Some Training Thoughts

I dusted off my video camera a couple of days ago to film my efforts with Belle on working turn and forward, turn and reverse through my legs and reverse weaves.  The edited video is below.  Ilona Wright, who is conducting this month's workshop on backing, pointed out that at that at :45 seconds I bring out the lure after Belle has failed several times to respond to my touch command.  Somehow in my readings, I managed to miss the instruction to never, ever do this since you are basically rewarding a behavior you don't want.  (You are also confusing your dog as to what the verbal actually means.)

Ilona's advice is to break off what you're working on for 10 seconds or so, and then work on the behavior that your dog is not performing.  In this case, I was trying to get Belle to walk backwards between my legs and remain lined up with my knees, but she was backing up faster than I could.  I wanted her touch my hand and back up, but that didn't work too well, so I put a cookie in my hand to keep her in place.  That probably would have been fine if I had done it as a first step, but I didn't.  I tried to use a cue that Belle doesn't respond to all that well (despite the fact that it is one of the very first ones I ever taught her) and after that didn't work, I hauled out the lure.

We are working on complicated behaviors.  It is my job to break them down into pieces that Belle can learn.  She is the final arbiter of whether or not I have done my job well.  I she doesn't execute my command, either I have failed to motivate her or I have failed to teach her what the command means.  Since Belle is a very motivated dog, it is normally the latter.

 

November Is Backing Month

November is being devoted to backing on the MDSA Seminar list.

Here are the important points I came away with:

1.  If your dog's rear end is flaring away from you when the two of you back up (dog at side or heel), work on having the dog go from a sit to a stand at your side.  When your dog is consistently moving into a stand that is parallel to you, you can move on to the next step. 

Have your dog stand, then give her a back cue or command, then take one small step backwards.  Practice this until the two of you nail it before adding a second step.

2.  To help your dog back straight away from you, place a target mat on the floor and backchain the behavior.

3.  Train your dog to stand between your legs and be comfortable there.  (I did this ages ago by having Belle do it before I put down her food dish.)  Once the dog is comfortable, you can work on backing up, turning, or moving forward with the dog between your legs.

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I was being pretty diligent about spending a little time each day working on backing with Belle and Dusty.  Then a couple of days ago, I wanted to demonstrate how to stand when teaching reverse weaves.  Belle did fine starting from my left, but when we tried it starting from my right side, we encountered difficulties.  Mainly, I had a very hard time getting her to align herself in a straight line and close to me.  Time to get serious about my criteria for heel and side (heel position at my right side).

I  decided I would use meal time to reinforce the two positions.  I found that when I used a platform, Belle had no problem bringing her rear end in line.  After working on it for three meals, I can see she is much improved even without the platform.  Interestingly, both Dusty and Libby assume a much straighter "heel" position than Belle despite the fact that I don't work with them nearly as much.  Go figure.

Fanny Gott

I'm back from NYC and finally enrolled in Fanny Gott's Heeling Class as an auditor.  I was really surprised to find that of the three Aussies, Belle is most in need of the practice.  I noticed a couple of months ago when watching video of us practicing freestyle that she was rather focused on my hands.  That struck me as so strange since she has been so successful in agility.  I guess the difference between the Aussies is that Libby and I did obedience together when she was younger and Dusty is unfortunately way too obsessed with me.

I can see that I will be employing Fanny's technique of moving backward while the dog is standing with her left shoulder at your left side (or right shoulder at your right side) for a while.  It is also a technique I will be using with my 4H'ers come clinic time.

The platform work that Fanny demonstrates for her class is also very impressive.  It seems to be an excellent way to teach a dog where heel is.

October 4, 2012

I must confess that journeling is not my strong suite.  However, I have been working with Belle a couple of times a day, and I try to work with Dusty at least once a day.  Lately, I've been working a little bit with Libby so she doesn't feel left out and with Max because he is getting to be a very senior dog and will benefit from some gentle exercise.

