Monday, October 31, 2016

Happy Halloween

I didn't buy Jedi a Halloween costume, so I just dug through the cupboard to see what crap I could put on him for a picture -- because you can't have a Halloween cover photo without dressing up, right? Normally this is a night where I hide in the house with the curtains pulled and all of the lights off until it's deemed "safe" from trick-or-treaters. This year was different, though, because I figured it would be a prime socialization opportunity for Jedi. So, after running around for a bit in the yard to take the edge off, I set off around the neighborhood with Jedi and Kizzy. It was interesting to see where the hots spots are (that would be my street) and also how many houses stayed dark -- I always assumed mine was the only one. The dogs did great with all of the (strange-looking) people and kids running around screaming. We didn't see any dogs out until the very end and that got exciting, but by the fourth encounter Jedi barely reacted (Kizzy is a horrible instigator -- great with people on walks, bad with dogs). We did our usual 3-mile loop and it was nice to be out enjoying the night instead of hiding in the house.

We spent the weekend at an outdoor NADAC trial in Zumbro Falls, MN. It was a small trial and I was pretty much working every class that I wasn't running, so Jedi spent a lot of time each day in the van (with the doors closed, because he's picking up Secret's barking). When he got to come out he was high as a kite. I think he sensed immediately that there was a river next to the park and his main objective was to get to the water every single time he left the van. Occasionally he saw agility in the ring and got excited, but he definitely wanted the water more. Before we left on Saturday I took him down to the water and let him swim. It was only 56 degrees outside, but he didn't care. He got to come play tug next to the ring a few times and show off some of his tricks, too. Jedi was fine by the ring and totally focused on his toy. Boy would I have loved to give him a shot on the tunnelers course! It would blow his mind.

Because we got home so early each day from the small trial, I still needed to do something to wear Jedi out. For some silly reason -- perhaps because Daisy Peel just re-posted her videos of Solar's running dog walk training -- I decided to see what would happen if I asked Jedi to run across a flat plank. My dog walk bit the dust this year and officially rotted through. The top plank is to the point where I stopped even letting the little dogs go across, but I've still used the down sides for some target work for Jedi. One of those is rotted on the end, but the other one is in okay/usable shape -- at least for this plank work that I'm doing now -- so that's what I'm using. The rest of it needs to get burned or something.

I have no real plan here. I'm not 100% committed to this (and don't think I can be until I have a new dog walk on which to practice). If plank work goes well and I decide I want to move forward with this, I'll probably enroll in Silvia Trkman's online running contact class. I enjoyed our puppy class, so it would be worth a shot -- but I need a dog walk first. And no snow, of course. At any rate, I think things are going pretty well. The first session on Saturday was mostly about getting Jedi to figure out that staying on the plank was the place to be. I stuck a couple of cones on either side of the end. On Sunday I swapped them out with stick-in weave poles. Since Saturday and Sunday went so well, I decided to video our session today. Things started out rough with several leaps and then he settled back into his pattern. I'm using a clicker to mark hits and vocally marking the super good hits while throwing a big party (which he largely does for himself with his victory laps).


Before we went on our trick-or-treat walk I took Jedi out for one more session. With my confidence boosted by our third good session (but first time removing the guides) I pulled the table platform out and propped the board up on that (just the table top, no legs, so about 4"). Jedi did fine going down the plank from the table, but when I backed him up for a running start at it he often skirted around. One thing I'll give this dog, he has a very clear understanding of reward/non-reward markers. He will stop from a dead run on an "uh-uh" and leave his toy instead of self-rewarding. It's kind of weird really. When that happened we reset and he'd get it the next time. I think he either needs to go back to more flat work or I need to introduce guides with the table setup to complete the picture for him. More than anything I just want him to be successful at this stage of the game. Because -- FUN!

Monday, October 24, 2016

Jedi's 1st Herding Lesson (Sheep)

As I alluded to yesterday, Jedi had big plans for today. He got to go play with sheep! There is a local person who has the setup and wants to learn more about herding with her dogs. To do so she is bringing in an instructor from out of the area (since we don't really have anyone around here who does this). They've had two weekends of clinics so far. The first one was on a dock diving weekend so we couldn't make it. The second one was this weekend when we were in Oshkosh. When I learned that the clinician would be available for private lessons before flying out today I jumped at the chance to let Jedi give it a try.

