PAX

Have the WA lot settled back at home? I think there is a big agility thing there this weekend, good luck girls if you are entered.

Thannks for the congrats :D

Waiting??????????????????????????????????????????????????????

Partly true, Dogs NSW doesn't even bother to record the parentage on your dogs Sport Assoc rego papers:( Pretty slack when they charge the same amont of money and some of the SR dogs have very long recorded pedigrees. Therefore the dogs parentage is not entered into the trial catalogue IME, but you do get the luxury of a prefix and not having to desex to compete. AR dogs can't have a Prefix on the rego papers and must be desexed.

http://recallers.the5minuteformula.com/fe/9103

A BC should not be a couch potatoe, but if this is working out well for your family who cares. We can swap dogs for a month or two. ETA changed how to who

I think this is why Kathy Sdao brought it up. A reinforcer is a stimulus that maintains or increases responding. If your pen ran out of ink and it was the only pen you had, you would stop using it. Actually you'd probably keep trying to get some ink out of it for a little while, scribble it back and forth really hard (extinction burst), then chuck it in the bin. Unless ink comes out of the pen, you don't bother to write with it. In other words, you only write with a pen if it puts ink on the paper. Mind you, I won't write with a pen that leaves big blobs of ink on the page. I find that really punishing. Exacdtly, well said.

I think it's about the ink coming from the pen that is a low level self reinforcing act, you continue to write, if the pen ran out of ink, that ends the behavoiur of writing with that pen, you would chuck it out or I would . It wouldn't matter if it was a pencil, if the pencil broke, thats the end of the writing, unless you had a sharperer. I think you are reading too much into Kathy's example. I thiink she is using the writing article as the example, not speaking of the actual reward of writing. Hope that made sense.

LP, this is the one. http://www.youtube.com/user/bluewyle?featu.../12/8IcStQRHQ0s

Go Dasha and Abby.

Yep, have small goals that get you where you want to be, stick to it, write when you were too slack to train or stick to the plan on the days you do it....this should be easy for you to do, as you love books. Get busy training. Giving yourself a time frame and date to have something on cue really challenges your skills and desire to acheive a result. All training is fun, how can it be anything but fun.

No link as a bought a live video ticket to crufts. Maybe its on youtube though, it's an Aussie coloured version of a red bc. In the UK they call red what we call choc.

Hi Sue & Cindy, I watched your clip a while ago but didn't have time to reply, so here goes. If you watch your clip you will see your dog interacts with the DB lots of times that you don't mark and reward, IMO she looks unsure as to what is being rewarded. You should read the steps over and over so your criteria of each step is very clear to you. You should also lift the DB everytime you mark her interaction with it so she cannot interact with it while you are getting a treat or what ever and not noticing what she does. The DB is not available to be rewarded until you represent it, she should be busting for the opportunitty to bump it again. You want her to be really excited to see that DB as that could be an opportunity to be rewarded. Also your reward marker could be quicker...YES not YEEESSSSSSS or use a clicker. The first time I used this method I had my chair next to the kitchen bench and the treats on the bench. so all I had to worry about was the DB and the clicker. Remember you should be getting 20 good solid nose bumps out of 20 before you move to the next step. From that clip, I don't think you are at the 20 nose bump step. Hope that makes sense and helps, you have most probably progressed since you posted that clip.

There is a really cute freestyle Red BC at crufts this year that has great rear end awareness, walking around a giant basket with her hind legs up on it like a hand stand, it was 2nd place I believe, super cute.

Sounds like a training journal might be helpful and keep your training goals on track. You shouldn't need to keep stopping to patch something if you train it properly the first time I tend to be slack with trick training so I kind of get what you mean but in reverse, for me, it's just for fun when I'm bored or it's raining and I want to do something different with the dogs. My dogs have heaps of half trained tricks. ;) I enjoy the process and reward of training something properly.

Of course you need to pick the breeds and times that you think are safe to let your dog off leash and free to mix with...something I rarely do. If your area is so bad to walk in, you may need to get in the car and go to places that are safe to walk. What area do you live and posters may be able to suggest safe areas to walk your dog.

Thankyou so much Sway and Megz You both deserve an award.

Thankyou. :D

Yummmmmmmm

Pitty we can't have a live broadcast.

Good on you Sway, was counting on you for this.

Friend with a boarding kennel in QLD always tick dips all dogs on admission, uses preventive tick collars on all dogs.

Hope they value dogs more than they value horses. I would never send a dog I bred there, but thank dog I don't breed.

Mayybe a pet taxi would be best.

When you said your dog freaked about a spot on medication, I thought maybe it could irratate her skin, but if she is freaking about tablets she is training you well. Goldies are usually greedy, put the tablets in some cheese, devon or somehting similar and yummy to her, give her a piece with no medication, then, when she likes the treat add the tablet to the treat (have it preprepared), after that give her another treat with no medication at the end. It shouldn't be that hard. If she is used to being fed treats and you behave in a 'matter of fact usual way' she shouldn't get suspicious, you are perhaps behaving in an anxious way that makes her worry.