The World Moves in Mysterious Ways

Those of you that follow Marks blog will know he lives his live by positive thinking. 


Here's an example of a chain of events that lead him to achieving something that he wants to do this year.


We arranged with Lauren last year to go and train at Devon Dogs this Sunday 25 March. Lauren planned a jump skills day for the Saturday 24 the day before. Perfect timing for Rhyme's stage of development. So I booked to go on it.


A few weeks ago we decided to book a Travel Lodge to avoid me having to go down to Okehampton and then back again (or rather avoid the van having to go back and forth). We dragged our heels a bit as Mark would then have to find something to do for the day. Mark being Mark did find something to do involving a long term project he's doing (that is another story and one to look out for on his blog). 


I was still a bit reluctant to book for some reason.


A couple of days later Lauren text as she had a once in a lifetime opportunity to go to Canada that meant she cancelled the jump skills day :(


I was very disappointed after all Rhyme's development is THE most important thing ever and his jump skills could suffer LOL.


Never disappointed for long we thought we could use the day instead to catch up with our nephew and niece (we've got part of a skeleton that Thomas would like) - but you've guessed it they were busy.


Meanwhile Mark happened to see that Rick Wakeman was doing an 'Evening with Rick Wakeman' in a cave in Cornwall on Saturday 24 March :) 
The Travelodge had been non-refundable so was sitting there all un-used so ...............Cornwall back to Devon and Devon Dogs the next day was definitely do-able so suddenly it all came together for us to go. 


Also we will get an afternoon on the beach for the dogs. 


Every one's a winner :)


PS Mark has given Rhyme some lessons and his jumping is coming on just fine.

Best Laid Schemes of Mice and Men

Well all our excitement about moving to Cholderton has had a sad set back due to a fire in Cholderton House. It was a beautiful old manor house and it is such a shame for the owners. Luckily nobody was physically hurt. Although all were disappointed it shows the stuff our members are all made of and some took advantage of a well earned break from training and others socialised :)
I am grateful for everyones patience.

Thursday was also cancelled so Getting The Show Season on The Road classes did not get on the road :(


Saturday we went to Devon Dogs to do some training for Lauren. We are there again on 25th March so Lauren structured the day differently from our normal format and we did a whole day rather than short courses.


As mine was Relationship Building involving quite a few young dogs or dogs that wanted more work on focus I had to plan carefully to avoid the dogs getting tired. The way I usually work most dogs are tired in one lesson. So I spent quite a while planning and putting words and reasons to why I train the way I do. Relationship is the key for me and getting the best out of each dog and handler partnership is important. Not every person or dog can or would want to be a Gold Medal winner. In my opinion understanding your and your dogs strengths and using them to get the most out of your time together is invaluable. Mark's psychology courses are great for helping the handler to be realistic and to move forward at a pace thats right for them. Strangely people often say they then over achieve and need to change what is realistic for them :)


As promised here is the words I came up with - hopefully they are useful.

TAP

Time and place - it is very important to choose the right time and place to train your dog varying on things that will distract from what you what the dog to do.

Window of imprint from birth up to 12 - 16 weeks many behaviours will be created in that time. 

This is the best time to share with your dog the life it is expected to lead. 

Top handlers will use this time to imprint the learning system they will use. E.g confinement and restrictions so the dog takes on board that the handler is the only source of anything. Some will get their pups as early as 5 weeks to help this happen in case the breeders home opens up other behaviours such as escaping as in case of Rhyme LOL (not a problem for me as this is his character and he got so much socialisation too)

This is the time I like to socialise to ensure my dogs can cope with my lifestyle including having loads of other dogs, people, children etc around. They need to be happy to travel to stay in hotels to be bold and confident. I do not want to be in the position of being in a qualifier and worrying that my dog won't be at his best because of crowds, children helping on the ring, having to stay away the previous night etc.

As owner it is your responsiblity to help your dog enjoy sharing your life and understand times why your dog may not behave the way you'd like. 

Eg many dogs are disciplined for not being able to wait on the start line. This may be due to something as simple as being uncomfortable with dogs behind him as he can't see what they are doing. Other dogs get in trouble for sniffing the ground which is a totally instinctive thing for some dogs and needs careful training to move in from.

Get to know your dog and it's breed so you can understand which behaviours will need more help to modify.

Any modification of behaviour needs to be patiently addressed. A behaviour needs to be learned (using rewards), challenged (rewarding every successful attempt of coping with the challenge) and only occasionally proofed until moving on to the next stage. 

Rewarding has to be on a varying schedule or it can extinguish the first time you do not reward. A pack of cards or dice can help you be variable.