We went over during my lunch hour and met our instructor, Ellen Schwab. I don't know a darn thing about herding, but she seemed to know her stuff and was good at explaining things to a total newbie. Because this was Jedi's first exposure to sheep, I was expecting (and would have been perfectly fine) to hand him over to this person and let them go to work. I don't know a darn thing about herding and figured I'd just get in the way. I figured out pretty quickly that this wasn't going to be how things worked, though, when she opened up with, "it's the humans we need to train." My first concern was regarding who would video (lol...), but thankfully the owner was there and was kind enough to grab a few clips for me.

My agility-ness gets in the way. I am far too comfortable being on the same side of my dog (sheep should always be between me and the dog) and in herding terms I "nag" and don't take the pressure off enough. You know, that's probably a lesson one could take away for agility, too. Should I really be "nagging" my dog to stay out on their line or should I expect him to stay there until told otherwise? I suppose that's how the mega-distance in NADAC works, but I digress... The instructor was great at giving me feedback to tell me to stop pushing, and when I needed to step in to move Jedi out on his circle.

I feel like we made good progress on the whole circling/gathering business, which I suppose is good for one's first session. I continually tripped over my own feet (and the sheep) when attempting to do anything that resembled a straight line across the pen. The little buggers knocked me down once as I was attempting this, and Jedi swooped in and said, "I got this" -- only really, he didn't, and he just scattered the sheep again. That's pretty much how it went. If I had half a clue what I was doing he did great. If I lost my sheep he tried to take control, which generally meant diving through them. He got a little vocal when he went for these dives, but he wasn't nasty to the sheep or a grabber. Good deal, I don't have to "buy" any sheep.


Jedi's turn was a bit over a half hour and he was done at the end of it. I think he would have continued to move the sheep if allowed, but he reached the point where when I took him away to talk to the instructor he just camped out on the ground and stretched out in an effort to find cool ground (poor Jedi, there was no pool or other water source in which to wallow). The instructor pointed out, though, that he never stopped "working" and continued to drill his laser eyes into the sheep because they kept moving around behind us. Overall he listened so well. We worked on a lot of stopping where I'd ask him to stop and sit, then touch him, then release him to work again. He was really good about that, but if the sheep started moving again the stopping was done.

It was a lot for me to take in, but I enjoyed it and I believe Jedi did as well. Because winter is coming, this is the last time they plan on having anything this year, so now we have to wait until spring to do it again. Hopefully it fits in with our schedule and we can participate in the full weekend. This will allow Jedi more time to settle into the work. The instructor really liked him and said he's a really nice dog. I just think it's fun to watch them do what they were bred to do. I imagine he would have done ever so much better with a more competent handler.




Sunday, October 23, 2016

Training, Trial & Hotel Stay

Well, I get a big fat F for blog updates seeing as it's been over a week since my last post. Silence certainly doesn't mean that stuff hasn't been happening, though. Down time isn't really in Jedi's vocabulary. Last weekend was lovely and warm (well, 70, which is warm for October). I didn't get us up to Lake Wazee as hoped. We did get out to hike on the bike trail on Saturday, though. On Sunday I set up the drill from Backyard Dogs in the June 2016 issue of Clean Run. I stopped subscribing to that magazine several years ago when I found I wasn't reading it anymore, but I recently ordered four issues to be able to read their series on agility flooring for a friend. The bonus is that we now have a bunch of fun new drills to play with. Jedi did awesome.

 

I didn't have class this week, but I did step in to sub a different class this week. Jedi didn't get to go along to this one. I'd been forewarned that there were some reactive and anxious dogs in the class. Given Jedi's arousal issues that we're working through, I really didn't think it would be beneficial to expose him to that, even just in the crate. As it turned out, the reactive dogs didn't show up that night and he would have been fine, but better safe than sorry. Instead Jedi got to go on a super long leash walk in town before I left to teach. I took him out with Kaiser first, and then took him out with Kizzy (Secret stayed home because she got a fun trip to the chiro earlier in the day). We ran into a couple of dogs while out with Kizzy, which is unfortunate because she doesn't exhibit behavior I want Jedi to emulate. He was in his Halti, though, and when he got excited by Kizzy's outburst it was easy to redirect his attention and all was good.

