Rottweilers Ate My Laptop

Rottweilers. Computers. Cameras. World Domination. Not necessarily in that order.

Rottweilers.
Computers. Cameras.
World Domination.
Not necessarily in that order.

Freya: class notes 2/6/10

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Although there was some progress made toward fixing crooked sits and sloppy turns, this was not one of our better pre-trial review sessions. This was the last run-through of the day, and you can see that Freya is beginning to shut down a bit.

Strangely enough, this less-than-stellar practice session was followed the next day by one of our best trial performances: a score of 208 and 1st place in the Level 1 “A” division. The next trial run later on Sunday resulted in a NQ, though, so I’m not quite sure what the moral of the story might be.

Maybe it’s just that I need to figure out the best way to do the last-minute practices and to handle the downtime between trials. Are the day-before last minute practices more helpful or stressful? So far, they seem to be more helpful, but maybe I should lessen the number of run-throughs. Should I do more or less warm-up between trials, and how soon before showtime for the second trial? That one isn’t quite so obvious.

As always, you can see more videos of Freya, her classmates, and other dogs-in-training on Allan’s YouTube channel.

(NaBloPoMo | February ’10: 14 of 28)

New title for Freya!

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As most of you know, Freya earned the first two legs towards her APDT Rally Obedience Level 1 title on January 24. I am very proud to announce that we completed the title at today’s first trial at Flying Paws Dog Training Club… with a score of 208 points (out of 210 possible points, 200 plus a 10-point optional bonus exercise) and first place in Level 1A! Since all three of our Level 1A scores were 190 points or better, we will also receive an Award of Excellence.

So Freya is now URO1 Sciroco’s Freya vom Viersen RL1 (AOE), CGC, TT!

Although we brought our “A” game to Trial 1, we did not fare so well at Trial 2 and NQ’d when Freya got up from a Down on the Halt-Sit-Down-Walk Around. Even though she was very distracted during this run, she is usually very solid on the stays for the Walk Around exercises so it was not only a disappointment, but an unwelcome surprise. The run was not great, but it would have otherwise given us a qualifying score. So, sadly, we do not yet have any of the 10 legs needed for the RL1X title.

The next APDT trial within easy driving distance won’t be until the beginning of May. There are some UKC trials coming up in March and April, so we need to learn the rest of the Level 2 exercises and get more practice working off leash. The other option would be to work on the AKC Rally Novice title. But since AKC trials are plentiful as compared to APDT and UKC trials, it seems to make more sense to work on the RN during the months that no APDT and UKC trials are available. Decisions, decisions!

(NaBloPoMo | February ’10: 7 of 28)

Freya: class notes 1/23/10

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Since most of our classmates were at the first day of For Your Canine’s APDT trials on January 23, Freya and I basically got a private lesson that day to help us prepare for the following day’s trials. Allan set up a practice course for us designed by one of the judges that I’d be trialing under on Sunday. I was able to view this video to identify areas to work on before doing another run-through. Allan posted a video of that run-through to his blog.

No course map today since it was a course used in an actual trial for which I did not get permission to publicly post.

Start: I still want to get better attention from Freya at the start. She does now seem to know that we ain’t goin’ nowhere until she makes eye contact with me. Our next run started off with better attention.

25. Spiral Right – Dog Outside. She’s lagging, partly because she’s not paying full attention to me, and partly because I’m not being interesting enough nor am I giving her enough cues to stay with me. Our teamwork is much better in the next run.

8. Left Turn, 13. 360-Degree Right Turn. I’m surprised we don’t lose more points on turns in trials. We did a little better in the next run.

2. Halt-Sit-Stand. Freya has never had a pretty stand. I would like to be able to stand her with a verbal command alone and will work toward that. She does not move around much which is an improvement.

20. Fast Pace, 21. Normal Pace. Still need to work on making pace changes more noticeable. Varying the length, even more so than the speed, of my own steps seems to be the key.

17. Call Front, Finish Right. Slow and crooked sit. Sits seem to be the current problem area. On the next run, I gave her both verbal and signal cues to help her sit quickly and in the correct place.

11. 270-Degree Right Turn, 10. About “U” Turn. See above; we really have to work on polishing our turns.

23. Halt – 90 Degree Pivot Right – Halt + 5. Halt – Sit – Walk Around. This is something that I believe exists only in APDT Rally. Signs can be “married” as in this example. The ending Halt with Sit of sign 23 is used as the beginning Halt-Sit of sign 5; it is not performed again. So the sequence is Halt with Sit – 90 Degree Pivot Right where dog moves with handler – Halt with Sit – handler Walk Around dog. We did ok.

13. 360-Degree Right Turn. See previous comments on turns.