Examples if you always get a tip for waiting on tables the time you don't get a tip you think that person is tight or wonder what the point of waiting of tables is. Also if you always get a bunch of flowers on a Friday on your husbands way home you will be annoyed when you don't get them once but if he brings them at special times or various times then you will always appreciate them. 

What you reward with can also be a key. Knowing what to reward with is crucial. 

Time - not only important re before exercise food etc but also how long your dog works for. Some dogs will benefit more from rapid regular training sessions instead of one hour long stints. Try timing each session and find your dogs best time.

Time and place also relates to your timing in giving the rewards and the placement of reward.

Waits

Wait = willing, able, interested and trusted.

Willing - the dog has to have had lots of rewards for waiting and showed in various situations eg before door opened etc for them to even want to wait. In agility we love to get on and do the equipment as much as they do so we need to ensure we want them to wait too.

Able - are there dogs behind unsettling your's, people collecting leads that make your dog nervous, smells grabbing their senses? It is important to help the dog deal with distractions and appreciate that it can be hard for them. Work through learning, challenging proofing etc.

Interested - watch dogs playing they will break off stare at each other daring each other to move. The joy in their anticipation is clear - that is what I like to see on the start line not a worried flatten dog or one not worried about going when released. It should just be another game.

Trusted - if you have worked though all the above then you should be able to trust your dog and your dog you. If you start testing the behaviour the dog can get confused so set a clear pattern that is realistic and don't spend hours trying to catch the dog out. I prefer to challenge by doing something totally unusual so the dog is still interested. I think dogs do have a sense of humour and enjoy challenges. Eg dog waits - you sit in a chair. initially the dog may get up but you are in a position to reward it not to. The dog gets rewarded for waiting and waiting gains more value but you have not messed around with your start line routine.

Sorry we ran out of time and I won't publish any of the "consequences" game we played (not this blog anyway LOL). Hopefully this will help. If you want details of the games/exercises we did please contact me. 


Anyone interested in further training or if you think this course would be useful for others please contact me.


It was a lovely day and all the dogs concentrated very well and hopefully you all have an idea of how to maintain that in different classes and environments. Great dogs and lovely people :)


Ruth sent me a great picture of Inka that evening :)

Born Again?

I am open to everyone’s beliefs so long as they are not harmful to others or themselves and don’t think blogs are the place to be that personal but I for me re-incarnation has a certain fascination – partly because how can so many dead people live in heaven without serious overcrowding LOL

Torro is an unusual dog and does not seem to have normal dog skills. His idea of being friendly is whacking another dog with his paw. There were a few happenings in his puppyhood and something from a communicator that could give the opinion he was a cat in a previous life. Well our cat (Dirty Harry) died of old age in the October and Torro was born in January. There was also a long and complicated serious of events that resulted in me having Torro. He made eye contact with me when we went to look at the pups that made me think he thought good I’ve found you again J

I had forgotten about this and only started to think about it because of how Rhyme is going at training.

I am so enthusiastic about the puppy training and how we can break things down to help dogs learn the equipment when they are older. I love training it and seeing the rapid progress dogs make and how much fun they have. However Rhyme does not seem to share this emotion. However much I would prefer to break things down and build understanding and then speed. He just does things. He does them like he has done them before.

The seesaw is a perfect example – I did wobble cushions, boards planks on balls gradually building to doing the seesaw on 2 tables etc, plus bang game and end games. Went to do the whole thing and he jumped off L Went back a few stages all ok then tried again. Again off he comes L Decided to just hold his collar in the old-fashioned way and viola, easy peasy, why didn’t you say this is what you wanted? seesaw sorted.

Then there was the match – I really should have waited and done more training, first on jump grids and set point etc etc. But the first time I showed him a course and he does it.

He’s getting to the age of doing full height now too so I just did an exercise at medium and then did the same at full height – done – no errors, no running under, no hesitation.

So this makes comes me to the conclusion that maybe Rhyme is a reincarnation of an agility dog. I do not know which dog and can only hope it was a very good one.

Traits peculiar to Rhyme include suckling your thumb when sleeping on your lap and nibbling you in a “you are mine kind” of way. So if you know of any past agility dogs with these traits I may have him – sorry you can’t have him back but it’ll be good to meet you J J

The Cats Out of The Bag & The Dog's of the Starting Block

So much planning and everything’s coming to fruition J

The meeting on Thursday was with the manager of a local Equestrian Centre that I can now reveal is going to be UpAndOver and The Lakers Dog Agility’s new home.