On Tuesday Jedi got to take a field trip up to my parent's house. I came home from work midday to find that my internet was out and wasn't projected to be fixed until the following day. I packed up Jedi and we went up to my parent's house to borrow their internet for the rest of my work day and to do my homework. There he got to run around with Wes & Lexie, and I think he managed to find every tennis ball in the house (of which there were many...). And this would be why I do not have balls of any kind available in my house, because Jedi proceeded to repeatedly bring them up and place them on the table by my computer. When my dad came home Jedi showed a behavior I've never seen before when he repeatedly jumped on top of the dining room table (from the floor, usually from a run). That was fun. It was around that time that I took him outside and used the Chuck-it to throw a tennis ball up the hill to wear him out a bit. We ended up going back to my parent's house on Thursday to borrow that hill again.

 

On Friday we were off to Oshkosh for an agility trial. We went to this trial because of the late start on Friday, which mean we didn't have to leave home until 9:30. Unfortunately for Jedi I just used that extra time for sleeping in, not wearing him out. This meant that by early afternoon he was starting to go a little bonkers. I, brilliant dog mom that I am, left home without Jedi's magical bag of toys. Blessedly I'd left a ball on a rope sitting on top of one of the crates in the van, so all was not lost. I took Jedi out between runs and let him wear off some steam. We made a trip to Petco on the way to the hotel to pick up some boredom-busters and treats. Jedi got to come in with me while the others waited in the van. He wore his Halti for reinforcement of good behaviors and I was glad for this when we encountered a pit bull whose first reaction was to lunge and bark at Jedi. I was able to redirect him before he could get riled up from the incident.

This was Jedi's second time in a hotel and he did well. He barked a few times at noises in the hallway (doors slamming, etc.) but always quieted quickly. There was quite a bit of jumping on/off the bed at first, but after being called back up several times he finally figured things out and stayed put. There was a dog in the room next to us that howled until its people came back at 2 a.m., but blessedly none of my dogs seemed bothered by that. Jedi stayed on the bed all night until we went out around 6:30. He did great with the on-leash potty trips, which pleases me greatly since some of the others have some issues with that and that can make traveling difficult.

Jedi did well at the trial on Saturday. I got him out and played fetch again for a bit. I took him inside for a bit between runs to visit, but Oshkosh has some pretty cramped quarters and it was hard to stay out of the way. Instead I opted to bring him in after the Masters classes were done running so that I could get him on the measuring table. It turns out my measurement against the fridge was pretty accurate. Jedi is just a hair (one line, to be exact) under 20" right now. We got out of there around 1:30, which put us home a bit before 4:00. I decided to walk Jedi down to the little park down the street to use the big field for a game of fetch. While I would never call my yard small, it isn't big enough for Jedi to really open up and run (something I learned while watching him at my parent's house). The park served its purpose and Jedi was able to run out all of his energy from being cooped up all weekend.

Today I was pretty darn lazy, but I did eventually get my butt in gear to play with Jedi. I ended up setting up the Power Paws Drill from the May 2016 issue of Clean Run. I finished reading that issue today and this exercise looked fun because it had a tunnel. The main focus of the exercises was sending to the tunnel entry and working on turns out of the tunnel. We had a few small hiccups, but worked through all of them. I think we struggled most with a send up to the tunnel from the left that occurred mid-drill (the send from the start wasn't an issue). Jedi ran past the tunnel entrance several times, so we broke it down until it clicked. I thought he seemed pretty pooped when we finished, but he's been super active all night. He's crashed now, but it took until almost 10:00 to get there. I guess that's what you get when we sleep the day away!

 

Tomorrow Jedi has a fun field trip in store. Hopefully we'll have a fun tale to share (with video).  :o)

Friday, October 14, 2016

8 months old! (32.5 lbs, 20"? tall)

Jedi has survived another month on this planet! In the blink of an eye, he is now eight months old. Gone is the wee, tiny ball of fluff. One can't be too disappointed in that, though, considering the incredibly handsome dog that Jedi is turning into as he grows up. To commemorate the day we went for a walk up to the vet clinic at lunch time to borrow their scale. I put Jedi's head halter on for the walk (just because) and he was a perfect gentleman. I made him get on the scale twice because I couldn't believe what I was seeing. He jumped up to 32.5 lbs over the last few weeks -- that's nearly 3 pounds! I did up his food a couple of weeks ago so that probably plays a little part, but he seems to have hit another growth spurt. I shimmied him up against the fridge to mark his height today and best I can figure he's about 20". I got 19" under the measuring arm at the trial this past weekend, but I figured the wicket was off because the last time I measured he was 19.5".

