Denise Fenzi - Seminar Announcement

[RubyStar]

Looking forward to reading how it went and for our weekend here in Perth!! :D

[Inevitablue]

For me it was a dog who gets so wound up in heel that he redirects energy, so she gave solutions to the problem, some dogs it was environmental distractions so Denise explained how to fix, but also how to proof any dog before the distractions become a problem. Fred came out alot for that.

Heel position was one for a few dogs, and then dogs which didnt feel confident in their work due to confidence issues.

The handlers gave a brief description of what they wanted to work on, then Denise just observed them for a few minutes before isolating the problem and describing to everyone. We worked our way through 12 dogs throughout the day.

[Ptolomy]

Thanks for the feedback - really really looking forward to having her here

[Wobbly]

It was awesome. "D I love Denise!

Oh that was you with the awesome young ACD, he's beautiful, and so clever! I was trying to figure out who the DOLers were, Cleo'sCorgwyn dogs have turned me into a corgi fan, I never realised they were Cattle Dogs with little legs, such cool little dogs. Using Fred is a brilliant idea hey, I worry the neighbours are going to think I am completely crazy feeding my imaginary dog though. I love the ethos of giving the dog a choice to, it makes so much sense, the dogs are really happy and engaged.

I only brought Jarrah to the drives and motivations day. She had a total blast, in the tugging section she did her favourite thing where she clamps down on the tug like a vice and then takes all the weight off her feet so I have to hold her in the air by the tug, she gets an enormous amount of satisfaction from holding onto the tug like grim death and making me work really hard. Denise told me to drag my alligator over and showed me how to hold the tug so it's comfortable and easy for me when she's putting up a good fight. Jarrah was a little conflicted at first, she really wanted to play tug, but she also really wanted to check out the other dogs too, because she does find fast moving dogs quite exciting too. So Denise got me to withhold the tug until she was giving full attention to me, so she was very clear about the fact she had made a definite decision that tug is what she really, really wants. Very important that she knows she is making her own clear and definite choice on that so she has no conflict about it.

Roscoe the GSD & Jarrah were the most confident, keen tuggers I think (I might be biased putting Jarrah in there XD), it occurs to me it's probably no coincidence that both are Steve Courtney clients. Jarrah did her outs beautifully (I have like a 10 page thread here somewhere on my difficulties in getting an out, Steve finally fixed that for me) I was really proud of how well she did in that section, especially since Denise noted she was a very stable and confident alligator. Most interesting to see the different motivations and styles of the different dogs, the dogs who were disinterested in tug were often the happiest and most capable at personal play (play without toy intermediataries). A few dogs were a nice balance of both too.

Jarrah and myself weren't so good in the personal play section though, I have never tried that with her before, so neither of us really knew what we were doing. I got her as an older dog and she was ridiculously mouthy, so I've always avoided playing with her without a toy intermediary, but Denise showed us some really good strategies that wouldn't remind her of how much fun she used to have being mouthy. Denise is a huge fan of personal play since you aren't allowed toy and food rewards in the ring, but if you have a strong foundation in personal play you don't need anything like that to give the dog a great reinforcer. Watching the dogs who were really good at it, it looked really fun, so I am going to do Denise's online course in personal play in December, and we will practice all the stuff she showed us on Saturday until then.

The hunt section was really interesting too, I have never engaged Jarrah's hunt instinct on purpose, although she does it herself when we bush walk, so she took to it very well. That one was really beneficial for the shyer, less confident dogs especially, they all looked a lot more confident and happy with themselves after a few minutes of engagement in that. I have a private lesson tommorow, we are going to do some nose work, which I have never done before so that's really exciting and I'm looking forward to it. It's definitely something I think she could be quite strong on, I just never thought to try it before.

Gotta give a special shout out for the food too! Homemade chocolate cakes and scones and jam and cream and biscuits, they were beautiful! I think I gained a few extra kilos to complement all my new knowledge.

It was a really fun weekend, a huge thankyou to everyone who organised it.

Edited July 14, 2013 by Wobbly

[Ptolomy]

Thanks for the wrap up Wobbly.

what happens if your dog doesn't tug or engage in play???

[RubyStar]

Thanks for the summary! Gives me an idea of what to expect and decide once and for all which dog I am taking!

Millie doesn't tug but is better at personal play and winding up and has more oomph in her obedience when I have her engaged (she can just as easily disengage, though, which I want Denise to help fix!)

