main point in starting this whole project at 6 months was so she had the concept of how to use her nose when she arrives at an article pile. I do believe we have achieved that goal. If I've counted right, today is the 30th day in a row we have done scent articles. 

Week 6 Day 6

From my training log notes from Friday's article session:

"Start with cheesed leather. (I wrote this on Thursday. Normally, the 1st article in ATC is a scented metal.)
Put out articles in correct pattern, but without regard to which type was where. Started with whiff of cheese on leather. Also whiff of cheese on 5th article @ position C, also a leather (this was an extra-curricular one. Normally, there are just 4 retrieves each session of week 6.)She was 5 for 5. Some nice confident pickups and trotting back.

The question is, do I move on to week 7 with wires, or first eliminate the cheese and the wires? I'm thinking the former..."

As I've thought about this more today, I continue to concur that I'll move on to Week 7 tomorrow. I can always backtrack.

Sonic at 7 months

In the past month, my primary obedience-related focus with Sonic has been her hold for retrieving, getting her picking up a dumbbell and articles, and getting her started on Around the Clock Scent Discrimination. As I've written about several times recently, we started the Around the Clock process the day we left on our 15-day trip in late February, and have worked on them every day since. I don't think I've ever managed to be this consistent. My goal is to have her understanding that she should use her nose when presented with a collection of scent articles, not just grab the first one she gets to. I am teaching her this now because when I start her working on a bumper pile for field, I do want her to grab the first one she gets to, at least ideally. Because of the importance of scent articles for Utility, I will be more forgiving of potential 'shopping' in a bumper pile than field trainers who aren't doing scent work, but I am hopeful that she can understand the difference. Here she is doing Week 5 Day 2 today here at home:

We have continued to work Rhythm Heeling fairly regularly, though hardly at all during our trip.

The other big milestone was her first swims in real ponds. I am so glad I spent the time (and $'s) to teach her to swim in the local therapy pool. She is a very good swimmer, and was in fact difficult to keep out of the water. Here is her Florida swimming video:

She is really getting the idea of the field game. She had several marks thrown by other people during our trip, both land and water, and this morning, she did the land marks that everyone else did, though hers were shorter than Gryff's. Still, I think she is approaching the 100 yard mark, which thrills me. She only visited a gunner once today - that definitely needs more work! She is holding pretty steady in her sit stay until I release her, races out, is learning to hunt well, and usually racing back to me. I am not demanding a delivery to heel position. That is something we are working on 'in the yard.' 

I have been working on field obedience with her every day since the Friday of the Mike Lardy seminar, after I was reminded by watching him what I should be working on. I do plan to have her able to work off both sides. I am very awkward with her on my right, but she is coping pretty well. We are doing walking on both sides, sits when I stop, sit stays, recalls, and finishes to both sides. I have introduced her to a heeling stick (kind of like a riding crop), the beginnings of collar conditioning, and just today, the beginnings of force fetch.

We will be showing in a supported entry in conformation next month, so I'm also doing a bit of work on stacking and gaiting. My son and I took several pictures of her today in honor of her reaching 7 months of age.

She's made some excellent progress in the past month. It will be fun to see where we are when she is 8 months old.

2012 Southern Odyssey Days 11-12

My biggest takeaway from Day 1 of the 3.5 day Basic and Transition field training workshop with Mike Lardy was foundation, foundation, foundation. Just like in obedience (or piano lessons, for that matter), if your foundation if poor, it is hard to build advanced skills. The seminar started with a short amount of lecture, then we moved over to watch several advanced dogs running land marks in preparation for the weekend's field trials. Once those dogs were done, some simplified marks were set up, and all 10 participants dogs ran the 3 marks. This gave Mike a chance to "make book" on the dogs' issues. We then went to "the yard" for some obedience work and some other yard drills. We finished the day with the Swim-by drill with a couple of dogs.

Purina sponsored a BBQ dinner right at Mike's property, and there was a drawing for a bunch of donated gear. Remarkably, my name was drawn first, and I made a beeline to one of the 4 heeling sticks. I had a heeling stick, but lost it last fall on my final training day at Omega Farms. A heeling stick is similar to a riding crop used with horses. I found it incredibly helpful in getting both Gryff and Ty under much better off-leash control during advanced field work, and have been meaning to order a new one so I could get Sonic used to it. I have seen heeling sticks used in ways that at least appear downright abusive. I don't plan to use it that way, don't worry. 