The Loriston-Clarke’s and of course, Fiona Boyne were brilliant hosts at Catherston Stud, both at Hurstbourne and when we moved with them to Over Wallop. We appreciate all their support and feel part of their greatness rubbed off and helped us create a great training school.

http://www.catherstonstud.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=90&Itemid=171

Times change and with their daughter managing and a group of very demanding livery customers our ability to hire the school for any other time than Tuesdays became impossible. We are very grateful for Ann allowing us to have that.

With classes full we still needed somewhere to take on new members so the search began and here we are now our new venue

Cholderton Equestrian Centre.

http://www.altogetherequestrian.com/

In order to secure the venue and move the club on again we are committing to hiring every Tuesday and Thursday, so more planning now for new courses etc.

Sad to be leaving Catherston behind but changes tend to encourage more changes and this is just the catalyst to get moving with loads of training opportunities J

Talking of training opportunities I took the opportunity to try out how our training was progressing with Rhyme by taking part in the match against Wallingford in the Nursery class.

This may have been a silly idea, as he has not previously done anymore than 12 obstacles. However he was incredible and worked his four paws off. We only did medium height jumps and he does not have the speed of his training mate (and Kodi’s son) Buzzy but he was quicker than I thought and he LOVED it. So much so that I thought I would just train the start line on the next course. He was very excited watching the other dogs but totally settled on the start in perfect position, ready and waiting. Proud as punch.

Third run again he knew exactly how to behave on the start and no hesitation of pushing up. It was nearly a disaster as we ran up the line towards the other ring when his really, really strong chase drive took over. But this dog who three months ago I thought I would never even get in a ring because of this reason, recalled beautifully to me and carried on around the course with no further error.

My grown up boy is truly on his way now. So much motivation now to do the things we need to do to realize the future that I see possible.

Some dates are just good

10 years ago today Mark and I got married :) Those of you good at maths will have worked out we got married just after Mark turned 40. Some would say it was a midlife crisis but here we still are :)


Our friends Lauren Langman & Matt Rouse gave birth to their little girl this morning - it's great news and the baby is lucky to be joining such a lovely family.


So 2 major events - one the start of a great marriage and the other a baby already on this date. Both are quite life changing.


Other people will have dates or times of the year when things are just good or things seem to go wrong. There is probably somebody that can prove some kind of spooky connection to our birth dates that will explain this phenomena. A bit like astrology I suppose.


Anyway whatever it is about this date something else happened today that will make a big change in our lives. We had a successful meeting with somebody and it will result in a big change that will have far reaching consequences. An end of an era is approaching.


This is separate from my other big "watch this space" happening and I will be able to reveal all much sooner on this one.


Those of you who read my blogs regularly will have heard about polishing coconuts - it seems mine have been well and truly polished :)


Bring on all the changes - an the old chinese proverb says
"When the winds of change blow, some people build walls and others build windmills.” I know what I'm going to do.

Watch this space

So excited with a brilliant idea my friend had. It really has taken my imagination. Luckily she wants us to do it together so keep an eye open for an invite to try something different after I've finished my experiment I mean project re warm up stretching and cool down routines.

Everyone has been timed now and it's great how everyone is so keen to help. Once we have finished the project I am going to roll out the routine to all as we are already finding it a great addition to our agility.

Torro Laker was 6 yesterday - he is looking physically on top form which is more than can be said for me. I had a muscle spasm in my lower back on Tuesday and could not move. Thank goodness we had watched the film 127 hours recently or I think I'd still be stuck on the living room floor now. I figured if he could cut his arm off to save his life then I could suffer immense (but admittedly non life threatening) pain in order to get to the pain killers and freezer to get an icepack :)

Happy New Year

Happy New Year - lets hope it's a good one for everyone.

I love this time of year. It is so exciting, full of promise of what this year will bring.

When I take down the Christmas decorations I have a big sort out and clean round. I also clear out the trophies from last year to give room for new ones this year. It is always difficult to know what to do with the old ones as it seems ungrateful to throw them away.

We have had a bit of a worry with Flint as he is showing his age although not when we have been out walking :) We've had some great walks this holiday including going to Studland on Christmas Eve. This was Rhyme's first trip to the proper seaside and he LOVED it. That's him in the background, out in the water where he stayed the whole walk, squealing with excitement and wanting us to throw something in for him.

He is such a great character and always looking for the fun in life. I am looking forward to his agility training and can almost guarantee we are going to have some interesting times when it comes to competing :)

It all seems so much brighter now he has understood the concept of recalling. We have walked in many different places with many different dogs and distractions this last couple of weeks and he has easily passed each challenge as if he never had a problem. Now he has understood what he is supposed to do, he comes back every time and his reward is freedom to run in the wide open spaces which is what is loves most (except running in the sea of course). Recall problems - what recall problems. What a great start to the year :)