Ruby tugs (though not ferociously) but isn't as keen on personal play, but she does try, bless her. Am leaning towards taking her because I need the most help with her motivation and well, she's my most special kid.... oh decisions, decisions!

[Inevitablue]

Denise explained that dogs prefer different parts of the prey sequence, so dogs dont have to tug. Some just love the chase. She related back to her own dogs chasing squirrels, not once have they ever caught one but their drive for it is as high as ever.

She explained some dogs like the chase and not so much the kill (I related this to my last dog, he would catch a mouse then stare and nudge it to get moving again), these dogs will happily chase a toy around your legs. Others like to have the toy in their mouth, and some like to 'gut' the toys. She wasn't big into face to face tugging at all, once the dog was on the tug she got us to start walking with the dog holding onto the toy beside us then doing front crosses to mix it up.

Dont think that she will get all the dogs tugging, she is more about having the dog super interested in the game your playing with them. The personal play was awesome to watch, the standard poodle was heart warming to see the bond between the owner and dog. One dog really had no interest in playing with a toy, but absolutely came to life when the owner just played with it. I asked Denise would she persist with a toy/prey item with this dog, or just use the established play interaction this team had. She considered for a short while then said the dog just simply loved playing with the owner so no need to make a dog want to chase/tug with a toy.

Her explanation of frantic dogs vs clear headed dogs really helped understand how just because a dog isnt throwing itself into back flips doesnt mean it lacking drive (example being a dog madly chasing sheep - frantic behaviour vs a border collie staring at sheep in a corner for 2 hrs - real drive)

She was very big on placement of reward. It must appear in the position you want the dog, otherwise you get dogs forging and curling around the handlers leg, which is undesirable in both IPO and ANKC.

EDIT: Ptolomy - for dogs who wont engage or disengage then Fred the imaginary dog gets all the fun and rewards. Amazing to see the dogs work that out quick smart! lol.

Edited July 15, 2013 by Inevitablue

[dwynwen]

It was brilliant - I was there as an auditor. I really appreciate the handlers being willing to put themselves out there in front of an audience.

Loved the way Denise did/said NOTHING to make any handler or dog feel bad about themselves in any way. Awesome trainer.

[Wobbly]

Wasn't that Standard Poodle beautiful! My friend who came along to pick me up with my husband was so impressed with him he had to have a phot opportunity with him. XD Very cute.

River Star, plenty of people brought more than 1 dog, and swapped different dogs for different exercises according to what they felt each dog needed most, or how comfortable the dogs were about the environment. I'd say bring along both dogs, if the anxious one is happy to work great, but if not you can work the other one so you will get the best benefit you can either way.

Ptolomy, if the dog really doesn't want to tug, Denise won't make him miserable by forcing him. There were a few dogs who just couldn't get into to the tug on the day for whatever reason, their breed, the distracting environment, personal history etc. Interestingly a lot of the dogs who didn't love the tug were really great at personal play, while my dog, the super keen, confident tugger was very poor at the personal play. We will work on that now I know more about it, I think she has lots potential there, but it's new to us, so I couldn't expect greatness until we have put some practice in and explored it some more.

IMO the important thing to remember is that it's about motivating the individual dog, what makes him happy, forcing him to do something he's just not into is more a punisher than a reinforcer, so not very motivating for the dog. There was one Belgian (Terv I think) who wasn't into the tug at all, but she was chasing it to make her owner happy, she knew that was expected but it wasn't the toy that was motivating her, it was pleasing her owner. I was actually a bit jealous of that dog's total devotion to her owner, and her owner was a bit jealous of how Jarrah tugged, we both got a bit of a giggle out of that.

Before the practical Denise gives all the theoretical information, which would help a lot for dogs who are a bit hesitant. I'd say bring a variety of toys, ones you know your dog likes the feel of in his mouth. There's lots of options for different dogs preferences, flirt poles, leather bite rags with lots of flappy bits that the more hesitant dogs might prefer to chase instead of biting a traditional tug. For a ball chaser, an orbee ball instead of a tug toy maybe? I have a good tugger who will tug on pretty much anything you offer, but there's definitely some surfaces she prefers over others.

