# The long road to the UD



## Mfmst

You can do it Lily! YES! (No pressure, with a Yale admission and all...). Best wishes to an unbeatable team. Crush it!


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## MollyMuiMa

GO LILY!!! Me and Molly will be keeping all fingers, toes, and paws crossed, with a few prayers, and pennies in the wishing well, that you accomplish your goal!!!!!!


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## Indiana

You can do it! Remember, you're a CONTENDER! (Top 10 in Front and Finish!)


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## shelhey

Best wishes for success and a great time!


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## hopetocurl

Good luck, Lily! You will be awesome!


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## lily cd re

We had our final practice today (at the site where the trial will be). I didn't do the scent discrimination since I didn't want to take a chance on messing up my articles right before the trial. Lily's scent work is really solid anyway, so I am not too concerned about that part. I made sure I wore a shirt in the style of what I will wear over the weekend to show Lily what she will be looking for on the signal exercises. Out walls are light in color so I wear a shirt with long sleeves and dark in color for contrast in trial. For proofing in training I wear light colors so she has to work harder. She did good signal work. the moving stand and gloves were good too. She was a little weak in the directed jumping in the practice routing, but I had the chance to do some more with it later and it improved. Now we just have to keep our fingers crossed! Keep your positive vibes headed our way sometime between 10:30 and noon tomorrow. We are the last entry in utility B.


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## Mfmst

Rooting for you two! 
Mary and (brushed) Buck


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## lily cd re

Well we didn't qualify today, but we came pretty darn close!

The order was directed retrieve, signals, directed jumping, moving stand for exam and scent discrimination. Lily took the correct glove but dropped it in front of me instead of holding it. This is a big point deduction but qualifies. Her heeling up to the moving stand was decent (not fabulous) she stayed where I left her, but then didn't drop all the way (didn't put her elbows down). I gave her an extra signal to try to get her to put her her elbows down and she decided to come in to me without the other parts of the exercise. This has been one of the hardest things for her to learn to do, so as long as she recovered from being worried (which she did) I am happy with it all. She did beautiful go outs and took both jumps on my orders with no problem. Her fronts were a bit crooked, but otherwise very nice. I was thrilled with the go outs (this also has been very hard for her to learn). The moving stand was very good and the scent discrimination was also very good. We NQ'd the first article because I had to give her a 2nd order to go to the pile, but she got the right article and worked the pile nicely. I had to do a bit of work to collect her to set up for the 2nd article. The steward hadn't been paying close enough attention and thought we were finished after the first article. He came in with the leash. Lily knows the man and also has a big thing about seeing her leash and wanting to take it so getting her back to do that 2nd article was a big thing.

I am most happy that she went into the ring nice and relaxed and she came out really happy. I am optimistic for tomorrow. It is the same judge.


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## Quossum

"Futility" is no joke! Good luck!

--Q


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## lily cd re

Oh yes, futility it is, although a fair amount was very good today. I was talking with the judge while I was scenting my articles and told him I was doing a UD out of B instead of A and he did say something nice about how she was doing at least as well as the UDX (really need to be in B dogs). Actually nobody qualified in utility A today and only 7 out of 15 who showed qualified in B.

I also have to say that after Bella broke her leg and Minnie wrote about just being grateful for her being able to recover instead of worrying about getting Qs my perspective has relaxed to being more about how Lily works than whether she qualifies. She was relaxed going in and happy when we came out, so it was a good entry! We will persist for the title though.


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## patk

when it's more about the dog and giving her the best chance to strut her stuff is when things come together. go, lily!


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## Indiana

I love your attitude! You'll get there, and all the training you've done has made Lily a better dog. Never in vain.


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## lily cd re

A friend of mine who is trialing this weekend and who really struggled for 2+ years with utility reminded me just before I went in to be happy with Lily no matter what happened. Part of her problems arose from showing her dog that she was disappointed when he NQd. She worked very hard to change her own attitude and finished his UD late last year. We talked more after we finished yesterday and I told her how much I appreciated her reminder. Her reply was to keep a picture of her old self in my head to bring out when I feel myself getting frustrated. There were a couple of people who looked angry with their dogs when they came out of the ring. I really hate seeing that. I do this to make my relationships with my dogs better. I like my titles and am proud of what they represent, but the most important thing behind the titles is the trust and honesty in how my dogs look at me that the titles represent. 

At the other end of the spectrum from the people who take themselves too seriously and get PO'd with their dogs for being wrong, one of the happiest people who NQ'd yesterday was a guy in beginner novice A with a labradoodle that goofed around with the judge during the sit for exam. When the judge stepped away from the dog, the man smiled and said that's ok big guy and went on with the rest of the routine with a smile on his face.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> <snip> Marguerite if you see this, thanks for your good wishes. I started here so as not to hijack your celebratory news for Neely.


I hope I'm not too late to send good energy for a Q today! I don't always drop into Poodle Forum but I was here today to update my avatar. 

Now that I've posted in this thread, I'll get an email about new posts so I can keep up with the conversation.

I don't want to hijack your thread either, but here's a little update on what we're up to. Neely's next outing will be in UKC Rally in September. He has his Level 1 title (URO1) and I'm waffling about entering him in Level 1 or Level 2 to see if we can add the URO2 title--or both. But since it's usually 3-2-1 instead of 1-2-3, I can't use Level 1 for a warm-up--but it would be good for points if we Q.

That Sunday will be my judging debut for UKC Rally, and it's at one of my favorite venues (Dandy Dog in Newville, PA), so I hope everyone Qs and has a good time. The trial secretary is a phenomenal cook and the lunches are always wonderful. It's the best way to spend a weekend that I can think of.


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## lily cd re

Hi everyone, no Q today, but the signals were great! She has never come close to Q'ing the signals, but she did it today. She only did one good go out an jump, but the articles and moving stand were good and the glove was ok. Between yesterday and today we Q'd all the exercises at least once. Once again she worked happy and was relaxed going into and coming out of the ring. Attitude is so important in this class I am very pleased with her look.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Hi everyone, no Q today, but the signals were great! She has never come close to Q'ing the signals, but she did it today. She only did one good go out an jump, but the articles and moving stand were good and the glove was ok. Between yesterday and today we Q'd all the exercises at least once. Once again she worked happy and was relaxed going into and coming out of the ring. Attitude is so important in this class I am very pleased with her look.


Terrific! Better luck next time!


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## patk

i am pretty sure you are doing a great job in handling and refining lily's performance. some things cannot be rushed. seasoning - with a light touch - matters. no doubt about you getting there.


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## lily cd re

I think the thing to do at this point is keep on refreshing her skills in class and as much as possible out in other locations. I have a place near me that I can rent ring time both indoors and outside. I can also go to school yards and some parks and set up ring gates and jumps to work on those exercises that are the hardest (go out and signals). Out next trial will be the Wine Country Cluster in the finger lakes area of NY near the end of September. It will be outside. We are very close to getting it to all pull together.


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## Streetcar

lily cd re said:


> I think the thing to do at this point is keep on refreshing her skills in class and as much as possible out in other locations. I have a place near me that I can rent ring time both indoors and outside. I can also go to school yards and some parks and set up ring gates and jumps to work on those exercises that are the hardest (go out and signals). Out next trial will be the Wine Country Cluster in the finger lakes area of NY near the end of September. It will be outside. We are very close to getting it to all pull together.


You are on the verge, and thank you for sharing so much of your journey! You have no idea C how your posts about state of mind help, even for the low level training we do. Thank you and this is all coming together, block by block, for you and Lily. What a celebration of a relationship for you two to work on this as a team and eventually earn the crown!


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## Mfmst

You'll get those letters. Patk is right, it is seasoning. She did much better at this past weekend trials and is much farther down that long road, than she was. Everything will come together and it will be so sweet when it does.


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## lily cd re

Thank you all of you for your kind words. Lily is a very special girl. I am very lucky to have her. No matter what her titles end up being, our lives together are turning out to be a fabulous journey.


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## Raven's Mom

I love your posts and especially reminders about attitude. I have really needed it lately as Raven hit this bratty teenage period and I was used to my "anxious to please" collie girl. Raven has to be convinced its worth doing before she will try. Once she decides its worthy of her effort she learns super fast and doesn't forget, but it am not used to having to negotiate with a dog!


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## lily cd re

Girls will try your patience to the bitter end I think. I had an interesting conversation during some of my down time at the trial this weekend along these lines. One of the people was a woman who has a male malinois working on UDX legs so she was in utility B with me. The UDX people all are pretty obsessive about watching each other and so she had seen Lily in the ring. She asked me about working a poodle and wanted to know if they are as smart as everyone says they are. I told her they are very smart and that this was a blessing and a curse. I said they are very quick to pick up things but then get bored if you try to make them do too many reps so you have to train in short sessions. I told her that once Lily knows something if I ask for too many reps she does the behavior wrong. Either she thinks she has been wrong and that she needs to change it (or anthropomorphically I sometimes think she does it to annoy me as a way to tell me she is quitting for the moment). The next part of our conversation was about how dogs are much more biddable usually than bitches.


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## Minnie

Congrats!!!! A happy Lily is the best possible result this was great news!!!!


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## lily cd re

Thanks for that Minnie. I thought a lot about you and Bella over the weekend. Since I am entering utility B with the UDX/OTCh folks I had a fair amount of time over hearing much of their sort of obsessive discussions about crooked sits and slight lags and losing a point here or half a point there. It just doesn't seem to me that those are the most important parts of this whole set of things we do with our dogs. Bella's injury reminds me that it is the journey that is most important, not the destination. If there are bumps in the road, who cares.

I went to class today (it was nice and quiet now that the trial is over). One of the people who is a regular was the table steward for utility B on Sunday. She was all set to have a post mortem with me and offer suggestions about how to fix all the things that had gone wrong. I think she and the other person who had seen us in the ring on Sunday who was there when I arrived were surprised when I said I was very happy with how things had gone since it was such an improvement over other attempts. One of them understood, the other one said she is always very upset if her dog doesn't qualify (she's much more about the destination).

How is Bella doing?


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## Minnie

*Catherine - *Your thoughtful words brought me to happy tears this time. Bella's injury was a huge wakeup call in my life. I was soooo nervous each time we went to the starting line and while I never let Bella see (we partied after each run no matter what) I was disappointed at times when that 1 weave pole or contact resulted in a lost Q. Now I am simply grateful for each day that we get to spend together. Bella is doing well her temp was up but it is back in the normal range and no sign of infection was seen in her bandage change - so far so good - thanks for asking!!!


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## mashaphan

Yep,they certainly DO call it Futility for a reason! I know many very experienced people who have worked on it for a very long time! It will come,as others have said..and I have learned HAPPY is the REAL goal! Best of luck,and see you in Nov,maybe? (if she hasn't finished by then!)


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## lily cd re

*It is hard to do this outside....*

was Lily's message to me this weekend. She had a terrible time in utility on both Friday and Saturday, so I pulled her entry on Sunday and just did rally. I wanted to ensure that we left with her having had success and feeling happy not stressed. I think though that she was more distracted than seriously stressed. She often gets an upset intestine when she is feeling stressed and also often loses her appetite. She ate well all weekend and had no intestinal disruptions, so she generally seemed very happy by all measures. 

I do believe however that a well trained dog should do whatever it is being told to do no matter where they are. That is the real proofing of a behavior. I also had the added distraction of my mom and Wolfie along for the trip. We will be doing a lot of training with them around before she comes with us again.


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> Yep,they certainly DO call it Futility for a reason! I know many very experienced people who have worked on it for a very long time! It will come,as others have said..and I have learned HAPPY is the REAL goal! Best of luck,and see you in Nov,maybe? (*if she hasn't finished by then*!)


If by some miracle I finished the UD before then I would still go to all the shows I have planned to start on a UDX!


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## mvhplank

It's all a learning experience. In my last CDSP judging assignment, I had to NQ a terrific team (they had earlier won High in Trial) for failing to get Glove #3. I looked at the handler and said something like, "I'm sorry--I never would have set that up to happen." She shrugged and said, "It's diagnostic."

I'm trial secretary for our next CDSP obedience weekend, so I get free runs and will enter Devlin in Open and Utility--I wouldn't pay for the utility classes if it were out of my own pocket. He's done all the different exercises before--just never in the same trial--and I think he likes it better than rally. 

And why enter in Open? We're working on an Open Championship--10 scores above 185 and you earn the title of CDX-CCH.


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## mashaphan

Oh,sorry it didnt go well,or at least as well as hoped! I don't show Che (whippet) outside as we don't TRAIN outside at all. Hope to do so w/the (eventual) Spoo,but I am leary w/a sighthound. Sampson is very BUSY as well.with all the vendors/events/spectators.and Utility is HARD (from my 60'S perspective!) Having done so much in rally now,my whole outlook has changed to Fun is the Focus;I don't know how MUCH obedience we will do,as he finds it stressful (probably because I do!)

See you in January,weather permitting!:banghead:


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> Oh,sorry it didnt go well,or at least as well as hoped! I don't show Che (whippet) outside as we don't TRAIN outside at all. Hope to do so w/the (eventual) Spoo,but I am leary w/a sighthound. Sampson is very BUSY as well.with all the vendors/events/spectators.and Utility is HARD (from my 60'S perspective!) Having done so much in rally now,my whole outlook has changed to Fun is the Focus;I don't know how MUCH obedience we will do,as he finds it stressful (probably because I do!)
> 
> See you in January,weather permitting!:banghead:



If I had a sight hound I wouldn't be too inclined to train or show outside either. My fantasy dog if I had the right property would be a salukie (saw a couple of really nice ones in Romulus).

It has taken time for me to get to where I feel comfortable training Lily off leash outside, but she has a really reliable recall so even if she gets distracted I can get her back. I also make sure I am not near any busy roads as a CYA. I generally think I am pretty relaxed when I go into any kind of ring since I always remind myself that the most important part is spending time with my dogs and building my bonds with them. As those bonds deepen and trust is reinforced, the dogs will gain the confidence they need to do the new things they learn with success and assurance. I kind of figured I should think of those utility entries as really hard matches and they were.

I had some great conversations with a woman who has had two OtCH Great Danes (no easy feat I think, since you don't have forever to get it done with a giant breed). She suggested also entering versatility or open B along with doing rally as confidence builders, ways to have fun and reinforcers for the utility exercises. The Sunday rally judge and I also had a conversation along those same lines. I thanked her for including one of the newer excellent exercises (stand and leave dog, sit dog, call front, finish) in the course. This of course is a sign that incorporates utility elements. She is getting a dog ready for utility and is also using rally as an aid to getting there.


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## mashaphan

OTCH Great Danes!:adore:

I had 2 salukis (mom and daughter) from very old lines (Warm Valley and Pine Paddocks)-not obedience minded in the least. VERY independant(well,mom.who was typical saluki wasn't..never tried daughter .but she was a biscuit short of a picnic :argh Also has 2 IWs..tried obedience w/the older ,but that was my "one failure and never go back in the ring" period  Love the sighthounds to death,but as I said to my obedience buds,I think I want a performance dog who LOOKS at me once in awhile!:boring:!


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> *OTCH Great Danes!*:adore:
> 
> I had 2 salukis (mom and daughter) from very old lines (Warm Valley and Pine Paddocks)-not obedience minded in the least. VERY independant(well,mom.who was typical saluki wasn't..never tried daughter .but she was a biscuit short of a picnic :argh Also has 2 IWs..tried obedience w/the older ,but that was my "one failure and never go back in the ring" period  Love the sighthounds to death,but as I said to my obedience buds,I think I want a performance dog who LOOKS at me once in awhile!:boring:!