Jedi is so good for an eight-month old. His recall on our hikes is brilliant, although we haven't really been tested by anything too challenging thus far (I don't take them anywhere I would ever consider it risky to be off leash). He has amazing focus and the best "work ethic" I think I've ever experienced in a dog. Best of all, he just wants to play ALL OF THE TIME, which is exactly what I hoped for in my next dog, so we are having a blast. Despite his never ending lack of energy, Jedi is a great house dog and doesn't get into things. He comes and drops toys on my computer when he gets bored, but is generally good at self-entertaining (or coercing one of the others to go outside to play with him). He's so good in the house that I've already started to leave him loose in the house for short periods when I leave (not quite up to leaving him for the half-days that I go to the office yet, he is still crated for that).


The last two days have been filled with hiking and taking advantage of the lovely fall weather. Yesterday we drove out to the trail point between Bangor and Rockland, then tonight we drove to West Salem and went towards Bangor. We were out just over an hour on both trips, which is more or less enough to take the edge off Jedi. Right now everyone else is crashed and Jedi is still at it, going in and out the dog door and randomly dropping toys on the computer again.  :o) Neither of our hikes involved swimming, so I'm sure that was a bummer for Jedi. This weekend is supposed to be around 70, maybe we can make it up to Lake Wazee at some point for a swim. The Dog Tank officially closed for the year last weekend. Bummer.

We're home this weekend, so with any luck we'll get in some play time and some more hiking. Next weekend Jedi gets to spend another night in a hotel when we go to Oshkosh. I think that's only his second time? I'll try to get him under their measuring arm to get something more official than pinning him against the wall.

Bangor - Rockland Trail





We found a bench to sit on!

Klee Kai bookends

8 months - Left profile

8 months - Right profile

8 months - Top view

West Salem - Bangor Trail

This trail is next to big open fields - Fun!

Found another bench  :o)

Wednesday, October 12, 2016

Trial, Class, and Daycare

Jedi has been a busy boy since my last post last week. Speaking of, apparently head halters for dogs are a popular post topic because that blog post got almost 3x the normal amount of views. It did generate some discussion on my Facebook link, though, and any time people comment on my Facebook link to the blog it tends to make more people curious enough to click into the blog to see what I've rambled about on any given day. It may be that people were curious to learn more about the "reactive behaviors" that I alluded to in the link blurb. In case I wasn't clear about what we're going through, I do not classify Jedi as a reactive dog or a dog who has issues with other dogs. I do think he has some momentary arousal issues that thus far have been fleeting and minor. The head halter is simply to ensure that nothing progresses past the point where we are now by giving me a way to easily redirect his attention. I am probably more sensitive than most to this subject because Kizzy came to me with severe arousal reactivity towards various types of dogs, and places like agility trials were very hard for her. Poor Jedi is subject to being my next dog following Kizzy and as such I'm hypersensitive to all of the issues she came with at 20 months old.

Jedi had a great weekend at the trial. As planned, I was able to crate out of the van all weekend where I believe they all get a chance to relax a bit more (okay, again that is more directed at Kizzy). It also meant that I didn't need to do any fancy crate swapping since Jedi has now outgrown the 30" crate. The trial was large enough that I had a comfortable number of dogs between all of my runs which allowed Jedi a chance to get out quite a bit. On Saturday I had a lot of down time during FAST (missed the boat on worker sign-up, so no free lunch for me), so I brought Jedi in and we played lots of tug next to the ring. He also offered a lot of fun tricks -- "Wee wee" has made a reappearance again recently. Admittedly I haven't been doing a lot of shaping behaviors with Jedi lately, so it was fun to see him offer this. Between classes we went and played on the warm-up jump doing all sorts of fun one-jump stuff with the bar on the ground.

