A few weeks ago during one of our nightly (well, maybe not exactly nightly but we do try to train nearly every night) I enlisted the help of both my Mom and my Dad. Dad was choosing and holding up the Rally signs for us to work on and Mom was holding the full length mirror (big girl + very small dog means I can’t really see where she is in relation to perfect heel position without getting myself completely out of position).
As we were working my Dad made a comment,
“You know, you’re really lucky that you’ve got a dog that absolutely LOVES all this stuff.”
And she does. She absolutely LOVES training. Whether we’re doing obedience or tricks, she just really enjoys working with me. And I am lucky. To have such a drive-y dog in such a small package. A dog who will respond above and beyond my expectations. People ask me all the time “Why does she just keep staring at you? How do you get her to do that? Did you train her to keep her eyes on you at all times?” We just work that well together. We are a team.
The only thing holding us back from dominating the dog sport world is our location. There is NOTHING down here. Our nearest obedience club is more than two hours away. No one has ever heard of earthdog or canine freestyle. Sure some people enjoy throwing a ball or frisbee for their dog or teaching them to down and stay but no one wants to pursue any of that as a sport and actually compete. But I love this stuff. Thankfully so does my dog.
So yes, I am lucky to have such a ready and willing dog. And I will take her as far as I possibly can even with our current limitations. She is everything you could ever want in a performance dog. And I am very very lucky that she loves this “stuff” so much, because so do I.
Maybe it was the Hurricane. Or the fact that she’s been a total DEVIL today (more on that later). But whatever it was, Mackenzie was more ON tonight in our training than she’s been in a long time.
Because of the Hurricane, I got the day off today. Throughout the day we’ve been to my Nan’s house (my Mom’s mom), my Grandma’s house (Dad’s mom), my Aunt’s house (Mom’s sister: who is in NYC for the summer with her daughters – my cousins – and my Uncle), and various other streets to assess the damage that Dolly did.
This morning when we went to my Grandma’s houses Dad had the brainy idea to take Mackenzie. I won’t go into all the details (imagine the worst YOUR dog has ever been and multiply that by at least 3x) but needless to say, Mackenzie was horrible. I imagine it was partly our fault because we were nervous about what we would find, and while we were driving there was a lot of “OMG look at that! Look over there! What happened at that house?” and so on (remember Mackenzie is a highly reactive hunting-type dog so any mention of “LOOK WHAT’S THAT OVER THERE” gets her going). So we probably added to her being nervous and excruciatingly whiny and trying to jump out windows (I would roll down the windows to take pictures which I may or may not post in this blog).
Once we got to Nan’s house it was evident that we really should not have brought her. There was broken glass on the driveway, a horrible Basset Hound chained up across the street who barked for the entire time we were there, and TONS of bugs and mosquitoes, not to mention a lot of work for us to do.
Anyway, we cleaned up and finally made it home after threatening to leave Mackenzie on the streets with a pair of mean stray dogs who chased our car on the way to my other Grandma’s house. The rest of the day was spent at my Aunt’s house (without the dog) trying to clean up their flooded living room where my brother slipped and fell on some wet tile. So all in all it’s been an awful day.
This evening after we got home from my Aunt’s house we were sitting in the living room and Mackenzie was on the sofa with my Mom on one side and my Dad on the other. Beethoven (her worst enemy) was laying under the coffee table near my Dad’s feet. My Mom got up to get my brother an ice pack for his back and Dad decided to get up at the same time. In what seemed like slow motion, Mackenzie took a flying leap off the sofa and onto Beethoven’s neck in a flurry of fur and teeth. I yelled at her to stop (believe me, this happens nearly once a week with those two so we’re used to it just being a lot of noise and white fur) but this time she was really into it and didn’t want to let go.
After a few moments she let him go and I grabbed her and escorted her to her crate for a cool down. Once I closed the door to the crate I told her she was a DIABLA (devil).
Fast forward a couple of hours (after all of that I really needed a nap) and we had our evening training session. A few sessions ago I was really starting to stress out about her crooked fronts and sloppy finishes but apparently she’s been studying because she was totally tight and clean tonight.
