Yes, at long last I have managed to drag myself from the depths of indolence to write up some of the stuff I am trying to do with my Poppy! As some of you will know, she is prone to drop the dummy to shake on retrieves from water. Not her fault; we trained it incorrectly to begin with, never realizing that at a later date we would want her to deliver the dummy to hand before shaking, but dropping the dummy to shake is a disqualifying fault in working tests. I have tried all sorts of things - running away when she brings in the dummy; standing close to the water to take the dummy off her so she doesn't have a chance to shake; getting INTO the water with her; holding a bag with bits of cheese in my hand... It all worked some of the time, but not always. Just recently I went to a one-hour training session with Poppy and a friend and her dog, purely to do some water retrieves. The trainer said he thought I put Poppy under a lot of pressure, that my body language became very tense when I was waiting for her to come in. I was shocked; honestly I thought I was being calm about it. He had a suggestion - that just as she was starting to get out of the water, I should throw another dummy right behind me. This took her attention off me; she held the first dummy and I was able to take it from her without her dropping it to shake. Then she ran to get the second dummy. I have been practising this a lot recently - it's been very hot here so water retrieves have been a pleasure! It is working well. We have progressed now so that I don't have to throw the second dummy behind me; I just have to hold it in my hand and she will bring the first dummy right to me and deliver it, then she gets the second dummy, then I take it back from her, I give the cue to 'shake', after which she gets the second dummy again to hold. Brilliant. I am just a bit confused as to where to go from here - obviously I have to fade the reward out... but I am not sure how to fade out giving a dummy as a reward! Any suggestions? Oh, and here's a photo of my lovely girl - the only dog I know who wags her tail while swimming!
Hi Karen, This is way beyond anything we do so this is an untested suggestion! Can you reduce the frequency of the dummy reward? So, dummy reward 9/10 then not on the tenth. Then after a while reduce to 8/10 and so on.
Hi Uncle Bob, thanks for the suggestion. The trouble is that at the moment, where she will still drop the dummy on maybe one retrieve out of 10, NOT getting the dummy is my only way of showing her that she hasn't done what I wanted. I am trying not to use any form of aversive, so in other words I am trying not to say 'ah ah' when she shakes or drops the dummy.
Do you use a clicker? If you do, couldn't you just gradually extend the time until the click and the treat is either the second dummy, or something else she values?
No, I've never used a clicker. Also to be honest I'm not sure I could manage a clicker as well as two dummies...
What about Uncle Bob's suggestion but instead of not giving her the 2nd dummy on the tenth retrieve give her a food reward. Very special tasty ones at first obviously. Then reduce dummy increase food until all food.
I think a clicker or marker word is probably a good idea because at the moment, the way you've described it you're bribing her rather than rewarding. Fully prepared to be wrong about that though If you have something that marks the correct behaviour the absence of the marker will tell Poppy she needs to try again....
Also I tried something similar with Obi when he was running around but I reached a point where if I didn't have the dummy in view it didn't work. I decided at that point I was bribing him and tried a hand touch instead which has worked well. Can you take the dummy out of the equation and do recall across water followed by some behaviour without a shake unless cued? Or is that no problem?
Sorry been thinking more......you could go from 2nd dummy already in view to 2nd dummy appearing out of pocket to hand in pocket to hand near pocket to no hand movement until 1st dummy delivered? That would change the lure of the retrieve into a proper reward which you could then fade?...... Also can you use one of the little bomb dummies or a ball so it's not so obvious whether or not it's in your hand? A bit like when you pretend to hold a treat within a hand motion as you change from lure to reward.
Ok yes, this is EXACTLY the kind of thing I was looking for. Swimming back to me and coming in without shaking - I've never tried that but instinctively I think it wouldn't be a problem (unless she had water in her ears). I just don't think I could be exact enough with the clicker, as neither she nor I have ever trained with it. But gradually fading out the reward as you have described, Barbara, - I can see that working for me. I'll give it a go over the next few weeks. Many thanks!
Cool..... good luck! Interestingly Claire Raymond popped a video up on the Positive Gundogs page of a water retrieve and she broke her retrieve up into its component parts which included recalling across the water. I believe for the purpose of getting a straight line without a dummy but I would be tempted to double check I had a straight line + something + shake on cue to build the memory banks. It might also help you learn to relax as there's no retrieve involved....although that may be why it wouldn't be a problem
We're training on a small river tomorrow (actually with cold game) - I'll give the 'recall across water without a dummy' a go before we start. Thanks for the tip
Dreadful training session with cold game today - Pops was terribly over-excited and completely hyped up. She did deliver to hand most of the time, but apart from that I am now having a crisis of confidence and thinking we should take a step back from cold game. We practiced a walk-up, and it was just too much excitement for her. Aargh, feel I have done more harm than good today The actual exam (which uses cold game for searching, tracking and retrieving) is on 25 September. It's a full-day program, with a maximum of five dogs. We have one more training session this weekend, then I will make the decision whether to go on with it, or whether to withdraw and maybe try at a later date.
Take your lovely dog for a nice walk and some deep breaths You won't have broken your red ribbon girl you've had a tough day is all. The hundreds and hundreds of hours you've put it don't disappear in one bad session. A little light training before the weekend and then make your decision. It will be a shame to miss the exam but not the end of the world. You still have three weeks too.....you can do a lot in that time if you want to. you'll both be fine I totally believe that
Also the thought of taking a step back from cold game doesn't denote a crisis of confidence just an acceptance that some stages are a little forwards, a little back and that it's not a race. If I had a pound every time we went back a step
Sorry , I don't usually post on the training threads, but I felt your upset Karen . Please don't beat yourself up , we all have those days when things just go wrong, no real reason or rhyme to it , it just happens . Deep breath , tomorrow is another day, keep the faith x
Karen you've never been wrong before when you've wobbled over whether you were ready for entering something so it will be ok.....next session will be better and you will be back on track by the date of your exam x
Thank you all so much for your support, I really appreciate it. As suggested we went for a lovely walk this evening and I spent some time ruminating on what a lovely little dog she is... So she gets a bit excited around cold game, that's not surprising really... We'll just take it slowly and see what happens. Thanks again xx
Yay! Poppy training post! The throw a dummy as a distraction so you get a good delivery is something I've used A LOT with Charlie (your coming out of the water problem) and I did exactly as Barbara suggested. No water involved, but Charlie would only deliver for a dummy reward so dummy - delivery - dummy - delivery....inch by inch, and split second by split second I moved the second dummy to be behind my back. Then a pause, then another second.....it worked. Eventually.....