It turns out all but 2 people won something. I felt badly for those 2.

Before the dinner, Dee Dee Rose threw some simple marks for Sonic. She didn't return to me on the 1st one, but instead went to Dee Dee because I forgot to get her attention with the extra bumper that I had remembered to keep with me. After that, she returned nicely. I took each dog out individually after that and did 'Stand Alone' marks, where you leave the dog in a sit stay, walk out however far you want to go, throw a mark, and release the dog to retrieve it from out in the field. I've done these with both Gryff and Ty for several years after reading about it in the Retrievers On Line magazine. Dennis Voight, editor of RoL, is in Florida to train for the winter, and gave a presentation at the end of the day's seminar presentation about using Stand Alones for training by yourself. It was great to meet Denise at the party. Sonic did a very simple version of this on my long flexi.

Today, the morning was devoted to more obedience and yard drills, finishing the morning with more swim-by for the two dogs from Day 1. It was good to see all the dogs making progress. The afternoon was devoted to water marks and some of the transition water drills, with a land tune-up drill Mike demoed with one of his Advanced dogs. We were very fortunate to not get rained on today other than a tiny bit of sprinkles at the end of the afternoon, when the win picked up and the temperature dropped a bunch.

Dee Dee threw several marks for each dog before we came back to the motel room. Except for dashing off to see the nice man in the white coat faaaaar across the field (I wasn't aware he was there, shame on me) when I got Sonic out for her turn, it was quite successful. The final mark she ran was 80-85 yds in length, and she did have to do some hunting, since we were not on mowed grass. She really seems to be getting the idea of the simple mechanics of the job. Very satisfying!

When we got back to the motel, I put Sonic on a long line and we worked field-related obedience in the motel parking lot for 10-15 minutes, including walking (vs. heeling) on each side, doing sit stays, recalls, whistle sits on her return to me, finishes to heel position and to a sit at my right side. I'm going to make the attempt to have Sonic be a two-sided dog. I feel pretty awkward with her on my right, but I'm gonna try. I was very pleased with her work. 

Here's Sonic's articles from last night - Day 4 of Week 3.

Tonight we started Week 4, and it went just fine. In week 4, 4 of the 7 retrieves have the cheesed article with the cheese down instead of up, so she had to use her nose instead of her eyes to find the right one. Correct on all counts!

2012 Southern Odyssey Days 3-7

When I wrote about our first day of our trip, I mentioned that I'd started Sonic on Around the Clock scent discrimination. I am pleased to say we have done it every day of the trip so far. We did 'Week 1' 4 times, then moved on to 'Week 2'. We did that 3 times. Since she had not made any errors, and was almost instantly going to the cheesed article, I decided to move on to 'Week 3'. We have done that twice so far, tonight makes 3. If sessions 3 & 4 go as smoothly, I'll move on to 'Week 4'. Here's a video of Week 1/Day 2. I edited out all the 'rescent, reheat, recheese' and getting Sonic to set up for the next one.

Once we started doing leathers ('Week 2'), she started picking it up after she'd finish licking the cheese. She isn't quite as keen to pick up the metal one now that we are alternating between metal and leather, but she mostly doesn't need much help.

I had a completely delightful time at Betsy Reiney's magnificent property on Days 3-5 of our trip. The weather was quite warm on the 1st two days, but since I mainly wanted to swim the dogs, it worked out fine. Betsy and Bill have 20 acres with one big main pond, plus several smaller ones, which means the options for technical water work are many. Here is a video of Sonic swimming the first afternoon we were there:

Ty told me by her enthusiasm that she wanted to get a turn retrieving, and much to my surprise, did very nicely on some water blinds that afternoon. She hadn't done ANY field work since last October, so it was a pleasant surprise.

On Thursday, two of Betsy's field training friends came over. We did a 3-station marking set up on land in the morning. Gryff did it as a triple, Ty as a double of the outside two marks and the long single up the middle. Turns out that long single was 130 yds. I moved up fairly close to Betsy and she threw several marks for Sonic, with me moving back some after each success to make for longer retrieves.

