A couple of tests in which I want to enter Mia require a blind water entry, so I thought I’d begin with Sophie and Dakota since they’re at opposite ends of the spectrum as far as dogs are concerned. However there is a lot of preliminary work to be done before I actually get them in the water:
First, brush up on blind water entry techniques myself; there’s a variety of them and I haven’t taught this technique before, so it’s a matter of finding one that they best understand. Once I begin working with my trainer again, this is something he’ll be able to help with.
Second, refresher whistle training. About a year-and-half ago before I found a trainer to work with, I began whistle training the guys. I sent video of it to a trainer who at the time was something of a long distance mentor, and his assessment was “what the heck I thought I was doing?” End of whistle training. Last year I spoke with another trainer – one who bred, trained and tested Spinone – and it turns out that I was on the right track to begin with, however never got back to to whistle training until yesterday.
Third, casting, particularly in sending them out; they cast fairly well at short distances so I need to work on stretching them out. This may be particularly difficult for Dakota since she refuses to pick up a bumper that she hasn’t seen thrown; a child psychologist told us once that if Dakota was a child, she’d be diagnosed with autism.
Finally, once those are in place, I can begin moving their training to water – by then the ice will either have melted or I can take the training to some warm water springs in the area.
I was impressed with how well Sophie did with the stop whistle, especially when you take into consideration what little I worked with her and that being a year-and-a-half ago. Ten minutes into our training and Sophie was almost up to the level that she was the last time we worked on it. Dakota was a different story. It was understandable that she didn’t remember her training as well, but by far the greater challenge was keeping her from becoming distracted and eating poop that the neighbor’s cats have deposited around the yard. Unfortunately the battery in my helmet cam is becoming increasingly unreliable, so nothing other than my initial training with Sophie was recorded.
January 30, 2012 at 6:35 pm |
Have you tried working the sit whistle on lead? We refresh Thunder and Storm’s sit whistles next to us on lead. That way we can correct right there..slow sit, no sit. Then we stretch the distances for the sit whistle. Might help Dakota.
Good luck can’t wait to hear how it goes.
January 30, 2012 at 7:01 pm |
I started them out on a lead, then lengthened it out and finally let them drag the lead behind them. I’ll probably have to go all the way back to the lead – what I need to be careful of is not to mix the “whoa” command for the Labs with the “whoa” command for the Spins since they mean different things. If I can find some of the video I took of their initial training, I may post it.