I was truly impressed! She also has a MACH 2 on one of them!!!!


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## lily cd re

Well, we didn't qualify today, but there were some good moments. We had decent heeling and a really good moving stand. Other things were rocky, but had flashes of good stuff in them. I had good company in my NQ with an OTCh dog that didn't have go outs today. At least when you are with poodle people everybody gets what a bad day with them can be like. We have tomorrow off and will practice go outs and signals along the way.

I met feralpudel, an old member from PF at the show too!


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## lily cd re

When we got back from our outing today we practiced signals and go outs in the hotel hallway. Lily did a good job with them even though she probably was sort of tired.

We are turning in early since we will have to be up and out early tomorrow. The utility ring will be all by itself in a separate building tomorrow and we are the last dog. I am hoping that Lily will think it is a match rather than worrying about the intensity of a trial. I hope that the signals are late in the order for tomorrow's routine.


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## Quossum

Good luck!!!


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## lily cd re

NQ again yesterday, but again good heeling and a brilliant moving stand and Lily got the second scent article correct. There are so many variables to work to be prepared for and I do as much as I can to anticipate everything. I am not the kind of person who wants to blame outside circumstances like the dog didn't like the lights in the building or saw a bird during the stays, but there are just some outside forces that are too overwhelming for a dog that is green in the routine you are doing and yesterday offered up a big one, so I guess I am really happy she did anything at all.

So here's what happened. We were the last entry in utility B and I could see that it was moving along fairly quickly since a couple of people were absent. I took Lily out to pee and poo about 20-30 min before I thought we would be going in. She did both and we were headed back to the building where the utility ring was (nice setting only utility in one building, nicely non-distracting and with an appreciative gallery). As I was walking back I had to pass about 8 to 10 feet from a group of 4 people and 2 dogs who were just talking (the people that is). One of the dogs was a huge rottie. All of a sudden he had run out to the end of his 6 foot leash and was lunging so hard he pulled himself up onto his hind legs and turned his "handler" around off balance. He was barking really nastily too! Thankfully I had Lily on my left side, otherwise I am pretty sure he would have been able to reach her. Needless to say I was unsettled and she was horrified! I worked really hard to shake it off myself and to calm her down and brighten her up, but it was too much to close to going in. It made most of the exercises where she had to move or stay away from me too much for her to handle (no glove, no go outs, couldn't stay away for the drop signal). The judge was very kind to let me stay in the ring and essentially practice. I had told her in between the gloves and the signals about what had happened (short version). We ended with the success of the second article.

The sucky part of it was that the woman who the rottie belonged to never apologized. One of her friends passed by me while I was trying to calm Lily down. She could see how upset we both were and she didn't really apologize but I did tell her this had created a big problem for me. She offered to bring out her dog (turned out to be a gigantic black GSD) to help Lily overcome her fear of large male dogs. I said no thanks, that Lily lived with a large male GSD and that her problem was only with rotties because she has repeatedly had bad experiences with them. It was really unfortunate too since I know someone with a nice rottie bitch who has helped me desensitize Lily to them and now that work is all undone. We probably won't see them again until January at the earliest, so now I have to make sure she doesn't see any rotties at all again for a while.

I have no problem with people showing any breed they want in obedience or any other sport, but this dog didn't seem obedience material (wouldn't want to have been on a group stay with it) and the handler seemed pretty clueless as well. I can't imagine this was a first for this dog.


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## mvhplank

Sorry to hear this. I'm glad the judge was sympathetic and helped get you back in gear. I'm sure your Rot-dar is going to be much more sensitive after this incident!

We were at conformation this weekend--Neely won over his grandfather four times, but we were the only standard poodles there and Neely needed to win over 2 Champions to get any wins toward Grand Champion. We got some nice comments from the judges ("nicest-moving poodles I've seen in a long time") both for Neely and for my friend with his grandsire (Neely's "a testament to your breeding program" and "you're going in the right direction").

The show ran out of several kinds of ribbons so I donated my Champion and Best of Breed ribbons back to the club. I had gotten free runs for helping steward, so I figured it was only fair. I kept my three Group 2 ribbons (lost each time to an astonishing owner-trained Master Hunter GSP bitch) but gave back my Group 3 ribbon (beat out by a Clumber! The shame!  )


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## lily cd re

Oh yes, Rot-Dar big time from now on. Thankfully the "friend" with the GSD came by later in the day when I had Lily out of her crate to say that the rottie was going back to his crate to give me a heads up. I just tucked Lily in close so she didn't see him. Congrats on Neely's shows over the weekend, sorry you didn't have enough entries to get you the points you needed.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> <snip> Congrats on Neely's shows over the weekend, sorry you didn't have enough entries to get you the points you needed.


UKC is a little different from AKC--I only had to calculate points for his championship. It's possible to finish a championship in a weekend, if you win you classes over at least one dog three different times. 

For Grand Champion, it's entirely within the breed classes, which makes it very hard for folks with rare breeds. They pretty much have to bring their whole kennel and friends to finish a Grand. You need to win the Champion class five times over two champions each time--class dogs don't count. So either a win in a 3-dog champion class five times or win a 2-dog champion class and then Best of Breed over the winner of the Grand Champion class--either way, you still have to win over two other dogs. 

We do well with judges who really like good movement. There was one judge at a show last spring that was putting up mediocre poodles with curly tails--"a serious fault" in the UKC standard. He's fairly local so I'll just save my money if he's judging.

Yes, getting another leg or two would have been nice, but otherwise no problem--I wanted to support my club and hang out with my friend, the one who owns Neely's grandfather. They're having their own struggles with a UD. He's turning 7 soon, so I think they still have time. 

A day spent with friends and dogs is never a waste of time!

M


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## mashaphan

What terrible timing! Che is very unsure of other dogs with whom he is unfamiliar (hence our Long Sit and Long Down issues). If this had happened to him,I'm sure he would have been the same way. Dogs have lunged at him,barking angrily,and outwardly he is unaffected;I can see the stress on his face,though,when I have to leave him.

On the lighter side,I know where the birds reside:aetsch:, and we ,too have a "Joy" ful Rottie buddy!:angel2:! Best of Luck in the upcoming trials!


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## lily cd re

The rottie who has been Lily's desensitizer is Joy at Syracuse Obedience, same Joy perhaps? I know them from Syracuse and from Rally Nationals 2014.


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## Minnie

Oh what rotten luck!!!!! I can't imagine anyone doing group stays with such a dog what a disaster in the making.


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## lily cd re

Minnie said:


> Oh what rotten luck!!!!! I can't imagine anyone doing group stays with such a dog what a disaster in the making.


Thankfully utility doesn't have group stays, but yeah what a drag being in an open out of sight stay that dog would be. I actually don't understand how someone with a dog aggressive dog thinks their dog should be in obedience classes that require group stays (actually don't understand why they would bring such a dog to any dog show).


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## mashaphan

lily cd re said:


> The rottie who has been Lily's desensitizer is Joy at Syracuse Obedience, same Joy perhaps? I know them from Syracuse and from Rally Nationals 2014.


Yes,that's our buddy!:blowkiss:


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## lily cd re

Joy is a lovely dog and her mom is a sweetheart too. She was a lot of fun to be in the group with at rally nationals. So now I am thinking we've probably been in the same place at the same time somewhere along the way. I was at the June SOTC trials with Lily.


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## mashaphan

We have! 

Did you hear about Joy's (mostly Janet's!) trauma w/her neighbors dogs? Scared them both nearly out of their skins;They came to a couple of Tues nt classes to recover,and of course at that time we had a Uber-reactive Cattle Dog,but neither Joy or Che paid him any heed.

We will (weather permitting) be at SOTC in Jan,but don't know if we will actually be entered or not. Joy will probably do ASCA in Dec,as will we.


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## lily cd re

I hope winter lets us meet up in January then. I hope you will say hello to Janet for me, we never actually have gotten around to trading contact info. My closest friends at Syracuse Obedience are Barb and Stacey with spoos.


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## lily cd re

No Q today, but saw some good work. Lily did one good go out, Q'd the glove, moving stand and the 2nd scent article. She came in on the drop signal, but did the rest of the signals once I got her to down. Only half the utility B (11/22) and none of the utility A dogs Q'd. 

Our judge today was the same judge at the Washington Poodle Club two weeks ago. She commented that lots of things looked better today than then. I mentioned to her what happened on that Sunday with the rottie and she was even more kind to offer that Lily did great to recover from that incident so well in such a short period of time.

This club had excellent stewarding. It is amazing how much that helped today. We also did versatility today. We didn't Q (I did a bad job and sent her to the wrong glove), but I think it was good for Lily to have a routine that started with exercises that she is very comfortable with.

We will try again tomorrow in utility. We also are doing a rally RAE leg.


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## mvhplank

I'm following your story with great interest. I just have been starting Neely on his utility exercises and the directed jumping is not anything to brag upon. He's starting to understand the scent articles and he seems to be understanding the gloves. He has a half-ring go-out, which we need for CDSP Open. 

I think I'm going to take a step back from directed jumping and work on "jump that thing that I'm pointing at no matter where you are, no matter where I am" and see how that goes - treat it a little bit like agility. I think he'll have more fun and I think I'll have less frustration. 

Good luck with the next one - we're trying to finish our rally novice title sometime this month.


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## lily cd re

So again no Q in utility today, but some things were very good. Particularly the moving stand, and the heeling (but not the signals). I did a bad job again and sent her to the wrong glove. I have to work on my part of that exercise (need better footwork). Lily again took the wrong article for the first one today. Both times she missed the correct article was in the middle of the pile. I will work on getting her to really work in the middle in the next few weeks. Go out went away entirely today. The judge was nice and had us move up about ten feet closer for the second one. It was a bit better but still not even close to what it should be. There was no AKC rep at this show so the judge (same person as yesterday) did a lot to "help" those of us with problems. Ironically I worked on signals and go outs at the hotel last night and had her doing signals from about 50 to 60 feet away and sent he on equally long go outs. I think I just have to keep trying and hope she relaxes enough sooner than later to qualify those exercises (which she has done). Today she was more focused between exercises. When she is really stressing over it she tries to flirt with the judge and to leave with the stewards. She did a lot less of that today than yesterday. 

On a better note, we had a great RAE leg today with a 99 in excellent and 100 in advanced. Believe it or not we got beat on time by a corgi in the advanced class! But I always tend to be a bit slow with her on my rally runs. If I go too fast she tends to get overcharged and I often end up having to redo things. I would rather get the better score since a lower score with a fast time doesn't get you in the placements.


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## Quossum

Isn't it wonderful to have a kind, supportive judge on your side? It makes such a difference. 

Sounds like you had a great weekend with plenty of "learning experiences"!

--Q


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## lily cd re

Quossum said:


> Isn't it wonderful to have a kind, supportive judge on your side? It makes such a difference.
> 
> Sounds like you had a great weekend with plenty of "learning experiences"!
> 
> --Q


She was so good to me all weekend long! Yesterday for versatility we were the only entry, so she asked me which glove I wanted to do instead of telling me which one to do. It helped that there was no rep looking over her shoulder either.


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## Minnie

Trials seem to run a bit different when a Rep is in the house LOL.... What a great yet expensive training opportunity


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## lily cd re

Minnie said:


> Trials seem to run a bit different when a Rep is in the house LOL.... What a great yet expensive training opportunity


For sure....don't regret a penny of it either!


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## lily cd re

*Literally on the road to work on the UD*

Here is how Lily travels when we are on the road. She has the back seat with a hammock to keep her from having to worry about falling into the foot well. Her car buddies keep her company and yesterday on the way home she used my bag with my clothes as a pillow on the way home! She is secured by a tether to her harness. The tether is locked to the child seat bar.


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## lily cd re

*Last trials of the year*

Lily and I will be on the road to Springfield, MA later today for the Thanksgiving Cluster (it used to actually be Thanksgiving weekend). It is a huge venue with a very large breed show each day (over 20 rings in two buildings), rally and obedience (1 rally ring and 4 obedience rings in another building), then also agility Friday-Monday in the back part of the obedience building. 

We will be doing rally on Thursday as a warm up along with versatility. Friday to Sunday will be versatility and utility. We also have an agility entry and rally on Saturday. Versatility is two novice, two open and two utility exercises. I am hoping that the easier exercises will be a confidence booster for the utility exercises and that versatility will support Lily for utility. If I feel she is struggling I can pull an entry or two along the way to give Lily a break. I really would be thrilled to get one utility leg to end the year.


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## mvhplank

Best of luck! Keep us updated. Neely and I will be trying to finish his Rally Novice title the Friday after Thanksgiving (11/28) in Point of Rocks, MD. That's where I finished Devlin's Rally Novice title, so maybe it will go well.

Right now I'm in the middle between two cataract operations, and the next one won't be until after the show. Should be interesting ...


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## mashaphan

Good luck to all! Apparently,after the past weekend,Che whippet and I are starting the Long Road to the CD!:argh: Maybe I will just wait until the group exercises are eliminated!:aetsch:


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> Good luck to all! Apparently,after the past weekend,Che whippet and I are starting the Long Road to the CD!:argh: Maybe I will just wait until the group exercises are eliminated!:aetsch:



So what's your news from last weekend with your whippet? Also you are in Syracuse area, right? Did you get a lot of snow?


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## mashaphan

We got flurries only for a change! Snowing now,but only 3-5" expected at last word.

Che did quite well until the long down (nothing like the last minute fail,eh?) The fairgrounds Nov shows are quite "busy" with all activities and vendors in the same bldg,and he is a worrier. First day I don't know what bothered him as no one else was near to judge,2nd day squeak toys behind him (apparently),3rd day the golden next to him rolled from the get-go and judge made handler leave her while doing that,but trainer seems to think it was a lady that screamed behind him that made him get up. Once upon a time,he had it rock solidly,then started to worry and lost it. Oh well,he kept his long sit,which he had lost as well,so one step at a time!

Barb and her Spoo continue on the long road to UD as well!


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## lily cd re

Oh darn on those groups. They really can be killer! Lily has rarely failed a group stay exercise, but somehow now she thinks the idea of them is very stressful Even at my club she has been really reluctant to go in to set up for groups. She also has broken the sit a few times, but I think that is because our floor is slippery since it only seems to happen when I haven't trimmed the hair on the bottom of her feet.

I find the fairgrounds in November to be too noisy to expect much. Although it is hectic in March too, having obedience, rally and agility in a separate building makes it better.

Given how versatility went today (the two utility exercises were signals and directed jumping, her least favorites) I am hoping there is a break from bad winter weather so I can get to the January trials at Syracuse Obedience.


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## lily cd re

Well we have a lot of work to do! I am realizing that I think that incident with the rottweiler back in October has had a deeper and more lasting impact than I would have hoped. Lily has really struggled with the signals and the go outs this weekend. After I go no go out 2x in versatility I pulled my entry for utility. I may do the same again tomorrow.