In the afternoon, I taught both dogs a very technical land/water blind. I was especially pleased with Ty's efforts. I've been planning to just concentrate on obedience with her this year, and train Gryff and Sonic in the field, but she may have other plans.

On Friday morning, we set out two piles of bumpers with stakes on the big pond, and walked around running each one from several different places. Ty was having a really hard time, but Betsy pointed out I was attempting really long water entries. It helped a lot when I moved up close to the shore. Gryff also got to run several of the blinds. I got Sonic out and threw a bunch of water marks for her myself, letting her get comfortable swimming near decoys. She'd had a fearful encounter with them on Thursday, but she turned it around and decided they needed to be investigated. Her swimming was much improved from the somewhat splashy video taken on Wednesday. I decided there wasn't a lot of reason to take more video, since it would just be boring - black dog swimming. So what??? Betsy then threw several land marks for Sonic again. I think we lengthened out to about 80 yds. Good girl! We did 2-3 more water marks and called it a day.

Friday afternoon (Day 5), I packed up and moved to Lakeland. I got unloaded at the new DogSense Obedience training building, and did some obedience with Ty and Sonic. I think Ty was really happy to do easy obedience after the difficult work in the morning. She was so enthusiastic and energetic, and a lot of fun. I stayed on a cot in Debbi's soon-to-be office Friday and Saturday nights, because there was not a motel to be had nearby due to several local events, including Detroit Tiger spring training games. I dubbed myself the building troll :-). While not ideal, it worked out okay. It was nice not to have to load up the dogs to drive to the building

As I usually find when I teach my seminars at DogSense, I really enjoyed working with all the trainers and their dogs. At least a couple of people got their dogs taking a dumbbell, which had been eluding them. We did more heeling than sometimes, which I always enjoy. 

2012 Southern Odyssey Day 1

The dogs and I made it to the Lexington, Kentucky Red Roof without a hitch. Yes, we hit rush hour traffic in Cincinnati, but I didn't really care. What was supposed to be a loooong trip with my travel trailer has turned into a trip in just the Burb due to some problem that made the right rear wheel of T3 end up at about a 30 degree angle yesterday morning. Not something that brought warm fuzzies to my heart, let me tell you. Broken axle? I really have no idea. What leaving the trailer behind means is I can travel faster and go farther in a day. Given the strong winds during the 1st two hours of today's drive that was buffeting my heavily laden Suburban around, I was really happy to have left T3 at home!

When packing training equipment to bring along, I decided at the last minute to bring an old set of articles along, with the hope that I'd find time to get Sonic started on Around the Clock Scent Discrimination. We got to Lexington plenty early enough, so after unloading my gear (boy do I love parking right outside my motel room door), I pottied Sonic, and we got the process started. She only just started picking up a dumbbell about a week ago, with article retrieves starting a day or two later, so she needs a lot of help to take the article, but I'm okay with that. All of my dogs take a while to figure out that they should pick up the article after the cheese is gone. Joker was my most recent dog to start ATC with, and I think it was day 3 or 4 of the first week when he started picking it up. I doubt Sonic will be that quick, given the state of her retrieve, but I'll let you know...

She hasn't had much 'cheese in a can', so she thought it was nifty. It was good I'm well practiced in holding the dog's collar, because she really thought she ought to check the other articles after licking off the cheese from the scented one. I typically pick up the right one once most of the cheese is gone to help with the taking process. I found it helped to guide her to me with the collar and the other hand supporting her chin.

All in all, a fine first session. 

I gave all 3 dogs (Gryff, Ty, and Sonic are with me) a rawhide chew. Gryff has finished his, but the girls are still chomping away.

My goal is to get to the Macon, GA Red Roof Inn tomorrow, though I'm stopping to have lunch with a long time friend in Knoxville, with the additional goal of giving the dogs a run and/or some training in a park. Yes, I'll hit Atlanta at rush hour, something I was warned NOT to do by a bunch of people. The alternative is to stop before and get going early in the morning Wednesday, but then I'd probably hit the morning rush hour. I'll just see how the driving goes. 

I will spend Wednesday afternoon through lunch on Friday in Palatka, FL, field training at someone's private property that has PONDS!!! I'm so excited to get there and to see how Sonic does in a real pond. I'm hoping I go home in a couple of weeks with a puppy who can swim.

