Second session of the second bout of Advanced classes.

Heelwork

So we started with heelwork, which was fine.

Then we did left about turn, which we haven’t done in a while. You stand on the spot and pivot turning left, the dog is to be slightly behind you in the heel position and the dog pivots backwards with you.

I was advised not to walk around the dog, the dog is meant to follow you. This only really happens with a good treat though!

Send away

We did send away again, with a different formation of cones: this time the cones were set to a triangle.

This time I asked Artemis to wait between two corners of the triangle, hid a treat at the third corner, came back to Artemis, said “away” and did a hand signal, then said “down”. 

Artemis found the treat fine! It was just the down command, she did it eventually but it would have been good to do before finding the treat. The treat is meant to guide the dog really.

A recall

I asked Artemis to wait, walked away from her, continued walking and called Artemis to heel whilst continuing walking. Then when the trainer calls “halt”, I asked Artemis to “sit” on my left.

This was fine, I was reminded to praise Artemis when she comes running to heel as I’m walking, as I want to encourage her – positive reinforcement.

Lead with leg

This was something new I learnt today. Start walking with the right leg if you want the dog to stay still, for example asking the dog to “wait” for A recall.

And start walking with the left leg if you want the dog to move, for example for Send Away.

Conclusion

Different things today and learning new things too, such as leading with the leg – will have to remember which leg though!

It’s good that Artemis understands what to do most of the time, she loves to please, so I must remember to encourage and praise her more.