On Sunday I decided to take a Chuck-it along with us so that I could give Jedi a chance to run off some energy (he was kind of loony Saturday night after we got home). There is a huge open (groomed) lot across the street from Canine Sports Zone that the owners are kind enough to let dogs use during trials. I figured since I was able to throw the ball over 2x as far as my yard (which itself is pretty big) that Jedi would have more time to be thoughtful about his approach to the ball. It kind of worked. At least he didn't go topsy-turvy on any of his runs, but he did come back a little muddy from doing some of his superman slides. After he'd had a chance to run off some steam I took him inside to learn the art of "chilling" next to the ring while they ran T2B. There were a couple of dogs coming out of the ring that Jedi found a little too exciting, but he was easily and quickly redirected back to me. It didn't take long before he was flat out and totally relaxed while dogs were running in the ring, getting ready to go into the ring, and coming out of the ring right past him. Good boy, Jedi!

We've been playing with cones at home the last few days, but haven't done much else in the training department. I had to mow on Monday and cones were the quickest thing to set up to run Jedi before it got dark. You can do a lot with 3 cones set in a giant triangle -- they are spaced well apart to give Jedi more room to run, since honestly the only reason we really play those games is to give him that chance (to run). I put the pools away (again) before I mowed on Monday, but I continue to relent and get them back out for Jedi. It also helps to keep him out of the water bucket.

Last night Jedi got to come to class with me. It was graduation night for both groups. The Advanced class was doing CGC testing and I debated running Jedi through it, but meh. I mostly took him so that I'd have the chance to work him in the Halti around the other dogs before class. He was remarkably good! One of the class dogs started out by having a really rough night and was more reactive than I feel she has ever been. This put Jedi on hyper-alert the moment she came down the stairs. He had two "OMG what is that" moments there were ended in an instant due to the Halti not letting him whip his head around to fixate. After that he was golden. There were even two moments where I specifically saw him *make the decision* to keep his focus on me after a brief glance towards one of the dogs he has had some trouble with in the past. He was so good! Then Jedi got to play with the lab puppy from puppy class and the other trainer's young labs as well.

I had an all-day meeting at work again today, so Jedi got to go back to daycare today! Last time he went he had just turned 6 months and I was told that this is their cutoff for dogs who aren't altered, but was told that I might be able to get permission from the owner to let Jedi continue to go. I messaged her on Facebook last night and we got the all clear, so Jedi got to have a day of fun instead of being stuck in a crate all day. He didn't make any of the videos posted today, but they got a couple of photos of him that they put on the Facebook page. I laughed when I saw the top picture because it doesn't surprise me at all that Jedi managed to get himself wet even when it was in the 40s today. There was a 9 week old border collie puppy there for his first day of daycare today and in the photo they shared to welcome him Jedi was in hot pursuit, so they must have played for a bit. They seem to really like Jedi there, so hopefully he can continue to go as needed, despite not being neutered.

The other bonus to Jedi spending a day in daycare is that he comes home and we have a very quiet night. This is especially helpful on Wednesdays since I have both of my school seminars back-to-back. Normally I try to get the dogs out and walked or something before my first class starts, but tonight I actually felt like that would be mean to do to Jedi. Instead I ended up going on the treadmill (because I need to start moving if I'm going to run Jedi next year) and Jedi crashed next to me. Since I had to go into the basement to use the treadmill I ended up being inspired to have Jedi work for his dinner, which I haven't done in ages. We did some work on the donut, played with the cone (circling, wee-wee, hug) and did some pretty impressive hand-stands against the wall. That one must be latent learning because we definitely haven't touched on those skills in forever!

Friday, October 7, 2016

Welcome Head Halter (Halti Optifit)

Jedi's head halter arrived today! I looked around at different brands and ended up going for the same brand that Jedi's brother has -- The Halti Optifit head halter. There are several reasons this brand and model won out. I knew 100% that I wanted to have control over Jedi's nose. The trainer who owns the business where I teach is a big fan of the Canny Collar head halter, but that model goes over the nose and is controlled from behind the head. I decided to try a head halter to keep Jedi's focus on me (more in a bit) and less for pulling, so I definitely feel that having the control point under the chin is more beneficial for what we're dealing with. The Optifit has a nice wide and slightly padded nose and shouldn't leave the indent that is so common with the Gentle Leader. I ordered a medium and ended up having to shorten it as far as it goes, but it works.

