More Birds
Training for a new sport is so interesting! Maybe I'll never take this stuff very far but learning new foundations will always captivate me!
Vito has been the most fascinating. When the pigeon I was using got a little torn, Vito turned into Savage Toller! In this session I learned that I needed to stick with holds before re-progressing back to short retrieves. I also eventually realized I needed to make the release cue very calm to prevent Vito from wanting to re-grab the bird as his "reward." Fascinating stuff!
Today's session I just focused on short retrieves. Skipped the holds until the very end when I would ask him to sit after he picked it up. A bit more wanting to pluck feathers came out but still pretty minimal overall.
And Zumi has continued to do great working with a real duck. No issues at all picking it up and only occasional issues with holding it. This last weekend was the first time we added in diversions while retrieving a duck and also introduced doubles with a duck and a dokken.
Biggest issue right now is her ever lifting butt! Some sessions she remains insistent on completely standing and I have to go out and retrieve the duck myself until she is capable of remaining in a sit. Thankfully she's never actually completely broken the stay and left without a release.
"Savage Toller!" I love it!
I think I get the biggest kick out of just watching you handle the dead birds in these videos :)
Ha ha! I still feel a bit sad for the birds and try to be gentle :) Good thing no serious field trainer is watching!