There are a lot of rotties here this weekend. The handlers all seem pretty good and I have found one who worked with me on meet and greet with her puppy bitch yesterday and my friend from Syracuse and I did a good session with her girl today. It is going to take more sessions like this to really fix it all though. During today's rally excellent, Lily went off course towards where her leash was hanging on the ring gate. She came back without much problem. Thinking it was because it was one of her wide, pretty leashes that had distracted her, I switched to a boot lace to use to go in and out for advanced. The judge had it folded up in a little package in her hand and it was out of sight but it seemed like Lily still was aware of where it was and wanted to take it. She tried to go around to my right towards the judge. I spoke to the judge after she gave the awards and told her about the attempted attack from October and said I thought the leash has become a comfort object for Lily. The judge noted that there had been a rottie outside the ring in sight and that she thought Lily had looked at that dog before she tried to approach her for the leash. One of my friends thought the same as the judge. 

Somebody else I know and I were talking later on. I was telling her how we did and generally how things have been recently. She made some comment to the effect of "oh well that has ruined her then!" Really? Why would you choose to say something so disheartening. We have overcome setbacks in the past and we will again. I am trying to be optimistic.


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## Quossum

She can get past it! If Sugarfoot can get past his brutal attack (and a few other minor incidents since then!) then Lily can recover, too. Good point about the leash possibly being a comfort object. Do you know anyone with a rottie that you can train around, play the "Look at that dog" game, maybe?


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## patk

lily cd re said:


> ...Somebody else I know and I were talking later on. I was telling her how we did and generally how things have been recently. She made some comment to the effect of "oh well that has ruined her then!" Really? Why would you choose to say something so disheartening. We have overcome setbacks in the past and we will again. I am trying to be optimistic.


stupid insensitive comments are a way of life with some people. what was that saying about better to appear to be a fool than open your mouth and prove you are one?


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## lily cd re

Quossum said:


> She can get past it! If Sugarfoot can get past his brutal attack (and a few other minor incidents since then!) then Lily can recover, too. Good point about the leash possibly being a comfort object. Do you know anyone with a rottie that you can train around, play the "Look at that dog" game, maybe?


There are none that I like near me at home. As luck would have it, I do have a friend in Syracuse with a nice working rottie bitch. I didn't think I would see her until January at the earliest, but low and behold she appeared this morning at the show. Her daughter was showing in agility and breed. My friend has her dog with her and we worked with Joy and Lily this afternoon. We had Lily walk around with Joy on a down and a sit, etc. Then we had them sit next to each other. Each of us treated both of the dogs. Lily wouldn't do a down near Joy, but that could have been because of other nearby dogs or because of the coat she was wearing. Her tail was up, not wagging happy happy, but up until the very end. We will do more tomorrow.

patk thank you for your wise comment about the dopey one I got earlier in the day!


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## Quossum

Keep at it! You're doing exactly what you should.

Funny about rotties: my very first dog I trained, my first Pembroke Welsh Corgi, Corky (heart dog). Somehow we got in with a Rottweiler training group. There were about five rotties, a Norwegian elkhound, and Corky, and we all met at this certain park to train together. At our first competition, what kind of dog ended up right next to Corky on the Long Stays? A rottie! It was poetic!


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## lily cd re

I got in another round of look at that nice rottie girl before we left. Unfortunately that will probably be it for a while since I only know one near home. She does agility but asks for a wide zone around her dog at trials, so she is not the right kind of dog to help us.


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## Streetcar

I"m sorry Lily's encounter had such ongoing impact. You are so perceptive with her and I believe she can recover, as you do . Pish posh to ruination for utility. I do wish you had a big group of friendly Rotties around near home, though. I don't suppose Long Island has a club...


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## lily cd re

I found someone with reliable gentle rottweilers on Long Island. A friend from my obedience club who I recently told the story of the rottie problems to asked a friend who has nice dogs if she would work with me and Lily and her friend said yes. Right after Christmas I will call her to set something up. I am hoping that starting with some walks together will lay the groundwork towards inviting her to sit outside the ring at my club a few times while I work on go outs and signals. I know Lily has it in her to be resilient. There is a house with a couple of crazy GSDs in my neighborhood. When she was a puppy she always dug her heels in about walking past that house, but we worked on it and I think her confidence as she passes has actually gotten to the point where it makes them calm down. Hopefully the desensitization to rotties will work and let us start to Q in utility.


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## lily cd re

I am very happy to have been able to make it to Syracuse this weekend. Last year a blizzard kept me stuck at home for this trial.

We had great practice ring time at the trial site yesterday as I described in my Syracuse thread last night. After I posted about that I took Lily over to the lobby of the banquet area of the hotel and also did some more work on go outs and signals.

The rally excellent B and utility B rings ran concurrently today so i had potential ring conflict. I asked to go early in rally so that I could use it as a warm up for utility. We had a great rally excellent so it was a wonderful way to start the day. We had time to make a potty stop before going in for utility.

The order of exercises today was: directed jumping, moving stand for exam, directed retrieve, scent articles and then heeling & signals. Directed jumping (go out then jumping) and signals have been the exercises that Lily has especially struggled with since the rottweiler incident, so it was hard to start with the jumping. Lily essentially didn't do any decent go out and therefore didn't have the opportunity to do the jumps. I wasn't too surprised since I know that is one of her hardest exercises even when it isn't first. She recovered well and qualified in the next four exercises. There were points off, but we succeeded with the moving stand for examination, directed retrieve and both scent articles. The last part of the routine was heeling and the signal exercises. The heeling wasn't the best and I know she can do lots better than she did, but after being a little murky in the middle of the pattern Lily recovered to heel nicely to the stand stay. And then here is one of the best things that happened! I left her and gave her the signal for the drop, and even though she didn't drop she didn't walk in towards me either! This was huge for her. It has been so stressful for her to go away (directed jumping) and to stay away for the signals. I have been very worried that I was really close to having to make a decision about stopping because I don't like the idea of her experiencing that level of stress over and over with no progress.

She came out of the utility ring a happy dog today. To see Lily work well and finish happy was very reassuring. I have hope that we are close to being back where we were pre-rottie incident. Here's hoping tomorrow is even better.


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## Streetcar

What a great writeup and day for you both . Congratulations on your progress. I loved reading about the time with the gentle Rottie yesterday. You did great today and tomorrow hopefully her directed jumping will feel more comfortable for you both.


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## lily cd re

Streetcar, thank you for your kind words. Tomorrow we are likely to have a different order for the exercises. I am hoping for something like moving stand, directed retrieve or scent articles first. Those are her favorite exercises. If she has a good confidence booster with one or two of those first, it should help her do better with the others. At this point I am glad that I decided to go to B since in A utility always starts with the signals and I know that it is a hard exercise for her.


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## Quossum

Congrats on making it through a challenging day, and fingers crossed for a different order tomorrow. I know how that is--I'd rather have Jumpers than Standard first these days, but it often doesn't work out that way.

Am I mistaken, or did the Utility exercises always used to be in the same order? Is that a fairly recent change?

Good luck again for tomorrow!

--Q


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## lily cd re

Q the order of the exercises used to be the same in novice, open and utility even if you were working on UDX legs and OTCh points. In novice A and B the order of the exercises is still the same. In open A and utility A there is a set order for both In open B and utility B there are different sequences and each judge is required to rotate through them. If you've had an OTCh you have to go to the B classes to title the CDX and UD, but if the dog doesn't have the title nor the handler an OTCh most people do their CDX and UD titles in the A classes. My current strategy is the result of my too smart for her own good dog having memorized the A order in open just from trials and NQing a couple of times because she anticipated judges or my orders. I don't want to set myself up for that again, hence we run with the OTCh dogs.


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## Quossum

Thanks;I had no idea so many changes had taken place in the regs since "back in MY days..."!


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## lily cd re

There are likely a whole slew of other changes coming this year too, with elimination of one of the group stays and new exercises to replace those. Most of the changes are going to affect novice, open and the various optional titling classes. Thankfully there will be no major changes to utility since I wouldn't want to have to retrain something big right now.


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## mvhplank

I was judging the Utility class CDSP one weekend last year when the dog that had taken the two previous High In Trial ribbons ran straight to Glove 2 when I indicated Glove 3 (the first time I used Glove 3 that weekend).

I said "I'm sorry" to the handler and I loved her response: (shrug) "It's all diagnostic."

Happy diagnosing! You'll get there.


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## lily cd re

We didn't get home until 9:00 PM last night. The drive was great until I got to the toll plaza for the Whitestone Bridge from the Bronx to Long Island at which time it started to pour (thankfully is was in the low 50s so no freezing). The last half hour of the driving was pretty harrowing. We narrowly avoided two accidents because of other people's foolishness on a flooding road, but we made it unscathed.

We had ring conflicts yesterday just like Saturday, but somehow it all worked to my advantage. I talked to the judges for both utility and rally to tell them of my conflicts and they both nicely said that whatever I worked out with the table stewards would be fine. After a bit of back and forth the utility steward put me last. I got both my rally runs in before utility so we had lots of ring warm up. Also by the time I got in for utility the ring beyond the go out was done so the sight line to the go out was quiet.

We made tremendous progress even over Saturday! the order of exercises was: Scent 1 (I do metal first), Scent 2 (leather), directed retrieve (glove 3), Signals, Moving Stand, and Directed Jumping.

Here's how my girlie did:

Scent 1 was an NQ but she did indicate the correct article at least twice, but came back with nothing. Saturday she did it but lost 4 points. On Saturday it was in the middle.

Scent 2 was perfect, no points off (4 off on Saturday)!

Directed Retrieve was 1/2 point off (4 off on Saturday) and Saturday was glove 2 (easier I think) and Sunday was 3. Saturday I didn't get a sit on the pivot but Sunday I did.

Signals were an NQ again and I didn't love the heeling, but Lily stayed where I left her and she did drop on a verbal order after she didn't respond to 2 signals. She then completed the orders for the sit, recall and finish on signals only. Saturday she didn't drop or sit even with verbal orders.

Moving stand was 1/2 point off (2 1/2 on Saturday). I think I am going to have to be careful to prevent anticipation of the stand which is what cost the points on Saturday.

Directed jumping was a bust on Saturday without even a go out, but on Sunday we qualified it with 7 points off. Lily did sit, but she made wide turns to the right when I gave her the order to sit so she was way off center even though the go outs were both beautifully straight. Despite being out of line for the high jump though she did the correct jump. She also had nice straight fronts both times.

Saturday I also lost two points miscellaneous because Lily did a lot of cruising around near me and even went to the judge and gave him her poodle lean and rub between the scent articles. There was a lot less displacement behavior along those lines on Sunday. I realize I need to teach her a couple of easy ring trick to hold her focus between exercises.

All in all I am very pleased with how things went. Lily clearly was very relaxed. She had a great time seeing lots of people she knows. She ate well. She was calm around every other dog she saw. She had no upset intestinal issues either (often some colitis type diarrhea is my best read of her stress level). She even got to make friends with a rottweiler!

Time to plan the winter/spring campaign!


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## mvhplank

That sounds like a really successful weekend! It's always encouraging to have things improve over time and to (I hope) leave your dog with a happy feeling.


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## lily cd re

Marguerite, Lily was a very happy girl all weekend! I also met a woman who helped as a judge/steward for my second utility practice on Friday. She gave me great help on Friday, but more importantly she reminded me before I went in the rings on Saturday that the bonding experience with the dog should always be the most important part of it. We played good rounds all weekend and our relationship is all the better for the time spent. The legs will come when Lily is ready, but I think she is very close.


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## mashaphan

Obviously,I ended up not making it to the show! Something told me not to enter,and my old lady (15 1/2 yr Golden x Husky ) died suddenly Sat am.:angel:

Sound like an overall good experience! Unless something unexpected happens.I WILL be at March shows,though may not be entered:wink:


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## lily cd re

*Making progress*

We were entered for trials yesterday and today (which is why I've been AWOL). We did utility B and RAE rally both days.

Yesterday there was only one judge for all obedience classes and for the rally trial. She was very nice and gave me encouraging remarks at the end of our utility routine. Lily missed one article Q because she dropped it when she fronted. It was the metal and I suppose it might have been cold since it was so cold outside here, but it was the correct article. She qualified on the other article, the directed retrieve and the moving stand. We didn't get good go outs since that was first and she finds the go out and the signals to be hard to start with. The heeling in the signal exercise was decent (not her best) and she stayed where I left her but I had to give a second order (verbal) to get the drop. The sit, recall and finish were fine. We had a really long slow day since rally didn't end until after 6:00 PM!

Today we had articles first and she worked the pile nicely and did a good job. The directed retrieve was next and she did great with it. The go out and directed jumping was next and unfortunately she went out over the jumps instead of straight out (NQ). Leave it to a poodle to creatively reinvent the exercise. After that we had the moving stand which was just about picture perfect. We ended with the signals for which she had really nice heeling. I decided that I had to not say anything if she didn't drop, so I just held the signal and she started to drop, but got stuck halfway between a sit and a drop. Aww Lil, you have to put your elbows down, your coat isn't long enough for you to cheat like that! Generally I am happy with where we are given that until January we had no good for go outs or for the stay in place for the signals in the aftermath of the rottie problems from October.

There was a great handler with a big rottie boy at yesterday's trial. She was entered in rally advanced. I spoke to her for a while before we went in the ring and it was very clear from talking to her and watching her dog that I would have a good desensitizing opportunity with her and her boy after the advanced class finished. By the time we finished, Lily was wagging her tail at this big boy. They sniffed each other's butts. They shared treats, lied down next to each other and sat shoulder to shoulder. I am very grateful to this woman who is very savvy about her dogs. She made no bones about the idea that there are some really rotten rotties in the world. She also said she wished I had reported the incident in October to AKC (which in retrospect I think I should have done). By the time we parted ways I felt confident that now if we don't qualify in utility is more about our own training, rather than Lily being afraid to do the distance work because of the dogs near the ring.

We had a great time in rally both days. The courses were nice and Lily did a really nice job in all four of her runs. We had a bit of poodle comedy at the end of excellent today. We were approaching the sit stay and Lily decided to go to the chair where her leash was. It took a bit of doing to get her to come back and sit. As I said to her "Lily leave your leash alone, I'm the one who is supposed to go get it," I heard the judge (whom I like very much, she's judged at PCA) giggle a bit. When we had the awards she said second place goes to the team where the dog decided to have a poodle moment at the end. All of our scores though were over 93 for all four runs.


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## Quossum

Congrats on some great moments while still respecting that unique Poodle joy!

I can especially sympathize with that "elbows inches from the ground" issue. Back when the table in Agility required a Sit or Down, I couldn't buy a Q with Pixie if the position was Down, as her elbows would hover. :afraid:

Good experience with the Rottie, too. You'll put it all together!

--Q


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## mvhplank

That sounds like a wonderful weekend. You'll get that Q soon, I think!


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## lily cd re

Marguerite, I think we are very close. I have to practice signals with someone standing in the judge's usual location all of the times I practice them and that should get us there. We have our next trials in early March.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Marguerite, I think we are very close. I have to practice signals with someone standing in the judge's usual location all of the times I practice them and that should get us there. We have our next trials in early March.


The woman who owns my boy's grandfather is making a similar quest for Utility. Maxwell finally finished his CDSP Utility title in October, which is giving her the confidence to campaign him in AKC. I'm not sure whether you have any CDSP trials near you but, as I've said many times, it's a great venue to get some practice in--and entry fees are lower than AKC's. You're allowed extra commands in most but not all exercises, and those exhibitors who have an eye on AKC titles tend to do their runs as though they were in an AKC trial. Come to think of it, though, if you haven't done CDSP before, you'd have to start with Novice! Show-and-goes are your best bet for practice right now. 