In Denise's lecture she says to start with toys the dog finds easy, and gradually increase the toy difficulty progressively until you get the dog onto the more rigid surfaces that are more practical as training rewards. And you can vary stuff to account for the environment too. I knew a good bit of the tug information already from Steve, and so did Roscoe's owner so we were both a bit ahead there, and also our breeds are naturally good at it. I brought a variety of toys to the seminar so I could choose one depending on how she was feeling on the day. Normally I use a firehose at home or leather tug outside the house in familiar places, or that hard unforgiving canvas frisbee surface (or sometimes the firehose or another synthetic for generalisation purposes) for swim/fetch/tug (Jarrah's true passion). Since there were so many distractions at the seminar I decided to lower the difficulty for her and used a french linen tug instead, it's a lot easier to bite and hold onto than the firehose, and a little softer than the leather, so she was really happy and keen and confident with that, which was good because it was a distracting environment and I really wanted to make it so she would win. If I'd felt I had to lower the criteria even further to get her loving it I would have - I'd brought along a squeaky, fluffy toy, and would have had no hesitation in starting there if I felt I had to (she's well beyond that really, she'll tug on anything now, anywhere really, but I brought it just in case). The stuff that was most amazing to me was the personal play and hunt instinct information, that was awesome. I just had a private lesson today with Denise on scenting, which was so cool, I had never considered that avenue before, but I'm really inspired about it now. That can be an intrinsically rewarding activity for a dog too.

You know your dog, keep in mind a seminar environment can be distracting, so have a think about what will work best for your particular dog and bring the toys you think he'll be most happy with, you can always work up in difficulty over time if the dog is a tugger. If he's not, and as Inevitablue says, he might be a chaser or a personal player, or even something else. There was Collie on day 2 who had such a great work ethic and sense of responsibility about his work he really perked up and got motivated and happy to work simply by being reassured strongly his owner was really happy with him. Some dogs are really different and the usual reward rules don't apply to them.

There was a little lagotto who wasn't having a bar of the tug or chasing games at all, but when it came around to the personal play, that little lagotto was amazing! Her owner must have been justifiable very proud. For me it was the reverse I was really proud of Jarrah's tug work, but we were probably least proficient of all at the personal play. But I'm glad I tried it because it's something I can work on now, and if we get good at it, that's great, but if we don't that's OK too, I'm not going to force the issue if it's not Jarrah's thing, I'm looking for stuff she finds genuinely rewarding so I won't persevere trying to make her do stuff she isn't into. Denise's whole thing is about giving the dog a choice to work, once the dog knows he/she's made a deliberate and definite choice, they are just so happy to work, that in itself is really motivating for them and so they try really hard. A really awesome realisation for me.

Haha Dwynwen, she really is an amazing trainer hey, just as good at human psychology as a canine. Even though I did so poorly at the personal play, I am so happy I gave it a go, it may or may not work for us, but it's certainly worth a try for us to find out. I've a certain feeling it will work for us, I just need to practise a bit to get comfortable and work up to the same proficiency as the Poodle, the Lagotto and the Corgi and some of the other dogs who were amazing at it.

You'll definitely walk away feeling really proud of your dog whatever happens, so don't worry if you don't have a hardcore tugger on your hands, you and your dog will have a great time anyhow, and you'll see your proficiencies and learn strategies to improve upon the things you find work for your dog. It's a really awesome weekend whatever your dogs temperament and preferences you'll get tonnes out of it.

Edited July 15, 2013 by Wobbly

[RubyStar]

Really excited, now!

I am going to have a private lesson, too :) Wobbly, can you explain more (pretty please!) about the nose work in your private lesson? Is this a motivator for traditional obedience work, or a different kettle of fish altogether? I'm not sure what I will do in my private lesson.

I'd love to take both dogs as I keep swaying back and forth about who to take as I really need help with both their motivation, but I think we agreed it wouldn't really be that fair on other handlers, which I am ok with :) I'll hopefully be able to take away enough and apply it to the other :)

Edited July 15, 2013 by RubyStar

[BC4ME]

QLD's turn this week-end.

Let's hope the weather holds up. We are at Camp Tailwaggers and they have a huge undercover area but if it rains it gets very cold up that high.

I'm sure Jenny our cook will keep our tummy's full of warm and delicious food.

So looking forward to getting away for the week-end with many friends and a wonderful seminar

[Cleo's Corgwyn]

I had both my Cardis with me, since I had to travel a fair distance, and didn't have anywhere to leave one.

Denise was amazing; inspiring, informative, encouraging and really made me think about my training. My older girl isn't a tugger any more, after a previous medical condition, but Denise has really inspired me to use more and different games to keep her enthusiasm up. We worked on the pocket hand and using the fly in heeling today, and she worked so enthusiastically!

