Thursday, January 21, 2010

Some dogs...

Make you look like a great trainer...and some dogs make you INTO a great trainer :-))

The dogs that really make you work for it are the ones that really make the training worth it :)

However...at the time it can be a hard pill to swallow when we as trainers hit a wall!

Even is a dog that makes you look good :) She figures things out quickly, and retains it and applies it immediately. She would be what many would call a "doer". Lynn is a "thinker" ANALYZE ANALYZE and then ANALYZE some more! Then take those results and ANALYZE them again :) Lynn makes me stay one step ahead of her and always will point out the faults or holes in the training....damn Lynn :)

Lynn suddenly decided not to do her running dogwalk as I had stated before. I couldn't for the life of me figure out WHY. Was it a phase, was the criteria too lose for her to grasp? Should I give up? Should I go to 2 on 2 off? What should I do?

My first thought was a break...maybe she needs time off. OR...

Maybe I am doing it all wrong, maybe I am going too fast, maybe I am being to much of a perfectionist....so many maybe's, what if's and what happened going through my head.

But I settled on a break...So DURING that break I wanted to work on tricks with her, in addition to agility stuff other than the dogwalk.

Of course, being the insane person I am, I have my dogwalk in the house...so I thought I would just play on the flat part of the dogwalk and just do tricks to just play.

Lynn did NOT want to go on it. NOT AT ALL. Hmmmmm...seriously...could I have taught the dog a running dogwalk and NOT have her like this part!?!? REALLY? Probably mom, you are kinda special like that...
Light bulb moment...Lynn didn't think she could jump OFF the dogwalk. She felt trapped and felt that if she was thinking she might fall off, just not doing the dogwalk was easier. In her mind, she had jumped off the side and I didn't reward her, THEREFORE, jumping off was BAD and so she wouldn't do it.


SO...we spent this week learning how to jump off the dogwalk :) LOTS of treats and toys and fun jumping off the dogwalk! WOO HOO!

Today...she did her 20" dogwalk just like before, except with MORE speed and MORE confidence :) Who says the easy way is always better :)

Staying one step ahead of Lynn can be challenging, but I wouldn't have it any other way!

2 comments:

D said...

Way to go Lynn, for finally showing your owner what the problem was!!

Sare said...

Yeah for the double L's(Lynn and Loretta)they figured it out. Noone ever talks about what an adventure you'll have teaching running contacts do they.