I finally purchased an FitPaw Peanut, and try to work out the Aussies every other day at breakfast time.  I fear that Max (my elderly Airedale) will never be able to get on the peanut, but I've been encouraging him to put his front legs up on it to strengthen his core and hind leg muscles.

Fanny Gott is doing an on-line heeling workshop this month.  I emailed her to find out how long the material will be available since I will flying to NYC next week, and can't really begin until I come back.

Shortening Music with Audacity

Yesterday, I received Sandra Davis’ three disc “Dancing with Your Dog.”  On the second disc, she details how she cuts her music to a useable length.  Then showed a routine that she did with one of her dogs using the music she had shortened.  I’m afraid the cut she made left a lot to be desired, so I thought I’d share how I shorten our music.

I use a freeware program called Audacity which displays your song as wave tracks.  I haven’t coded a song yet as Sandra Davis does, but I suspect it would probably save time in the long run.  I just listen to the song over and over to identify areas where it repeats.  I just figured out how to add labels on a separate track so I can easily re-locate spots that I might want to edit out.  Here is how I worked on “Rockin Robin” sung by Chuck Barry.

I listened a whole lot of times to the song, which is 2:34 long.  I’d like to cut it to about 1:45 and there appear to be three possibilities for shortening this song:  Remove one or both of the two “instrumental only” bits and/or chop out a continuous section and try to have the music and lyrics still make sense.  With a song that has a repeat or a chorus, the second option is a very viable option as long as there is not key change between the two sections. 

 

I opened Audacity and selected the song I want to work on from my music library.

Since removing one section is easier than removing two, I started with the second option.  “Bless my soul, he out-bopped the buzzard and the oriole” occurs twice.  So with a little luck, I might be able to cut out all the stuff in between them.  In the screen shot below, I’ve marked the section between the first and second “oriole.” 

  

The oriole to oriole section is about 34 seconds long.  That would make my edited version about 2:00 minutes long, which is 15 seconds short of my goal.  Hmm.  If I want to stick with my target length, then I will also have to cut one of the instrumentals.  I labeled the longer instrumental section in the screen shot below.  It is about 18 seconds in length.  I had to zoom into the tracks to select the beginning of the this instrumental because Mr. Barry leads into it with a loud and drawn out “Ohhhh” and all traces of that will have to be cut to ensure a smooth transition between the spliced sections of the song.

Now that I have a rough idea of what I want to edit out of this song, it’s time to do the actual cutting.  I'll start with the longer section first (oriole to oriole).  I make a selection of what to cut by ear and simply cut it out and listen to the result.  With any luck, I will cut a little less than needs to actually be removed from the song.  If not, I undo the cut and select a slightly smaller section to cut.  Once I have made a cut that leaves a second or so of extra stuff, I zoom in on where I have made the cut.  It is important to leave a little more than you want because removing it is a whole lot easier than trying to put a little bit back in.  

In the screen shot above, I have made the best rough cut I could, I and will be zooming in on the darkened section of the two tracks to do some fine tuning.  The vertical line on the left side of the oriole to oriole label shows where the two split portions of the song meet.

Here is the section I want to fine tune.  I have really zoomed in on the tracks and less than two seconds of playing time is visible.  There is an annoying echo effect that I suspected was coming from the low amplitude wave between the more massive groupings of waves—just above and to the right of the line on the label track that marks where the two pieces are spliced.  However, trial and error showed me I was wrong. (I’m hoping with experience I will get better at reading the soundtracks, and the whole editing process will become a little less of a hit or miss thing.:-)  The two wave forms connected by the low amplitude wave are very similar in shape, and due to the zoom effect appear to last much longer in time than they actually do.  After listening to the effect of cutting out different little segments, I finally tried removing the first big waveform (which is in the gray zone in the screen shot below), and voila.  Once it was removed, the transition between the two pieces was super smooth, and undetectable by my ear. 

