Today I got to play with Peepers and Sparky again. I decided to build on yesterday's session, almost just for the sake of it :). Peepers rocked! I set up the perches side by side, and sent him to the red perch from different spots. That was going well, and for one rep, Peepers did a touch and go on the sisal perch before he went to the red one. shortly after that, it seemed like he was kind of interested in the sisal perch, and what it was doing there. I asked him to step onto it, and he did. Then he offered a short flight to it. Sweet! I ended the session by doing a little circle with him and sending him to each perch in turn. You just can't ask for more than that after you've been a dufus LOL. I hope this continues tomorrow, so we can add in directed flight and recalls from the perches.

I need to change up Sparky's routine a bit. I can't figure out if she's getting bored, or if she's just kind of an on again/off again kind of girl. Maybe what I can do is stationary behaviors for one bird and flighted for the other, and switch the 2 in the middle. Dunno, have to think on it a bit. But she needs to learn new stuff :).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4MF0M6fZ68M

The dogs got no training today, as some friends came into town and that sucked up a bunch of time. I really hope to get back on track tomorrow.

Geez, another title...

So today I finally got to play with Dempsey and the parrots. Dempsey got to practice his weave poles and box turn, while the birds worked on recalls and sends around the evil sisal perch.

So Dempsey's weaves were better than expected given that he's had over a week off from practicing them. he had some trouble getting into them, then in one of the spots where I had closed the poles last time, he popped out. I guess that was a little too hard to get back into. But, after I opened the one spot about an inch, he just plowed right through like he had been doing it all along. So I closed up the last poles and inch or so and he thought he could totally handle that.

Like I said, Peepers and Sparky worked on recalls and sends, near the sisal perch. You can see the video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oaLxkrjyph4. You can see I sent Peepers towards the sisal perch to the red perch near it. I did one rep where I stood between the sisal and red perches, and sent Peepers to the red perch from there, but he was uncomfortable with that, so I went back to what he was more comfortable with. I mixed in recalls for Sparky in between Peepers reps. This is one thing I can do with the birds that I can do with the dogs - play with them both at the same time. the dogs swallow so fast that I don't have time to cue another one.

I'm hoping tomorrow to continue with the stuff I did today, apparently that's enough for my plate right now LOL

Boy, when I mess things up...

Well, the 2 sessions I have had with Peepers and the sisal perch have been just yucky. The 2nd taped session (here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vyqfgx8Nj5c ) I thought that he would be ready to progress really quickly, like he did before. So, I brought the red perch out and tried to be ready for the fantastic session I was sure was coming.

Peepers wasn't in any way ready for my optimistic agenda. I tried to be sensitive to what was going on with him, but the fact is, I married my agenda on this session, and not much was accomplished as a result. bleh. I hate it when I do things like this. I know better. I really do. And, on top of that, we don't have a timeline that I have to work with on this one. There's just no good reason for me to get like this.

So, today I came into our session trying to be sure that Peepers was ready for the next steps, and not getting too attached to my agenda. Peepers came into our session a little jumpy, it was very strange. I did notice this, and I tried to back off a little bit so that he wouldn't feel too much pressure. I managed this, but then I was stoopid and moved the perch to clean the crumbs off the island. That scared Peepers and he didn't want to touch the perch anymore. So I tried to salvage the session. You can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Scoo5IgOcCI

Sometimes my asperations and goals get way too high for the current situation. I guess it's time to reevaluate everything and come back fresh tomorrow for Peepers.

Dempsey hasn't gotten to play with me at all. I really need to get back on track with all of this. Tomorrow morning I have agility practice with my friend, and then hopefully when I get back I can get some good training in with the birds.

Who knew we could move this fast?

So today I finally got to train just a little bot with Dempsey and Peepers. The new dog has been a little bit of a drain on my time, but we may be settling into a routine that will allow me to get back into the training that I've been doing.

So Dempsey got to work on his box turn. This is the first time we've done anything for 5 days, so I expected that I would almost have to start completely over with this. Dempsey needed to be reminded once that the box was the key to me throwing the ball, but we needed to keep really working the idea that 3 feet needed to get on the box. Overall, we had a good session, with a bunch of 3 foot turns towards the end. All that work was hard for Dempsey, though. He came out of the session with all the wrinkles that usually mean he has been thinking really hard about the project we've been working on.

Peepers got a session working with the sisal rope perch. I had one session before this one (I think I wrote about it here already), but I hadn't done anything with it since, besides keeping it near a bowl of strawberries to keep Peepers away from them. Anyway, the plan was to work the same way again, asking Peepers to do other things near the perch. He relaxed so quickly that I decided to try and ask for direct interaction with the perch. Peepers was a star, and by the end of the session was stepping up onto the perch and staying there to eat his almonds. I taped this one, and it is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuuvNDYmsCc

So my plan now is to do a few sends and recalls to and from the sisal perch, then add in the red perch and go back and forth. Then, we get to add in hoops to fly through. This is starting to get fun :)

trying to get back into the routine

Well, it's been a coupla days, but I swear I have a good excuse. I took in a large dog who is a bit of a high maintenance dog. He has fairly major orthopedic issues, and also is a bit of a picky eater, probably because many foods make him ill. AND my dogs hate him. So I've been really busy trying to find a good management routine for all of us. It's kept me busy, so the dogs haven't gotten any training at all.

But, I did play with Peepers and Sparky a bit today. Joe managed to cover another PVC perch I have with sisal rope, so I thought I would see how Peepers reacted to it. He was really scared of it, so I decided to work with him like I had planned on with the red perch - just ask him to do tricks in the same general vicinity as the perch. He managed to wave with either foot and to target while he was on one corner of the kitchen island and the perch was on the other. That was asking a lot, so my plan is to video these sessions, because I think there's a lot of potential good learning that will happen with this perch.

Sparky did a few recalls, but wasn't as excited about training as she had been before our little 2 day break. I guess I need to make sure she gets her time every day just to keep her enthusiasm up.