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Lesson 9 is uploaded
WHEW! Rebekah, you are QUITE THE EXTRAORDINARY HANDLER! Pray you will be able to heal quickly.
The Lesson 9 videos are uploaded as well as today's ALTERNATIVE LESSON 9 videos. Still working on the classroom Zoom recordings.
My thoughts are that when I HAVE TO MAKE AN EC, I ABSOLUTELY WANT IT TO COUNT. Why? So, I don't have to do it again. Once the dog believes their handler, "Said what I meant and meant what I said", that is 95% of the retrieve training.
Roxanne
Saturday, March 5, 2022
A couple thoughts for Corbin and Kratos
I've had a chance to catch up a little bit. Roxanne told me that Corbin and Rebekah and Kratos remind her of Brooke, Me and Kimber. I wanted to see why and oh boy do I know why she thinks that. She asked if I'd reach out with some advise for you. So the following council comes completely from a desire for all three of you to succeed. But first a tiny bit of context.
Brooke was the primary handler because I travel for work quite a bit and it's difficult to work the dog from a hotel room. I was always playing catchup when I came back. Brooke had put in a lot of the work and I would walk into a dog that was more or less able to accomplish the tasks for the exams. I just had to go through the motions. Brooke was (is) the firmer handler. I was (am) soft.
Kimber did most everything I asked her to do for 2 reasons. 1: Brooke and 2: SHE wanted to. She did NOT do what I wanted her to because I wanted her to, it was only because she wanted to, because she did NOT believe me; I was such a soft handler of a HARD dog. And honestly after watching many of your videos, Kratos might even be a harder dog than Kimber. (which is CRAZY).
Below is the video of the moment Kimber did what she wanted, but not what I wanted and the one of the most difficult 10 min of my life followed. However, by the end, Kimber believed that I said what I meant and meant what I said.
There is a whole lot here.
1. Notice her drive is off the charts, when I release her she takes off, because she wants to.
2. When she brings the duck back she doesn't finish the task.
3. Next you'll see me go and start to get the duck for her, I thought, "well she brought it this far, that's pretty good right?"
4. Lee Whittaker, the man in blind and 2nd best dog trainer I know tells me to make her finish the job. Also Roxanne the 1st best.
5. Next comes the 9 minute ear correction. You can't see everthing that is going on but she tries to escape, bite me, roll over, she quivers, she growls, she straight REFUSES to pick it up. I am using my weight to force her head onto the bird, I'm pushing so hard on her ears she later got an ear infection. I was leaning on her, sitting on her. I was tired and muddy and embarrased. But I won and winning that fight made all the difference.
Corbin, the reason I share this with you is because you and Kratos are heading for a moment like this if you can't get him to believe you now. You may unconsciously believe that being slow to correct or not correcting with enough force or both is enough or fair, but it isn't. It's the opposite. When an Alpha in a wolf pack needs to make a correction to a member of the pack, it bites them. That's the dog's language. You've got to "bite" Kratos when he's refusing, avoiding, stopping, dropping dumbbells or whatever else because that's the language he understands.
Now here's the amazing part; after forcing myself to be a firmer handler (I'm still working on it) Kimber is happier that ever. She LOVES being in her place. She is calmer, more lovey, more content and so much more. I thought I was being the nice handler before, but the nice thing for Kimber was for me to get much more Alpha.
I hope this makes sense. I hope you see this comes from a good place. The last thing I want is for you to feel like I'm overly criticizing you. I wish I would have understood this BEFORE I had to roll around in the mud with my dog in front of dozens of dog trainers who were all watching and judging me.
You're doing great, but it's time to make that dog believe you now, so that he will believe you in the future.
You got this.
Call me anytime. From your fellow softy...
Brad
801-598-4185
Friday, March 4, 2022
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