My nine month old boy had the time of his life, being his little social butterfly self, and we worked on some distraction exercises. Denise's thinking is that the more you teach your dog to work around distractions, the better the work you get out of them, and then distractions in the ring become almost an advantage because the dog has learnt to work harder when they encounter 'real' distractions!

[Ptolomy]

Thinking I need to book some more private lessons - at least one with each of the kids

[Tassie]

OK ...I'm officially green with envy ...but so many great presenters this year, I had to make choices. :-). Best I can do is observe some of Denise's online courses .. and read about what a great time you guys have been having ;-).

[Inevitablue]

I never thought my dog Zac could ever be repulsed by BBQ chicken without any form of negative reinforcement. But he was! :laugh:

[PAX]

It was a great seminar, she was so engaging, got something more out of every dog...very impressed:)

If you have a troublesome dog, bring it, she will have it and you worked out in a heartbeat...she is super:)

[RubyStar]

Denise's thinking is that the more you teach your dog to work around distractions, the better the work you get out of them, and then distractions in the ring become almost an advantage because the dog has learnt to work harder when they encounter 'real' distractions!

This I definitely believe :)

Thinking I need to book some more private lessons - at least one with each of the kids

I decided to book a private lesson with each of my 2 kids :D I'd love one with Pippa too, but that might be stretching the budget a bit too much I don't need help with Pippa's motivation, more problem solving with her. One of our many problems is I can't do fast pace with her without her getting under my feet

It was a great seminar, she was so engaging, got something more out of every dog...very impressed:)

If you have a troublesome dog, bring it, she will have it and you worked out in a heartbeat...she is super:)

So glad to hear this! Problem with my Ruby is she gets all hyper to work or play for someone else, but when it comes to working and playing with me, I'm a big fat bore to her

Gosh I'm really excited! Wish it was this weekend :p

[PAX]

Need a like button RS:)

[Wobbly]

Really excited, now!

I am going to have a private lesson, too :) Wobbly, can you explain more (pretty please!) about the nose work in your private lesson? Is this a motivator for traditional obedience work, or a different kettle of fish altogether? I'm not sure what I will do in my private lesson.

I'd love to take both dogs as I keep swaying back and forth about who to take as I really need help with both their motivation, but I think we agreed it wouldn't really be that fair on other handlers, which I am ok with :) I'll hopefully be able to take away enough and apply it to the other :)

Ruby, Denise picked nosework for me to work on. I explained my situation - a big surgery on Wednesday so I will be unable to a lot of the stuff i normally do with Jarrah for quite a while, so I wanted alternatives that were fun for Jarrah and easy on me. She'd seen us working, and suggested the nose work makes Jarrah work hard with her nose while I sit and watch her do her stuff. It was really fun! We just started with getting her to know the scent (anise I think it was) tin in one hand, and a food bribe in the other. When Jarrah chose to mug the scent hand we rewarded, swapping hands. After a little bit more practise of that she will be clear on what she is looking for and I can start hiding it round the house for her to find, I will have to do a bit of research to find out more about it, since it's very new to me, but that research is a perfect convalescence kind of activity too. We did some heeling exercises in between scent repetitions so I could work on left pivot and pocket hand too, and Jarrah could have a change of exercise so she didn't get bored and had some time to think about the scent work. Denise picked all the stuff we did, which was really cool because she is way better at assessing where Jarrah and I are and what's most helpful for us than I could possibly be.

If you don't have a specific idea in mind, once Denise has seen the dog work, perhaps explain your situation - what you want in very broad terms (eg I explained I wanted activities that would suit Jarrah the super active when I can't be active with her). In doing that, keep in mind she is seeing A LOT of dogs (some people used 2 dogs, and there are different handlers on different days, so it really does add up to her seeing a lot of dogs in a very short space of time. so do it on the day your dog has worked so it's fresh in her mind rather than on the day of the lesson, it might help also to remind which dog (I only had to mention the alligator dog for her to know) the obedience day is a better day if you''re doing that day, since there is more time with each individual dog than on the motivation day where there is so much theory there's only time for a short assessment for each individual dog in the practical sections.