Listen to the two clips and you will hear the difference:

My song is now about 1:59 seconds long in actual playing time.  I will add three seconds of silence at the beginning so I can start my music and have three seconds to set up with my dog when I’m working alone.  I could stick with my original plan and cut out the long instrumental also, but I like the change of pace the instrumental section adds, so for now I’ll leave it in and work with two minutes of music instead of 1:45.

I hope you found this information helpful.

P.S.  10/16/2012.  I found a blogger who describes how to use the draw tool in Audacity to eliminate clipping when you delete a section of your music.

Rockin' Robin and The Magic of the Match

I chose "Rockin Robin" as this month's project.  After trying my utmost on the 13th, I was forced to admit that this was just not a good choice for Belle.  It's known as the "magic of the match," and this song is definitely not it for Belle.  I tried one more time today, and I also tried with Dusty.  Although Dusty is much, much rougher around the edges, this song is clearly much more suited to him.

09/11/2012 – I cut “Rockin Robin” down to about 2 minutes and filmed our efforts.

The most notable thing I saw was Belle’s confusion when I wanted her to spin or twirl.  I have to put these two on a verbal so that Belle doesn’t confuse the hand signal with verse or up.

Also, 2 minutes is an incredibly long time to keep moving.

09/13/2012 – Cut “Rockin Robin” to 1:34.  Much better length. 

Forgot to do any backing up with Belle.  Duh.

I had Belle run thru my legs when I brought her back to me after doing big circle around me.  I could have also had her jump through my arms.

Didn’t put much action into either lower corner.

After the roll at the end, I should have had Belle slap me 10.

Work on having Belle start off when I do instead of hesitating and falling behind.

I was tense in the beginning and we were herky jerky.  At about :58, I relaxed and the performance became much smoother.

August 16, 2012

I split the first part of HH into two 35 second pieces, and tried to begin choreographing it with Belle at my side.  I quickly discovered that out in the field, she does not begin when I move.

I gave it some thought, and decided I will teach her a new cue, V or vite, which will signify she is supposed to leap into action.

Other observations from today's video:

Have a toy in my hand when we walk out to take our place.  Without it, Belle's attention is everywhere but on me.  Hopefully, she will eventually find as much joy in FS as she does in agility.

If I'm going to fiddle with the Walkman, I should put Belle into a settle instead of just leaving her hanging until she drifts away.

We need to work on getting a bow as we stop.  Belle goes into a down for some reason.

Rather than following up a couple of Fontaines with a jump through my arms, I think it would look better to have Belle move around to my other side by either moving in front of me.  Another idea would be for her to back around to my other side and then we start backing and moving forward with her in that position.

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Last night I worked on getting Belle to reverse weave using the method Carolyn Scott demonstrates at the end of her Canine Freestyle video.  I was able to get her to move backwards through my leg starting on my left side, but it was very difficult to get her to stay close enough to me to back through my legs when she started on my right side.

This morning, I introduced Dusty to the idea of backing around me.  I used the corner method, but I had to add a chair to form a third side on the box.

Beginning to Choreograph

I went out this morning to lay out a working space that meets MSDA requirements, which are 40x50 with the longer measurement being the front and back of the ring.  I thought the space I had already delineated would have to be cut down.  Oh, so wrong was I.  My old space was about 40x30.

Once I had the new space marked, I began the interesting task of trying to set the camera so that the entire space could be seen without panning.  Should be easy enough, but in the bright sunshine on the tiny screen of my Kodak Playsport, it is impossible to see the markers.  I finally had to run the camera and walk the front boundary of the space.  I found I still had to move my camera back a little more.

Now to start choreographing.  I chose "Heranando's Hideaway" since it will work for both dogs.  I went out sans dog, cued the camera and started to dance.  Since my neighbors can't hear the music, they must think I've absolutely flipped out.  I was originally planning to work a little with each dog, but by the time I finished moving through the song once, I was too tired to do any training.  I can't believe how much more exhausting it was to move through a larger space.  I would have thought if anything it would have been easier.

If you draw a line through the space from the back left marker to the right front marker, I have noticed that I hardly enter the space on the right while dancing.  I tried to compensate for that this morning by beginning the routine in the back right corner.  Now to see how I did.

