HULA DOGS: TRAINING SCHOOL

Tye's Training Diary

by Leanne Graham

Today Tye joined the training classes with Karl and Holly. Because it was Tye's first class, but the others' fifth class, Tye, me and Angela went into the smaller paddock for him to get assessed. As Tye finds it hard to stay focused, Angela thought it a good idea to teach him 'Look'. For this You call Tye's name and ask him to 'Look' and he needs to look you in the eye; not at the clicker, not at the treats - but in your eye.

Tye did really well with this and even though he'd occasionally stare at the treats/clicker a quick hiding of those behind my back got him darting straight at me.

We then as Angela suggested, progressed onto taking off his lead and moving away\hunching away from him so he'd need to make some effort to look. It took Tye a little longer to understand this as he just got too excited and would start thinking I wanted to play with him. But a quick ask of him to sit and he is easily composed.

We are taking things slow with Tye and will very gradually build up the distraction in the hope that once something does catch his eye and get him focused we'll easily be able to call him and him to look at us.

At the end of class Tye got let into the big field once everyone had left the class for his off-lead assessment. The same as the other dogs, Angela and I walked around the paddock and every time (which was actually surprisingly quickly) Tye would come darting in front of us to catch up, we moved and started walking in the other direction) Angela put into practise the 'Look' and Tye was actually very good. When his name was called he went into a thoughtful decision mode and took it upon himself to stop sniffing and to look up at Angela - from a fair distance. He then finished his sniffing and came dashing back.

Tye is a very smart man, and once he realises that going back on the lead isn't a game/bad thing. He'll be a right doddle to handle.

Next week Angela said we're going to touch on Agility and Scent work. Both of which I think will really help Tye as-well as being a lot of fun for him, too.

We're both looking forward to next week and are going to be practising learning 'Paw' 'Down' 'Touch' and of course 'Look'.