P1 Agility class, Day 1
I've been spending or and more time with my dogs lately. Rookie, my border collie/heeler mix is very intense (read obsessive!), high energy and somewhat socially awkward. He's fine with other dogs, but aside from a handful of people, he doesn't show much interest in people unless they are holding a frisbee. I thought that agility training would give him a good foundation and help him become a more balanced dog. I also thought that the training would be good for me and help to get my mind off the fact that I'm having fairly serious surgery in a few weeks. I think I've just added to my worries.
Last night was Rook's first night of school. We showed up around 8:00pm for the 8:15pm class. I realized early on that I was in the minority being a man, as most everyone else there was not. We are taking the "P1" or Pre-agility class and the class before ours was the "P2" class. It was the more experienced beginning class. Most of the dogs were collie mixes, shepherds, etc but there were a couple of lap warmers present. My class had a German Shepherd, a young boxer, a border collie mix, two labs, a lab mix and at least one other dog that looked more at home on an elderly lap than an agility field.
I've never given my dogs much training. I teach them to sit and to shake and we pretty much just wing it from there. Thats not to say that my dogs do not behave. My dogs don't chase cars, people, airplanes or anything else. They generally just leave people alone. Rook doesn't care about anything but frisbee or ball. I've always been proud of how well he catches a frisbee and brings it back to me just for the chance to catch it again. He has never had much interest in anything that didn't fly and need chasing. His sole focus is frisbee and I've always catered to it. Oooops! That is my first hurdle to overcome.
My first shock of the night was to learn that my high flying, frisbee chasing border collie/heeler nutcase was eight pounds overweight! My dog is fat? He's solid muscle, that isn't fat. Well apparently he's too fat for agility standards so now he has to lose weight. Damn! My next shock was even worse. Arriving at the class standing around the other newbies, I was proud that Rook chose to take a spot next to me and just sit like a well behaved dog. Ha! All the other dogs are barking, and trying to get to the other dogs to say hi, but not Rook. He was calmly surveying the scene with almost comical disinterest. I just KNEW Rook was going to be the star of the class. Wrong again! The look in his eyes was probably the same as I would have at a broadway musical. Really? You think I belong here? Pffft!
The training is all clicker based positive reinforcement training. What does that mean? There is no "Bad dog". You never punish the dog for doing bad, you simply reward all behaviors that you want to encourage. That sounds great! Wait, it's much harder than it seems. To get your dog to do what you want, you have to reward each step he takes towards the positive behavior you want. We started with just clicking the clicker and rewarding the dog every time they looked at us. After a few minutes, everyones dog is just staring at them off and on waiting for the next click. Not mine. Apparently my fat dog isn't hungry enough to really want a treat, so he's just looking around at everyone else like they are nuts. After some encouragement from the instructor (meaning raw hotdog pieces) I had Rook staring at me. Funny, if I really wanted him to stare at me, all I had to do was pick up a frisbee, but I guess I'll try things their way. Next we play the "name game" and we just walk around with the dogs and say their name. When they look at us, we click and give a treat. Wow, we taught our dogs their names! Hmmm, if my dog hasn't learned his name by now, I think Agility competition is a lost cause.
Next we learned to teach the dog to stand...in theory. Apparently all this time our dogs have been standing wrong? Not exactly, but apparently they aren't aware of their rear legs. (Sounds like me after too much rum!)The excercise is to teach the dog awareness of their rear legs so that they are more stable on the agility equipment. We started by getting the dog to sit. We then placed our hand with a treat in front of the dogs nose. As the dog tries to get the food, you tap their rear foot with your foot. The dog gets unnerved and immediately stands...in theory. That worked one time with Rook. He isn't stupid, he did not want me kicking his foot, so any time I moved my foot towards him, he angled his body away from me. He didn't stand up, he just made it impossible for me to nudge his back leg with my back leg. Pretty smart! He also had no interest in the food. I could see the instructor looking at me, feeling my shame. She attempted to help out, by trying to direct Rook, but he would have none of that. When she reached for him to reposition, he growled and lunged at her. Ooops, she decided that I could handle it from there. I sensed a "talking to" after class...
Next, we were too teach the dog to quickly lie down. In agility there are different types of downs. First is the "settle" which is a resting position as a dog would normally lay. Second is the "down" down that is where the dog flattens down but is ready to get up quickly. That "down" was what we were working on. You start with the dog standing and offer a reward. You bring the food towards their chest so that they will lay down in an effort to get the steadily lowering food. Not Rook. He just looked at me then away. He was very clearly bored with this.
Last, we were to get the dogs to do something that I was sure I could handle. We had to get the dogs to play. Woohoo! I can't fail this one! Right? I got my rubber frisbee out of my bag and Rook instantly turned into a frisbee weather vane. His focus was dead-on. Wait, did I hear that right? The instructor wanted us to play tug with the dogs, not retrieve. I tried to stick the Frisbee towards Rooks mouth to get him to bite and tug. He backed away. In his eyes, I could see he clearly thought I was retarded. "It's a frisbee. You throw it, dummy!" His eyes seemed to say. Nothing I could do would make him see the frisbee as anything other than something to chase out of the sky. The instructor tried a large rabbit fur on a roap, but nothing would catch his interest. To pass the class he has to tug/play on toys. I may be doomed.