I watched the tape.  I did a good job of covering the back half of the space, but failed to utilize the front.  Also, I think I failed to use big stretches at a time, i.e., my moves seemed to occur in small areas.  Actually, I watched the video again.  The front markers are off-screen.  I think I did use the front of the ring also, but I have to make sure the front markers are in frame.  I'll make sure to use the cones in front and the jump standards at the back from now on.  Also, I think the music suited itself to working in quadrants as opposed to covering the entire field with a single move.

August 12, 2012

This morning, I decided to work a little bit of heeling with each dog before running the agility course I had set up.  With Belle, a little bit turned out to be much too long (about six minutes).  However, I discovered that although she is looking up, she is not looking at my face.  She is looking at my hand.  RX:  Make sure Belle is looking at my face before we take our first step.

Dusty, of course, stares at me intently.  Has nothing to do with my ability as a trainer and everything to do with the fact he is too focused on me.  We have to work on getting Dusty’s rear to not flare out to the side when he is looking up.

August 9, 2012

My mpg speaker arrived yesterday, and I tried it out today.  I used march music for both Belle and Dusty, but I ended up dubbing in the theme from Rawhide for Belle’s first session.

The MSDA Seminar group is working on heeling and attention this month, and when I went out that is what I fully intended to work on.  However, I ended up working each dog for too long and had to throw in some spins and such to reward them for the heelwork.

Points to Remember:

Keep pure heeling practice short and intense.  30-60seconds

Belle lags when we go slow.

Dusty doesn’t quite get spin and twirl when we are moving.  I must remember to keep my hand lower for him.

Dusty's rear flares out walking on either side of me; Belle's only flares out when she is on my right.

 

Have to mark all four corners so I don’t go off-camera.

Heeling and Focus

This morning, I decided to work a little bit of heeling with each dog before running the agility course I had set up.  With Belle, a little bit turned out to be much too long (about six minutes).  However, I discovered that although she is looking up, she is not looking at my face.  She is looking at my hand.  RX:  Make sure Belle is looking at my face before we take our first step.

Dusty, of course, stares at me intently.  Has nothing to do with my ability as a trainer and everything to do with the fact he is too focused on me.  We have to work on getting Dusty’s rear to not flare out to the side when he is looking up.

And Dusty, Too?

I’ve been working with Belle for the last few weeks on a fairly regular basis.  Since I’ve never done this before, it’s probably taking us longer to learn stuff than it would if I was taking instruction or had a syllabus to follow.  On the plus side though, I usually work/play with Belle two to four times a day for 2-5 minutes at a time.  We just work on what strikes my fancy at the moment.

I was trying to gait Dusty when it dawned on me that he would be an excellent freestyle dog, so I started working with him also.

Today, I videoed both dogs so I could try picking out some music for them.  It took Dusty almost a full minute of bouncing around before he exhibited a modicum of self-control.  I must remember to deliver food into his mouth.  If it falls on the ground it takes him forever and a day to find it.  Also, Dusty does not seem to like to bow, so we need a substitute behavior.  I think the leap into me and down might do the trick (so to speak).

When I began with Belle, I had a tug in my hand.  It was definitely much too stimulating for her.  It’s a shame her bark is so high-pitched.  My neighbors probably hate us both.

Music Choices - Belle:

I Fought the Law (I could wear an orange jump suit; Belle could wear a K-9 vest)

Respect (Harley Leathers)

Born to Be Wild

Do You Love Me

Tequilla

Music Box Dancer

Putting on the Ritz

Cracklin’ Rose – instrumental

Hot Diggitty

A Bushel and a Peck

Whipped Cream

Espana Cani

In The Mood

Rebel Rouser

Music Choices – Dusty

Heard It Through the Grapevine

Do You Love Me

Putting on The Ritz (cane prop)

You’re the One that I Want

Da Doo Ron Ron

Let’s Go Trippin - instrumental