So, why a head halter? The idea started with that trip to the park when we went on our walk on Monday. Jedi completely blew me off as soon as he saw the water and I could not get his focus back on me for anything. He would stop and sit, but then plow forward as soon as he was released. Tuesday night I took Jedi to class with me. I was setting up some rally stuff for my Advanced students to play with and I wanted to run Jedi through the exercise before we began (note, I am not a rally person). For some reason everyone started to arrive 10-15 minutes early, so I had zero time alone to work with Jedi. From the very beginning he started doing his lunging behavior at the other dogs as I worked him. He's not aggressive towards other dogs -- he was actually running around loose when the first one came and he was fine, but when I started to work him he tried to go after the same dog. I believe it to be resource guarding behavior. It's the same naughtiness that he did in puppy classes when another puppy would come too close while he was working. At any rate, I'll stick him in the head halter next time so that I can control his head in those situations.


Jedi's snarkiness earned him a spot in a crate for the entire Advanced class. I was glad I'd brought him when the puppy class rolled around and only one puppy showed up this week, though. It was the female lab puppy that Jedi played a bit too rough with last time. I kept him on leash at first and pulled him off her when he got to be too much. Eventually he settled down and they were able to have some good play time together. Jedi did a good job showing her how to play crate games and then we took them out on a walk together. He always does so well when walking with the class groups. Really, I have had very few issues walking him on a flat collar or harness to date which is why I never really gave much thought to other training aids up to this point.

On Wednesday we went out on the trail for a quick hike before I had to get home to log on for my online classes. We were out for about 50 minutes and Jedi was a good boy. He continues to improve during his off-leash hiking time and has been very responsive to my recall cues when he starts to veer off in the wrong direction (towards the tracks). I think he's figuring that rule out, though, because he's not going off towards the tracks very often now. He's not very coordinated at ditch-jumping and face-planted a few times when he couldn't see the change of terrain through the tall grass. Thanks to all of the low spots and ditches filled with water, Jedi spent that entire hike wet from head to toe. He smelled a bit rank on the trip home, but seemed fine once he dried (thank goodness because the last thing I felt like doing at 9:00 was bathing a dog).

Last night we played in the yard. I brought out a tunnel and set up some hoops in a configuration that AgilityNerd posted on their blog yesterday. One of the patterns involved a serpentine. Jedi does not get serpentines. I think it's probably time that I back that one up to square one and do my usual method of gradually making the pattern more shallow/flat. After playing with that for a bit I straightened the tunnel and pointed it at the table. We played with running really fast to the table, jumping on, and then having a party in the down position. Jedi needs more work at driving onto the table. We also did some teeter slams before ending for the night.

Tonight I took Jedi out for a walk by himself to test out the new head halter. I ordered it from Chewy.com on Wednesday (along with a bag of food that we'll eventually need, so that I could get free 2-day shipping) and we had it already this morning! I took Jedi out alone because I never do anything with the trialing dogs the day before a trial, and I figured it would give me a chance to better assess the head halter. I put it on Jedi several times in the house while getting it fit properly and he seemed completely oblivious to the contraption. Once it was time to go and I had a leash attached to it, though, he had a complete meltdown in the garage. So much bucking, and flinging, and thrashing, and pawing.... I finally grabbed him by the head to see what the heck was going on and he somehow had gotten a piece in his mouth. I got that fixed and off we went.

We dealt with dramatics for the first half a block or so. At one point he somehow got the thing off his nose. At least he was a good boy and stood like a rock while I got it fixed. After that he seemed to accept it and we didn't have any issues. He did start rolling his face around in the grass when we were stopped for me to clean up his poop (thanks for going on the sidewalk, Jedi...) but for the most part ignored it completely. As I said earlier, Jedi is generally pretty good for walks -- at least the few leash walks I've actually taken him on -- but he was perfect in the head halter. We just walked about a 3.5 mile circuit through the neighborhood, so I didn't test it around water or anything difficult yet. I figured it would be good to get Jedi used to it before testing it like that. We did see another dog on our walk and while Jedi acknowledged it, he kept his attention with me.


After one wearing I'm pretty much sold. We're at a trial this weekend and I don't know that we'll need it there, but I'll take it along just in case anything pops up. I plan to crate out of the van, though, so Jedi will just come inside for some socializing and play time. One of these days I'll put the halter to the test and take Jedi walking in the park again. I also figure I'll take him to class on Tuesday just to use it there, too. I really want to squash the reactive behavior before it escalates into anything more serious.

