Reply To: Shannon & Cricket (DRTDT)

[Alana McGee]

Wow – thank you for the feedback! I’ve read through it 3-4 times and every time I read it I find another piece of wisdom. Thanks!

Last night we worked on staying at the source and building lots of value for that. It was a two target hide and we primed using the frisbee, and then did lots of food rewards for finding the target, keeping her really engaged there, and ended the reward sequence for each target with the frisbee.

I did re-prime between the first and second target using a food reward and then sent her off again. I wish I had it on tape, she stopped and went around behind me looking for the frisbee (tucked in the back of my shirt) and then ran out alerted on the target and we had a party. I was completely prepared to manufacturer a hide and quit the search if she couldn’t get back into it, but she rocked it!

The other thing I did was put the sources as far away from each other as I could. She knew they are both there, but I am thinking it was less distracting for her to decide what to alert on.

We just did the one hide – I think that we stopped on a high point, she was happy and so was I.

I predict that she is going to LOVE the fetching of the tea ball. I’ve been looking for a grassy area that will work for us (not too many distractions, no loose dogs, long enough grass, etc ). I think I may have found one – we’ll try it as soon as the sun comes up on Saturday or Sunday when it will hopefully be the quietest.

Thanks again!