Time to feed them and get myself to bed.

Sonic at 6 months

Sonic turned 6 months old on Valentine's Day. It is sometimes hard to remember how young she is because of how big she has gotten. She is about Ty's size and she's got a reasonable amount of hair.

Since she lost her last puppy tooth on January 23, we've been hard at work on formalizing her hold of a dumbbell and a small bumper. A 3" big bumper is still pretty tough for her to hold. She will retrieve a big bumper, but often carries it by the rope. I haven't added a fetch command yet, though the time is fast approaching. I wait to add one until my dog will pick a dumbbell up from several feet away. As of last week, she was reaching down almost all the way to the floor and holding it reliably. She loves to use her feet to slide things around, so I'm taking my time getting it all the way to the floor. Over the weekend, I started doing hold work with a metal article. She's a bit reluctant to take it, so we need to do more. Last night, she made the big step of picking a dumbbell up from the floor without my hand nearby. I was especially proud of her given that the dumbbell we were working with has quite a chewed up end, thanks to Little gnawing on it last summer. This afternoon, we did some short retrieves of a metal article and a leather article as successfully as the dumbbell last night.

So, what else can Sonic do besides retrieving basics? All of her heel position maneuvers (heel starts, close, away, back, in, scoot sits) are roughed in and she'll respond to all of the cues without food in my hand, but for most still needs at least some help with a guiding hand to show her how to position her head. 

She can do a reasonable approximation of a finish in both direction, but needs hand motions to help her and does not end up in the right place without help. I'm very excited about her fronts, though. Except for the occasional nose poke ("Am I close enough, Mom?"), she seems to have a pretty good sense of where she should be. We've done chair fronts, platform fronts, steering fronts (side-passing in front of me), angled scoot fronts, cookie-toss recalls, recalls through a chute of broad jump boards, and a few motivational recalls from a sit stay.

I haven't formalized her sit stay much, but she can stay pretty reliably while I put the other dogs' food bowls down, and while I set out cookies for her to do various exercises. I've had a couple of people do some sit stay proofing a few weeks ago, which she handled very well. We've had some conformation exams, but not much since we showed in the Beginner Puppy (4-6 months) class at the January shows. I've done just about no down stay work. She's a Flat-Coat. She'll figure out the down stay all on her own :-).

She's had 3-4 sessions of distractions on Find Heel, but her demo at the seminar last Saturday - she visited the distractor eagerly many times - reminds me that she needs a lot more of that. We've worked a lot on Rhythm Heeling, which we started working on when she was about 12 weeks old. We usually start with clockwise heeling, but have also worked quite a bit on big counterclockwise circles. While I usually start with a treat in my left hand, we've done some work when we are by ourselves without food in my hand. I do keep the leash snug, either behind my legs held in my right hand or gathered up in my left hand, to help keep her close. At home, she can heel 15-20 steps with focus often. Saturday morning at the seminar, before we started, I had her out to get her familiar with the room. She couldn't do more than 2-3 steps without looking around. By mid-afternoon, when I got her out to demo starting Rhythm Heeling, she was great and able to heel like she can at home.

I've introduced her to the basics of about turns and left and right turns, and left and right circles, which lead to Figure 8s. I introduced her to Play Running - a predecessor to fasts - in mid-November and to slows in late December. We've done some Scoot Heels, my predecessor to halts, but I don't think she has quite enough body control to worry about them at this point.

She's done some agility tunnels and all the contacts low. I think she would love to try more, but I'm just not that interested in pursuing agility. 

She's done several sessions of angled jumping, the basis for Directed Jumping, and really loves jumping over low jumps and chasing cookies. We haven't done any of that in a while, but I don't think she'll forget. We started baby go-outs - cookies on a target - when she was 8 weeks old, and she was doing 50 foot go-outs to a cone and/or a target by late November. Her understanding of targets lead to several weeks worth of work on target wagon wheel, where I put out 4 targets in a half circle with cookies on them. I used this to work her retrieve mechanics of looking straight ahead on cue, staying until sent, getting used to my steadying hand above her head, and going to the target on a BACK command. We've worked this both from the left and the right.

We started having success with bumper retrieves somewhere around mid-December. I finally decided to use a Flexi-leash, after seeing the distance at which her brother was retrieving. The flexi prevented the choice of run away with the bumper and started building the habit of coming back to me. 

