Saturday 20 October 2007

obedience training and canine freestyle, aka doggy dancing

Penny has been to lots of obedience training in her time but I think she prefers dancing, chasing lures and agility.

However, I've just spent some time watching and re-watching Amber-Mae's video of her obedience routine and enjoyed it so much that I think we'll have to get outside and practise some of those commands tomorrow. I noticed that Amber's human uses a ball for reward instead of food. I'm going to give that try - I think the only problem will be that Penny will obsess about the ball so much that she won't come back. I might try with two balls.

Also, I had fun looking at a canine freestyle video. I loved the fact that there were people of every age and fitness level enjoying themselves with their dogs and that some of them were terrible dancers - as I am! It looked like a funny hat was the way to spruce up your act. Maybe I could do that...

5 comments:

Noah the Airedale said...

Hi there,
Thanks for stopping by our blog. You were wondering about the wubba. It's a toy made by kong but it has material wrapped around it with a squeaky mechanism inside. Personally I dont know what he fuss is all about. My sisters like to chew and make it squeak but then I'm not real keen on toys in general. They come in different sizes. We got ours from the Pet Barn. There are a few of these around Sydney, not sure about Melbourne though.
Quite a lot of dogs that we've met on Dogs With Blogs seem to have one so we thought we'd see what all the fuss was about.

Nice to meet you.

Noah (the airedale)

parlance said...

Thanks for that, Noah. I'll look around for one in a shop, so I can see whether I think she'll like it. Love your site, by the way. I've set up a feed from it so I can keep up with all your new postings. So you'll know I'm reading about your interesting life even if I don't post a comment.

Johann The Dog said...

Hi! Got your comments, thanks so much for stopping by. Really glad you liked the info on dog car safety!!! Wondered if you had ever tried GoogleReader - or Bloglines - they help you keep track of all the blogs you like to read and the feeds. We use Google Reader all the time! We think you may like it.

Talk with ya soon - have fun with the obedience 'work', I love that stuff.

Woofs, Johann

Amber-Mae said...

Hey Parlence & Penny!

You asked me how to teach 'Send Away' right? Well, actually my mommy read about how to teach this exercise online. What she does is, she would put a tasty treat on a plate & would put it 6 meters away in front of me & a orange cone beside it to indicate, this is the spot. She will let me sniff it first ofcourse before putting it there & then she will give a command 'Go Out!' I will have to run towards it & eat the treat & come back. Just like doing recall but without the finish 1st. Then after a few times, she increased the distance by 1 more meter. Then she will ask me to 'Go Out' & then I eat the treat & then she would call my name & ask me to lie down. Sit also can but she prefers me going down coz I tend to get confused when asked to sit, hehehehe... Then do a recall & finish. That's it! Not hard to train.

And about mommy using a tennis ball as my reward. Well, I prefer my tennis ball that treats actually. Motivators & rewards can be anything that your dog likes! From treats to toys, from old socks to hamsters, anything at all that makes your dog wanna work for ya! Reward can also be a bug praise but nothing beats a toy or a treat to a dog. Would you prefer if mommy took a video of me teaching me how to do 'Send Away'? I wouldn't mind just for you & I can send it to your email.

Love licks,
Solid Gold Dancer

parlance said...

Hi, Amber-Mae
We went to training today and tried with a ball instead of treats and it worked well. Thanks for the idea.

I think I understand how you are describing how to do 'send away' and I'm going to try it with Penny this week. I'll let you know how we go.
If we can't get it to work I'd love to see a video of it, but we'll try it from you description first. I think what you wrote explains it well.