Progressing jumping foundation - progressive grid

With the weather it has thrown some challenges in creativity in keeping the guys entertained. However, we managed yesterday to try out the progressive grid. There is no height involved, my brief interpretation is that it is about helping dogs to judge distance and drive through the progression, working on extension and looking for fluidity/confidence/understanding of task in how they approach the grid. One of the things I really like how Salo breaks the tasks down and all the positive aspects. This I find really useful as we do not have a horsey background and sure we can look at agility courses and think that seems about right. But I have often lamented if only we could convey the information to dogs about jumping, then Salo goes and does it - well cool. It is the stuff that makes it a well honed skill rather that 'crikey, how did my dog do that?'.

Another beautiful thing is Rivi, adores doing the exercises this weekend and does them just great, she actually comes up with a toy and is like 'my turn', which is really gratifying, all the others do it, but with Rivi she did it before she was hormonal, and then that 'me,me' behaviour has not resurfaced until this weekend. Woohooo, way to go Rivi.

It was really interesting with Zev, he was like the facilitators are in my way and knocked a couple, bearing in mind these are 4 inches high, I was like 'bugger', so scoope up the toy. His toy focus is terrific, but he can be 'my toy, right now'. And his little face, he was so shocked at no toy. I felt bad, but I have learnt with my guys that they are so used to being rewarded, a non-reward is a very strong signal. Blimey!!! So set him up again, this time his leg touched one and he actually turned around a looked, so set it up again. He did it, and we worked on smoothness ensuring that he would be successful and that he was learning the task. We were all quite worn out as it is so intense and you have to really concentrate watching strides and deciding to adjust and use the additional stride bumper if required. I wished we had it on video, to show, but you will just have to take our word that it was a really productive session and taught us and the guys an awful lot.

I must admit, I was sceptical about getting this DVD, has I received one last Christmas about control in agility by someone else and it was not good. But I am so glad I did with this Salo one, it has taught me alot, and challenged my thinking 'Yep, it made me think!', and I love the positivity. Now looking forward to spring, so that these excercises can be incorporated regularly into the guys and our training.

January 09 Agility Foundation Training

Blimey, we did this bit of training on Sunday, based on the Salo Jumping DVD and trying to get the video together has been a learning curve indeed, especially the audio, and editing out the playing otherwise the video would have lasted about 20 minutes. Far to Long. Then I wanted to get rid of noise. I talk far too much ha ha. Then I thought yaah, lets put some music with it, only my song of choice has copy right issues. Boohoo.
The training was really interesting and we did the excercises, to really try and gain an impression of how they guys moved. If you are interested in how dogs move, you will see that they are all very different. Rivi, i thought was the most at ease along with little Mr Big. Who very much has the attitude, "anything they can do, I CAN". Raz, puts so much effort into it and for a massively powerful dog he adjusted his stride really well. Wing's looks awkward, but this I think stems but to her initial training before she was rehomed to us. It took her a long time to understand we have a chilled training approach and confidence/attitude is key. When you do different stuff, she takes a little while to go 'oh, i get it, this is a good thing' Zev's end of contact training is awesome to me, as you can directly see the difference with him and Rivi. He has done this contact board 3 sessions, yep that was he third session. He has generalised his targeting and release cues. His attitude, is "yeah, me me, my turn NOW" I love it. Rivi, the darling girl is gradually coming back into training, she is so much happier again. My happyoli, long may it continue! :-)