I look forward to hearing about your success!

As far as our own quest goes, Neely is entered in Rally Advanced and Novice A in the next two trials I've signed up for. We need one Q for RA, and we haven't attempted AKC Novice before. Neely needs one Q to finish UKC Novice, but I haven't found any trials sooner than May 30. I'm sure I told you he finished CDSP Open in October, and we're training in the Utility exercises, with some exercises coming along nicely, and some a ways off--particularly directed jumping. I also want to also teach the UKC version of gloves in the baseball diamond arrangement--CDSP uses it as an optional bonus exercise in Utility B.

So, while he gains confidence in out-of-sight stays and his advanced exercises, we'll play around in the various Rally venues offered around here--AKC, UKC, and WCRL (formerly APDT). He's still intact--he passed his OFA hips and other screenings--so I want to earn a variety of titles to make him an attractive option to someone who may want to breed for performance. I've never done agility in my life, but I guess I ought to at least consider it.


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## lily cd re

*An update, long overdue...*

Lily and I have continued to struggle with utility obedience. We had a very rough go back in March, as did many others. The obedience trial moved to a new building this year and even OTCh handlers and dogs NQd left, right and center. In June we had some decent work, but no Qs. In July we had a Lily meltdown in Binghamton. I think she was so stressed about the puppy (who had only been with us for about five days) she ended up making herself sick.

I've been working on my own and with help from the members of my club and some things have come back on track, but I still feel there is a lot of room for improvement. On the recommendation of one of the other instructors at the club I decided to get some private lessons with a very successful local trainer who has Pomeranians. Unfortunately her schedule is so full I am having to just squeeze in when she has cancellations but she gives me homework and she has said I should email anytime I have questions. I love working with her. She is very clever, knowledgeable and honest. I have told her to feel free to critique anything and everything.

The main things she is helping me with is to get Lily into the ring with focus, keep her focused and to move her successfully from place to place and to bridge the exercises with excellent connectedness. Her view is that you can get away with very good attention in novice and open, but that excellent attention is mandatory in utility.

We did a couple of good things today that I can easily work on for homework. I won't belabor describing everything we did, especially since not everyone would know the details of the utility exercises, but one thing we worked on was a really interesting focus exercise that puts the decision to do the right thing entirely on the dog. It is described below.

I had Lily at heel and on leash looking at me. Deb came up very close to her and just stood right next to us. Lily found this stressful and looked away from me. We just waited quietly for her to turn her attention back to me. Once she did, Deb backed away. If Lily looked away immediately Deb came back. If Lily kept her attention on me for at least three seconds I told her good and released her to a treat. We repeated this a number of times. With each repeat at low levels of distraction other than Deb being there Lily refocused to me faster and held her look longer. As other people and dogs came in she went back to distracted but then came quickly back to focus.
I think this will be very useful to us in getting success in utility but also think it can easily be adapted to training on other distraction based issues for other everyday behaviors. I already tried it out with Javelin (http://www.poodleforum.com/5-poodle-talk/172618-new-look-loose-leash-walking.html) for loose leash walking. I like that it puts responsibility on the dog. Especially with smart dogs like poodles I think that giving them a chance to problem solve their way to good decisions will make the neuronal connections that make the behavior fixed stronger more quickly.


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## mashaphan

Many UD people here have taken a break to regroup/rework. As they say "it IS called Futility! wink wink!) The pressure on/pressure off you describe is a well proven technique; keep at it,you will get there!

Martha et al


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## lily cd re

We have taken several breaks to regroup. I am hoping working with this trainer will mean an end to needing breaks!

Auntie Martha, Lily says she can't wait to see you too. Let's hope for not too much snow in early January. SOTC is such a great place to show with the match time on Friday.


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## lily cd re

We took another private lesson with my local great handler who a friend recommended. We had a great session. Deb was very impressed with how much better Lily was today. She stayed much better focused and when she did look like she was ready to bail I was able to get her back much more easily. The friend who recommended this trainer had a lesson right before us and she stayed to watch us work. She was very happy (as was I) to see how well Lily did today. Deb still sees lots to work on but also commented that Lily was really great to have come so far so fast.

We are entered for the trials at my club this Friday and Saturday. Deb said to keep positive even if there are exercises we NQ, but that if she does really badly on Friday not to show her on Saturday. That is how we will proceed. Wish us luck! Hopefully I will have good news to report.


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## mashaphan

Lily is a smart girl! She will get there!:cheers2::grouphug:

Martha et al


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## lily cd re

Martha she is very smart and I do think she really understands all of the exercises. She showed Deb that today. As Deb noted though her stress is greatest over the work that requires big distance between us, the drop signal and the go out part of directed jumping. At this point I think a lot of that is still after effects of the bad experience with the rottie last fall right before we went in the ring. Our success will come out of helping her to work through her nerves and to persevere in the ring through all of the exercises. Once she qualifies once or twice I think she will just continue to gain confidence.

The trainer is in high demand here, but is happy to fit me in where she can. I am hoping I will be able to get Javelin into her novice class when he is ready. I am lucky Lily is so willing to forgive my A handler foibles.


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## lily cd re

I was very happy to get an email telling me that the trainer has two cancellations at times I can get to her. When I wrote back to her I told her that I was very grateful to have been able to start working with her and happy with the results even in a short time. She sent me a very nice message back telling me that she could see a clear desire to learn and grow, that we had clearly worked hard and that she could tell I appreciated her theory of training. She went on to say that Lily is a really nice dog that just needs some things explained a bit better and a confidence boost. She concluded by saying that she loved working with a thinking, committed handler...

Now I have two excellent coaches/trainers working with us, one for agility and one for obedience. I think the next few months will see tremendous change in how we do and it all gives me great fuel and understanding for how to get the most out of Javelin as he comes along. I am a very good pet dog trainer and I am also good at getting people started for obedience and rally. Now I will be able to use the treasure trove of knowledge from my two lovely coaches to become excellent at all levels of training.


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## lily cd re

We didn't qualify today, but it was the best fail I've had with this in a while. There was no go out and there was no drop, but Lily did everything else including all of the other signals after I told her to drop. Her heeling was good (not great) and she even sat at the halt (which sometimes disappears under stress). We lost no more than 2 points for the exercises we Q'd for (moving stand, directed retrieve and the 2 scent articles (with only 1/2 off on the second article) so if we had Q'd all of the exercises with similar results we would have had a score around 190!

I emailed the trainer to tell her how things went since she wasn't there and asked her about whether to show tomorrow. She said not to since she doesn't want to reinforce the fails on those two things. She made note of how smart Lily is and wants to help her succeed so she thought it would be better to sit things out tomorrow. So that is my plan. I will take Javelin in the morning and just do some socialization work with him for a while. Then I will bring him home and go back to steward the afternoon classes.

I was very happy to see that the work we have done in the privates is already starting to pay off under trial conditions. As Deb pointed out Lily is young and healthy and there is no reason to rush.


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## lily cd re

I've taken two more private lessons with the obedience trainer. We both agree now that the root of all of the problems are ring and judge pressure. Deb can see that Lily does really know the exercises, but has to gain confidence doing them in a trial ring. To help get there she has recommended doing lots of matches. We did our first match time on Sunday at a place on Staten Island with Deb there. She coached me on what to do to make the best use of the time. We practiced confident attentive ring entries at the start of both time slots. After that for the first run we did moving stand first since Lily likes that exercise. Then we focused on the go out with a judge in the ring. We got good marking of the go out and added distance successfully with each repetition. We finished that session by playing with a tug toy. For the second run we had, we started with gloves (another of Lily's good exercises) and did a bit of work on tweaking her return, but mostly focused on her confidence with a "judge" presence. After that we worked on the drop signal and as with the go out worked on how Lily deals with judge pressure. I was able to add distance moderately successfully with the practice judge, but can see that this will probably require a bit more work than the go out.

We have more match ring time in November and December. I am not sure that we will be ready to try again in January for utility, but it is improving.


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## nifty

It is so interesting to learn more about this sport from your posts, Catherine and I am grateful that you share the successes AND the challenges. It makes it seem so much more doable for others reading when someone like you - with, as you said, lots of skill in many areas -- and a dog with so many titles like Lily still have challenges that need to be worked through AND you are working through them! Talk about inspiring!

P.S. 10 points for (F)utility!


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## lily cd re

Oh everybody calls it (f)utility! Not my clever term...


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## mashaphan

I will be working the Jan practice session,and I am sure we can get someone to "play judge" ,if only for the practice. Che does not like judges,either; I have even had a judge tell me he was "giving (her) a dirty look"..well,whippet are EXPERT at what we call "the stink eye" . I think he is becoming bored,as his performance has become very sloppy and disconnected of late. Plus ,he is now officially a veteran,so maybe time to retire,eh?

Martha et al


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> I will be working the Jan practice session,and I am sure we can get someone to "play judge" ,if only for the practice. Che does not like judges,either; I have even had a judge tell me he was "giving (her) a dirty look"..well,whippet are EXPERT at what we call "the stink eye" . I think he is becoming bored,as his performance has become very sloppy and disconnected of late. Plus ,he is now officially a veteran,so maybe time to retire,eh?
> 
> Martha et al


I'm glad to know you will be there on Friday for the matches in January! You know Lily could go in Veterans now too. She is far from retiring though.

Martha, you might want to check out some of Brenda Aloff's stuff. I am reading her Get Connected With Your Dog book right now. It is full of great ideas for getting the happy glint in their eye.


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## lily cd re

I have been following the recommendations of my private trainer to get Lily's utility routine put back together for a couple of weeks since our last session with her.

We were able to get time with her today and when she came to my novice class yesterday I told her she was going to be impressed with what she saw. Well, she was! The signal exercise is orders of magnitude better. We have solid confident drops at full distance with someone near and to the side (where judges often stand), with someone moving off to the side (like a steward might do or someone warming up near the ring). The only thing that really seems to remain stressful is having a person directly behind her when she gets the drop signal, so that is this week's homework. The go out is also improving, but still needs work. The gloves are much better and we added some significant proofing to that exercise today. We also put some proofing on articles with mixed results, so there is some homework there for us too.

Over all, I think Deb is impressed with how quickly the improvements are coming. In addition to improvement in performance of the exercises, Deb commented on Lily's affect, more engaged and happily working rather than looking worried. Lily is showing herself to be very smart, willing and forgiving of past mistakes. I am thrilled because I have real hope for this and also happy to be learning how to avoid some of my past mistakes with Javelin.


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## lily cd re

The AKC recently changed some of the utility rules regarding scent articles. Handlers now can choose to use any two of three types of articles: leather, metal or wood. I have beautiful leather articles and Lily loves doing the leathers. She has always had struggles with metal though. Initially she refused to pick up articles I have that are made of aluminum. In the long run I have decided she must have been having a galvanic reaction to the aluminum because when I switched to using mason jar ring articles that are steel she started doing metal pretty reliably. One of the people who comes to my utility and open classes (who has OTChs with goldens) was helping me do article practice recently and she noted that it was obvious that even though she will do metal Lily finds the metal stressful. She suggested trying wood instead. I think she will do wood with no problem since her open dumbbell is wood. This friend who made the suggestion made a couple of sets of wood articles for her dog using wood cutouts from craft vendors with dowels. They are very cute and quite light. I am going to make sets of wood articles for both of the poodles. I ordered these star and poodle cut outs that came today. The longest dimension is 2" for both.









I plan to paint the poodles black and the stars either gold or silver (one color will be for Lily and the other one for Javelin). I am going to glue those painted cutouts onto 3" squares made from 1/8" craft plywood. The squares will be left natural so that the numbers will show easily. I hope it will boost Lily's confidence for doing the scent exercise to take the metal out of the picture all together.


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## mashaphan

Glad to see the change! I think a lot of dogs have issues w/metal! This may be the change that The Queen needs!

Martha et al


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## mashaphan

PS,if you are clever enough to make those articles,SOMEDAY you may have to make a set for ME; Nothing I could EVER do! Is there no end to your talents???:adore::adore:

Martha,and a "Hi" from Janet and JoyBella,too!


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## lily cd re

Martha I am hoping to debut them at SOTC in June!


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## mashaphan

I cannot wait to see them! You will be the envy of all the poodle people if not EVERYONE! :adore::adore:

Martha


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## lily cd re

I finally made some good progress on getting wooden articles assembled. There has been a lot of planning oriented thinking involved.

Here are a couple of pictures of roughly what they will look like. I have just a couple assembled and haven't put numbers on them yet, but I think they will be a great alternative to metal.

















On Thursday morning I was able to get a private training with my friend. We got through all of the exercises for the first time in many weeks. Clearly Lily has a much better understanding of the working criteria for everything and most importantly has learned how to handle many distractions and stressors.

Since things went so well Thursday, on Friday BF brought Peeves to my obedience club so that I could work on exercises with them as distractions. In the past I have never had great outcomes working with BF around. We just did heeling and signals, go outs and jumping, and articles. Wow did my girl do me proud. She resisted the temptations of Peeves, Jav and BF all sitting ringside. She did great signals while facing towards our guys. Her go outs were lovely and as always her jumps were clear sailing. I put the article pile in front of the guys and she worked nicely getting both articles (metal and leather) correct. 

We are matching at another facility this Sunday. I am hoping for good work!


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## mashaphan

These are looking great,and It seems as if the Queen is getting it all together! Best of luck at the match and look forward to seeing all ya'all in a few weeks. I am showing Thurs and Sun,so I will have all of Saturday to watch!:adore:

Martha and the Charming Che


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## lily cd re

mashaphan said:


> These are looking great,and It seems as if the Queen is getting it all together! Best of luck at the match and look forward to seeing all ya'all in a few weeks. I am showing Thurs and Sun,so I will have all of Saturday to watch!:adore:
> 
> Martha and the Charming Che


At the moment I am planning to travel on Wednesday and show Thursday to Saturday with Sunday as a back up plan. The Sunday judge is ok, but not my favorite. I do want to try for finishing RAE8 at PCA and since I got closed out of a couple of trials and had a really unfortunate experience with a judge who is now on my never show to this person again list, so my options are getting tight to make that happen.


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## mashaphan

Great! I am going Wed to set up and give Che some exposure to the bldg,as we didn't show there last March. (I never heard of the Fri/sat judges so stuck w/those I knew  ) I will have to go over to conformation to watch Breed and "Poodle Shop" when the times are right,but will be around most of the days. 

Are you showing Jav? And Lily in UB as well as rally? We are only showing to get the timing right to get RAE2 at SOTC for the fancy ribbon!:aetsch:

Martha et al


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## lily cd re

I am going to travel on Wednesday, not sure if I will manage to get there in time to set up, but I will try. Hopefully we can find each other and set up in the same neighborhood.

I am not going to do utility. I am going to wait for June for that.

I entered Javelin for rally novice on Friday and Saturday. I do know the Friday judge, Robert Withers. We showed to him in one of our two advanced rings at the 2014 rally nationals. His course was really nice, challenging, but flowed well and not over the top complicated. I don't know the Saturday judge.


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## lily cd re

I plopped Lily and Javelin into my truck yesterday morning and headed out to a match show (like a trial, but cheap to enter and you can use food and toys as training rewards). I had Lily in for 3 entries in utility (9 minutes each) and Javelin for 2 in novice (8 minutes each).

