Discover Top Posts Tagged with #training talk

Not a dog... but it IS training ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Meet Merlin, a 9mth old Norwegian Forest cat being conditioned to a position box and the cue "place".

#merlin #dog... uh i mean cat training #cat training #catblr #training #training talk #position box

Treat prep before nosework class. One bin is Happy Howies beef(new to me) and the other is a mix of string cheese, tuna fudge, and hot dogs. Not pictured is freeze dried liver, Vital Essentials beef nibs and pieces from the Farm Hounds variety sampler. I’m finding he’s all about variety to stay engaged so I mix it all together and he never knows what’s coming!

#I try to use Stremmings treat hierarchy idea but yknow sometimes he’s not into it #vital essentials is our main middle of the road treat for most training #but also we’re building search drive for nosework so I’m only using The Best #training talk #Salem

Bad horf vs good horf, all in rapid succession.

Today was a good session in terms of working through an issue Horsie is predisposed to - napping. Periodically we have to revisit the issue at home, else he could pull it at a time when we can’t afford to have him dick around, such as on a hack or at a show. Sure, he doesn’t do it when you have your outside leg on, but a good horse shouldn’t NEED your outside leg to remind them and he’s not always going to be ridden by perfect riders.

Young horses aren’t always fun, and today wasn’t a great day to be the rider, but it was an important day to ride through!

#horsie #gif #training talk

Via the IAABC Facebook Page

Source Paper: Social Referencing in the Domestic Horse

Transcript of the top 2 Images in this post:

"It’s Science Says Sunday!

Previous studies have shown that dogs and cats use social referencing. In other words, they use human emotional information in an unfamiliar situation to guide their behavior. This study looked at whether horses can also use human emotional information to adjust their behavior to a novel object.

To test this, an experimenter positioned in the middle of an arena directed their gaze and voice towards the novel object using either a positive or a negative emotional expression. The researchers measured the duration of the horse's position to the experimenter and the object, frequency of gazing behavior, and physical interactions with either the object or experimenter.

Horses in the “positive condition” showed less avoidance behavior towards the novel object compared to horses in the “negative condition”. Horses in the “negative condition” showed an increase in vigilant behavior, suggesting that horses do use emotional cues from humans to guide their behavior towards novel objects.

There were also differences in breed types — thoroughbreds showed less human-directed behavior than warmbloods and ponies."

#equine science #equine health #equine welfare #equine behavior #equine cognition #equine training #training talk #training theory

Me watching y’all’s training videos

#training talk #Sophie the bean #muses

Some self reflective dog training ramblings about the CIK rule or something ...

So I'm doing the National Dog Agility League (NDAL) with Bree this summer. The other night we got together (many feet apart, with masks!) with like 6 other people to build and run the course at the agility field. Several of the dogs are young, and newer to agility. Some of the dogs are seasoned pros. Two people had both a seasoned pro and a newer dog. Bree started agility a few seasons ago, and while not a pro, she competes at Starters and Advanced levels, and has a decent skillset for a 10 year old Pekingese mix who jumps the lowest possible height.

Anyway, point being, I was watching everyone's runs the other night. Almost all the dogs were getting distracted, blowing things they "should know", or stopping to piss (not allowed in the ring), or taking random obstacles instead of the directed one. And I dunno, I thought it was interesting how different people handled it. One very experienced handler had a dog who barked and jumped at her constantly, and was looking at her instead of the obstacles, and either refusing obstacles or taking random ones. The handler muddled the dog through the whole course. I imagine if this had been "just training", that handler would have stopped and calmed the dog before proceeding or something. Like she would tell her students. But because this was being recorded for a competition, proper training was out the window. Muddle through, do the course sloppily but entirely, and get some points. It's a competition, so you gotta try! Hmm. But I used to do that. Haley would bark and jump at me in the trial ring, and I would push her through the run. But as I learned more, I found that that was exactly the wrong way to handle things. She was overstimulated and frustrated and not really focused on the obstacles, not really paying attention to my commands. But the pressure really gets to you in the ring, doesn't it? I see this a lot, it's really common. Better to do the best you can with a stressed or overstimulated dog, than to throw your whole run out the window by getting whistled off for training in the ring. You would NEVER let the dog continue like this in training, but this is a trial, so it's different. Except it's not. To the dog, it's just a kind of weird high stress place, made more stressful by the fact that you have suddenly changed your expectations of the dog! Why are you acting differently, allowing behaviours you wouldn't usually (like zoomies, or barking, or jumping, or blown start lines, or sloppy jumping, or missed contacts)? But if anything, a trial is when your dog needs you to be fair with them the most. I've learned the hard way that Consistency is Key (oh it's like my training motto?), and I find I'm much more reflective about training in terms of that now, which is actually Really Cool.

I think it's quite the mark of improvement that you can recognize things like this about yourself as a trainer. You can sort of say, Hmm, well, these are my principles and what I generally believe in in terms of training, and I can't just let them slip away. So, even if it's hard, if a run isn't going well, I need to step back and reevaluate what I'm allowing in terms of stress, misbehaviour, overstimulation, lack of focus, or my own poor handling. I'm now very much trying to model myself after the trainers I have seen at trials before, who will "blow their run" or excuse themself from the ring for the sake of treating their dog fairly. Some trainers might muddle through runs sloppily and get tons of Q's, but end up with an inconsistent performance from their dog and themselves. I get that some people are in it for as many titles as they can get, and it doesn't always have to look pretty. I was like that at one point. And you know, that's fine, that's your choice as a trainer. But I'm really finding that I would like to be like the trainers who do not relax their principles for trials. For them, well, a run isn't worth doing if it's not done right. These are the people who will waste their entire ring time putting their dog back on the startline if it breaks its stay, reward it for staying even for a few seconds by sending it to the first jump and tunnel, then say thank you to the judge and leave, realizing they now have something to work on. These are the people who come in the ring, and their dog is all over the place, no focus whatsoever, so rather than begging them over one obstacle at a time, because they're "not usually like this", they try to get any semblance of attention, handle the dog nicely over a short off-course sequence, say thank you, and leave. These are the people who recognize that their dog is stressed or unhappy or tired, and excuse themselves immediately. The people who pay for an FEO run just to bring the dog in the gate, get them to settle at the startline, then re-leash the dog and leave, because they accomplished their goal. The people who recognize that their dog is barking and jumping and nipping because they're overstimulated or frustrated, and that staying in the ring any longer will do no good. The people who stop mid-run and realize they have become too flustered by their mistakes, and it wouldn't be fair to the dog to continue because they aren't handling well. And the list of examples can go on. But the gist is that I want to be like the trainers who aren't afraid to excuse themselves from the ring if something isn't right. The way that I want to train is by following my own personal goals, and what I believe to be the fairest way to train a dog - ie being consistent in your expectations and commands to eliminate stress/confusion/frustration. And this isn't everyone's ideal! I recognize that too. I do also understand some of the ideas that would lead trainers to stay in the ring and muddle through a course the best they can, to try to capture at least a few moments of brilliance. That can have value, if it's part of your training. But I think it's important to recognize WHY you've made the choices you have, and if they're really consistent with what your training goals and ideals are. That's what's led me to the conclusion that I want to be the competitor whose never afraid to excuse themselves from the ring, if staying will only lead to stress and frustration. It's just a game. It should be fun. Best way to have fun is to keep everything as low stress as possible, right? By performing consistently at your best, and recognizing when your dog needs more work on something.

#dog training #training talk #sometimes I use my blog as a blog!#dogblr #one day i Will learn to summarize my thoughts in less than 8000 words and not write in stream of consciousness