28. Halt – Turn Right – 1 Step – Halt + 3. Halt – Sit – Down. Another set of “married” signs. I want to phase out the excessive body English for the Down signal, but Freya’s Down has not been too consistent, so I will stick with a firm tone and exaggerated signal for now.

9. About Turn Right, 14. 360-Degree Left Turn, 8. Left Turn, 10. About “U” Turn. See previous comments on turns.

Bonus: Exercise 1. Halt – Leave Dog – Call To Heel. This is one of our better bonus exercises, but could use some polishing. I’d like her to come in closer and straighter.

This is the first session where I switched to a 4-foot leash. I found it helped me greatly in keeping a loose leash. Even when I tied knots in my 6-foot leash, I found myself folding it too short or grabbing it too short and below the knots. It may not have been the greatest idea in general to switch leashes the day before a trial, but in terms of avoiding point losses for tight leash, it was very successful.

As always, you can see more videos of our rally obedience classmates, as well as Allan’s other training clients, on his YouTube channel.

(NaBloPoMo | February ’10: 3 of 28)

What would Jake do?

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Note to self: If you do “Save Draft” and not “Publish,” then no one gets to see what you write. Not that it would always be a bad thing, but, yeah.

I was deciding whether to post Freya’s Saturday class video and commentary, or write a little more about Sunday’s trial. But for some reason I am thinking about Jake, mostly because APDT Rally Obedience encourages disabled dogs and handlers to participate and goes as far as allowing certain exercise modifications so that they may do so safely and successfully. I think this is absolutely wonderful.

Jake has been gone for over seven years now, but he was one of my heart dogs so he is never far from my thoughts. He was an amputee due to accident, which is what took my post in this direction. Only a few of you who visit me here probably remember him in real life, but you can read what I wrote about him about a year ago.

Although the APDT and rally obedience were both in existence during Jake’s lifetime, I didn’t know much about either one until later. After he had recovered fully from the amputation surgery, my challenge was to keep this active dog busy and happy, or at least out of trouble. Since Schutzhund competition involves a 1-meter jump and an A-frame, it was not something we could easily return to. So I just started to look around for things we could do, and titles we could achieve.

All AKC titles were then, and still are now, off the table for disabled dogs. The Canine Good Citizen test was a possibility. In 1998, the CGC guidelines which encouraged participation for disabled handlers were already in existence. The guidelines that now exist, welcoming disabled dogs to participate, did not exist at that time. There were more than a few clubs that chose to defer to the AKC show rules which referred to disqualification of dogs who appeared lame. It took way more phone calls and emails than I ever imagined to get a club to allow Jake to test. And then he failed his first attempt. He did pass on a later attempt, even though at heart he was more outlaw than good citizen.

I don’t even have to look up the names of the people who helped me in my quest: Mary Burch from the AKC, and Tammy Dean from Glenbard All Breed Obedience Club. I like to think we are all part of the reason that the CGC evaluator guidelines now specifically state:

Dogs with disabilities such as the loss of a leg, deafness, or blindness in one eye are welcome in the Canine Good Citizen Test. Dogs must perform all of the 10 items to pass the test, however, handlers may use hand signals, gestures, or other cues to which the dog has been trained to respond.

Anyway. He also got a doctor’s note to be allowed to take ATTS’s Temperament Test, which he passed with flying colors despite his outlaw leanings. I was not even their volunteer webmaster yet at the time.

Back then, UKC specifically allowed disabled dogs to participate in obedience competitions. I went so far as to register him with UKC, but since their CD, unlike the AKC CD, involved a jump, I decided not to put him through it. For the rest of his life, we got out to club and as much obedience and protection training as he could handle.

Titles aren’t important… yet, they are. I would have so loved to do Rally with him. He was truly my best working partner and we would have had a lot of fun with it. Miss you, Jakey. I hope you are proud of me and Freya.

(NaBloPoMo | January ’10: 25 of 31)

First APDT Rally-O legs for Freya!

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I’m happy to report that Freya qualified and placed in both trials at For Your Canine today to earn the first two legs towards her APDT Rally Obedience Level 1 title!

Freya’s score for the first trial was 201 points (out of 210 possible points, 200 plus a 10-point optional bonus exercise) for third place. Her score for the second trial was 192 points (we totally blew the bonus exercise) for fourth place. We need one more leg to earn the title, and our next trial is in two weeks. It’s possible that we could even earn the title with an Award of Excellence if we can get that third leg with a score of 190 points or better. I just hope we both bring our “A” games to the next trial!

We are both way more tired than we should be, considering that total time in the ring is approximately two minutes per trial. In our defense, the day did start very early, especially since I stupidly didn’t set up the van and crates last night, but I think we are just getting old!

More details sometime in the next few days and possibly video, too!

(NaBloPoMo | January ’10: 24 of 31)