Another video

Here's Dottie and me doing tricks:



I love her enthusiasm. She's a very sweet dog and loves to eat.

In other news, we went to the park today. I put Gustav on his 50-foot line to practice coming when called. In the meantime, Dottie gets to play frisbee. I will take a video of her someday, she's really a remarkable frisbee player. Something I read on Patricia McConnell's blog recently made me think about how Gustav's responsiveness drops off significantly after about five repetitions. I first discovered this when I was first working on his "watch" cue. True to my type-A overly enthusiastic personality, I was asking for a watch about every half block. After about five of these, Gustav would give up and just start ignoring me, which I found very irritating. But on the blog, people talked about short and sweet sessions being both more effective and easier for lots of dogs. Dottie could probably do this stuff all day, although she does get a little overwhelmed sometimes and starts offering random behaviors (in the video she goes to her mat halfway through shaping, and at least once she rolls on her back in response to a totally different cue). With Gustav's recall I noticed he would start off strong then fall off pretty dramatically. So I'm trying to do five recalls tops while we're out. We did a few from far away but he wasn't doing anything, and a few while he was sniffing but I was only five or ten feet away. Then we did one as a bicyclist went through the park, far away. He got them all, although was a bit hesitant and slow on a few, so I know it's not time to get harder yet. I also give him treats just for showing up, I appreciate his check-ins. Distance and distraction. (duration N/A)
I have to remember to work them separately.

Ok!