Zeke has another session of Agility I tonight. We worked primarily on jumping techniques. We spaced out three and then four jumps close together, then farther apart to force the dog to adjust his stride between jumps. Zeke was great at it.
We’re still working on calming behavior, and I was surprised how well Zeke did tonight. He did really well until the end of class. I’ve noticed that one of his triggers is when a dog plays tug as his reward. It really sets him off. I’m going to have to find a dog that tugs to work on de-sensitizing Zeke to this from a distance then gradually moving closer. Our homework is to reinforce a cute behavior that the dog already does, so they can do it on command or use it to ask for cookies. Daisy does a jump, turn, flip combo–one day I caught it with a click, and she learned really quick that it earns cookies. Next you wait for the dog to offer the behavior again, click and reward. Pretty soon, you can add a command. We’ll see what Zekester learns this week!
