Dhal-baby

I have been wanting to post this all week, but I couldn't find the time. Here is Dhali being totally awesome and a smart fun puppy on Monday! This video makes me soooo happy! He can do a tunnel!  He really knows what I want too.  And only in a few easy training sessions!  :)  P.S. Look at me throwing a leash like a real agility person LOL!  I watched people doing that on Sat. and couldn't resist doing it myself.  It's fun!  P.P.S.  I got some nice deep holes in my arms/hands from our play session.  You can hear me say that we need a toy.  Uh, yeah!  I'm getting eaten!  But I try not to show it, because I don't want Dhali to stop playing.

Yesterday we had a not so great training day, but today he is back to acting like he did in this video. Play, play, play! I think the difference may be the amount of Tibby time he gets. So restrictions are in place. They get to play, but Dhali has to be willing to come to me if I call while he is playing. No come = tied to mommy for a while. Fun for both of us LOL!

Yesterday he was willing to do heeling, ride his skateboard, balance on a ball in front of a busy store. However, later when we went to a park he blew me off - wouldn't come/didn't want to tug. The park was empty. Weird little guy. He might have been too hot....but then again today it was hotter and he was playing like crazy at home. Not sure. Just have to keep on trying different things.

Today I was very happy when we were playing in the living room after a breakfast clicker session, Tibby was resting on her dog bed and Dhali was able to ignore her. We worked our way across the room until we were right next to her and he kept playing with me. He tried to go see her a couple times, but thanks to Mr. Always present Leash he quickly redirected back to playing with me. We will keep working on this every day.

Tug Fail

Dhali likes to tug on this fleece strung across the x-pen. Sometimes he gets a little too into it and his whole body get involved! LOL! He isn't really stuck, but I was interrupting his game,so he stopped to look at me.

Dhali's First Lesson, Hiking! and First Agility Trial!

Wow we  have done so much in a short amount of time!  And I don't have pictures of ANY of it :(  Oh, well. 

Yesterday we went to Loretta's and Dhali had his first lesson!  He did a really, really good job.  He had a few moments when he wanted to do his own thing, but those moments were very few.  I think he thought it was too hot, because when we went in the shade he did better at staying by me, but considering how many new things he was introduced to - I think he did GREAT! :)
This is the list of things Loretta gave us to work on.  It's a lot, but I think Dhali will be able to do it. 
And me.  I'm the one that has trouble!

Minimum 80 recalls---no dining and dashing.

Playing----no playing and dashing. When doing recalls with toys, stop and play for 30 seconds.

Sits, downs and waits on a mat.

Agility trials---MAIN FOCUS IN SOCIALIZATION, get to as many as u can.

Kibble for treats.

Teach a jump on the ground, work up to a pinwheel. Start FC, RC.

Tunnels, chute (end opened) and start get on board, and reward on board.

RUN AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. Work food to toy to food transitions. Of having issues give breaks between transitions.

Playing with dogs 1 to 5 ratio. For every 1 min with dogs, 5 mins with you. INVOLVE IN THE PLAY! Recall out of play on leash. Reward heavily.

If you cannot MAKE HIM come to you, don't call him.

Reward and name potty times. On leash.

Once jump trained, start lateral and forward sends.

PLAY PLAY PLAY ALL THE TIME.

Jealousy is a good thing :-)

Loretta

I can see that I'm going to have a hard time with the 80 recalls a day.  That's a LOT!!  But I will try my best to get close to that number.  I'm also going to have a hard time with the 1 min. play time with Tibby for 5 mins. play time with me.  It makes Tibby happy to play with Dhali, but I know that the results in the future will be worth a little work now.
During Dhali's lesson Tibby waited and barked a lot.  I wanted to do something fun for Tibby, so on the way home we stopped at a state park and went hiking.  Tibby was very happy!  It was a nice hilly hike and we only saw 4 people and 2 of them were (female) park rangers.  So very nice hike for Tibby - no scary things or people.  It really shouldn't be a surprise to me that Tibby is happiest hiking, after all that's what we did every day for the first 3 months she was with me.  It was the only way I could keep her from keeping me up all night long - very long off leash hikes.  She would run and run and come home tired, but still happy to keep me up at night.  Yeah.....I was pretty sleep deprived for a long time.  Crate training, people....do it!

The last 2 nights Dhali has been so tired that he doesn't make a peep in his crate for 8 solid hours of sleep.  sweet, sweet sleep - ahhhh I love it.  Before that I had my construction ear muffs.  Pop those on and I can't hear anything.  Yes weird, but it works.  I tried those orange ear plugs, but they weren't strong enough.  Dhali's voice can pierce through brick walls.  I even tried ear plugs + ear muffs.  Well, any way he's doing better and it's so much easier having a puppy in a crate at night.