At our last training session we brought out the target stick (which I hold in my mouth so that I can keep my hands at my sides) and she was cleaning up her fronts and finishes, but even then I had no idea what to expect today (especially with the way she’s been acting today and the Hurricane yesterday). What I got was this incredible dog who was actually coming close enough to me in her fronts to actually bump my leg! In previous sessions we had been having a lot of trouble with her even coming close enough at all, now she was actually TOO CLOSE! Obviously we don’t want her front paws on my feet or her nose bumping my leg at a trial, but I would much rather work on that then have a dog who comes front and sits 3 feet away from me.
We worked all the Novice Rally signs and she was totally brilliant. The cones exercises are going to be a problem though. I get quite dizzy watching such a short dog while we’re heeling around those damn cones. After the Spiral-Dog Inside sign I need a few seconds to get my bearings back or else I would probably be on the floor with her. Other than my problems, Mackenzie was definitely clean on everything. Fast Forward from Sit might get her a little bit crazy because sometimes that’s how we end our sessions, but we’ll work on maintaining control after that sign. All in all, her fronts and finishes were absolutely brilliant. It was probably one of our best sessions (especially given the circumstances).
And in the best news of the night, she finally did what I would consider a solid flip finish. 
She got jackpotted and hopefully she’ll keep trying it.
I haven’t written in a while and while I have no obvious or substantial reason for this, I do have a reason. I’ve been very busy. Now busy in the world of Jen may not entirely be the busy many of you may think of when you choose the word busy to describe someone’s days. But nevertheless, I’ve been busy.
First and foremost in my busy days has been working with Mackenzie. We’re having a few issues with some (hopefully) easily fixable things, but they are becoming increasingly troubling because of how close our trial is and how many of them have come out of nowhere (or so it seems). We’ve also been busy with home repairs including painting the hallway (twice), choosing a new carpet (because Beethoven has ruined the old one), I got a new badass bookcase for all my dog training and behavior books, and Spencer has a bacterial skin infection (loosely called Ringworm).
I haven’t decided if I want to fully make this a training journal or not, but if I’ve got some time and energy (I think I’m coming down with something – Texas tomato salmonella maybe? I do love my SALSA!) I’ll write out the specific issues we’re having including but not limited to:
Recall/Finishing herself early (bypassing the Front)
Down-ing herself during long Sit/Stay
Croooooooked fronts
She is such a clever girl though. And her heeling is breathtaking these days. She’s made some good progress in her swing finish (it’s almost a FLIP …almost) and she’s looking really tight. So for now we’ll end on that note and maybe write more training details later.
When I was in college I would always dress up for exam days. No matter how I felt that day, or whether I had actually slept the night before, I would always put on some really good clothes, do my hair and makeup, and try and look as fabulous as possible. I figured this was the day that all those other days were leading up to. All those days of sitting in class writing notes, listening (or not) to lectures, and waking up relatively early to go to class (or not). The exam day was the culmination of all those days and nights of hard work (surely I’m exaggerating for some classes) and I wanted to make it special.
Now that I’ve graduated there is a new goal in mind.
It was more than a year ago that Dad, Mackenzie and I attended an AKC Obedience and Rally seminar in Austin, Tx. A year ago I decided that we were going to get serious about dog sports. A year ago Mackenzie and I went from “pet training” to “competitive obedience training”. And here we are now. One year later and a few months until our first trial. Our first time in the ring and our first time at a dog show.
We’ve been training with this in mind for over a year, I’ve already requested the days off from work, Dad is going to clear his schedule, Mom is coming too, and even Matt is interested in what all this talk is about. Today I bought a really badass collapsible crate, a new orthopedic bed (in the same shade of blue to match the new crate) and a new Wing-a-Ball (to save for the show weekend).
And naturally, I needed some nice new clothes for the trial. I got two new striped button-down shirts (one in blue stripes and the other in pink/red stripes) which are short enough to leave un-tucked, but I may tuck them in just in case they prevent Mackenzie from seeing my eyes. When I was trying them on I even practiced giving a right and left finish signal to see how well they moved (clearly they passed the evaluation). I also got some really cute shoes with hardcore grips on the bottom to wear in the ring as well.
This is it. The trial is in the beginning of August.
