Wow! It's been nearly a month since our last training session. We were meant to be training tomorrow with a group but all sorts of things have worked against being able to spend any meaningful training time with Poppy. We were away for 3 days on business, followed almost immediately by a walking week in Cornwall (with Poppy of course), then tagged on the end of that a week with Nina the Cockapoo - mad dog in the making! I exchanged texts with our trainer, Judy, to explain I thought there was a high risk of Poppy and I ruining her group training session because the pair of us hadn't really moved forward. Judy understood and suggested a one-to-one this morning instead so that's where we've been.
I have to say at this point that when I have been able to do a spot of training with Poppy she's been very lacking in enthusiasm and I mentioned this to Judy as we were walking to the usual training field. She was surprised by that now that she knows the dog quite well. She diverted us off to a different field so it was new territory for Poppy and said that would break any tendency of same-old same-old.
I think Poppy is maturing fast at just 28 months old. She has calmed down almost completely into adult dog mode. It took our old girl, Lady, until she was almost 3 years old before that happened. I guess they all reach adulthood at their own pace and Poppy seems to have arrived early. I mention this because the walk to the new field was all nicely at heal with a (almost) slack lead. A big contrast to the last session when I had to convert her slip lead to a figure-of-eight to stop the pulling until Poppy settled.
We kicked off with Poppy at heal on lead walking with me up the field. When we had gone far enough, Judy fired the gun and Poppy had to stop and sit. It needed a hand under the chin and a gentle prod on her rump but she did sit. Judy threw out the dummy and I sent Pops "back". Poppy actually went off like a train hunted (with a little help) and delivered to a point so close to putting it in my hand it was unreal, then jinked left and ran off to bury it.
We tried again, this time with a sighted retrieve in front. And again ...... And again and yay! the girl got it! After that false start Poppy did fine including steadiness to dummies thrown left and right and over her head. We've never before managed that. We also introduced "round behind" so after a delivery Poppy walks around behind me and sits at my left side (very much a work in progress). Some success with hand signals too. She was focussed on a dummy to the left, but successfully went right to my hand signal given at a short distance away from where she was sitting and brought the correct dummy back. She did this several times for the correct one including "back".
Judy had a long chat with me about how to proceed. One problem I must address is that I'm letting Poppy "bully" me into treating. We are using treats as a motivator which wouldn't normally happen but because of Poppy's history they seem appropriate and they work. I've got to extend Poppy to do more and more before treating. So, for example, a good delivery to hand and sit is followed by say a walk to heal and sit on my left by my side then a treat. Extending this repertoire gradually as she does things properly. Judy, who has a long and successful track record with gundogs said again (she keeps drumming this into me) that Poppy's head is full of detection dog stuff that's been trained into her during her real puppy time and now we are training a whole new set of things into her. She thinks Poppy is a bright dog because of how far she has come in a short time. This is quite the opposite of how I was seeing things by-the-way. She also said with all seriousness that if she'd had Poppy from a puppy she would be competing by now. She says she's trained a lot of dogs including assistance dogs and that dogs often just don't fit a particular role but turn out well in a different role. She thinks that applies to Poppy (sniffer dog failed) and she will be fine as a gundog, she clearly wants to work and enjoys it and we should aim to get her out on a shoot say mid-season coming. Judy is aiming to get us into a group session with other dogs next time out.
Lots of work still to do of course. Not least is Poppy scents the air a lot when searching ie her nose and body are held high rather than a ground search. That's the sniffer dog training probably. She needs practise on judging distance as well. She grossly overshoots sometimes. And we haven't even looked at cold game or water or a whole host of other stuff yet.
I have to say at this point that when I have been able to do a spot of training with Poppy she's been very lacking in enthusiasm and I mentioned this to Judy as we were walking to the usual training field. She was surprised by that now that she knows the dog quite well. She diverted us off to a different field so it was new territory for Poppy and said that would break any tendency of same-old same-old.
I think Poppy is maturing fast at just 28 months old. She has calmed down almost completely into adult dog mode. It took our old girl, Lady, until she was almost 3 years old before that happened. I guess they all reach adulthood at their own pace and Poppy seems to have arrived early. I mention this because the walk to the new field was all nicely at heal with a (almost) slack lead. A big contrast to the last session when I had to convert her slip lead to a figure-of-eight to stop the pulling until Poppy settled.
We kicked off with Poppy at heal on lead walking with me up the field. When we had gone far enough, Judy fired the gun and Poppy had to stop and sit. It needed a hand under the chin and a gentle prod on her rump but she did sit. Judy threw out the dummy and I sent Pops "back". Poppy actually went off like a train hunted (with a little help) and delivered to a point so close to putting it in my hand it was unreal, then jinked left and ran off to bury it.
We tried again, this time with a sighted retrieve in front. And again ...... And again and yay! the girl got it! After that false start Poppy did fine including steadiness to dummies thrown left and right and over her head. We've never before managed that. We also introduced "round behind" so after a delivery Poppy walks around behind me and sits at my left side (very much a work in progress). Some success with hand signals too. She was focussed on a dummy to the left, but successfully went right to my hand signal given at a short distance away from where she was sitting and brought the correct dummy back. She did this several times for the correct one including "back".
Judy had a long chat with me about how to proceed. One problem I must address is that I'm letting Poppy "bully" me into treating. We are using treats as a motivator which wouldn't normally happen but because of Poppy's history they seem appropriate and they work. I've got to extend Poppy to do more and more before treating. So, for example, a good delivery to hand and sit is followed by say a walk to heal and sit on my left by my side then a treat. Extending this repertoire gradually as she does things properly. Judy, who has a long and successful track record with gundogs said again (she keeps drumming this into me) that Poppy's head is full of detection dog stuff that's been trained into her during her real puppy time and now we are training a whole new set of things into her. She thinks Poppy is a bright dog because of how far she has come in a short time. This is quite the opposite of how I was seeing things by-the-way. She also said with all seriousness that if she'd had Poppy from a puppy she would be competing by now. She says she's trained a lot of dogs including assistance dogs and that dogs often just don't fit a particular role but turn out well in a different role. She thinks that applies to Poppy (sniffer dog failed) and she will be fine as a gundog, she clearly wants to work and enjoys it and we should aim to get her out on a shoot say mid-season coming. Judy is aiming to get us into a group session with other dogs next time out.
Lots of work still to do of course. Not least is Poppy scents the air a lot when searching ie her nose and body are held high rather than a ground search. That's the sniffer dog training probably. She needs practise on judging distance as well. She grossly overshoots sometimes. And we haven't even looked at cold game or water or a whole host of other stuff yet.