So we had fun hiking, then we came home and I gave both pups a bath and then they had after bath zoomies, I played tug with Dhali and then I was tired!  Dhali was still ready to go, go, go.  Lesson, hike, bath, play - more!  He doesn't sleep in the car very much either.  I don't remember if it took Tibby a long time to start relaxing in the car?  He watches me, chews his bully stick and barks.  Today he slept, but he was very tired.

So today!  We went to an agility trial in St. Cloud.  Just Dhali and me.  It was fun.  Dhali was awesome again.  My only complaint is the benches were super uncomfortable.  I need a chair with a back!  Otherwise it was great.  Fun to watch everyone and see some great dogs and handlers.  Dhali tugged on his toys, chilled and watched everything and watched me to get treats.  Mostly he just relaxed and watched everyone.  I DID notice where his comfort level for tugging was.  He was a crazy fiend in the parking lot - jumping and tugging really hard in the parking lot and on the walk to the trial site.  When we went around the side of the building and he could see people/dogs his tugging went down a lot.  He would still play, but he wasn't jumping as much. 

Although at the end of the day he did really fierce tugging right by the ring with dogs all around and people sitting around next to us.  People even stepped over him and he was still tugging and playing.  I think he did great.  We were there for a long time - almost 4 hours?  I think.  And he was focused on me really, really well.

So different from the first trial I took Tibby to.  She barked the ENTIRE time and she lunged at anyone/dog that came within her vision line.  We didn't stay very long, because she was acting so crazy and BARKING like a crazy.

Thank you Loretta for kicking me in the rear and getting me to take Dhali to agility trials.  I will try!!!

One thing that we need to work on - Dhali wouldn't pee!  He held it the entire time we were away from home!  He pooped, but NO PEE.  Silly pup.  So that was what?  We left at 12pm and got home at 7:30pm.  That was a long time to hold it!  Poor little tiny bladder.  He also wants to go really, really far away to poop.  Which is nice, but also a pain.  Gotta work on the potty on leash!

So after the trial we stopped at Petsmart and the best happy making me thing happened.  When we were checking out the Petsmart employee said, "I was watching you while you were picking out a collar and he just sat there and watched you the whole time!  It was so cute!"  Yes, he was a good boy!  We were working on focus and Dhali was a very good boy.  He doesn't try to jump on everyone he sees, but rather sticks with me and walks along or sits and watches me.  It looks like I actually train him or something LOL!!

Whew, so we made it home and Tibby missed me SO much.  She had to sit in my lap for a while until she calmed down and she followed me around to make sure I didn't try to escape again.

Very tired now.

When we got home Dhali was like, "Let's do something!  Play with me!  Toys!  Run around! Fun!"  and I was like no you are tired.  I know you are tired.  Dhali was like, "Put me in coach!  I'm ready!"  But yeah, 5 mins. in the x-pen he was sleeping.  He WAS tired!      

Agility Lesson April Spring

Tibby did very good at our lesson with Loretta today.  She was a really good girl.  I have a lot to work on though! 

I really like how Loretta can see what I'm doing and then explain it to me.  Now if I could just remember to do what she says!  I'm pretty sure she must get sick of telling me the same thing over and over again - and think that I don't get it!  I get it, but my body just doesn't want to connect with my brain! 

I really, really, really have to stop getting into Tibby's space.  It's so tempting though!  She hates it.  So I have to stop.  If I could stop doing that then maybe her speed would even out and that would help me quit decelerating and then Tibby wouldn't get de-motivated.

Tibby did a great job though!

 She likes extension and thinks collection is stupid.  I have to agree with her.  Less thinking with extension - which is good for me :)

"We go now?"

My right thumb is so beat up from Tibby biting it.  It hurt all afternoon, but it's fine now.  I give her tiny little bites and let her nibble on my thumb to get the pieces.  Good except I have 2 holes in my thumb now! 

At the end of our lesson Tibby played with a toy!  It was so much fun!  Back a couple months ago (maybe Dec. or Jan. ?)  I offered her the toy and she was not interested at all.  Today she was ALL OVER IT!!!  Running around chasing, tugging and then running off when she 'won' it.  She figured out really, really quickly - give toy back, get treat.  Although I still chased her a little when she had the toy, because that's her favorite part. 