Things we really need to work on in order of how much work they need:
-Stand for Exam: with as many people/situations as possible
-Proofing Stays: I want at least a 2 min sit/stay and a 5 min down/stay before August
-Recall/Front: She comes in a little crooked and sometimes is a bit too far from me
-Heeling is great: need to work on-lead more since mainly we work off-lead
-Figure 8 is pretty solid: could use some proofing with different kinds of people
Also within the next few days we need to refresh our memory of Rally (duh) and figure out if we are going to enter both O/RLY on Saturday and Sunday. God I’m giddy.
I got my hair cut this afternoon and I must say it looks pretty fierce. And you know I don’t use the word ‘fierce’ that often, so it must be true. After my haircut I went to get some pictures developed at HEB. Then I came home and did some scrapbooking. Is that a verb? Scrapbooking? Whatever, it’s awesome. I can feel myself start to get totally obsessed with it. I try not to shop in the “scrapbooking” section at Hobby Lobby because I feel this urge to spend hundreds of dollars on scrapbooking accessories. God, I love it. It is incredibly fun to do and if I can’t imagine how bad I would be if I were actually a stay-at-home Mom… Thankfully I am not, and instead I scrapbook pictures of my clients and their dogs.
At around 5:30PM I began briefing Mom on what she needed to know to play Judge for Mackenzie and I. And let me tell you, it was quite a challenge. My mom, an extremely intelligent and successful woman, could not for the life of her figure out how to do a logical Heel sequence. Her favorite thing to call out was “Forward…Fast…Slow…STOP!” right before she ran us into the street.
After a few tries however, she gave us some pretty good ones. The “Fast…Halt” was actually pretty good practice even though it can’t be called out in the ring. We managed to get a few good sequences both on and off-leash. We then did a few Stand For Exams which Mackenzie did beautifully for the first (and only) time in her life. And this is my Mom, so imagine how she’ll do with a stranger if she can hardly stand still for my Mom. She’s never understood that even though I gave her a command she is still allowed to be petted. When we are at work and I’m working with her and someone comes up to pet her and let’s say she’s in a sit/stay, she will actually scoot away from the person who is trying to pet her. Either that or she will actually get up, walk a few steps away and then sit down again. Like she simply can not be bothered with petting when she is in a stay. Obviously we need to work on this.
We did Figure 8s with little cones as the posts which she did very well with. And then we did a couple of Heel Off leash sequences. Mom of course was terribly nervous that Mackenzie was off leash in the front yard (no fence) during 5-6PM traffic. Much to her surprise, Mackenzie is actually MORE attentive to me when she is off leash.
By this point I was sweating so much that my hair was about to start getting frizzies so we came inside. I talked to Dad for a little bit about how I was now officially promoting Mom to Head Coach and demoting him to Assistant Coach because she was learning so quickly. As we were talking Mackenzie decided to attack Beethoven (our 16yo Lhasa Apso). Although we’ve made great progress in lessening her food aggression, there are just some times when she can’t help herself (like Spaghetti Mondays obviously). She’s been crated for the past half hour (while we ate dinner) and we will probably work on training some more in a little bit once she calms down.
Tomorrow I’m going to a Pet First Aid class in Harlingen with a few of my clients and people from our therapy dog group.
I think if Mackenzie were a real person she would be some kind of life counselor or a psychiatrist. She has this incredible ability to get through to not only people but she is simply amazing with other dogs.
As some of you may know, a few months ago Mackenzie was showing some real signs of dog aggression. Her label would be “dog-reactive” or “leash-reactive” but to the average dog owner she would be considered “aggressive”. In other words, she was (still is sometimes) a BITCH.
A “happy and playful” (in dog trainer terms: a RUDE, BADLY-TRAINED) puppy would run up “just to say HI” and Mackenzie would react. We got to the point that she was growling/snapping at nearly every dog who approached her unless they were well-trained and calm. So obviously, since my job is as a dog trainer, the majority of dogs she would meet were not well-trained (yet).
I knew something had to be done so I did all kinds of research, asked other trainers, bought books, and got my ass in gear. Today, almost a year after the peak of her aggression (she drew blood from the nose of a Golden puppy) she helped me with a dog/leash-reactive Lab. I let her in the training area (off-leash), she sniffed around, stretched and yawned several times (calming signals) and kept her eyes on me the whole time. The Lab didn’t react at all. In fact, both of them acted, for the most part, like the other dog wasn’t there. Mackenzie was amazing as was the Lab, who also seems to only react when the other dog approaching him is rude and ill-trained.