For Javelin I just wanted to work on getting him into the ring easily and with a happy attitude and having him stay connected to me. Mostly we played with a tug toy, but I also did some moving around with him and some recalls and fronts. For the stationary work his main job was to think the most fun to be had was to look at me and ignore the judge. He did ok for his first times at matches and rings away from our home club.

For Lily my plan was as follows:

A. First time in practice ring entries and leash hand offs with focused attention, then play with a tug toy, then an exercise she likes, out of the ring and repeat each time with a different exercise that Lily likes doing.

B. Go into the ring and treat the time roughly like a trial. Work through all of the exercises. Give informative corrections as needed and make sure to end on a happy note. We got through all of the exercises (needed some corrections) and did end happy. The video link below is for that run. In some places the heeling isn't good (I think I need to adjust my pace). In a couple of places I held my signals too long. In a couple of places Lily tried to quit on me (you'll see her walk away from what she is supposed to be doing). She showed some stress (yawns, sneezes, walking off) but she worked through it much better than any of this would have been six months ago.

C. Practice the things that needed the most work from the second run for the last run with fun built in (tug toy and mozzarella cheese). End on a happy note (tug tug tug, big hugs)!

We are making real progress now.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5ZkbNzJOu0


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## lily cd re

We did another set of match rings today, three for Lily and three for Javelin. I had people record Lily's second run and Javelin's first. Here is Lily's. The go outs are getting better and better. I need to work on my pace for heeling, but all together I think this week was better than last week. We got through all of the exercises in two of the three runs this week.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSV_LIqN0wg


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## MollyMuiMa

I always enjoy watching Lily! She always seems to obey you with a little touch of "I'm gonna do this my way if I can get away with it....." LOL!
What's nice is you that let Lily be Lily! Kinda of a 'spirited obedience' in that you let her enjoy what she is doing, yet make her follow the rules!


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## lily cd re

Molly, you've hit the nail on where the balance needs to be. I want her to work happily and confidently, but she needs to get over the idea that doing these exercises is something she has a choice about. I think her confidence has gone up significantly in the last couple of months and therefor she seems to be getting the idea that if she just does what she is being told it will all go smoothly and be done before she has a chance to think about being nervous or worrying about failing.


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## lily cd re

We have made some tremendous progress as a result of the private coaching I've been able to take advantage of along with taking Lily (and Javelin) to matches. For those not familiar with all of this, a trial is an official entry through which you progress towards titles when you qualify. A match is always a lower entry fee and is unofficial. It is an opportunity to practice however you want from "playing" in the ring or teaching something newly learned in a different location to being a chance to see if your dog is ready for a real trial. I had three ten minute sessions with Lily today to work on utility. The location had three rings and we were in a challenging ring located near the front door to the building and having a lot of human and dog traffic moving around us on two sides outside the ring and on a third side in the adjacent ring.

For our first run I did one exercise at a time with a tug session in between each. We did all of the exercises other than articles. Lily was a happy worker throughout.

For the second run I worked on chaining a couple of exercises together and made the "play" in between more low key than getting out the tug toy. Again Lily was a happy worker and hung in for the movement and moments between exercises well.

For the third run I told the "judge" that I wanted to do the utility A order and treat the run as closely like a trial as I could. So the order of the exercises is: heel free and signals; scent discrimination; directed retrieve; moving stand and examination and then directed jumping. Lily did great work. She stuck with the program until the transition from moving stand to directed jumping. Even though she was ready to check out for a moment she came back to work pretty quickly. She did qualifying performances of the scent discrimination, directed retrieve and moving stand with no extra assists! She had some really lovely fronts and finishes too. She is starting to be confident enough to do a flying finish to the left too. She had lots of bright eye contact and a pretty happy wagging tail to boot. Her heeling was pretty nice, but I had to stay in closer than "legal" for the signals. She also had a hard time finding the go out without little marker sticks that I often use. Once they were put out she got to where she needed to be with no problem.

I am thrilled.


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## lily cd re

I took a private with Lily last Thursday and I have another one this week. Last week went really well. As per the trainer we only have one more exercise to really finish rebuilding, the dreaded signals. The issue is distractions. Lily needs to understand that she needs to keep her attention glued on me no matter what might be going on around her. 

I had been planning to go to a trial at Syracuse Obedience the first weekend in June, but I just realized that because of our trip to Indianapolis and the summer class calendar that I really can't swing it. I am going to take that as a sign that I should wait a while longer to put her in a trial ring. Martha I am sorry we won't make it, I was looking forward to seeing you all.


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## mvhplank

I enjoy reading your training news!

I dropped into PF to update my signature (adding titles to Neely's name). He just finished UROG today, UKC's highest rally title.

My big news is that Neely has had an epiphany about the go-outs and is suddenly pretty darned reliable. We'll continue to play in CDSP Versatility and Utility at local trials next weekend. I'm the trial secretary, so I can run my dog at a great discount. He has one Versatility leg, but the person judging my runs is the same one we got the first leg under, and this venue requires two different judges. (UKC doesn't--go figure.)


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## mashaphan

Oh pooh,I just saw that you aren't coming next weekend! I may come down to the southern tier shows in July,as I am changing schedules to weekends (whole ones,that is) off,and Che will retire after Jun SOTC. No more classes,either ,until Spoodom. Will miss you all..will try to see Stacey and Barb and report back.

Martha


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## mvhplank

mvhplank said:


> <snip> We'll continue to play in CDSP Versatility and Utility at local trials next weekend.</snip>


Neely finished his CDSP Versatility title May 22 (it's a mix of Novice, Open, and Utility exercises, but with no retrieves). On Sunday, he qualified in both of his Utility A runs! I'm over the moon.


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## lily cd re

This week we joined a utility class given by the trainer we have been working with privately. Deb thought that since we have taken every exercise apart and put it back together at this point that the proofing against distractions offered by 's under Deb's training methods within the last two years.

Lily needed a bit of extra support to settle in at the beginning, but then she did great work. She even did really nice articles despite hers actually being in BF's jeep. I gave her Javelin's set to work with.

The biggest success though was with the signals which we did with three dogs all working at the same time near each other. Lily did awesome drops with a collie about five feet away from her. Her focused attention was nearly perfect and she saw and obeyed the signals promptly and crisply!

I think that before too long I will have to start a Javelin's road to the UD thread. I have a private lesson for him with Deb next week. She will look at where we are and she will be developing a training plan for us. Hopefully with her wise counsel his path will be shorter than Lily's. No matter what though I will always owe anything he accomplished to the path that Lily has forged with me. I am very grateful to have had her be such a forgiving girl and to now have her be so much more deeply a true partner than I ever imagined was possible.


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## Quossum

You learn so much with dog you train. Sounds like you've got a great plan going forward with Javelin. Can't wait to follow his journey, too! Lily's just a pure superstar. Sounds like great progress!

--Q


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## lily cd re

We took our second utility class yesterday. Mostly the same people were there this week as last. We rotate around in partnering with the other people in the class to do gloves, articles, moving stand and signals. Lily was happy while we were there and did nice articles and moving stand. She had a hard time with the number one glove since we worked into a different part of the room which had a lot more distractions, but we took it apart and got her happy to take that glove. Glove 2 was easier and easier still was glove 3. She had a hard time with signals yesterday and I am not sure why but we finished with a successful set and she finished class with great go outs and jumping. The class really will be the last leg of getting to be ring ready for the utility class later this year.


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## mvhplank

Good luck! Neely managed to squeak out two UD Qs in CDSP in May. I think it's a good place to get ring practice if you're planning to run up to AKC, where the grading is much tougher. (He finished his CDSP Versatility title the same weekend.)

Neely finished his UKC Open title June 4 and moved up to Utility the next day just to play in the ring, since he doesn't have the second half of the UKC glove exercise yet. He does love his glove retrieve, though, and did his directed jumping in fine form.

If anyone isn't familiar with the UKC utility exercises, it includes signals, scent articles, two glove exercises, consecutive recalls, and directed jumping. There's no stand for exam. In UKC, the jumps come out for the first part of the test because the gloves are laid out in a "baseball" pattern (imagine you're on home plate, and the gloves are on the other three bases). In the first half, you send the dog directly to the glove the judge indicates. In the second half, the dog must go to sit the middle of the ring, and THEN you direct the dog to the glove the judge indicates.

The recalls are one drop on recall (either signal or voice command, but not both), followed by a straight recall. Scent articles are metal only. Directed jumping is much like it's done in other venues.

Please keep us updated on your training and progress! I enjoy reading about it.


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## lily cd re

Marguerite I am familiar with CDSP and UKC utility obedience exercises. However I do not want to spend the money and time to restart Lily at novice in the other venues. She really is just about ready to be in the AKC utility ring, so that is where we will be going.

Also for my part in it, I don't really want to have to think about which venue I am in and what the rules are. I don't like that baseball diamond glove exercise either. I've invested too much in a good full distance go out to try to teach a half distance one. For other people who may have more access to those venues I do think they are worth considering. Around here and the places I am likely to go AKC trials are much more common.


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## lily cd re

We went to New Jersey for a match show today. I signed up for three runs with both Lily and Javelin.

We had horrible traffic getting there and missed my first scheduled time for Javelin (which we made up later). Not long after I got them settled in their crates Lily and I went in for our first run. Javelin barked the whole time like a fool.  It was fairly annoying to some of the other people there, but it was a good distraction for Lily who did look, but collected after she started to have success.

For our first stint we focused on the go out and jumping to start, then we did articles, then moving stand, then gloves. We ran out of time before we did healing and signals, but I liked a fair amount of what I saw so it was time well spent even though we didn't finish all of the exercises.

It took a couple of tries for Lily to find the go out and then she missed the jump the first time. She was looking at the area where Javelin was barking his foolish little head off. After showing her more clearly where the go out was she did nice straight brisk ones.

Lily seems to be having trouble with articles recently and I am not quite sure why. We will see if we can figure it out when we take class on Thursday.

Moving stand is one of Lily's favorite exercises since she likes having people put hands on her so she did nice ones and then she did a really nice job with gloves three and two (in that order).

Our next two runs were back to back so I practiced ring entrances and then we did a lot of work on heeling and signals. Her heeling wasn't perfect but it was very good. After several repeats she got nice signals (Javelin wasn't barking anymore). We did the signals at both ends of the ring (one end had a wall and the other the gates between our ring and the novice ring. She did a great job by the time we finished with it. I did some more go outs without my visual aids at the go out spot and she went fast and straight all the way and turned and sat when ordered. She loves to jump so no problems there.

She needs some fine tuning on the signals and we have to reboost her performance of the articles, but we are very close, finally.


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## lily cd re

After working on signals with Deb at utility class last week, she and I had a heart to heart about this exercise. At this point she thinks (and I agree) that I have to change my role in this exercise. Her feeling is that since I am nervous about getting this exercise fixed that partly I am projecting some anxiety when working on it. As a result Lily is getting nervous and is looking away for a distraction that can let her escape from having to do something she finds hard. 

We both agree that the hardest thing for her is waiting on the stand as I go across the ring. She really wants to follow me. We have a couple of things we are going to do to improve this whole exercise. First I will be practicing with a mirror as much as possible. I will use it to be able to watch Lily as I walk away. If she keeps her attention on me rather than looking away and doesn't take any steps to follow I will reward that by releasing her to a thrown treat. 

The next thing I will be doing is giving her a meaningful correction if she looks away and misses the drop signal. Since I have been worrying over it I have gotten into the bad habit of giving her a second signal. What I will be doing now is holding the signal and walking in to tell her firmly that she had to do the drop. With both of those practices I expect things will get better soon.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> ... We both agree that the hardest thing for her is waiting on the stand as I go across the ring. ...


This is not Neely's best exercise either. If he seems to suddenly go all airhead on me, I'll stop closer to signal, and reward heavily between signals. Then I'll take a little break and try it again at a farther distance.

If he looks away, I have even done a jumping jack or two to plant the idea that I might do something weird and would bear watching.

He has started anticipating the next signal too, so I sometimes wait for a count of 10 to 15 before giving a signal. Another exhibitor told me her Utility judge waited for a longer-than-usual time before indicating the next signal, I suppose just to catch out those dogs that kept going on autopilot. I also mix up the signals, maybe doing the sit first, or asking for a down-sit-down-come.


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## lily cd re

I generally don't have problems with the sit, come fore and finish once she gets the drop so right now I am usually just doing drop and release or drop, sit then release. Focus focus focus on me pupchick!

And yes sometimes the judges do wait to see that the dog is really following the orders/signals rather than doing the routine it has memorized.


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## mvhplank

Last Wednesday in training, Neely kept sitting before I signaled a down. That was a new one, so we had to "review" that one a little bit. The distance doesn't much bother him, but I find it easier to do refinements if I'm closer and then ask for them from across the ring.


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## lily cd re

Reducing the distance is one of the best ways to be able to correct and reinforce those exercises. If you are closer and have to correct something your timing on the correction will be better.


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## mvhplank

Yes, not only that, but he responds better and quicker if I'm about 8 steps away. Building habit and muscle memory before adding distance. Splitting, I think the clicker trainers would say.


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## lily cd re

Yes there has to be understanding then adding distance and waiting between signals, etc.


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## seminolewind

Yeah small steps are better. And doing these exercises in different places.


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## lily cd re

Different places for sure! It helps the dog to generalize and that is important for all things, not just performance sports. I train in Petsmart and at Lowes, in hotel hallways, on school tennis courts, etc. as well as going to match shows.


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## lily cd re

*A breakthrough today with signals*

I went to utility class this morning with a slightly different group of people so my working partner was someone new (although I know her well and Lily knows her too). Before we started, Deb and I had a heart to heart about how to handle the signals. I know that I need to be less worried and show Lily a good picture so she will be confident and do what she is supposed to with confidence and a sense of responsibility for herself.

We did not do full heel patterns, but just forward about turn and stand your dog. I got a poor response the first time but held my ground and kept the signal up while I walked in to where Lily had gone halfway down. when I got there I firmly said "I told you to drop" as I took her by the collar and helped her into the down. She clearly knew she was supposed to have dropped all the way and started to drop as I touched her collar. I stood her right back up and went just a short distance away and made myself give her a big idiot type grin and gave her a decisive drop signal and SHE DROPPED all the way right away. I repeated that and got another good drop with me close. I gave her a treat and played with her. I did one more repeat with a little heeling and went as far out as I could and gave her a good clear signal and she dropped right away. UD here we come!


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## Streetcar

Congratulations!!!! This is fantastic-I'm so happy for you both, Lily CD RE !!!


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## lily cd re

This was huge. I felt like weights came off my shoulders. I just have to keep up my end of the deal and I think we have our last problem ironed out.


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## lily cd re

Today was my day to teach at my club. I didn't do all of the exercises, just directed jumping and heeling and signals. We had kick ass go outs and jumping and pretty darn pretty signals at full distance with distractions of people and dogs behind my good girlie!


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Today was my day to teach at my club. I didn't do all of the exercises, just directed jumping and heeling and signals. We had kick ass go outs and jumping and pretty darn pretty signals at full distance with distractions of people and dogs behind my good girlie!


Nice!


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## lily cd re

I have been so busy with jury duty, class and what have you that I forgot to update here. We have continued out utility class with Deb and I can definitely see that Lily is gaining confidence all around because of it. Not only does she have less stress, but my great girl is starting to show really bright and happy affect even with other dogs working all around her for all of the exercises. We are continuing to have much better work on the signals at class and at my club. If it is quiet and I have time this week I will try to get some of it on video to post here.


