Teaching heel

Thanks, it is me and my lack of footwork that causes Bobbys errors.

I disagree that a lured dog is not a learned dog, my dogs do learn this way. They are smart and make the connections easily. I used a lure for the go out exactly six times before Justus could do a go out, half a rings distance. The food has never had to come back to the stanchion. Lures and marking words work for me.

I cannot stand for the dog to rapidly throw behaviors at me, guessing, trying everything to earn the reward. I would not be happy. Disturbs my sense of order, I might be a bit ADD too.

We can respect each other regardless of method, for the goals are the same, we enjoy our dogs and respect them for their learning ability, and we do not use fear, pain or intimidation in teaching them.

We are off to another show and go this morning, the UKC trials are next weekend.
 
I started with luring but have never learned when and how to quit so I joined many pet owners who keep luring and luring and receive result attitude-" you got food in your hand I will work, no food- no tricks, mama":ick
While I learned few things by now and can use lure properly boys have become thinking dogs so there is rarely need. I really do not have all that throwing ADD behavior either mostly because I set up my shaping sessions with easy obvious choices, i.e. if I want my dog to pick up a pen on the table I will have only table and pen, no any other objects near.
We went long way working on reverse luring i.e. IYC, I keep my treats in my right hand when I walk backwards and only pay when dog in the position at my left hand. I take my food from right hand into the left and touch my hip before rewarding- this is pure Pavlovian trick to dissociate food location in any other place which prevents dog from forging to anticipate treat or lagging.
Fanny started her career with Morten and Cecilie from Canis/ Norway? I think/ who are pure free shapers. I heard amazing stories about that obedience school, even their basic pet folks in starter classes never use any luring and even those folks who are not "into dog training" seems to come out with amazing pets from those classes.
 
I had a disappointing day today, I'm not qualified to talk that my Justus has been lured into learning heeling. Today he lost focus and moved away on the left turn, had to pat my leg to get him back... it was our first experience in choosing not to heel, so I've got lots to do and think about. I don't use pops or compulsion, have to break out the clicker .... I had a bad day. Bobby however held the sit stay! Good boy!
 
Open the drawer, put that experience in and close that drawer. Done and over with.
Did you tape that run? What you liked about Justus work today?
 
I tie them to my leg. Really. Buckle collar right under my knee, eight inches of rope tied to thier collar. And then off we go. When they are right, they get a click and cookie and a loose lead, when they are wrong they get self corrected back into position. You do have to be careful about walking normally, but it's also a simple transition from "on lead" to off.

I tried "choose to heel", and my dog chooses not to. It is much more fun to run around and bark, come heel three steps for cookie and then run around again. So now she does agility :smile2:
 
My biggest problem has been the sit rather than the heel - at least with Deska. I've been videoing my Rally walk throughs and found Deska is always trying to look at my face. He'll have a tight heel then swing his butt around to sit so he can see my face. I realised he wasn't doing this with target sticks and lures because he had something else to look at which was closer to his eye level. So we are working on a focal point for him at a lower level - which atm is my hand in my pocket (bit awkward on lead). Tully is an entirely different and as long as I keep very fast paced she'll stay close.

So all these various methods I teach in classes, none of them worked for us. Mind you, I find a lot of the methods I learnt to teach in companion (non-trialling) classes are much better suited for medium to large dogs. But then for a companion dog I think it's better for the handler of a small dog to have their dog sit slightly in front of them so they are easier to see.

It will be interesting to see how this all turns into practice. Rally-O only started in Australia this year and Deska is doing his first trial next weekend - but heeling is the least of our problems, he needs to stop chewing his lead, spinning and sniffing the signs too.
 
It will be interesting to see how this all turns into practice. Rally-O only started in Australia this year and Deska is doing his first trial next weekend - but heeling is the least of our problems, he needs to stop chewing his lead, spinning and sniffing the signs too.
Click to expand...

Good luck! Rally O is so much fun :smile2:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top