rubyroo Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 TSD you and Em sound like you are having a ball!! I cant wait to see her results once you start trialling, you will be in restricted in no time! My guys are too used to the bumper boys, they get a little too close at times, stupid dog even tried to pull a bumper off one day that could have been dangerous. We had a pretty full on weekend training. I was using wings for most of the weekend and doing lots of drill work, only fun marks. I bought a frozen bird out of the freezer this arvo and jumped on the 4x4 and drove around the paddock for atleast 10mins and made him carry it the whole way, thought he was pretty special, made it fun and he didnt even roll it around in his mouth. Think I might do this for out walk in the morning, hopefully my next weekend he might be sick of them, must teach him to pick it up by the wing at a trial would save me so much greif and embarrassment. Hope everyone had a great weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 We are having a fabulous time rubyroo....and that's not even including the glass of bubbles I shared with LL when we arrived back to her place Learning lots about my Little Em - what makes her tick and when to push on or pull back. I thought she bounced back today much better than previously (mentally I mean) which is a sign of her maturing and gaining confidence in my book. Did some obedience with her this afternoon and then a nice long walk plus an off leash gallop with Zig. Some shaping work tonight for her dinner and she'll be happy to go to bed! Good news on the carry for your lad - yes, lots of fun is definitely the key! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 1, 2011 Author Share Posted May 1, 2011 Well done TSD, sounds like she's coming along lovely! I envy you and the amount of time you have to train your dogs :p I did some birdy work with Ruby this evening. She's been a bit ho-hum about it previously, doing it cos I've asked but obviously not overly enthused when the retrieving training doesn't involve a thrower and a decent length retrieve, but this time I wanted some enthusiasm for our little backyard work. So I kinda went against "the rules" and rewarded a nice pickup and present of the bird with a throw of her ball. Wow did that perk her up, and all of a sudden I had her dancing around asking me to throw the bird again, NOT the ball!! So I've progressed to throwing the bird across the backyard, and her bringing it back, all without munching it, woohoo! Stopped while she was still wanting more Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 I don't really have that much time RS :p I just don't do anything else apart from Uni (5.30am wake up anyone? ) and dog stuff at the moment. Zig also benefits from a break from trialling/training so I fill the gaps where I can. Here I am on a Sunday night doing paperwork....again!!! Em is a nightmare to walk at the lake now - goes completely nuts over all the bird life and dances on the end on of the lead the whole way round. As soon as she is in the off leash area I can call her off anything though! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FHRP Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 (edited) The training sounds fantastic TSD and RubyStar! fetchindawgs, nice photo's, Congratulations on your Easter results, very rude of me not congratulating earlier! Nice to hear of the youngens and the 'oldies' doing so well Polo and I survived our first Field Trials :p Can you believe it though, his retrieving was atrocious!!!! He is not used to the short marks and any handling sends him off at full speed and over running the birds by miles in a second Even his water retrieve on the pigeon was very poor today :D although he did nail it yesterday. Despite his embarassing retrieving work he did well to win the Saturday non-qualifying trial and to place 2nd today in the Novice trial for his first Field Trial Championship Point Edited May 1, 2011 by FHRP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RallyValley Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 Yay Polo!!! Huge congratulations. Did his brace come across many birds? Apparently in WA they sometimes don't get one bird the whole trial :D Going to watch my first field trial in a couple of weeks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 1, 2011 Author Share Posted May 1, 2011 Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. You've mentioned a few drills now, care to share with other newbies what they are, pretty please? :D I could always do with drills for very novice dogs! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 1, 2011 Author Share Posted May 1, 2011 Polo and I survived our first Field Trials Can you believe it though, his retrieving was atrocious!!!! He is not used to the short marks and any handling sends him off at full speed and over running the birds by miles in a second :D Even his water retrieve on the pigeon was very poor today although he did nail it yesterday. Despite his embarassing retrieving work he did well to win the Saturday non-qualifying trial and to place 2nd today in the Novice trial for his first Field Trial Championship Point Congrats!!!!!!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 (edited) Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. You've mentioned a few drills now, care to share with other newbies what they are, pretty please? :D I could always do with drills for very novice dogs! I haven't tried this one with Em yet so will report back when I have worked it out. What other ones RS? I do a lot of walking singles and I'd like to try walking baseball - that one is very hard to explain on paper though so LL is going to show me. Edited May 2, 2011 by The Spotted Devil Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 2, 2011 Author Share Posted May 2, 2011 Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. You've mentioned a few drills now, care to share with other newbies what they are, pretty please? I could always do with drills for very novice dogs! I haven't tried this one with Em yet so will report back when I have worked it out. What other ones RS? I'm not sure :D Think you mentioned LL showed you one recently? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 2, 2011 Author Share Posted May 2, 2011 (edited) I sent her for a second dummy from the same bumper boy but she wasn't keen on hunting in the same ground - just shows how much emphasis we've placed on retrieving on fresh ground. No dramas at all but just gives us something else to work on (found a good drill for that!) Here we go Just to clarify, is this ground where the other dogs have already retrieved a bird in, or is it ground that already has nice smells opposed to fresh oval grass? Or am I off track completely? I threw a dummy for Ruby out in the bush and she was distracted by the other smells. Not sure how to overcome this properly (hoping a birdy proves enough motivation in the end). Edited May 2, 2011 by RubyStar Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FHRP Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 Yay Polo!!! Huge congratulations. Did his brace come across many birds? Apparently in WA they sometimes don't get one bird the whole trial :D Going to watch my first field trial in a couple of weeks. All dogs found birds at each trial. Unfortunately Polo's bracemate on the first round yesterday did not get the opportunity to retrieve, and