I would still take both if I was you, so long as you have 2 crates and they're crate trained so they aren't noisy or disruptive when they aren't being worked, (or if they're noisy breeds/individuals make sure you have a management solution to deal with that - some of us brought campers (I did that), or others left their car open with crates in the car (vans and hatchbacks, there mostly but I imagine you could work tht in a normal car too since the weather is nice and cool right now. A few people brought 2 dogs. You only use one dog per practical exercise of course, you can't have two turns at each exercise, that would be unfair to other handlers. But having both on the day means you can use a different dog for different practical exercises, and you can choose which dog on the day, which may be especially helpful if you want to work a shy dog but you aren't how it'll cope with the pressures of all the other dogs and people around. or you decide you want to work the shy dog on the food hunting and the confident dog in the personal play or want to decide which dog after you've heard the practical. There was one girl there with a lovely shy dog who she wanted to work on the motivations day, but she brought her other dog for back up in case the shy dog was a little overwhelmed and not comfortable enough to be able to choose to work, as it turned out the shy dog was fine and worked well, but if it had been a bit freaked out she had an alternative dog to do the exercises with.

[bedazzledx2]

We are looking forward to hosting the seminars in WA.

I have to jump in here and say that our venue is not large enough to accommodate more than the twelve working dogs on each day. If we offer that to one, then it's only fair to offer it to everyone and we cannot accommodate 24 dogs on the one day.

It should be a great learning experience :-)

Really excited, now!

I am going to have a private lesson, too :) Wobbly, can you explain more (pretty please!) about the nose work in your private lesson? Is this a motivator for traditional obedience work, or a different kettle of fish altogether? I'm not sure what I will do in my private lesson.

I'd love to take both dogs as I keep swaying back and forth about who to take as I really need help with both their motivation, but I think we agreed it wouldn't really be that fair on other handlers, which I am ok with :) I'll hopefully be able to take away enough and apply it to the other :)

Ruby, Denise picked nosework for me to work on. I explained my situation - a big surgery on Wednesday so I will be unable to a lot of the stuff i normally do with Jarrah for quite a while, so I wanted alternatives that were fun for Jarrah and easy on me. She'd seen us working, and suggested the nose work makes Jarrah work hard with her nose while I sit and watch her do her stuff. It was really fun! We just started with getting her to know the scent (anise I think it was) tin in one hand, and a food bribe in the other. When Jarrah chose to mug the scent hand we rewarded, swapping hands. After a little bit more practise of that she will be clear on what she is looking for and I can start hiding it round the house for her to find, I will have to do a bit of research to find out more about it, since it's very new to me, but that research is a perfect convalescence kind of activity too. We did some heeling exercises in between scent repetitions so I could work on left pivot and pocket hand too, and Jarrah could have a change of exercise so she didn't get bored and had some time to think about the scent work. Denise picked all the stuff we did, which was really cool because she is way better at assessing where Jarrah and I are and what's most helpful for us than I could possibly be.

If you don't have a specific idea in mind, once Denise has seen the dog work, perhaps explain your situation - what you want in very broad terms (eg I explained I wanted activities that would suit Jarrah the super active when I can't be active with her). In doing that, keep in mind she is seeing A LOT of dogs (some people used 2 dogs, and there are different handlers on different days, so it really does add up to her seeing a lot of dogs in a very short space of time. so do it on the day your dog has worked so it's fresh in her mind rather than on the day of the lesson, it might help also to remind which dog (I only had to mention the alligator dog for her to know) the obedience day is a better day if you''re doing that day, since there is more time with each individual dog than on the motivation day where there is so much theory there's only time for a short assessment for each individual dog in the practical sections.

I would still take both if I was you, so long as you have 2 crates and they're crate trained so they aren't noisy or disruptive when they aren't being worked, (or if they're noisy breeds/individuals make sure you have a management solution to deal with that - some of us brought campers (I did that), or others left their car open with crates in the car (vans and hatchbacks, there mostly but I imagine you could work tht in a normal car too since the weather is nice and cool right now. A few people brought 2 dogs. You only use one dog per practical exercise of course, you can't have two turns at each exercise, that would be unfair to other handlers. But having both on the day means you can use a different dog for different practical exercises, and you can choose which dog on the day, which may be especially helpful if you want to work a shy dog but you aren't how it'll cope with the pressures of all the other dogs and people around. or you decide you want to work the shy dog on the food hunting and the confident dog in the personal play or want to decide which dog after you've heard the practical. There was one girl there with a lovely shy dog who she wanted to work on the motivations day, but she brought her other dog for back up in case the shy dog was a little overwhelmed and not comfortable enough to be able to choose to work, as it turned out the shy dog was fine and worked well, but if it had been a bit freaked out she had an alternative dog to do the exercises with.