I left class feeling really bad. Rook just didn't act like the other dogs. I think if I could throw the frisbee as a reward, he would happily do whatever I ask. As it is, I have a lot of work to do. I expected him to just pick everything up and to be amazing. I can't help but be disappointed in my good friend. I hope this isn't an uncorrectible trend.
Last night was Rook's first night of school. We showed up around 8:00pm for the 8:15pm class. I realized early on that I was in the minority being a man, as most everyone else there was not. We are taking the "P1" or Pre-agility class and the class before ours was the "P2" class. It was the more experienced beginning class. Most of the dogs were collie mixes, shepherds, etc but there were a couple of lap warmers present. My class had a German Shepherd, a young boxer, a border collie mix, two labs, a lab mix and at least one other dog that looked more at home on an elderly lap than an agility field.
I've never given my dogs much training. I teach them to sit and to shake and we pretty much just wing it from there. Thats not to say that my dogs do not behave. My dogs don't chase cars, people, airplanes or anything else. They generally just leave people alone. Rook doesn't care about anything but frisbee or ball. I've always been proud of how well he catches a frisbee and brings it back to me just for the chance to catch it again. He has never had much interest in anything that didn't fly and need chasing. His sole focus is frisbee and I've always catered to it. Oooops! That is my first hurdle to overcome.
My first shock of the night was to learn that my high flying, frisbee chasing border collie/heeler nutcase was eight pounds overweight! My dog is fat? He's solid muscle, that isn't fat. Well apparently he's too fat for agility standards so now he has to lose weight. Damn! My next shock was even worse. Arriving at the class standing around the other newbies, I was proud that Rook chose to take a spot next to me and just sit like a well behaved dog. Ha! All the other dogs are barking, and trying to get to the other dogs to say hi, but not Rook. He was calmly surveying the scene with almost comical disinterest. I just KNEW Rook was going to be the star of the class. Wrong again! The look in his eyes was probably the same as I would have at a broadway musical. Really? You think I belong here? Pffft!
The training is all clicker based positive reinforcement training. What does that mean? There is no "Bad dog". You never punish the dog for doing bad, you simply reward all behaviors that you want to encourage. That sounds great! Wait, it's much harder than it seems. To get your dog to do what you want, you have to reward each step he takes towards the positive behavior you want. We started with just clicking the clicker and rewarding the dog every time they looked at us. After a few minutes, everyones dog is just staring at them off and on waiting for the next click. Not mine. Apparently my fat dog isn't hungry enough to really want a treat, so he's just looking around at everyone else like they are nuts. After some encouragement from the instructor (meaning raw hotdog pieces) I had Rook staring at me. Funny, if I really wanted him to stare at me, all I had to do was pick up a frisbee, but I guess I'll try things their way. Next we play the "name game" and we just walk around with the dogs and say their name. When they look at us, we click and give a treat. Wow, we taught our dogs their names! Hmmm, if my dog hasn't learned his name by now, I think Agility competition is a lost cause.
Next we learned to teach the dog to stand...in theory. Apparently all this time our dogs have been standing wrong? Not exactly, but apparently they aren't aware of their rear legs. (Sounds like me after too much rum!)The excercise is to teach the dog awareness of their rear legs so that they are more stable on the agility equipment. We started by getting the dog to sit. We then placed our hand with a treat in front of the dogs nose. As the dog tries to get the food, you tap their rear foot with your foot. The dog gets unnerved and immediately stands...in theory. That worked one time with Rook. He isn't stupid, he did not want me kicking his foot, so any time I moved my foot towards him, he angled his body away from me. He didn't stand up, he just made it impossible for me to nudge his back leg with my back leg. Pretty smart! He also had no interest in the food. I could see the instructor looking at me, feeling my shame. She attempted to help out, by trying to direct Rook, but he would have none of that. When she reached for him to reposition, he growled and lunged at her. Ooops, she decided that I could handle it from there. I sensed a "talking to" after class...
Next, we were too teach the dog to quickly lie down. In agility there are different types of downs. First is the "settle" which is a resting position as a dog would normally lay. Second is the "down" down that is where the dog flattens down but is ready to get up quickly. That "down" was what we were working on. You start with the dog standing and offer a reward. You bring the food towards their chest so that they will lay down in an effort to get the steadily lowering food. Not Rook. He just looked at me then away. He was very clearly bored with this.
Last, we were to get the dogs to do something that I was sure I could handle. We had to get the dogs to play. Woohoo! I can't fail this one! Right? I got my rubber frisbee out of my bag and Rook instantly turned into a frisbee weather vane. His focus was dead-on. Wait, did I hear that right? The instructor wanted us to play tug with the dogs, not retrieve. I tried to stick the Frisbee towards Rooks mouth to get him to bite and tug. He backed away. In his eyes, I could see he clearly thought I was retarded. "It's a frisbee. You throw it, dummy!" His eyes seemed to say. Nothing I could do would make him see the frisbee as anything other than something to chase out of the sky. The instructor tried a large rabbit fur on a roap, but nothing would catch his interest. To pass the class he has to tug/play on toys. I may be doomed.
I left class feeling really bad. Rook just didn't act like the other dogs. I think if I could throw the frisbee as a reward, he would happily do whatever I ask. As it is, I have a lot of work to do. I expected him to just pick everything up and to be amazing. I can't help but be disappointed in my good friend. I hope this isn't an uncorrectible trend.
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