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## Mfmst

Sounds like it's all clicking and you are both having more fun with it. We're all rooting for Team Lily! And Javvy too


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## lily cd re

Mfmst said:


> Sounds like it's all clicking and you are both having more fun with it. We're all rooting for Team Lily! And Javvy too



Yes Mfmst getting the worries out of the way and bringing back the fun is critical. I have entries for both Lily and Javelin at a show upstate for the weekend of July 22nd-24th. Javelin will just be doing one day of rally novice to give him something to do. Lily will be doing three days of RAE to hopefully finish her RAE8 and get some scores that would qualify her for the 2017 Rally Nationals. I also entered her for utility on Sunday and will play it by ear about whether to put her into the ring that day. 

There are two really unique things about this trial that I like. They have match time in the trial rings on Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Thursday you can pick a spot and set up your crates then work in the ring for something like $10 for ten minutes. Friday and Saturday the match rings start after the last trial ring ends so you have to be willing to wait around but then you can work on the things that maybe didn't go so well that day if you are doing the same class the next day. I will put Lily in the utility ring all days to assess her comfort and confidence.

The other thing that is really nice is that they have a professional photographer at this trial. He has done great pictures for me as can be seen in this album. http://www.poodleforum.com/members/5730-lily-cd-re-album3658-lily-susque-nango-kennel-club-2014.html Since the official ring side rally novice B pictures from PCA ended up lost on a corrupted memory card I have no decent pictures from PCA at all. I will talk to the photographer next week and ask him to take ring shots of all of my runs so that I will have some nice pics to choose from. He also does studio shots so I may have him do a session of portraits of me and the 2 black spoos.


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## lily cd re

My obedience club had a trial over the 4th of July weekend. It had been quite busy in my routine and lass time leading up to the trial, but now it is very quiet since there are no trials close in time locally and lots of people are away for vacation. Because of how quiet it was my assistant and I both had extra opportunity to train our own dogs.

Usually when I am doing the utility class I will bring Lily out at the end to work on one or two things that really need attention. Yesterday I was able to have her out to do the whole class and all of the exercises. One of the people there has a very high drive 2 1/2 year old male lab who was a pants on fire dog yesterday so he provided lots of distracting pressures. We divided into pairs to do the gloves, moving stand and articles. I worked with the guy with the lab. I am happy to say Lily kicked [email protected]# even with the lab near her on a down stay (that he broke a couple of times). It was great to see her ignore the energy from the lab and to be solid on the moving stand with a person who she doesn't know well.

After we all finished the work with partners I gave the other teams their directed jumping and heeling/signals exercises. When they had finished one of them gave me those two exercises. Lily knocked the go outs out of the park and did nice heeling followed by lovely signals. If it all had been strung together in a trial, she would have qualified for sure (and not by the skin of her teeth either). I am thrilled. Lily was very pleased with herself too. She had great bright affect all the way along.


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## Streetcar

I just love these wonderful victories you and Lily are sharing together .


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## lily cd re

I went down to my club to do a run thru of utility today. I treated it a closely as I could to the conditions of a trial. We did the reverse of the "A" order: 1. directed jumping; 2. moving stand; 3. directed retrieve; 4. scent discrimination and 5. heeling and signals.

Lily did a very good job with almost everything. She would have qualified on everything except the signals. Our old nemesis is still a bit of a nemesis. I will focus on keeping myself from stressing on it and keep myself light in step and light in mind for it. I am going to take both poodles on a summer road trip this weekend to a trial where you can rent practice ring time Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Hopefully I can get us out the door in time to make it for the Thursday match so we can have some practice time and get acclimated to the setting.

Keep your fingers crossed for us on Sunday, which is the only day I entered utility. I will be doing rally with both dogs. Lily should finish RAE8 and Javelin will get try to get a bumper novice leg.


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## lily cd re

We were at a trial over the weekend where it was possible to rent practice time in the actual trial rings on Friday and Saturday after all of the judging was over. I had Lily in for RAE legs and a title run all three days. I did enter her in utility on Sunday with the plan that unless she did everything well in the practice rings I would not show her there.

She did do very well in the practice rings, but was still a bit shaky on the drop signal. Friday evening the friend who worked as a "judge" for me suggested talking to my trainer about changing the signal for the drop. I thought this was probably a good idea since my old signal is pretty contaminated. I know Lily knows what to do, but she stresses over doing it when she sees that signal. 

I took a semi-private hour with Deb this afternoon. We talked about the idea of changing the signal and agreed on a new signal and a very clear set of criteria for teaching Lily what it means. I think it will work out very well.

Here is what I am doing. The new signal will never be given a second time. At first it will be accompanied by the verbal order to drop and done at close distance. The verbal will be dropped ASAP. As soon as Lily shows that she knows what the signal means I will start to add distance and as she gets reliable at distance we will add distraction proofs. Even just in the time we worked today I was able to move out further than when I started and I dropped the verbal. Tomorrow when I train at my club I will go back to the beginning and do the same things, drop the verbal order, get distance and start to add distractions.

I am also continuing to reward Lily for the stand stay that sets up the signals by going back and treating her or going back and releasing her to play. I will tyr to get some video in the next couple of weeks to show you how it goes.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> ... the friend who worked as a "judge" for me suggested talking to my trainer about changing the signal for the drop. ...


So, out of curiosity, what is your drop signal? I find if I drop my hand too soon he must think I've changed my mind and he doesn't down or he stops his motion and sits back up. I can drop it once he's committed to moving to the next position. 

My "down" is with my right hand (up in the air, not a forward push) and my "sit" is with my left hand, off to my side with the palm toward him, so it's easier to see the outline of the signal compared to a hand raised toward him, palm up. "Come" is the regular one, sweeping my right hand up toward my left shoulder.

Do you vary the order of the commands? Maybe anticipation isn't a problem for Lily.

I have had to start re-reinforcing the stand-stay after Neely began sitting down if I waited for 10 seconds to signal the down. I'm trying to reduce anticipating the next command, which crops up from time to time.

Marguerite

PS--I know you're focused on AKC, but since we're talking about signals, I also had to change a signal for one part of the UKC gloves in the "baseball" layout. The second half of the glove exercise is send the dog to the middle of the ring to sit before the judge tells you which glove to get. Gloves 1 (third base) and 3 (first base) are easily understood by pointing, as in directed jumping. But getting the dog to turn around and get the glove behind him is trickier. (Also, when first training the go-out to the middle, you also have to train the dog NOT to go directly to grab Glove 2.) 

Most folks teach the signal as an overhand throw with their right hand, and do so by actually tossing a glove behind the dog, transitioning the toss into a signal. I tried that, and felt he was confusing it with the down signal, so I had to come up with something else. He now understands a left-hand, underhand toss motion to be the Glove 2 signal. 

I also "name" the gloves and use it as the command, "Two!", for example. I do this for all the glove exercises. It also means I can say it when confirming it from the judge, to put it in the dog's head before we turn around.

I knew that a friend trained gloves by name, and this method really resonated when I was judging her in a CDSP utility run. I said "Take glove 3" and her dog, without changing position, peeked left over his shoulder at glove 3 and returned to facing forward. He knew before the glove was marked which one to get.


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## lily cd re

Marguerite my old contaminated drop signal was a "push" with my right hand. I am still going to use my right hand but put my arm out in front of me at shoulder height palm facing Lily and bring it down to my side. I do my other signals the same way you do for the sit and come front. 

I already see tremendous improvement on the drop. I did full distance, no verbal back up and with distractions at my club today. I will have to take it on the road to make sure she really understands, but she seems very relieved to have a new signal that has no stress or bad history associated with it.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Marguerite my old contaminated drop signal was a "push" with my right hand. I am still going to use my right hand but put my arm out in front of me at shoulder height palm facing Lily and bring it down to my side. I do my other signals the same way you do for the sit and come front.
> 
> I already see tremendous improvement on the drop. I did full distance, no verbal back up and with distractions at my club today. I will have to take it on the road to make sure she really understands, but she seems very relieved to have a new signal that has no stress or bad history associated with it.


That's terrific! I hope to see a title announcement in the coming months!


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## lily cd re

mvhplank said:


> That's terrific! I hope to see a title announcement in the coming months!


You and me both!


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## lily cd re

We went to a match this morning, given by a club we've been to before, but at their new facility. They are still settling in there, but it will be fabulous for them. They have lots of crating space, warm up space, a fenced in potty area and the parking is reasonable. At their old space the neighboring businesses were pretty nasty if people parked in the wrong area.

I had three utility runs for Lily, but Javelin came along for the ride. You will here him barking off and on in the videos. For the first run I just did go outs/jumping, moving stand and gloves. A lot of time in that run was about helping Lily to not worry about being in a new space. In the second run she was clearly more settled and confident. I started with gloves, did articles and heeling and signals. By the time we finished that run she was very much in tune with the new environment.

I had one of the desk stewards record our third run. My tablet video shuts off just before four minutes each time, so the whole thing is in three parts with just a couple of little gaps. I was very pleased with just about everything, except for some silliness regarding the jumps at the start. At the directed retrieve when I turned to send Lily I saw that the gloves were not ours. The ones I use don't have colored cuffs. This is why Lily didn't go to the glove the first time in the video. Also near the end Lily anticipated the recall signal, but I think and the judge also said that the anticipation probably was because I said good when she did the sit. Here are links to the videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nK_QUp4isM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xNtsWJcgCFs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DHNQAoknIo

I feel much more confident that the entries for three trials in September will not turn out to be expensive matches after all.


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## lily cd re

I sent an entry for a trial that is a one ring venue and on Long Island taking place on labor day weekend. I am not sure how this one will go because even though I used to train at this facility with a group of about 6 people we had to stop a couple of years ago so I am looking at this as a place Lily really doesn't know.

To prepare I still took my regular class but with the morning group (some of the same people) at our usual place. We had six team working so there were plenty of distractions. Lily and I worked with someone I know casually but who Lily does not know. There were a couple of stressful moments. Lily did a good stand stay and beautiful drops, but was distracted by the working dog on the other side of the ring gate about 4 or 5 feet away and missed the sit signal twice. We worked through it though and she was successful on the last set. She did great work on the articles, moving stand a decent gloves. Because of the large number of people we didn't have time to do the go out and jumping.

We then went in search of a little lunch (shared some chicken McNuggets from McD's) before going to another utility class at the location of the September 3rd trial. I am really glad we went. At first clearly Lily was nervous because she wasn't sure about the place. There are mirrors and the flooring is different than most of the other places we work, but the class is in the actual space where the trial will be. The instructor also is someone Lily does not know well. We started with go outs and jumping. She had a hard time finding the go out at first, but by the time we stopped she had done three really nice full distance go outs and succeeded with both the jumps. We did moving stand which went very well and heeling and signals. The heeling was very good and for the first set of signals I stayed close in. She started to take too many steps in before she dropped so I moved in and gave her a correction by backing her up to where I had left her for the stand and staying just 3-4 feet away and giving her the drop signal. the rest of what she did with the signals was better and better with each repeat. We finished with gloves and she did nice pivots but went and came back from the first glove slowly so when I saw her coming in slow I ran away and turned again to face her. She sped up and came to front nicely. We did another glove and she went out and back very smartly and brightly. She was wagging her tail by the time we finished.

Unfortunately I don't think I will be able to take that class since the instructor is on vacation next week and the week after that I have my first day of fall classes on September 1st, but there will be match time on August 31st there and I will decide then if she is really ready to do the trial on September 3rd.


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## mvhplank

Interesting training session. Good luck!

M


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## lily cd re

We had a quiet morning at my club today. I just had two people for utility so I was able to do a routine with Lily after I finished helping the other two people. I had my desk assistant as a judge/steward. Lily really loves Kathy and so she was a bog distraction for her and I am sure that if Lily felt worried she would have gone to her to avoid working. We did all of the exercises as they would be done in a trial as much as possible and she did great! She heeled really nicely and did all of the signals with Kathy walking around her waving her arms around. Just after I turned to face her Lily took one little glance away, but instantly looked back to me. Huge! She did great articles, beautiful go outs and jumps, stellar stand for exam and really nice gloves. We even put the gloves at the front end of the ring where there were two other people two other adult dogs and the little puppy. She ignored all of them and did what she needed to. 

She had a bright and sassy affect all the way. I am very pleased. Yesterday was good for my girlie girl.


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## lily cd re

I took Lily to a match this afternoon at the site of the trial we are entered in on Saturday. I treated both of my runs as closely to trial conditions as I could while still giving her good support and feedback. Most importantly I wanted her to succeed with the signals and to have a bright affect while doing so. If she failed in the match with this exercise I was going to have myself marked absent. 

Drum roll please...I am happy to say she did well with the signals in both runs and two different people acting as the judge. I didn't love her heeling, but it would have qualified and the signals would have Q'd too. Our trainer has said she doesn't care if she fails everything else, but that it is important she doesn't fail the signals, since this exercise has been her biggest struggle.

She did really lovely go outs, gloves, articles and wonderful moving stand for exam. Between our two runs she qualified everything with the exception of having to get a second order for one jump (this would be an NQ). Keeping my fingers crossed...


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## mvhplank

Good luck! 

I'm entered in several preferred open runs in the next couple of months. Now that Neely has a diagnosis of Addison's, I don't see an reason to stress him with out of sight stays.


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## Mfmst

C'mon Lily! We will all be rooting for you this weekend.


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## lily cd re

*Not a Q, but darn close!*

I am thrilled to say that the only exercise we didn't Q on was the directed retrieve. And yes, that means we qualified in the signals! It wasn't all beautiful, but I am very happy. Many friends were there who know us and have helped us get things in order, including the private trainer who I have been working with. They all congratulated me on a good NQ, by noting what a huge accomplishment it was to have gotten the signals.

We are showing in utility B (could be in A since Lily doesn't have a UD title and I have never had an OTCh) so that we will get the exercises in varying sequences to avoid having Lily memorize the A order (which she did in open). We had order number 3, which is scent discrimination, directed retrieve, heeling and signals, moving stand for exam then directed jumping.

On the first article Lily showed some stress by being slow to go to the pile and to come back and she didn't sit when she got back to front. She did take the correct article though. For the second article she was much livelier and brighter and she did sit front when she returned.

The directed retrieve was glove number 2 (middle glove). Lily sat out wide and ended up going towards glove 3, but didn't take it. There are mirrors around the ring out where the gloves were and the five dogs that NQ'd all did what Lily did (probably because of the mirrors). I called her back from the mirror where she got stuck and we moved on to heeling and signals. Lily did much nicer heeling than at the match on Wednesday so I was quite pleased with that. I think I would have gotten really freaked out if her heeling was bad and I probably would have made her nervous about the signals so we each helped the other out when we really needed it. She did the drop and the sit wonderfully. She came to front but didn't sit so since I knew we weren't going to qualify I quietly told her to sit. She did a nice finish when we got that order.

Lily loves the moving stand exercise since she thinks it is really just a nice person petting her. She gave me nice focus while the judge went over her and did a nice finish. She had a bright affect when she returned to me. Our last exercise was the directed jumping. By this point Lily was obviously happy and feeling a decent level of confidence. She did beautiful go outs, went straight and briskly away went I sent her. I did lose a few points for giving the order to sit a bit too late (the judge was very nice and gave almost everyone who needed a pointer or tip something encouraging with the comment). She did both of the jumps nicely, sat when she came to front and did nice finishes. The whole routine ended on a very positive note with a happy working dog!

