This weekend was low on training, and high on fun walks in the woods (I refuse to call anything under 4 hours and/or without a destination and/or with no elevation gain a ‘hike’).
Today’s lunch time training consisted of some very informal work on putting swing finishes on cue. I am on a cue crusade! I got some of the most awesome enthusiasm with the swing finishes today, but the precision was a little lacking. Luckily with Perrin, the precision is the easy part if I can get the enthusiasm.
This evening we went for a trail ‘run’. I tried to run up hills, and Perrin moseyed along.
Training was a whole laundry list of bad choices on my part. We tried shaping ‘4 feet in a box’. The first box was way too high. The next one too small of a foot print. I knew better than this, because this is a new behaviour; I needed to start with an easier problem to solve. He started to get frustrated, so we stopped that for now. That was about the only good choice I made today with the boxes, haha.
We then worked on putting finishes on cue. Marginally better training, but not much. I ‘help’ him get straight rather than not reward him at all. I need to split this out better to avoid frustration (start cuing from a lesser angle, so it is easier for him to be right, than build up to larger angles where he has to spin around into position), the ‘helping’ will just lead to bad things. Despite my bad choices, he did a few really nice ones. He also clearly knows generally what the cue means, which is definitely a success! He didn’t know it a week ago.
In the spirit of authenticity, here is a video of that mess. I don’t often see trainer’s ‘bad’ training sessions, so here is mine! Most of my really bad training sessions are caused by a complete lack of planning or forethought on my part. I need to get better at that. Also, ignore the disaster that is my living room. I am starting to pack to move, and that has led to a giant mess. Warning: this is not an entertaining video, I am keeping it here so I can come back and see it later for progress tracking purposes, or solidarity purposes for other people who are having poor training days.
Adventures in Dog Training 