I think she wasn't feeling well last week.  I don't like to make excuses for us, because there are always excuses for why something is wrong.  But last week, the day of our lesson, Tibby threw up twice in the early morning.  This is gross, but I think she ate a hair ball that Catty threw up outside.  There were pieces of grass and cat hair, ect.  Yuck.  She was also acting all scared of everything and now she is much, much better.  She has started sitting outside on the grass - by herself!  It's one of her favorite things to do, but she has been too scared for the last couple weeks to do it.  It's nice to see that she is feeling all relaxed again.

"I tired."

It really helped to tie Tibby to the door when we weren't running.  We would do an exercise, run back to her leash and then Loretta and I would talk about what we had done.  I think that made a big difference in her motivation.  At first she didn't get it, but by the end of the hour - when I let her off she was running with me.  It really helps to have Loretta talking me through everything.  It's hard to see, objectively, what is going on.  I like lessons!

I also liked running Tibby to her leash at the end, because I have been teaching Tibby to target her leash.  I figure there is a pretty good chance that, if we ever trial, and I don't teach her to target her leash, she will run out of the ring when we finish running.  So this will be a good training step.  I'm going to do it at home too, when we are training.  I just have to make sure that I remember to reward her when we get to the leash, so she doesn't think she is being punished or that she did something wrong.

She is such a good dog.

The Tugging Video

I told you it wasn't exciting tugging LOL!  But it was exciting to me!  She did it a bunch before I asked someone to tape us.  I couldn't believe/ didn't think she was going to keep doing it!

Please let me know if the video works.  I tried something new with the music  :)

Need For Speed

Tibby sequenced tunnel - weaves - jump wrap today!  She also did it the other way and did weaves - tunnel - weaves - jump wrap.  It was in the basement on the good weave poles.  She is getting it!  Fast, happy and 80% perfect.  I tried all sorts of odd entrance angles.  We have lots to work on, but she is doing amazing! 

At class 2 weeks ago, she tried to weave on the poles they have there.  That was 2 weeks ago and now I think she could do it.  I really see her thinking about getting the entrance.  Sometimes she doesn't get it, but she is trying :)

She's also getting better at tugging.  Sometimes I carry a tug around in my pocket and surprise her with a game of tug.  She still likes to steal the tug and run away.  But if I tell her 'show' she will (most) of the time trade the tug for a treat.  I think part of the reward for her is having me chase her.  So as long as she will come back eventually and it's safe, I will chase her.  It's good exercise!

Visiting Tug

Tibby tugged in a new place!  Twice! 

This is the first time she has ever tugged outside my house.

We went over to my Grandma's house and I got Tibby to tug with me twice.  We had so much fun!  And we had everyone watching us.  It didn't phase Tibby at all.  She was all about the tugging.

We only tugged for a minute - I wanted to keep Tibby eager to GET THAT TUG!!!

It worked.  She chased the tug back to its hiding spot and was ready to tug when I brought it out later.

She also chilled in her crate (with the door closed) during dinner.  Then I took her for a walk and she went back into her crate for an hour while we talked.

Notice my Grandma's cat in the right upper corner?  She sat in that spot the whole night.  Tibby doesn't even look at her any more, because she isn't fun like Catty.  LOL!!

She also got to play It's Your Choice when we ate pie at the end of the evening.  It took a while, but she made the right choice and got to eat some whipped cream.

Stopped Tugging

So, since we just did a review of a tug toy I thought I should probably fess up about our history with tugging.  When I first brought Tibby home, I read a lot of books and got a lot of bad advice.  One thing that everyone seemed to agree on: You should never tug with your dog.  Being the naive new puppy parent that I was, I belived every word. 
So, for the first 7 months of her life Tibby never got to tug.  Whenever she started tugging on a toy I would drop it and turn away from her. 
Wow! It was super easy to eliminate her tug drive.  Oops.  My Bad.
Once we started getting into agility and dog sports I realized how valuable a tool tug drive could be.  So for the next life time I will be nurturing Tibby's tug drive.  Now with my next dog.......I will know better.




Little video of Tibby as a puppy tugging. 


This was one of the first times I let her tug.  Considering our history I think it is amazing that she tugs at all.  Good thing she has a mind of her own!

  And.....Oh My Goodness isn't she CUTE!!!

New Tuggies

Tibby got a new tug and leash on Friday.  It was a reward for getting groomed Friday morning.  This is the shop where I bought them.  Tillies Tuggies  The store owner let me pick the colors.  I got brown and aqua - matches Tibby's crate.  A portion of every tug purchased goes to the Glen Highland Farm BC rescue.

What makes these really special is the rabbit fur braided into the tug.

"Hmmm, what's this?"

"Mine!  All mine!"

This is the leash with the tug bar.

"Rawr!"

"Is this how you do it?"

"Let me get a better grip."

"What?"

"I'm just playing with my new toys...."