the team were given several chances to make it happen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 I sent her for a second dummy from the same bumper boy but she wasn't keen on hunting in the same ground - just shows how much emphasis we've placed on retrieving on fresh ground. No dramas at all but just gives us something else to work on (found a good drill for that!) Here we go Just to clarify, is this ground where the other dogs have already retrieved a bird in, or is it ground that already has nice smells opposed to fresh oval grass? Or am I off track completely? I threw a dummy for Ruby out in the bush and she was distracted by the other smells. Not sure how to overcome this properly (hoping a birdy proves enough motivation in the end). OK - this is about the dog hunting in ground where it has already retrieved a bird/dummy. Walking singles is a case in point - the thrower walks in an arc so the dog learns to retrieve in new ground all the time. Remember that dogs think in 'pictures' for marks and we are trying to teach as many 'pictures' as possible. When I'm at the park training I move Em around after every exercise so she doesn't get in the habit of hunting in the same area. Of course they have to learn to hunt in the same area for some retrieves but you can teach that with another drill (which I haven't tried yet - will report back on that one). So when the bumper boys are stationary I worked Em around the clock in 4 positions so every retrieve was "fresh". When LL and I were training it didn't occur to us until after she wasn't as enthusiastic about hunting about what was happening - she was doing everything she had been trained to do! Wasn't a big deal, as I say - just showed that what I had been concentrating on training had worked and what else we needed to work on. We also talked about her natural propensity to quarter when she's hunting (kind of zig zag from left to right) and how natural that is for a dog bred for field work. So obviously that's something that she might revert to - and not something we should be surprised about nor ever correct. Motivation is a difficult one - you can nurture it for sure and build lots of confidence by the thrower helping out with another dummy (for a mark) or going closer (for a blind) or opening up the angle (double mark or 2 piles of sighted blinds). Only work on one thing at a time e.g at the park we were pushing Em hard on distance and she had lots of success (and she was brimming with confidence). But as soon as we took her into cover with birds we shortened the distance so she only had to deal with cover - lots of success. If you're working on distractions back off on cover and distance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted May 2, 2011 Author Share Posted May 2, 2011 Thanks for the explanation Please report back on your drills if you have the time and don't mind, I'm trying to be a sponge, here Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FHRP Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 (edited) Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. I have done various 'drills' for depth with Polo in his retrieving training, he usually does very well although the retrieves are generally always longer than we get in the field. Part of the problem is that as I live in a state that doesn't have a game season, he does not have the experience of being shot over 'for real'. He does watch the bird come down once flushed, but he will then look away, ready to go on and find another bird which has been the norm in our training. He doesn't get as good a 'picture' as I'd like! It was quite obvious with the other dogs that have much more experience with shooting, they don't take their eyes off where the bird went down. I don't think it will take Polo long to learn the process though :D Edited May 2, 2011 by FHRP Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 Whoo hoo FHRP and Polo Way to go That's not 'surviving' - that's brilliant! Interesting about the shorter retrieves - Polo sounds super enthusiastic! I have just found a drill for working on depth of field which looks like fun. I have done various 'drills' for depth with Polo in his retrieving training, he usually does very well although the retrieves are generally always longer than we get in the field. Part of the problem is that as I live in a state that doesn't have a game season, he does not have the experience of being shot over 'for real'. He does watch the bird come down once flushed, but he will then look away, ready to go on and find another bird which has been the norm in our training. He doesn't get as good a 'picture' as I'd like! It was quite obvious with the other dogs that have much more experience with shooting, they don't take their eyes off where the bird went down. I don't think it will take Polo long to learn the process though That's the thing about retrieving in particular it seems - fix one thing and then something else breaks :D Polo sounds like a lovely, drivey dog to work with Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FHRP Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 Thought I'd share the only photo I took at the field trial. It was taken with my phone, so low quality. I was walking Polo back to the cars around the edge of the padock while another brace was working and he found three birds on the way! He's pointing one of them here, lead still attached. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fetchindawgs Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 Well Done FHRP, and, what a great photo of him. I have been to one field trial, one early misty morning, and was allowed to walk with the judge, just behind the braces of dogs. I found it fascinating to watch and was very impressed how the dogs backed each other. With conditions being so bad over here, I am wondering if there are any stubble paddocks still around for the field trialers to use. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 2, 2011 Share Posted May 2, 2011 (edited) That's a gorgeous photo Isn't the intensity in our Gundogs incredible to watch....it never ceases to amaze me. Mr TSD helped me with a new drill on the oval tonight - taken from a book written by Carol Cassity ("Drills for the retriever hunt test enthusiast") and kindly lent by LL. It's called the X drill and for those not in the know it has the thrower standing in the middle of the X (for the purposes of description picture North straight up, South straight down, East to the right and West to the left) and facing South towards the dog/handler. 1st dummy is thrown South-West, 2nd dummy is thrown North-East, 3rd dummy is thrown South-East, 4th dummy is thrown North-West, 5th dummy is thrown due East and 6th dummy is thrown due West. It teaches depth perception and to run across old fall. Great fun for us newbies to run with and good for any level of dog. Of course we started on the oval to make it easy but I'd obviously like to try it in some cover down the track. Em had a ball - paraded with the first dummy but she quit that very quickly. On the 5th dummy she looked behind Mr TSD's back to see if he was holding a bird and then, finding nothing, decided to be happy with what she had and come sprinting back anyway. Off to agility with Zig so will do a few things with Em under lights. Edited May 2, 2011 by The Spotted Devil Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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