Our next trials are at my obedience club, so we should have home field advantage. I am looking forward to the end of the month and those entries.


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## mvhplank

Excellent progress!

I'm looking forward to news of your new title!


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## mashaphan

I am so happy and proud about the progress the Queen has made!:adore: It won't be long now!

We are also proud to report that the Charming Che was the Number One (!!! :adore RAE whippet for the first half of 2016 (in spite of a couple of stupid mistakes that I made!  )

Martha and Che


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## lily cd re

Martha I have a funny feeling that UD may happen at SOTC in January.

Hooray for you and Che.


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## lily cd re

We went to a match in New Jersey yesterday at a facility where I hope to get into a trial at the end of October. In addition to yesterday I also have entries for the match to be held the day before that trial so getting good practice in at this location is really useful. We go to this place as often as we can. They have matches once a month and although I don't get there every month we have worked with the young man who is our judge in these videos often enough that Lily is really starting to like him. Having her work well without trying to flirt with him the whole time is great proofing.

Here are videos from one of the three runs I took with Lily yesterday.


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## Sammy the spoo

Good job Lily! I loved the videos - it is really neat to see how it is done! Thanks for sharing!

Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk


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## Skylar

Thanks for posting - it's interesting to see what you do so I have a better understanding of where hopefully we are headed.

I was watching it on a small screen - were you sometimes giving Lily treats at the end of each step?


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## lily cd re

Yes I was feeding. You can use food in a match, but not in a trial. I use either string cheese shredded into little bits, plain shredded bits of boiled boneless chicken breasts or my home made turkey brownie treats. I prefer those for most things since I can hold pieces in my mouth and feed from my face to the dog's mouth while they maintain eye contact and keep connected.

However for the scent discrimination when I put my hand out for her it is so she can take my scent.


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## Streetcar

I was able to watch one of your videos and love seeing how you and Lily work together. What a fantastic team . This is an awesome journey you are making. The UD can't be far off.


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## lily cd re

She is an amazing girl. I am so lucky to have her. We are having a wonderful journey together.


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## Skylar

lily cd re said:


> Yes I was feeding. You can use food in a match, but not in a trial. I use either string cheese shredded into little bits, plain shredded bits of boiled boneless chicken breasts or my home made turkey brownie treats. I prefer those for most things since I can hold pieces in my mouth and feed from my face to the dog's mouth while they maintain eye contact and keep connected.
> 
> However for the scent discrimination when I put my hand out for her it is so she can take my scent.


I see, I had assumed that in a match you wouldn't use food. 

I'm limited in food because of Babykins colitis - I've been using cooked chicken/turkey but sometimes I find it awkward to use when I want to have a handful to treats to dole out one at a time from my hand. What are your home made turkey brownie treats? Would this be more kibble like?


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## lily cd re

If the match had been at my home club I probably would not have fed her at all, but I did want her to know what she had done that I really liked. Also I am not so sure that I really fed her each time it might look like I did in the video. There are times I have my hand behind what you see of her, like in showing her where the go out is that there is no food. I gave her a bit of cheese around the time of the scent discrimination because I was really pleased that she was hanging in with me for the whole ten minutes worth of time we were in the ring.

Tomorrow I will put her through a run thru with no food and that will probably be the last time we do all the exercises before the trial on Friday.


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## Mfmst

Every dog has its day, and I know the UD Day is going to come soon! We are all cheering Team Lily!


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## StormeeK

I too am cheering on Team Lily. I love watching your videos and following the action. GOOD LUCK!!


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## Skylar

lily cd re said:


> Tomorrow I will put her through a run thru with no food and that will probably be the last time we do all the exercises before the trial on Friday.


Good luck on Friday.


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## lily cd re

Less than 24 hours to our next trial. Keep us in your hearts for good work tomorrow. I think if we qualify I won't need to post for you all to know about it since you will hear my hooting and hollering across thousands of miles. If we don't qualify I will be happy as long as we get the signals and come out of the ring with a happy girl.


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## mvhplank

Good luck! Or "break a leg"! Or whatever expression of hope for a favorable outcome works for you.


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## MollyMuiMa

Have all my fingers & toes crossed, tossed a bunch of fairy dust into the air, and asked all the powers that be, to bless ya with a win! Oh yeah, even E-mailed a couple of Leprechauns to bring ya Good Luck!


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## lily cd re

Not our day today...

We had order five from Utility B: directed retrieve, scent discrimination, directed jumping, heeling and signals, then moving stand.

Things started well with the glove. Lily stopped working the pile during the first article, but did the second article. Then things got sketchy with no go outs so at that point the judge tired to let me help her a bit and told me to send her a second time for the go out, but at that point I am sure Lily knew she was wrong and got worried. She did do nice heeling but then wasn't paying enough attention to take the signals the first time so I gave her a couple of verbals. At that point it was a bit to obvious that I was training in the ring so we were excuse (as we rightly should have been, even though some judges will give you a blind eye on this). 

Anyway the judge (who I've shown to before) noted that there were some very good things and also said that she often sees dogs have a hard time in their home club because it is very different from what they are normally used to on the home field. My trainer had also said not to be surprised if things went flooggy on Friday. Hopefully the cob webs will clear for tomorrow. She did stick with me even when she was worried and she did enter and leave the ring happy. Tomorrow we start again with a clean judge's book!


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## mvhplank

I'm sure she'll pull it together! Best of luck!

We're going to give preferred open a try the second weekend of October. Since Neely was diagnosed with Addison's, I've decided that he doesn't need the added stress of out-of-sight stays. He can do them--he has his UKC Open title--but we'll try these alternative classes for now.


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## lily cd re

I am sure she will get her act together and I expect tomorrow may be a lot better than today.

I think it is a good idea not to put the stress of the out of sights on Neely. It should all be for the good, not for the titles and ribbons (nice as they are!). I wish the AKC had gotten rid of the sit stay from open and put in something like a directed retrieve in its place when they made the changes last year.


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## Sammy the spoo

I'm sorry that it was not Lily's day. I'm surprised to hear that sometimes dogs don't perform as well in their home ring. I'd have thought opposite but very interesting indeed. I hope tomorrow will be a better day for both of you!

Sent from my A0001 using Tapatalk


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## lily cd re

I think the home ring thing is that the dog recognizes it as home, but not like home as they usually see it which can throw them off. For examples we pull out the ring gates along the side walls to get a little more width and normally there is a green stanchion at the go out that we allow people to put food on (like squeeze cheese), but for trials it is replaced with a blue one like all the others. Depending on the judges preferences the ring entrance can end up being moved too. 

And I am sure (and talked about this with a couple of my friends today) that handlers must always send a pheromone or a vibe or something that raises the little antennae that the dog's use to gauge expectations about what is about to happen off of. They definitely know the difference between normal training, match training and trials. Each has its own vibe.


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## lily cd re

Well better, but not good enough again today. We didn't get a go out the first time, but she did a good one the second time. Signals were problematic again. We Q'd everything else though and her heeling was quite nice despite creeping in for the drop. 

I think maybe our club is just too quiet for her to work well in a trial. She seems to be able to do extremely well during matches in places that are on the busy side, but also struggles some in matches at my club. I will send my trainer an email post mortem and see what she thinks.


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## mvhplank

As a very good competitor said about an NQ on a simple glove retrieve--"It's diagnostic." I liked her philosophical attitude and complete lack of anger either at herself or her dog--I did not perceive any disappointment, either. The dog just told her what needs a bit of extra work.

I think you're perceptive enough to figure out what will work with your girl. Diagnostics are always useful and will certainly help you reach your goal!


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## lily cd re

Oh yes, Marguerite I view every match, trial or other training as lessons and opportunities to learn. Lily tried hard today (and yesterday) but as I said I think maybe it was just so quiet that not having many distractions to cope with, which I think makes her pay attention to me more (along the lines of her thinking well I know I can't go look at that bit of fluff on the floor so i better pay attention to mom). She has been doing very well in busy match venues and in places she isn't all that familiar with in the last several months.

We will get there. I recently was talking to someone who said that statistics posted for 2015 said that there was only a 14% qualifying rate in utility A. It is very hard, but I am very determined and Lily is very devoted to taking on challenges too as long as she's with me!


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## Streetcar

Every event gets you closer, I am certain. Lily is so intelligent no doubt she takes in everything around her.


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## Mfmst

I am sorry that this wasn't the UD weekend. Maybe it will happen at one of your away trials where everything about the venue is different and the only constant is you. I know she will put this all together for the title.


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## lily cd re

Mfmst said:


> I am sorry that this wasn't the UD weekend. Maybe it will happen at one of your away trials where everything about the venue is different and the only constant is you. I know she will put this all together for the title.


Mfmst that is what I am thinking this evening. I have some matches coming up and will be interested to see her focus if we are in a place where she normally might not be so comfortable and has to look to me as her anchor.


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## mvhplank

I think you and I might have similar approaches to training. I spend a lot of time mulling over what happened and parsing what the reasons are and what to do to adjust the next outcome.

Good luck and happy training!


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## lily cd re

mvhplank said:


> I think you and I might have similar approaches to training. I spend a lot of time mulling over what happened and parsing what the reasons are and what to do to adjust the next outcome.
> 
> Good luck and happy training!



We would have a great time training together I think. Maybe I can come out to you sometime. I really like having someone to watch what I'm doing and then getting ideas about how to move forward.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> We would have a great time training together I think. Maybe I can come out to you sometime. I really like having someone to watch what I'm doing and then getting ideas about how to move forward.


That sounds like fun!

My October is all booked up, and most of November, too. If you want to make a little weekend vacation in the Gettysburg area, we could try Nov. 12 or 13. I have a key to the training building about 15 miles from my house where we can work on whatever we like.

On Dec. 18, the Mechanicsburg club is having a show-and-go where you register online, select the time you want, and pay. Some folks like being able to schedule, versus the free-for-all that sometimes happens when it's register as you arrive. There's more info on their calendar page, Calendar - OTCHPA. This building is probably an hour closer to you than I would be in Gettysburg.

Give it some thought!

Marguerite


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## lily cd re

November 12/13 might work. I am on a waiting list for a trial in NJ on November 12th, but I am not likely to get in. the trial secretary asked me if I could go into the Sunday trial, but the judge is not someone most people I know like showing to in obedience (very nice for rally though).

If I don't get in to that November 12th trial, I could drive out early on Saturday and we could work for a while, then have dinner and I could stay over and we could do some more on Sunday morning or if you only want to work one day I could go to the battlegrounds (I've never been).


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## Skylar

I'm sorry it didn't go as well as hoped - but I love your attitude about analyzing what went wrong. It will happen eventually as all the parts of this puzzle come together.


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## Mfmst

That would be so awesome to have a training trip to Gettysburg with another of PF's most accomplished members. Wish it could be during fall foliage. The Keystone State is at its most beautiful then.


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## mvhplank

Catherine,

Have you considered putting Lily in Versatility for a few trials? I used CDSP's version of the class as a ramp-up to their Utility classes. (CDSP Versatility has no retrieves.)

The skills leap between Open and Utility is not insignificant, and showing up at a few trials with some "easy" and familiar exercises might help her confidence. I know it isn't offered at all trials, but you might try taking advantage of it when you find it.

As I read the rules (getting ready to do Preferred Open this coming weekend), the eligibility requirement for Versatility is, well, to be "any dog." I hope to give it a try at some time. First, I've got to figure out why Neely has recently decided that it's fun to run around the jump on the retrieve. 

M


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## lily cd re

Marguerite, yes I have thought about that and might do it in November at the Thanksgiving cluster. I've also thought about refreshing her open routine and putting her in Open B.

It is so true that the leap in skills to get successfully from open to utility is a big one. In agility the big skills gap is between novice and open (not so hard to get from open to excellent). So I am in purgatory in both sports right now. I've had a couple of utility routines with only one missed exercise in obedience and don't really even want to think about how many 2R open agility standard and jumpers runs we have (only one R allowed there).

We are nothing if not persistent!


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Marguerite, yes I have thought about that and might do it in November at the Thanksgiving cluster. <snip>


Which Thanksgiving cluster would that be? I have my eye on one in West Friendship, MD.

M


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## lily cd re

mvhplank said:


> Which Thanksgiving cluster would that be? I have my eye on one in West Friendship, MD.
> 
> M


Sorry, W. Springfield, Massachusetts. There is agility as well as obedience and rally along with a large all breed conformation show, plus great shopping and a chance to see Javelin's breeders.


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## mvhplank

lily cd re said:


> Sorry, W. Springfield, Massachusetts. There is agility as well as obedience and rally along with a large all breed conformation show, plus great shopping and a chance to see Javelin's breeders.


Sounds more fun than the one I expect to attend. 

M


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## lily cd re

After working with Javelin yesterday Deb and I worked on the two things that Lily had a hard time with in our most recent trials (September 30th and October 1st), the signals and the go outs. Her go outs were really good yesterday and I took advantage to reward her at the go out location so she got reinforced on that being the right place to be.

For the signals we talked about what happened at the trials. Although Deb wasn't there she noted that she heard none of the Utility A dogs did well with the signals. Even though we entered in B Lily really is effectively an A dog. Deb said that she felt that the judge moving to be right behind the dogs while the handlers were going across the ring was probably the issue for most of us. Her analysis was that we all need to work on proofing the stand and then also proofing the drop. So that is what we did. I would leave Lily and Deb would do all sorts of things near Lily (moving, talking to her clapping, standing behind me and moving and the like). I rewarded her for ignoring the distractions to proof the stand and wait. The next thing we did was proof the drop. Again I rewarded her for keeping her attention on me and ignoring Deb's distractions which were very heavy (on the floor talking to her and clapping, etc). Deb also told me to be sure to give her a meaningful correction for not staying in place or dropping in place. She wants Lily to truly learn that she doesn't have a choice about doing these parts of this exercise. She thinks that my worrying about this has allowed her to be unsure of herself when in a trial. So when we started the heavy proofing yesterday she did look away and she did take steps in, but rather than letting her think that was okay I came back in to her and corrected her. For missing the drop I took her by the collar and pulled her down to the drop (as an example of the correction). I then did the next drop at shorter distance so she would not be so nervous about the proofing, but also so she knew that I could get to her for the correction quickly if needed. We will work on this heavily for the next few weeks. Our next trial is on October 30th at a location where we frequently match and she does very well.


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## lily cd re

*October 23, 2016 match rings*

We took match ring time at a great venue in New Jersey today. I had three runs with Lily and did all of the exercises in different orders each time.

The first time I used food to reward.






The third time there was no food at all. I had a bit of time left at the end of my ten minutes so we mostly just played tug. Sadly my tablet ran out of storage space and only got roughly the first half. 






Overall I am very happy with how she did. She worked happy and although I would have lost some miscellaneous/handler error points she hung in pretty well all the way through.


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## zooeysmom

Wonderful job, Lily and Catherine!


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## lily cd re

We had a great trip to New Jersey this weekend. Saturday I had both poodle do match ring time. Lily did a great job in her three runs. I felt we were well prepared for Sunday.

Even though we didn't qualify, I was pretty pleased with how she did. Our first exercise was the directed retrieve. We had glove three and Lily did a great pivot, took my direction well and returned for a very nice front with just a minimum of pouncing/shaking/"killing" of the glove. She also did a lovely finish and was obviously confident and happy on hearing exercise finished. 

