Today's Exercise is Sponsered by the Letter "E"!

Part I:
Well, today Monster and I played with the "E" drill from Nancy Gyes' Alphabet Drills. It was pretty fun! One of my favorite drills so far. Lots of things to do with this drill :) Easy to break up into smaller sequences and, at the beginning of the exercise, she breaks it down until you build up to the full drill sequences. Monster surprised me by finding a straight line that I wasn't 100% sure he could see. The jumps were different angles but all 3 of them had a definite straight path to each other. There are still a few sequences that we haven't done with this drill so it will be in the yard all week. 

I chose this drill because, at the LCDA trial, Monster missed a jump that was part of a pinwheel. It was likely handler error but I'd like him to recognize that pattern on a course better. He nailed it! We threw in a few dogwalks to practice our DW criteria and he knew it. Having seen him perform the dogwalk appropriately at home and at the big training field, I know the issue at this recent trial was just a lack of changing habitat. We will continue to practice and hopefully make it to a run thru or two to practice criteria on other dogwalks. We are going to try to go to the big field tomorrow and get some practice in before I leave for a week for my internship. 

I have entered Monster in the November LCDA trial for 1 day only and we will have the opportunity to earn a Standard Q that I'd love to see us get. I know he can do it but we just need to make it happen in a trial atmosphere. We will also be running Pairs so that I don't have the issue I had with Shawty (not entering Pairs ever and ending up trying desperately to earn that Q for too many trials). 

***I have a mini project tonight to build some contact trainers from spare PVC I have for our A-Frame training tomorrow night :D

Part II:

Well, today is day 2 of the letter "E" drill and we have had lots more success. I have been working on "pushes" with Monster as well with this drill. I also threw in some weave poles in one of the modified versions of this drill so that I can encourage more weave independence. I left the guide wires on all 6 poles and then removed the middle. 99.5% success! I stopped handling because he took the poles without my cue and he jumped over a wire when he realized I had "turned off". My boy is so smart though :) 




There are 2 more modifications to this drill that I hope to set up and practice before Friday but we will see if time allows. I have attached a couple of pages, but not all of them, from this drill. I have also attached a photo of one of the modified versions set up in my backyard. 

I think I have underestimated the skills I could teach in my backyard for a long time until now. I absolutely love this book because there are endless training opportunities and it's great for some one like me who doesn't have lots of other equipment besides jumps, weaves, and tunnels!