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I’ve been busy, or lazy or both

I looked at my blog and was aghast that my last post was in July!  Busy, yes… lazy, always, except when I have a burning desire to do something with my dogs.  That trumps all thoughts of a lazy, do-nothing afternoon sitting in front of the boob-tube.  Actually, my personality makes sitting around impossible.  Always a dish to clean, a carpet to sweep or a wonderful walk outside with my “kids”…

Do you know how sometimes you see the light bulb go off and your dog just does everything you have been trying to teach him right, after weeks of ripping your hair out and wondering if there was a snowball’s chance in h_ll he would ever, ever do what you were asking?  Charlie and I had that kind of two days in tracking… mind you, the light bulb went off for Charlie before it did for me.  Yes, we got a twofer this weekend–Charlie AND I had a lightbulb-type moment in training.

Saturday we tracked with Butch at Rosaryville and I laid a track with 12 articles, 3 turns and food sporatic with two long 20-30 foot stretches without food.  Food on start pad, food leading off the start pad to help Charlie start focused with nose to the ground and food two to three steps before and after each turn.  The rest of the food was very sporatic.

As has been the case for Charlie, he started without as much commitment and focus/intensity as he should and as Butch pointed out to me, I let him.  I brought him to the scent pad and let him begin when it was obvious to everyone but me, that Charlie was not really paying attention to the job he was about to start…  and it showed… he was not intense until he had gotten half way down the first leg and had found two articles.  Butch picked up the last article on the first leg before Charlie got to it and I asked him why (later, when we were finished).  It was to see how Charlie would work without the constant motivation of an article just up ahead.  When you have twelve articles on a track, there is a lot of article motivation.  Charlie platzed two times without articles and I restarted him… no reason that I could tell for him to decide to platz.  Other than that, the track was ok… nothing to write home about, but ok.  He indicated all the articles and kept working, albeit without a huge amount of drive.

Butch’s comments:  Allow Charlie to go ahead (let the leash slip through my hands before I begin to follow); don’t bait the corners for at least 3-4 steps before and after; have longer stretches without food; stop trying to make the track easy so Charlie can always do a perfect job–no learning experience and he will get bored.  Charlie is not the most food driven dog in the world (getting better:-) and if he is bored, then what motivation does he have to keep going down the track?  It can’t all be compulsion!  He has to want to do it too (at least for me to be happy and that is a definate part of my equation).

Light Bulb for Charlie.  On Sunday I tracked at Villa Julie.  I stopped asking him to track when he messed up–what I mean is, if he platzed and there was no article, I stopped just asking him to restart–I gave him a correction forward to restart.  He said, OH, OK and restarted with focus.  And if he went off the track, I gave him a correction instead of letting him wander his way back.  Again, he said, OH, that is what you want–OK and he refocused.

 Light Bulb moment for me:  On Sunday and again today, I laid the track like Butch asked (see above).  Before I started Charlie, I had him sit and give me focus.  I then placed the line between his legs and let him begin.  Although I would like him to spend more time on the scent pad (and I’ll ask Butch about that), he started with more focus.  When he platzed without an article, I gave him a correction to restart.  He had his nose deeper than before, he moved forward with me letting the line slip between my fingers until I was 6-8 feet behind him and he never seemed to notice.  He nailed all the articles. On the first turn, he went a step too far, did a tight circle, picked up the turn and off he went (remember this is new to him, no food on turn–he worked it out).   Sonja was with me and she said my turn was not 90 degrees and she thinks that contributed to Charlie’s inability to find it right off…  The second and third turn he nailed.  It was a reasonably long track and I was very happy with how I laid it and how he ran it.  My light bulb moment was realizing Charlie didn’t need me to make the track easy and perfect for him.  He needed the challenge to work it out himself and he needed the motivation of the challenge and he needed the motivation of the correction to do the work.  He worked harder and with more focus.  Whoo-hoo. 

We both have so far to go, but at least I feel we made progress this weekend.