Goals for 2013

Okay, deep breath.  Time to put those 2013 plans in writing.  In one year, will I look back at these resolutions with a sense of accomplishment? 

FOR ALDER, the goofy standard poodle boy:

I’d like to put a UD on Alder.  I’d like to set a timeline for that UD.  After our nearly 2-year trek through Open, I’ve learned that no title is guaranteed and timelines are a recipe for disappointment. 

The dilemma is that, if dates are not set, it’s too easy to dither and procrastinate (on both training and showing).  In the meantime, while you’re chanting to yourself that “It’s not a race,” or the ever-popular “Don’t show until you’re 95% certain of a Q,” the clock never stops ticking on the dog’s age.  Alder is 6.5 years now.  He’s never been the world’s most athletic dog.  Strangely, the past few months, he’s shown more stamina, jumping ability, and enthusiasm than I’ve seen from him through most of his life.  Who knows how long that will last?  With Alder, my resolution is to TRAIN and TRY.  He may not get that UD if we try, but he sure won’t get it if we don’t try.

I live in a area where the show season runs from mid-April to the first week of October, with the bulk of the shows in April and May.  (I could greatly expand the show season if I wanted to drive across the mountains to western Washington and Oregon, but I’m not crazy about driving across snowy mountain passes in winter and I’m a real chicken about driving in urban areas.) 

Effectively, given Alder’s age and the realities of the show calendar, his first appearance in Utility will be in April and I will probably be submitting my entry for a second show before I’ve shown him in a first show.  (Yikes!  The first show is only 14 weeks away.)

I learned, the hard way, in Open that, if Alder NQed an exercise on the first day of a weekend show, he would NQ that same exercise on the second day.  Trying to fix a problem overnight never worked for me and usually made it worse. 

So, until Alder gets a first leg in Utility, I am resolved to show him in Utility on only the first day of a show.  On the second day, I may skip the show completely or show him in Graduate Open. After he gets a first leg (and I am going to think positively that he WILL get a first leg.  Maybe.), then I will reassess the one-day-a-weekend rule.

 

FOR MAPLE, the Golden Retriever girl

Maple is 3.5 years old now.  She is my first real OTCH prospect.  She is amazing to train.  She learns so fast and has such fast reflexes, she covers for my klutzy footwork in heeling. But, as in a Greek tragedy, she has a fatal flaw: she hates riding in a vehicle and does not like being away from home, possibly because she knows she will have to get back in the hated vehicle to get back home. She has a CD, but her heeling in the ring is worse than Alder’s, and Alder’s klutz index rivals mine.  Maple’s Novice scores for her title were in the high 180s, a long way from OTCH level.  Alder’s were in the low 190s.  His heeling improved through our long Open career and he would probably score in the mid-190s in Novice now.  After I got Maple’s CD, I showed her a couple more times in Novice and in Rally Excellent and Advanced.  Her heeling got worse. 

Mary Jane McCall, a local trainer from whom I took a few private lessons, suggested I go ahead and show in Open, on the theory that if Maple gets to do some retrieving and other more active exercises, her attitude might improve.  So, that is my plan.  She knows the Open exercises and most of the Utility exercises.  We will plunge ahead, starting with Open and Graduate Open and not worry about scores.  After she finishes her CDX, we will go directly to Utility.  I will continue to work on her vehicle issues.  I am determined to find a way to bring the dog I have in the yard to the show environment.

Last year, I also tried to address her anxiety about traveling by doing hunt training with her.  I may have said this before (but I still marvel at it): Obedience is all about finding a way to motivate the dog through some intensely tedious, nit-picky activities, like straight fronts, but in hunt training, the reward is built into the activity.  Maple would walk across hot coals for the chance to leap into icy water for a dead, smelly duck.  Hunt trainers virtually never use treats or play or tugging or any of that stuff obedience trainers obsess over.  Hunt training usually involves the type of negative reinforcement that would have an obedience dog wanting to run away from home.  Yet, if you want to see a bunch of insanely motivated, excited dogs, go to a hunt test.  Maple still hates getting into a vehicle, but she totally forgets all her travel worries when she’s on the line waiting for a duck to be thrown.

Maple has a couple of her Junior Hunter legs (the Hunt test equivalent of Novice).  A natural retriever can generally get a JH on instinct alone. Maple sure didn’t get much help from me.  She was born knowing more about that stuff than I think I’ve learned.  The next level (Senior Hunter) requires some actual training to direct the dog to a “blind,” which is a retrieve in which the dog does not know where the bird has fallen.  We have been working on handling (i.e., teaching the dog to take directions via signals and a whistle).  My goal for her is to wrap up the JH and I think she is perfectly capable of finishing her SH next year, if she can overcome her handicap of a novice hunt trainer. I think we might be ready to enter the next level (Master’s) by fall, but I’m still too much of a greenhorn to know whether that’s doable.

BOTH DOGS

I have a few general training resolves that apply to both dogs:

·        Make time to play during training, especially when the exercise is difficult.  Alder, the poodle, especially responds to playing.

·        Work on the things we need to work on, not the things that make me feel good because the dog already knows them.

·        When it doubt, simplify.

·        Make the effort to take the dogs into town and train in different environments.

·        When training with a group, TRAIN, don’t test. 

Good luck to all with their training goals for 2013.