Took the dogs down to my training club today. This club is as old-fashioned as it gets; there was an "advanced beginners" class with no less than 20 dogs in it (likely closer to 30), heeling in circles, screaming at and scruffing dogs who break their stays, yada yada yada. It's been the same since I took (and failed) my first class there almost 9 years ago. Why am I a member? Because there's nowhere else to train in my city.
So I took Peach and Basil to work in the free ring. I started by trying to do some signals with Basil, and he was just too geeked up. I admit I got frustrated, but he was hopping all over the place, distracted, etc. I quit on signals and did scent articles, which he did very well at; I didn't push it, though. I put out 5 total articles, and stood only about 6-8 feet from the pile. He retrieved the articles correctly every single time. Good boy!
We also worked on go-outs. The very first one was ugly. I asked him to go bop, and he ran out to the broad jump chute and touched one of the jump boards with his nose, and then jumped it. Ugh. I went out, took him by the collar, led him to the wall, and then he bopped. After that, we were able to make steady progress until a man with a Chessie insisted on sharing the ring and throwing a freaking duck decoy over the high jump repeatedly. The loud thud of the decoy hitting the floor and the wall freaked Basil out, so we stopped for a while.
I worked Peach for a bit (so distracted, she was!), and then got Basil back out. He was SO much better the second time out! Signals were perfect at a distance of ten steps (about 20 feet), and we did our very first full-length go outs!! YES!!! He did go outs that were probably around 35-45 feet. I was SO SO SO proud of him!
I think something I've noticed is that both dogs really need some acclimation time to the building and the environment in which we're working, wherever it is, before I start asking for behaviors. I know this, logically, but I have a bad habit of getting frustrated when I can't get behaviors within five minutes of arriving. I've got to work on that...