We started casting to and from platforms in mid-November a la Pat Nolan, and whistle sits to a platform in mid-December. We did quite a bit of puppy casting games for a while, and she was doing a nice job with them. She's also done some gunner-placed multiples to targets with cookies on several occasions, both doubles and triples. With our mild and nearly-snowless winter, we started some gunner thrown marks in January, and she's done some as long as 50 yds. I've also thrown bumpers into some taller grass for her to fetch. Just last week, she delivered a bumper to a platform in heel position several times in a row, something I hadn't tried in a while. I was thrilled to see that development. Her hold needs to be stronger before it is really reliable, but nevertheless, it's a start.

I started her on cookie-toss sits in late January, which will lead to sits on go-outs and whistle sits in the field. She's only reliable about sitting in place at 4-5 feet from me, but it's a start.

She graduated to using the Otto Step (google it if you've got a hitch on your SUV - it is great!) to jump in and out of the Suburban just last week, which meant I didn't have to take the borrowed ramp along to the seminar. 

She's been learning to swim in the therapy pool at the Animal Rehabilitation Facility. We have one more swim on Friday before our trip south, where I hope she gets several opportunities to swim in ponds. 

She can do a decent kick-back stand in heel position and in front of me. Her down is very much a work in progress. If I'm standing up without a barrier, she tends to want to come towards me a bit, and go into the down via a sit. If I'm sitting down, she's much more successful at lying down in one smooth motion. We haven't spent a lot of time on it lately, but enough to see some progress.

She is better at having her nails trimmed than any dog I've ever owned. I'm really hoping we can keep it that way! I still do her upside down on my lap, but I'd like her to graduate to the grooming table and from the clippers to the dremmel. She's had her feet and ears trimmed several times, had a bath or two, and had some exposure to the dog drier.

There is probably more, but mostly in the details. Sonic has benefitted greatly from me being far more available for training than when puppy Gryffin came into my life. I also have another 8 years of training under my belt, and I like to think I've learned a few things!

Sonic's Hold

Up until a week or so ago, I've limited my training to indoors this winter, including quite a bit of basic field training with Sonic. We have had such a mild winter that I have been going outside to throw bumpers for Sonic in the past 10 days or so. I'm tickled with how well she's been doing on her bumper retrieving. The first time I went out with her, I had an extra bumper that I twirled as I called her back. It worked like a charm to get her to focus on me and return. She's also learning to retrieve when someone else throws for her. Sometimes she just gives up and starts back without getting the bumper, but she is showing some real promise in the field.

Since she lost her last puppy tooth on January 23, I have gotten to work on her hold in earnest. Here is a video I made in mid-November, showing her progressing on holding a dumbbell:

While she was teething, she was a bit put out when I tried to work on the dumbbell, which is not unusual for teething puppies. She was avoiding taking it quite a bit.

Puppies usually love to grab a bumper by the rope, and Sonic really likes to do that. Here is a video of our work on shaping her to take a black and white bumper at the intersection of the colors, which is the middle of the bumper, the ideal place to hold it.



And here is a video of some of the dumbbell hold work we've been doing:



Since this footage was taken, we've advanced her 'cookies on the table' work so that I can walk 10 feet away to get a cookie while she calmly holds her dumbbell.

Whistle sits

Yesterday, I worked on whistle sits with Sonic, which is something she'll need for handling on blind retrieves. I did it very much like I do cookie-toss downs, but using a platform that she has to come back to and stop and sit on. I was probably 6-8 feet away from the platform. I also did some calling her over it, like I do when working the CT down. What was interesting was that she was very good at getting to the platform from one direction, even from off center, but wanted to run by going the other way.

Here's a short video showing her doing the drill. I don't remember that I saw exactly this drill on Pat Nolan's website, but I was certainly inspired by his retriever training for puppies website.

Today, I put out a 2nd platform about 15 feet from the first one, similar to how I add a 2nd barrier to my Drop on Recall work. It increases the options from stop or don't stop to:

1. stop at the 1st one 
2. stop at the 2nd one 
3. stop at both 
4. stop at neither. 

It was fun and I think Sonic enjoyed it and was learning a useful skill.