Next was scent discrimination. She failed the first article (wood, not her favorite), but did a really nice job with the second (leather for which she is much happier. I have done metal or wood first as a waay to get it over with and then rewarded her with the one she likes very well coming second. I am going to try switching the order and see if that helps her.

Next was directed jumping. She anticipated the send for the first one, but she stopped right away when she realized she had made a mistake. The judge let me set her up again for the send. She waited for the order and went out briskly. She took the order for the correct jump and fronted and finished well. The second one was almost perfect.

Jumping was followed by the heeling and signals. She did nice heeling, but then she didn't stay out where I left her. I really feel better that she ended there rather than getting to showing the drop signal and having her fail that. To fix this I will do heeling, stand and leave and then reward the stand stay without doing any signals for a couple of sessions.

The last exercise was the moving stand for exam which is probably very nearly her most favorite exercise since she thinks of it as a chance to get petted by somebody she doesn't know, but doesn't worry over since she really loves to touch and be touched.

Our next trial is in the same place and coming up soon.


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## mvhplank

Moving in the right direction, it sounds like!


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## lily cd re

mvhplank said:


> Moving in the right direction, it sounds like!


Absolutely!


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## Skylar

I love watching the videos - it's very helpful even if I'm no where near to doing this yet. And I loved seeing that poodle bounce when Lily was running.


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## lily cd re

Sunday I had match ring times at a great facility in New Jersey. It was cold and windy, so part of me really wanted to stay home. I thought about the grooming that needs to get taken care of before we go to our trials this weekend, but at the end we went. I am so glad I did. 

In the first time slot I had with Lily I worked on two things that had developed problems. The first being staying on the stand before the signals. After a ring nerves experience where a judge moved a fair amount behind dogs while they were on the stand stay, Lily had started walking in behind me to the point where (sort of thankfully) she never even got orders for the drop, etc. I combined ideas from two OTCh handlers for how to fix this. One wants the dog to know there will be a meaningful correction for not doing the ordered signal The correction is to walk in while holding the signal and to then put the dog into the ordered position with a big uh oh. The other person suggested making staying in position at the stand with a release to a reward behind the dog. This requires a good leave it and a helper. I had the helper put a treat on a target behind Lily, but made sure she knew it was there. I gave her the order to stay in place, walked out and turned to face her. I waited until she decided to ignore the treat and other distractions to offer focused attention to me. Once she held that direct eye contact for a few seconds I released her to take the treat. We repeated this several times, increasing the duration of her attention first, then adding the drop signal and then doing drop sit before releasing her for the treat. After that I was able to remove the target and treats and do all of the signals with no rewards until she finished.

The other thing we worked on was switching the order of the articles to leather, then wood. I have been doing leather second for quite a while. She likes leather better and I had put it second so she would know that it was something to look forward to. She started really goofing around with working the pile and stopping, going back to the pile etc. She failed the first (wood) article in our most recent trial, so I decided that it might be better to do leather first to boost her confidence in the exercise. I am still not entirely sure which order I will do them, but she did work both articles nicely on a number of sends.

In our second run, I told the "judge" that I wanted to treat the time like a trial, no food, no repeats, no play rewards. We did the reverse A order which starts with jumping and ends with heeling and signals. There were a couple of stress moments where I had to work to recollect Lily's attention, but she did everything! I felt like that was a big breakthrough.

In the last run, we did an exercise and then played tug if it was good for as many exercises we had time for. I wanted to end our work on a happy and playful note.

We will be going back to the same place on December 11th. I hope to use two of our three runs to do a whole "trial conditions" routine and then one for having some good fun with some attention work thrown in. I did have video done of the 2nd run, but I need to do some editing before I post. I also did some great work with Javelin that I will post about later in his blog.


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## Raven's Mom

Congrats on the good run! I hope she does well on the 11th. You tow have worked so hard!


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## lily cd re

Raven's Mom said:


> Congrats on the good run! I hope she does well on the 11th. You tow have worked so hard!


Thanks. It really is turning out to be a much longer road than I anticipated. We took a lot of stupid detours because I was new at teaching these exercises. 

We have rally trials this weekend and also on December 10th. No matter what else is going on at that point I have decided that I think I will enter her for RAE at Rally Nationals in March. I can measure how she is feeling about things by how she does in rally. During the time I was still in the process of taking utility apart and rebuilding it this time last year she even acted unsure of herself in rally and we had a period where her scores were down in the low to mid 80s. Once she started to get confidence in utility her rally scores went back up to the upper 90s with some 100s sprinkled in.


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## lily cd re

We went to trials in Syracuse this weekend. I like these trials since you can match in the rings you will show in on Friday and then trial on Saturday and Sunday. For the match time we worked on all of the exercises except scent since I didn't want to make a mistake with my articles right before the trial. Lily did great go outs and nice heeling. She also did the signals in the match rings.

Saturday things were mixed. She missed the 2nd go out and she walked in on the signals, but did the glove and the 2nd article along with a very nice moving stand. Sunday also had mixed results but was generally better than Saturday, including that she stayed out for the signals. Saturday we had some really top notch competitors (like think OTCh and Nationals) who joined us in the NQ pool, so maybe there was a vibe in that ring.

One of my friends who was at the trials (PF's own mashaphan) watched us both days. We were talking after we finished on Saturday and one of the things Martha made note of to me was how "serious" my affect was on Saturday. She is right and I know I am often too serious in the ring. This is a hobby, so it should be fun, right? I made sure that I used a brighter voice and kept a smile on my face on Sunday. I think that helped. So I have to do some attitude adjustment I guess.


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## Sammy the spoo

Sounds like it was a very productive weekend!! Good job Lily!!!



lily cd re said:


> One of my friends who was at the trials (PF's own mashaphan) watched us both days. We were talking after we finished on Saturday and one of the things Martha made note of to me was how "serious" my affect was on Saturday. She is right and I know I am often too serious in the ring. This is a hobby, so it should be fun, right? I made sure that I used a brighter voice and kept a smile on my face on Sunday. I think that helped. So I have to do some attitude adjustment I guess.


I'm sure it would be so easy to be "serious". You traveled a long way for that time in the ring. You are focused and you'd like Lily and Javelin to be focused. I have watched the Crufts videos on YouTube, and those handlers look confident but serious, especially on obedience (although, I'm not sure if they would be considered a hobby?). Having said that, I'm sure your uplifting voice and smiles helped Lily relax on Sunday . Thank you for sharing your weekend!


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## mvhplank

I think this is where video can be helpful. I know you're already capturing a lot of video, but maybe go back and review what YOU'RE doing vs. Lily.

You'll get there! If you kept trying the same thing, you'd stay in a rut, but you're smart enough to analyze the problems.

M


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## lily cd re

Marguerite, yes video does help since you can't watch yourself if you are doing what you should be!


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## lily cd re

Poodles and I got in the car early this morning and drove down to a place in New Jersey to take match time. Every time I do this I come close to not going and getting back in bed! Then I remind myself I spent money for the entries and tell myself not to burn my bucks like that.

Well now I am starting to see consistently good outcomes from matches that I treat like trials and as a result I think it is going to be easier and easier to get myself out of the door. We had fun in the ring and after a little silliness about go outs at the very start of our first run somebody we know put in a qualifying performance of everything!


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## lily cd re

*We came very close today*

I entered a set of trials that consisted of 2 rally trials last night and then an obedience trial today. One of the rally judges was the obedience judge we showed to today. These events were at one of the places that I go for match ring time.

It was my hope that getting the butterflies out in the rally trial last night would help with utility today and I think it did. We got two more RAE legs last night on some challenging courses. It was late when we got to our hotel and we had a host of oddball things happen there (partly based on me having to bring my mom's dog, left Javelin home), but after a decent night's sleep we went back over to the show site this morning. I was happy to see the order of the exercises was: gloves, scent articles, directed jumping, heeling and signals and then moving stand for exam. The signals continue to be the big challenge so I am always happy to see them tucked towards the back after things Lily does well. We qualified everything except the signals. It was a little disappointing to have gotten through most of the exercises successfully and then miss the drop signal (where Lily walked in towards me), but she really tried very hard. She persevered through tough moments and came back after failing the drop to do the sit, come and finish, and then to do a good moving stand.


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## mvhplank

You will get there! 

I just started classes with a multi-OTCH trainer who is teaching in Westminster, MD, which is close enough for me to attend once a week. She's already making a lot of sense and I'm working on the things she suggested. (Mostly, getting Neely's nose off the floor.)

I hope you don't mind if I share a bit of good news that happened today in our own quest.

I'm trial secretary at small CDSP trial this weekend and running in Utility B, which is not precisely equivalent to AKC's UB, since it's not a titling class, but more like Versatility, with a mix of exercises from other levels. The breakthrough we had today was getting TWO of the bonus exercises, each of which is worth 20 points toward this venue's OTCH-C title. Whether you try for the bonus or not, it does not affect your basic score.

The baseball bonus is a "directed signal retrieve," like the second half of UKC's utility glove exercise. The gloves are on laid out like 1st, 2nd, and 3rd bases, while you stand at home plate. (Confusingly, the left-hand glove is #1 and the right-hand glove is #3.) You must send the dog to the center of the ring (the pitcher's mound) and tell him to sit. Then the judge tells you which glove to send the dog to. Today, our first glove was #2, which is behind the dog and a very tricky one to teach. He never hesitated! In our second run, the glove was #1 (third base) and he got it without any issues--but it is his favorite glove.

All that said, we still need 2 Qs to finish AKC Preferred Open. Then we will play in Preferred Utility. I decided after Neely's Addison's diagnoses that I really didn't need to add the stress of group stays to his life.

May you continue to have success while working toward your goal! I really thought you'd tell us today that you'd gotten a Q!


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## lily cd re

I have been working hard on getting fun back into our training sessions based on the work we did at the Top Dog advanced workshop. I am going to send an entry for a nice small venue trial in November.

I put sticky paw on Lily's feet too on Friday and we worked on just two exercises, directed jumping and heeling/signals. I think Lily also really appreciated the surer footing she had with the sticky paw spray I put on her feet. I feel a lot better about asking her to jump since she is nine years old I worry that if she hurts herself she might not recover well enough to do the jumps. She was so happy and cheerful in what we worked on Friday. It was a joy to see and gave me renewed hope that we will get this.


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## mvhplank

Great! Are you using the Cramer foot spray? Another Utility handler told me about it and said it added a great deal of confidence in her boy. I ordered it from Amazon and will be able to try it out the weekend of Oct. 21.


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## lily cd re

Hi Marguerite, I got BioGroom show foot, but looking at the Cramer can it looks almost like it could be the same thing. I hope what you got works well for you and Neely.


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## mvhplank

I'll give you an update after I have a chance to try it. 

As you probably already know, but for the benefit of other readers, it was developed by a runner to prevent blisters by keeping his feet from sliding around in his shoes. It's a rosin product, and since it's human-safe, it's presumably dog-safe too


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## lily cd re

I have been doing my training on this with Lily as much as possible like a trial lately. My only rewards to her during the work are play breaks and tricks like spins and touches, no food.

She has gotten her groove back since we did the proofing workshop in August. One exercise that had gone to heck was the pivot to the glove, but through the use of a slip lead to keep her in position for it for a few weeks, yesterday I worked all of the gloves without the lead and she did very serviceable pivots. She slipped up on one of the jumps, but it was a proof and she did it when I reset her.

Better....good girlie girl Lils.

PS. I have continued using the rosin spray on their feet and Lily is jumping nicely with much more stable landings.


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## Skylar

Haha futility. What I’m impressed with is that you keep it fun while finding new ways to train Lily.


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## lily cd re

Oh there have been many many futility moments for sure. I went through a funky phase where I was really disappointed that we weren't doing better. When I recognized how much that had eroded Lily's confidence in herself, I lighten it up quite a bit and although I really do want her to get the title I appreciate the journey much more now than I have at other times.


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## lily cd re

Well this isn't really the road to a UD any longer. I will still enter Lily in utility at local trials to play at it, but I have come to accept that I don't think it is fair for me to expect her to qualify since she didn't come close either of the days we entered at our home club back in June. 

We still train utility exercises and she has fun working those exercises with me when the pressure is off, but at almost ten years old I don't think it is fair for me to pressure her for it.

This does not mean Lily is retired by any means. She still likes playing at rally and we are close to a masters title there. I will also redouble my efforts at tracking with her and get her a certification track hopefully in the fall and then look for a couple of trials in the spring to add a tracking title.

Today I worked on rally masters spin and twist with her at our rented floor time. Her spin (360 turn to the left) is now pretty reliable but the twist (360 turn to the right) still needs work. I sent her for go outs and did low jump height utility jumps with her and she was a very happy girl.


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## Click-N-Treat

Good on you for recognizing that Lily needs space to just be a happy dog. Tracking sounds like fun. I've thought Noelle would enjoy tracking, since her favorite part of playing fetch is when the ball lands in the bushes and she has to hunt for it. Tail up, wagging, looking with her nose is great fun for her. 

Lily girl has impressed me tremendously. So have you for your dedication to training. If it wasn't for your threads about your dog, Noelle wouldn't be trialing in obedience and rally. Thanks for the inspiration!


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## mvhplank

You and I previously discussed trying Lily out in Preferred Utility, I think. I like the lower jump height option, since Neely is a pretty sloppy jumper. Had you considered the optional class of Versatility? How about Graduate Open? Alas, like the preferred classes, they're not offered at every trial.

There will be only two Utility exercises in any Versatility class, and Grad Open is probably manageable for her. That is, if you think she will have fun doing it.

Tracking sounds like a wonderful idea! Good luck!

Marguerite


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## Skylar

I agree with Marie - it's good to recognize your dog's feelings. Lily's still having fun, still learning and still hanging with mom on the competition circuit without the stress.

I fell into competition dog sports by accident - I had no idea they existed when I first took Babykins for her first basic obedience class. I was thrilled to discover not only your training threads - but also your generous sharing of knowledge and experience.


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## lily cd re

I have thought about those various options Marguerite, but I have mostly decided against for vaarious reasons.


mvhplank said:


> You and I previously discussed trying Lily out in Preferred Utility, I think. I like the lower jump height option, since Neely is a pretty sloppy jumper. *Lily is a great and clean jumper so I am not sure about preferred utility at this point. *Had you considered the optional class of Versatility? *We have versatility at our fall shows and I may enter her there along with veterans. *How about Graduate Open? *She hated both grad novice and grad open. We have one leg in each and won't do either again. *Alas, like the preferred classes, they're not offered at every trial.
> 
> There will be only two Utility exercises in any Versatility class, and Grad Open is probably manageable for her. That is, if you think she will have fun doing it.
> 
> Tracking sounds like a wonderful idea! Good luck!
> 
> Marguerite



If it isn't deeply fun for Lily I won't enter her. At this point in her life I owe her a relaxed and fun life. She has tried very hard to do utility for me, but it isn't really in the cards. She enjoys rally and it is now a nice challenge on good terms for us both. She has a great nose and likes tracking, after all what is better than being allowed to sniff all you want while dragging mom along 20' behind on a leash?


Lily will always be my bright star shining deeply in my heart and soul, but it is also time to let Javelin become the rising star and to reach his great potential with the same commitment I have given and continue to devote to Lily


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