Monday, October 3, 2016

Run-throughs / Still swimming!

On Saturday the dogs and I drove down to Canine Sports Zone to play at their run-throughs. I love that they've started to hold these on Saturdays -- at least when I don't have anywhere else I need to be. I do find it a bit ridiculous that the money I pay to run all four dogs would cover the cost of an hour-long private ring rental, but it's nice to have other people/dogs there to give it more of a trial-like feel. While Jedi hasn't shown that he is going to have any issues with the trial environment, I figure it never hurts to give him the opportunity to get comfortable playing in the ring with other dogs around. Honestly, though, when you put Jedi in that situation he is just completely oblivious to all of that other stuff going on (which is a blessed change from what I went through with Kizzy).

Possibly thanks to my request, the folks at CSZ had set up the individual large dog agility course from the Agility World Championships. There was a novice course nested in it and one of these days I should probably start looking at those to give Jedi something more age/skill appropriate. Again, though, I didn't really have time to put together a plan for Jedi's turn and ended up just working him through some pieces of the course I was running my other dogs on. I figure we're not there to work on actual skills anyhow, we're just taking advantage of getting to play around equipment, on turf, around other dogs and people.

I got Jedi's first trip on video -- Nothing super exciting, but he had fun! A minute and a half is not long enough for the crazy puppy. Thankfully he was the last to go and then they opened the course up to walk-throughs again. I kept Jedi in the ring with me while I went around to help set bars, so he got to play in the ring a bit longer. Then we went out and played with a couple of wings that were in the crating area (also on turf). By the end of that Jedi's tongue was hanging way out (look how big that tongue is!!), so I think he was happy with the amount of play time he got. I didn't get his second session on video because he was the last dog to run and most people were gone. We were a little more organized on that round, still just breaking the course into the small bits that Jedi could do. I think he had lots of fun!


I hoped to get out on Sunday for another hike, but I ended up being disgustingly lazy. I finally got out and mowed the lawn before dinner. Jedi has no fear of the mower now and has joined the ranks of the other dogs as being one I need to make move out of the path of the mower as I come by. At one point he was laying next to the table and I chuckled because that's where he used to hide from the mower. I don't think he can fit under there anymore! Jedi was a bit loony from having done nothing all day, so after I was done mowing I dragged a few traffic cones out into the yard and ran him a bit. I threw in the tiny teeter, which Jedi does well with when hopping on from the side, but really overshoots when you add in any sort of speed. Stopping is hard!

Today I had to take my van over to Brenengen Ford for an alignment check after getting new tires put on. I took Jedi along and took him for a walk while they worked on the van. We walked down the main drag (Hwy 16) to the park. Jedi did well on the walk to the park but lost his ever-loving mind as soon as he saw water. Seriously, all leash manners went completely out the window and I couldn't get him to walk nicely for more than 2 seconds at a time, and they were stiff, halting steps before trying to take off for the river. I finally gave up and took off his leash. We found some sticks that were washed ashore by the recent flooding. Jedi enjoyed jumping in after them but lost them nearly every time. Apparently someone is used to brightly-colored bumpers.

After some swimming time I put Jedi back on leash to walk through the park. He continued to completely ignore me and fixate on the water. This continued as we headed back towards the dealership, until which point he couldn't see water anymore and then returned to his well-behaved angelic self. The van was ready when we got back, so Jedi just had to sit and wait patiently while I got everything paid for. Other than a couple of impatient barks when I wasn't engaging with/looking at him, he was really good. One nice thing about a dog who fixates on you waiting to play is that they are oblivious to those around them and don't try to do obnoxious things like jump on strangers.  :o)

I really should have set something up and worked the dogs tonight, but instead I was lazy and we threw frisbees. I've been working with Jedi and he's starting to do better at catching low throws. I moved to throwing the disc in an effort to try to keep him from killing himself with face plants and somersaults that he does with balls and rollers. His catch rate is pretty low because he doesn't really track the disc yet. He generally overshoots it and has to come back to get it, but at least that's at a more moderate speed. When I manage to get the disc directly in front of his nose he shows he actually can grab it. In an effort to keep him from jumping I often throw it too low. We are a work in progress. He sure does love his frisbee, though. Agility, dock diving, frisbee.... So many things to choose from!