#ratg

Was reminded to go back to basics. So Thyme was re-taught fetch awhile back using the Jo Laurens Clicker Retrieve (vs other clicker retrieves) because LockDowns (tm) might as well challenge myself and reteach from scratch, and she does have a section dedicated to troubleshooting the dropping during water retrieve using the skills taught during her clicker retrieve and reverse-luring. Even better, a podcast to listen to while crocheting!

Snippets from the podcast:

When dogs have coats that are full of water, very heavy. They're uncomfortable for the dog and dog naturally wants to shake to get water out of their coat.

Now, if the dog puts the retrieve down on the ground and the retrieve is a bird, and the dog is retrieving a bird, and a bird isn't fully dead - the bird can get away, the bird can escape, and it's considered not to be acceptable for the dog to put game down.

A dog will probably eliminated if they did put the retrieve on the ground had a bit of a shake, fix the retrieve and then deliver the hand beautifully. So the difficulty that people have with this is the dog has done a lot of good things. So what do you do with that chain?

Because there are so many bits of that chain that we love and that we want to keep. There's a bit right in the middle of it there where the dog put the retrieve down, which we don't like. So how do we communicate to the dog all of that other stuff?

If you ignore the bits where the dog put the retrieve down, and you still give the dog a reinforcer at the end for the delivery, then you're not only reinforcing that decision to deliver the hand, but you're also reinforcing everything that came before it in the chain, including putting the retrieve down at the edge of the water.

So what we do about this? The answer is going to be the clicker retrieve. (...) The part of the clicker retrieve which is useful here is what we call proofing the hold against food. (...) Proofing the hold against food is where we have the dog with the retrieve item, the dog has got the retrieve in their mouth - and we teach the dog to keep holding onto that retrieve item even when we have shown them food on the flat of our palm right in front of their nose, that they will not drop the item.

In fact, the dog starts to learn that this physical cue, this hand signal, this Reverse Lure, is actually a cue to hold. It's actually a cue for the dog to resist the temptation to drop and to keep holding in the face of this, this food, which is so delicious and tempting, it strengthens the dog's desire and resolution to hold, because they know that the only way to get this amazing thing is to keep holding until they hear the click. When they hear the click, then they can drop, and then they get the food. And if they drop before the click, it doesn't work. The food disappears. They don't get it.

When the dog understands this, we have a powerful tool for any situation where the dog is tempted to drop.

What we would do once the dog understood this concept, and when we are around water, is we would begin right at the edge of the water where the dog comes out of the water, because that's usually when the dog is at first going to put down the retrieve and want to shake. So we want to be there ready with our Reverse Lure right then as it comes out of the water. So what comes out the water, we immediately put our hand with that, that familiar cue right in front of their nose, and tempt them to keep holding the dummy - not gonna do it for ages at first, any sort of brief hold, as long as they're resisting that temptation, we're going to click and deliver the treat.

So over time, and as the dog understands this, what happens is the dog exits water and they expect to be greeted by this temptation from you. This is the next part of the chain: exit water, and I hold in the presence of this distraction, and then I drop them.

And once they're expected, we can build back away from the shore and extend the distance, which is the fantastic travel over the ground of the land before they get to us. And it gradually teaches them holding during all of this, and we get rid of this desire to drop and habit of dropping. I find this to be a really powerful way of fixing this very common problem of dogs dropping as they come out of water.

Now, if the dog does drop at some point, especially when they first starting out, the dog is probably going to drop. They're probably going to just come out the water and drop, even if you do the Reverse Lure. So if that happens, you can't just do what you would do in the house from land away from water, which is you would just put your feet behind the back, wait for them to read the dummy taken out again, because then what's happened is you taught them that they can sort of come out of the water, spit out the dummy, lose the food, and then get a chance to do another rep where they pick up the dummy. And we don't want that to become part of this chain for coming out of the water.

So if I had a dog which came out the water and dropped in the presence of the Reverse Lure, what I did was to pick up the dummy, and I would just toss it back into the water again, not as far as it was originally, so they wouldn't have to swim quite that far again. But I would want them to kind of go in and get wet, so, you know, going up to shoulder height or something, and come out again and THEN have another go. So in my mind, that would be a fresh rep of exiting the water.

What I don't want to do is just stay on the land and let them up the dummy and have another go. So I would just possibly back into the water when it was a kind of mini version of the end of the chain. So they would come out with it in their mouth again. They tempt them again with it.

We have some polishing to do on our static-recall, distraction in new places especially where cattle and rabbits have been, and our long distance retrieves.

As far as distraction around other dogs, water retrieves, and our heelwork went, Freyja did marvellously. Everyone was very complimentary of her work ethic and our general outlook during the trial itself.

It probably helped that everyone had a lovely little chuckle at Freyja's lauched faceplant into the water after the dummy after being released to retrieve on her first run. Ridiculous animal that she is.

Still, we had fun, learned plenty, and are greatly looking forward to our next trial.