Griffin: Off Leash Class

First night of "Off Leash Transition" class tonight. For once, a class I'm not teaching! The sad part is I wish all of my dogs could be in the class.

There were three other dogs in the class, a young very large breed and two excited herding mixes. And Griffin. As the dog with the most training, Griffin was in the middle of the line up. And very excitable.



- Recalls: We did recalls on the longline, I was VERY surprised that Griffin was immediately and 100% focused on coming to me. With the other dogs being interested and some vocalizing... I thought he would be more tempted to visit. Horray!
- Sits at a Distance: He's done a lot of this with field training, but...due to the excitement of the room, I only went about 10-15' away. He was sitting on cue. it was adorable.
- Walking with Me: (Sorta off leash nice leash walking) We did the demo for the class. He was cute. He was tempted to watch the other dogs. But he kept going!
- Collar Holds: He was really good with this. But I suppose he's never been one to duck away...he's almost tempted to stay out of 'reach range' if he wants something, but I think I'm imagining that. As I don't go for him if I don't think he'll come.

There was some barking, esp when we entered. He didn't eat immediately. He was able to do some other things (dumbbell work behind barriers), some stays, some sits out of motion. We did a lot of really nice heeling with really nice duration. We did some tugging and playing with toys.

But he could barely contain himself. We used a lot of food: 3/4 a block of cheese. A handful of mustard pretzels. Half a handful of peanut butter pretzels. A cup of kibble. And a few misc. treats. THAT said, I was careful with EVERY piece of reinforcement. He worked for every single little crumb.

Next week, we'll have crate near our station and do more crating/stays/settles and shorter spurts of working. I'll have him in the building before the other dogs come in, so that we don't have to walk so far to get to our station. I'll have a greater variety of reinforcers and cut into smaller pieces. We also need to go back to our Adventure Walks and out in public work. I'll give him closer to 100%. I got a bit distracted watching how the others were doing and being tempted to jump in and help teach!