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  1. #1
    Senior Dog TuMicks's Avatar
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    Now for something completely simple-minded...

    So, I've been at mom's in another city for 6 days. Rocket Dog was on the pro's truck/kennel so she got training while I was away. However, the training group cannot get together today and so I was on my own.

    I am new to this whole "drill" thing. To be honest, after our dogs are through with transition... boom... all the training occurs in the field. I'm not gainsaying the approach because there are some splendid dogs on that truck who are totally capable of going to the MN this year. And there are some senior dogs who are coming along just great. But the drills, in my view are as much for me as they are for Rocket Dog.

    So today was Sesame Street for retrievers. If we were going to name it, it would be called the Piece-o-Cake Drill. I'm almost embarrassed it was so simple.

    -piece-cake-drill-jpg

    White flags. White bumpers. I wanted it to be as easy as possible... to start with. We are lining up behind the white gutters. After putting everything out, I returned to the line and realized it was a very, very tight arrangement. But, the park has that narrow waist, so...

    What I learned today: I totally got a good look at her "I'm-on-this-like-ugly-on-ape" expression and body posture. In the field, I have been unable to determine what she was telling me. So she locked onto the center flag... fine, I sent her. Then she wouldn't "unlock" and look at the flag on the right. So we walked out to it, showed her what/where it was... went back... then, no problem. That fine line turned out to be quite useful since I was able to interpret some very small shifts in her eyes/head/spine.

    So that was our 30 minute training session (including set up.) It was worth that amount of time, I think.

  2. #2
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    Looks much like the 3 leg set up we do. Once the dog has the line to those three ingrained we start to stop and handle from pile to pile. Helps with getting a cast at distance. Then we put in the diversions. Start with a mannequin that the dog has to run past to get to the pile, have someone go out and through a mark, then a bull dog and then a poison. Throw away from the line, throw towards the line and then throw over the line. If you are alone you can sit the dog and go out and throw these marks yourself. That is what I will be doing next with M. We have reviewed the 3 legs and now are working on a chinc with 7 piles out. Today we ran the set up twice , we worked left to right first as this gradually turned us into the wind. After a rest we ran it from right to left, which put the first 3 pile directly into the wind. You sure could see the difference, M did not like running directly into the wind. She also was snotty about wanting to run back to the 2 short outside piles. I got some good handling in. With drills it is teaching so there are very few collar corrections. Like you it was show me what you want, use some attrition and move up a little so the 2 outsides weren't so prominent.
    Our weather has been all over the place so we are grabbing time when the rain has stopped. Tomorrow rain and maybe snow on Sunday.
    Getting plans underway to host our picnic FT trail/hunt test on the 17th.

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    TuMicks (03-30-2016)

  4. #3
    Senior Dog TuMicks's Avatar
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    I'm taking notes Anna!

    I THINK we will be back in the field tomorrow, but that doesn't mean I can't review this with her, stretch her out some, add another pile. The park is very close to our house.

  5. #4
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    You can put short piles out to the left and right and then longer piles between the others. It may be tight but it will teach her to fine line. If she drifts towards the wrong pile simply handler her to the one you want. We used to put this pattern out at demonstrations using a different colour at each pile. We would ask a child to pick a colour, have them tell the dog the colour and then help the child line and handle the dog to their colour. They thought our dogs were really smart and knew their colours.

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    TuMicks (03-30-2016)

 



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