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Training update for January 19 and 20, 2008

Have you ever heard the saying, “Colder than a witch’s t-t”? Well, it comes pretty darn close today.

Lessons learned on this 25 degree morning: 1) Always remember to wear your ultra thin and warm bicycling gloves when laying a track. You can wear them and handle the tracking food and the line. When you stupidly wear your heavy, ski, thermal, blocky type gloves, you cannot handle the tracking food (no taking just one little piece at a time; it is a handful or nothing), so off come the gloves to lay the track. By the end of the third leg, you can’t feel your fingers. By the end of the track, you are not sure if your hand is still attached or laying somewhere on the field with a frozen piece of food attached! 2) Always wear long underwear! And wool socks… by the time I got back into my car, I was desperately trying to contact my toes and they were not answering my plead to wiggle. I think they were mad at me. 3) If you can sleep in, do so. I’m thinking Charlie, my fingers and my toes would have been happier with me! 4) Have warm coffee waiting.

Charlie is learning to stay focused (the track went right next to a couple of piles of deer droppings and Charlie stayed on the track. I find that on occasion Charlie will lift his head, stop, then before I can correct him, his head is down and he has self restarted. He only did it twice today (yesterday he did it three or four times)… Yesterday, I found out I was laying my corners incorrectly. For a right turn, I was stepping off on my left foot on the turn and vice versa for the left turns. I actually did the turns correctly in terms of footwork when I first began tracking with Charlie, except I was not stepping far enough forward. When Butch corrected my footwork, I misunderstood and began stepping off (and forward) with the wrong foot. I NOW UNDERSTAND! Right turn, step forward just as I do when going straight, only turn foot to the right for turn and follow on the new leg with the left foot…. Charlie did much better on his turns today. So we are both doing better

Training Yesterday: After tracking, we worked on Charlie’s retrieve. Charlie is reaching for the dumbbell, even on the ground and turning and coming to front. I am working on his calm grip of the dumbbell. Charlie wants the dumbbell and does not want the stress of not getting it, so he is working fast.

Protection: We are working on the Schutzhund 1 routine as far as the blind search. I send Charlie and he must return to me and sit, then I send to hot blind. He is also learning to heel out of the blind and wait when I tell the helper to step out of the blind. I had to relearn (duh) to heel Charlie and face the blind across the field, NOT the helper for the escape bite. The courage test did not go as smoothly as last week. Charlie was missing the sleeve, not jumping up it seemed. Lazy? Unsure? He went down the field like a sprinter going for the 50 yard dash title, but half-heartedly jumped for the sleeve. He was always willing to reengage and nailed the sleeve each time.   I think Charlie needs more work on targeting the sleeve. A little closer a few times, then go further down the field for the courage test. He needs to understand the speed, target, open mouth, effort necessary to grab the sleeve the first time. I also wonder if Charlie needs some pole work for stronger grips and more noise, whip action…. I see the puppies working on the pole and I think that would not be a bad thing for Charlie… I may ask…

Tomorrow is a holiday from work and I will get another track under Charlie’s belt before returning to the daily grind…

January 12th training and protection shots

 We started our day, bright and early with a track.  Charlie is doing four or five turns, still has food in each footstep, but he is showing concentration and for a dog that is not food oriented, he is doing very well.  Considering we waited until Charlie finished his breed championship to begin our tracking training, he is doing very well.

His obedience is also moving along.  We are working on heeling (with attention), the retrieve, a moving sit and the go out.  All progressing…

I am working the blind search (two blinds) as an obedience routine.  Send him and reward when he rounds the corner with a ball toss…  yesterday, I put both blinds up (about 25 paces apart) and sent him around one, then when he came flying around the first blind, sent him around the second… reward was a toss of the ball when he rounded the second blind.  Went well.  He had a blast… it was cold and late (8pm in the field by my house) so we only did four or so passes… left him excited and me happy that he understood.
Here are a few protection shots from Saturday training (1/12/08) It was cold and I was wearing sweats… so no comments on my fat butt!…  

Charlie heeling to the end of field to prepare for a long bite
 

Charlie sitting waiting to be sent for long bite
 

Charlie going for long bite

Charlie and Mark (Charlie goes down the field so fast, he needs to learn how to gage
the distance.  He hasn’t done many long bites and I’m hoping he will learn to target
the sleeve with practice.  However, he didn’t miss and he didn’t come off the sleeve, so
I was happy!

Charlie returning to me with sleeve after long bite (nice full bite
 

Tracking:  We restarted Charlie’s tracking the week before Thanksgiving and have logged 23 or so tracks since then.  Charlie is doing four to five turns, still food in each footstep and concentrating on slow, methodical, nose to the ground, footstep to footstep tracking.  His focus is good for the most part and he is learning, if distracted, to restart himself.  He is taking light corrections with a grain of salt and continuing the track and with another 200 or so tracks, we might be ready for our Schutzhund I….  aggghhh.

Obedience:  Working on the retrieve with the idea that Charlie will learn to grab the dumbbell and come to front, quickly and without mouthing the dumbbell.  I’m demanding precision with straight fronts.  At this point, we are working with Charlie back tied and me holding the dumbbell.  This is all about speed, precision and calmness.  This is also about doing what is asked whether you want to or not.  Charlie is doing great.  My handling and footwork leave a lot to be desired.  I’m the one who needs to practice!  Charlie is jumping a practice jump in my front yard (24 or 26 inches) to learn proper technique and to go and come over the jump, not around.  Again, no options here, so once sent, the only way back to me is over the jump.  No pressure used, just a firm no if he tries to go around and then I make him go over the jump both ways.  At this point, he is doing as asked and is not trying to go around… Took about a week.  

Protection:  I’m moving further away from the blind when sending Charlie and calling him to a sit once he clears the blind, then I send him to the hot blind.  This is helping Charlie stay closer to the blind and cutting down on the wide around he was doing in his excitement to get to the hot blind.