Emily Snider shares her training notes for her new agility pup's fourth through sixth month in this continuing series.

(Read parts 1 and two of the series here and here).

These past two months have been more of the same training as before, on a smaller scale.  I have really fallen in love with Fillie and her zest for life, and have just been enjoying her company more than doing much structured training.  Now I'm thinking back on Josie's puppyhood and remembering where she and I were at this point, I realize just how different these two dogs are, and how I am adapting my training accordingly.

Felicity is hard-headed about life in general, and that makes it somewhat hard to get through her noggin and convince her that what she thinks isn't exactly what I'm looking for.  In training, however, she is somewhat soft and gets her feelings hurt when she realizes that she was not correct.  As a pup, being wrong just made Josie more determined to make it right, whereas with Fillie it's like she feels so guilty for being wrong, it takes a minute to work back up to the level of intensity of training we were at before the "oops".  Don't get me wrong, I don't correct or tell her she's wrong, I simply don't reward the wrong behavior, and restart and ask for the desired behavior again.  We have really been working through this and I think we're making great progress.  I've switched to where I only restart and ask for a different behavior instead of the one that she either did not perform, or performed incorrectly.  This keeps her from getting her feelings hurt, and keeps our training session on a more continuous level of intensity.

One of our big goals this past month was to get desired shaping behavior with a toy as a reward, just as we get with a treat as reward.  Felicity, like many drivey pups, has a harder time wrapping her brain around actually thinking when a toy is involved.  She can think and shape and offer behaviors and work through complex problems when there's a clicker and a treat, but a tuggie or disc or ball gets her into "the stance" and there's not much going on in her head besides "throwitthrowitthrowit," I imagine.  We have had a breakthrough in this and she will now offer her sits and downs with a toy offered as a reward, and she isn't frothing at the mouth and quivering, she's actually thinking about what she's doing!  Great progress!

Fillie had her first introduction to a piece of real agility equipment right around the time she turned five months old.  This is the one and only time she's seen the teeter, as since filming this the sky has been unloading buckets of wetness onto the ground and we have not been back to the muddy training field.  We still work on her going over all sorts of different surfaces and shaping all four feet on objects, just no actual obstacle work.  You can see her first introduction to the teeter here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5CSAIYYBh8 [copy the url and paste it into a new window to view].

We have also been working on any and every toy being a reward.  Fillie had a great preference for the ball when she was much younger, but I want to be able to use any toy I put my hands on as a great reward for training agility.  I always like to use a floppy disc as it's great for tugging and for throwing; it's a very versatile reward!  We had to take a big break from tugging ferociously as Fillie was teething pretty good a month ago.  I took that opportunity to introduce her to my reward of choice - the floppy Frisbee! The "get it" command I use while playing with a disc is perhaps the most useful tool I have with my dogs.  It means "Get it and bring it to me, don't be lazy and drop it over there and expect me to come to you!" It keeps me from having to fetch.  It has many applications.

Now that her teeth are all in and where they should be, we have gone back to working on tugging games and making it the most fun thing in the world to tug with me.  I'll sit in the middle of the room and she's allowed to go off and play with the tuggie on her own if she wants to, but when she brings it to me we play, play, play and have a blast.  Consequently, she spends very little time parading around with her prize; it's much more fun to play with me!  This is a very important thing for her to realize on her own, and this shaping game of "bring it to mommy" without coaxing is a great way for her to figure it out.

Swimming is a vital part of my dogs' exercise program.  It is warm enough to swim many months of the year around here and we take full advantage of that fact.  I think swimming is one of the best full body workouts a dog can get, especially remembering that it's such a low impact activity.  In preparation for a life of swimming, Felicity has been getting more and more acclimated to the water.  She is now launching herself off into semi-deep water as long as the current isn't too strong, and she is up to doing a few feet worth of swimming at this point.  She loves the water, but is just a wee bit unsure about not having any footing.  As she gets more and more acclimated to it, she becomes braver each and every time. 

Fillie is learning to swim, and she's enjoying it! Photo by Emily Snider.

The games continue...so stay tuned for the next chapter in Felicity's life!

Emily Snider has been involved with dogs since early childhood, where there was always a Golden Retriever by her side.  She now lives in the Dallas, Texas area with her three Border Collies and one Jack Russell "Terrorist".  Emily has been involved in dog agility since 2004 and funds her agility addiction by working as a Civil Engineer.

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