half way there...

we'll half of our figure eight is spot on, the other have needs work. it's not that she's out of position or would get points off, she's just not got her head up for attention. it's an aesthetic thing and not required. i'll need to revisit some attention work for the straight line heeling. it's really not fair that we have to heel through agility equipment, but it's a good distraction. her fronts are spot on, she was off on retrieve over high. the recall over jump and recall on flat we perfect - with a perfect finish i might add. we practiced using dinner. that seems to be the ticket for her. it will forever be the baine of practicing, you focus on one point in the routine and the other stuff slips a bit. this is just novice stuff! of course i'm not like most people and am striving for a perfect score. she has the open stuff in the rough, except the out of sight sits and downs. though we will be doing UKC first, i'll practice AKC as well.

there's a fun match this friday night in chicago ridge... that's now closer to my new house, but i don't think that trip will let me go. we have a bunch of stuff to move as we have to be out by the end of the weekend. maybe i can twist his arm and beg a bunch...

on another note, our agility is coming along very well. we tested our knowledge of walk the line last night and wow! does she know it! i don't have to use my hand to signal the turn or the rear cross. now we have to work on collection. need to go back to that one jump for that. it's just about time to bump her up to full height too. we'll have to do some drills at 20". next monday we'll mix the jumps. our contacts are great - they are just running for now. i'll have to start working harder on the dogwalk stop, we'll leave the a-frame running, and for now we'll leave the teeter running b/c she's still not confident on that. we'll address that later.

come see us at IKC in feb. McCormick Place, Chicago IL....

This week...

So this week we focused on Figure 8's. We need to go backwards as bit and work on our left turns. We'll get the body position correct and then work on attention. We'll have to work on our on lead sits. During our private this week we worked for attention during the stand. We were clicking and treating her looking at me and not focusing on the judge. She needs to look at me and not turn her head when the judge comes in the touch her. It will happen. We also worked on the moving stand, a bit of proofing.

On a happy not we got our scent articles! Finally. They are not like the two that I found at FYC. They fit Kay's face nicely, but I would have liked a bit more room on either side for her lips. I'm going to work with the ones I've got. I don't want to send them back again for the 4" ones... She has no problems holding them, we'll see about the pick up.

In other good news, we'll be heading out for hunt training in late February. We'll complete the group and they will be able to help me out. I'm excited to test Kay out on a few puppy marks!!!

Why all this??

Well I needed a place to track my training with the youngest of the crew. It's a place to brag and place my thoughts. She's almost two years old now and is proving to be everything that I hoped for. She's really rockin' in Rally-O, both APDT and AKC. We took a look at where she's at in agility this fall and wow! She's rockin' already. We still need to fix the A-Frame contact, but it's coming along. Same with the poles. Obedience is going to be our newest adventure. We'll see where we're at this sunday.

Yesterday was our training session with Maragret. I always look forward to my sessions with her. This week though was tough. I had to bring Charlie out to leave with his new foster family. I am still a bit unsure on how he's going to be with him. The guys is used to being physically corrective on dogs and that's not going to be good with him. So needless to say I was a bit distracted during my lesson. I know it's not fair to Kayla and not good for us b/c we're showing this weekend. Maragret and I got to talking about about what I was doing in agility with Bailey. She noticed that I was doing a not of no-reward markers. I was doing what Dana had suggested for teaching. I could try to cut back or eliminate it from my training, but I want to mark the fact that he can't skip the poles just because he wants to go. I will try it out the next session that I do. I think that I should eliminate it from my contact behavior all together.

On a different note, I need to work on my figure 8 exercise. I haven't paid enough attention to the details like I should have. I'll have to do what margaret said and set up hidden food in the room before bringing Kay in. I should get a good guage of if she'll hang with me with verbal encouragement. I have no doubt that she will. She loves to work.