changes
Today is my last day up at Gentle Touch. I'll continue to go up there on a regular basis to teach weekend workshops, so I don't have the guilt of completely abandoning my friends/students up there, but it's time and yes, I still feel sad and a little guilty. Ah that Catholic upbringing and my Socialist tendencies make it so hard to do what is best for me financially.
In other news, I finally sent in my write up for my Power Paws Camp topic. I am really excited for this year, fun group of instructors and several of my friends from down south are making the trek up north. Also, come on, I managed to quote Mahler in my topic description. Oh yeah... ;-)
Energy Up, Energy Down: Handling the Mental and Physical Aspects of Transitions
The real art of conducting consists in transitions.
Gustav Mahler
Transitions, those places on course where we need to let our teammate know things are changing. Sometimes referred to as "traps" or places where handlers sometimes need a "call off", when really our goal is for our dog to have the information they need to know where they're going next. The challenges of transitions can vary from team to team. With the very self-propelled dog, the challenge seems to be in getting our teammate to acknowledge the information we're presenting, where for the tighter dog, the challenge can be maintaining enthusiasm and speed through the transition.
We will be using short sequences with obvious transitions to help handlers work on their timing and cue delivery. We will also address rewards to help our dogs better appreciate our cues, as well as some tricks to help handlers better maintain their "head game".
So, on Sunday I was talking with Nancy and I just happened to bring up Rich's too vulture even for me startline and my thoughts that maybe I'd need to do a stand start. Nancy told me a story about Riot and how she was similar to Rich with the quest to be a pancake, but that she was able to fix it by working stays by the pool and I immediately thought "THE BEACH", because Rich had lost the ability to sit and wait for a release there. Of course, I went to the beach and further put off my Camp write up. And after a while, had Rich doing a vulture, but not pancake puppy there. See, the rare adolescent beach vulture, which Starlet finds fascinating.
This was a tremendous improvement, since I couldn't step away without Rich doing pancake puppy at the start of the walk.
Also awesome was Vic finally swam in the ocean!
And how handsome is the puppy, I'd say super handsome. On a completely unrelated note, I noticed that he has a bunch of white hairs coming in on the bottom of his tail. Don't know if they'll ever be visible, but it's fun noticing new things.
Anyway, back to the whole "Operation Beach Sit", I had a couple hours at Happy Dog on Monday, so wanted to do some work on his startline, using static rewards and why not introduce the table. :-) Holy crap, was his "sit" better, sure it's still a vulture, but I could live with this. And Rich was so cute, for the rest of the day, he kept putting himself on the table and looking for acknowledgement. I swear he also was saying, "so teach me this now" about other obstacles that he'd take his toy to and stand by looking at me with his Mr. Intensity look. He is a really brilliant puppy. And yes, still totally sound. :-)
In other news, I finally sent in my write up for my Power Paws Camp topic. I am really excited for this year, fun group of instructors and several of my friends from down south are making the trek up north. Also, come on, I managed to quote Mahler in my topic description. Oh yeah... ;-)
Energy Up, Energy Down: Handling the Mental and Physical Aspects of Transitions
The real art of conducting consists in transitions.
Gustav Mahler
Transitions, those places on course where we need to let our teammate know things are changing. Sometimes referred to as "traps" or places where handlers sometimes need a "call off", when really our goal is for our dog to have the information they need to know where they're going next. The challenges of transitions can vary from team to team. With the very self-propelled dog, the challenge seems to be in getting our teammate to acknowledge the information we're presenting, where for the tighter dog, the challenge can be maintaining enthusiasm and speed through the transition.
We will be using short sequences with obvious transitions to help handlers work on their timing and cue delivery. We will also address rewards to help our dogs better appreciate our cues, as well as some tricks to help handlers better maintain their "head game".
So, on Sunday I was talking with Nancy and I just happened to bring up Rich's too vulture even for me startline and my thoughts that maybe I'd need to do a stand start. Nancy told me a story about Riot and how she was similar to Rich with the quest to be a pancake, but that she was able to fix it by working stays by the pool and I immediately thought "THE BEACH", because Rich had lost the ability to sit and wait for a release there. Of course, I went to the beach and further put off my Camp write up. And after a while, had Rich doing a vulture, but not pancake puppy there. See, the rare adolescent beach vulture, which Starlet finds fascinating.
This was a tremendous improvement, since I couldn't step away without Rich doing pancake puppy at the start of the walk.
Also awesome was Vic finally swam in the ocean!
And how handsome is the puppy, I'd say super handsome. On a completely unrelated note, I noticed that he has a bunch of white hairs coming in on the bottom of his tail. Don't know if they'll ever be visible, but it's fun noticing new things.
Anyway, back to the whole "Operation Beach Sit", I had a couple hours at Happy Dog on Monday, so wanted to do some work on his startline, using static rewards and why not introduce the table. :-) Holy crap, was his "sit" better, sure it's still a vulture, but I could live with this. And Rich was so cute, for the rest of the day, he kept putting himself on the table and looking for acknowledgement. I swear he also was saying, "so teach me this now" about other obstacles that he'd take his toy to and stand by looking at me with his Mr. Intensity look. He is a really brilliant puppy. And yes, still totally sound. :-)
Click to view