We’re at the point now that Group sits and stays in the Novice ring are a real possibility. A year ago I might have said her dog show career was impossible. A year ago she stopped coming to work with me and I was thinking that maybe it was hopeless to even try to work with her around other dogs. I was wrong. We’ve worked through it and we continue to work on her reactivity every single day. She has made tremendous progress and now greets other dogs with enthusiasm. She really is incredible to watch.
The Chuck-It is BY FAR the greatest dog invention in the history of dog inventions. Little did I know what I’ve been missing out on, but today marks the first day we try out our new Chuck-It. Initially I thought they were dumb and huge and horribly awkward to use, but once I found the Chuck-It JR. (in bright yellow!!!) at the natural pet food store in Harlingen, I had to have one. Best $8.99 I ever spent.
Every week, (unless one of the dogs is sick with a rash, infection, allergies, vomiting, and any other random ailment my dogs get just to make me worry) we go out to this elementary school park near my house and meet one of my clients/friends and her Aussie Matilda. Usually we just bring the frisbee(s) and toss that around for Spence while Matilda watches and Mackenzie gets into trouble. Today I brought the frisbee AND the chuck-it and I was going to allow Spencer to choose which one he would rather play with. When he insisted on carrying his frisbee all the way to the car, and then getting it down all by himself at the park, I thought he had already chosen. I got the chuck-it down anyway and when he realized OMG ITS A BALL!!! all hell broke loose. This boy is OBSESSED with balls.
My first attempt at throwing left Spencer panting and waiting for me to actually do something even though the ball was several thousand feet away (yes, several thousand feet away). It took him two throws to understand that the yellow stick-thing isn’t actually part of the fun (which of course didn’t stop him from carrying the whole stick + ball all over the park when I told him to carry it).
He has such intense ball drive which comes from how we raised Spencer as a puppy. A professor friend of my Dad’s had a litter of Scottish Terriers that he needed to “get rid of”. Dad and I have always wanted a Scottie so me Dad and Matt went over to look at them. They were the absolute definition of Farm dogs. The mother dog, Maggie I think was her name, was totally scruffy and had probably never seen a pair of clippers much less gotten a proper “Scottie trim”. The pups were probably about 4-5wks old.
Needless to say, we came home with a fat jet black (with a white beard and tie) wiry terrier puppy who we would soon name Spencer. From the day we brought him home my brother kept saying “I hope he likes balls. I want to play catch with him”. Now Mackenzie is no master of catch and fetch, but she does at least try. It’s just that her mouth is too small. So my brother was hoping for a dog who would actually be able to catch a ball in his mouth. Shortly after we brought him home we introduced him to a ball. At this point he’s so ball crazy that we only ever let him see any balls when we take him out to the park.
If he were a Border Collie, we would absolutely be at the top of the flyball and disc dog world. But instead I’ve got Border Collie drive in a Scottish Terrier shaped package.
Tonight’s training session:
Mackenzie: We worked mainly on fronts ’cause DAMN that girl’s crooked when she comes in for a front. I guess it doesn’t help to have such a damn long body. Her head is usually in the right position, but then she swings her little bum all chueca (‘crooked’ in Spanish [slang] for you non-Spanish-speaking folks). I got out her target stick and extended it all the way. So essentially I could remain standing up relatively straight and still have her targeting the right position (instead of targeting my hand between my legs). Oh the trials and tribulations of having a short dog.
We made some pretty good progress even with my brother coming out of his room to tell me that the way I was saying “Front” was annoying him. Generally with “come” and “front”-type commands my voice raises significantly in pitch, which apparently really annoys my brother. We quit on that and did a couple long stays. Which she hates, no surprise.
We ended the session with some position changes (sit/down/stand + random short stays). I’m thinking of switching to German for ’stay’ = blieb (damn this blog is gettin’ all kinds of multi-lingual). She confuses STAND and STAY a lot and I don’t blame her. So maybe it would be easier to switch ’stay’? We use ‘fuss’ for her right finish, and occasionally ‘platz’ and ‘giblaut’ because people are all impressed when I say she understands English, German, Spanish, and sign language. We also reviewed some of her fun tricks and I taught her to “take a bow”.
Spencer: This boy literally go SO EXCITED and worked up when he knew he was having a clicker training session that his red rocket came out (ie: he got a hard on, boner, woody, etc.) Yes, of course he’s neutered, but clearly clicker training is REALLY REALLY EXCITING. Worked on “sit up (and beg)”. He made very good progress and is learning to balance on this big butt of his. Tugged on the leash for a little while as a reward, and then I brought out he hula hoop. Started off with some low hops, but then he was giving me some good solid jumps. We ended his session when he started panting.
April: We worked some position changes (sit/down/stand). Nothing makes me happier than baiting my little Rescue girl pretending she’s in a dog show. She learned that after she’s stacked into a stand/stay she has to look intensely at my hand (with the treats). She looks damn good to me. Even though we’ve got no idea where she came from, except for the glaring fact that she is 100% purebred, maybe she could have been a show dog. Oh wait, no. My dog has ZERO breathing problems because her snout isn’t so far pushed into her face that she looks like a horribly disfigured “show-quality” Boston Terrier. She doesn’t snore, or have trouble breathing, or need expensive surgery to have her airways widened. Anyway, after a few minutes of that we ran through her fun tricks, shake, roll-over, sit up/beg, BANG!, and crawl.
Then I brought out the hoop. HOLY GOD. I was literally holding the hoop probably 3 or 4 feet off the ground and she was clearing it NO problem. She jumps SOOOO HIGH, I can’t even describe how high. Dad was watching and he said that we could probably tie the hoop to the ceiling and she could clear it. She’s so amazing. She jumps like a little horsie doing dressage. Once she started panting (and Spencer got all hot and bothered to join her training session and eating her dropped treats) we quit. All in all, it was a pretty successful training night for all three dogs.
Quite possibly the scariest thing to do in dog training is to videotape yourself performing what you thought was a pretty good heel sequence. Little did I know what I was going to see on the video.
I put the camera on the ground at the beginning of the driveway and got Mackenzie into position and pressed Record. What followed was a wonderful effort at heeling by Mackenzie and a horrifying performance from ME. As it turns out, many of you may already know this, but I am a large girl and Mackenzie is a small dog. What that looks like on video is that Mackenzie is responding to EVERY slight movement of my feet and my body in the fear that any sudden movement and I may fall right on top of her.
I took a few more after that, and they all were increasingly easier to watch. Except for the glaring fact that the more we work in the video, the lower my shorts fall (from holding such a heavy bait bag) and the more likely we are to see my ass or my bright pink underwear as I lean over to drop Mackenzie a treat.
All in all, she’s got a beautiful heel. I just need to work on myself and my body language so that I don’t throw her off. Dad played judge for a little while and gave us a heel sequence complete with running us into the street when he forget to give us a halt, and heeling straight into the back of my car when he forgot to give us a turn. It was fun and she actually did quite well even with the added distraction of April being tied to the basketball hoop pole and having her whine and whimper every time she heard a command and then start quivering every time she heard a click.
The goal right now is August. Corpus Christi. Obedience Novice A/Rally Novice A.
Our first time in the ring. Hell, our first time at a dog show.
Mom and I like to make a snack of bread + butter pickle slices and cheese on whole wheat crackers. Whenever Spence knows someone is snacking he will shuffle his short little body into the kitchen to see what’s up. Mom is a sucker and will almost ALWAYS give him a taste of what she’s got unless it’s on the ABSOLUTELY NEVER GIVE TO THE DOGS list (nuts, grapes, chocolate, etc.) Anyway so we’re in the kitchen preparing the snack and I see Spence is already chomping on something. “What did you give him?” I asked Mom and she replies of course, “A cracker…” A whole damn cracker for doing nothing.
So instead of just giving away freebies, I used one small cracker to get several spins, even a few jumping-spins in BOTH directions out of him. Since I was so impressed (we’ve only practiced spins with food -and not the disc- a few times) I decided to bring out the hoop. Now keep in mind this is only the 2nd time EVER Spence has seen the hoop. And here he goes jumping (like, actually jumping) without me luring him with a treat. I was just saying “Spence Hoop!” and he would give me a solid hop and I would praise and treat.
It’s like magic.
