Thinking pups!

These pups are doing so well!  They are a bunch of thinkers!

Carmine very much thinks about the clicker but she is a bit more willing to make mistakes than her mother was so I'm grateful for that.  The absence of a click is not a big deal for her, she will think and try again. 

When Carmine has been on sheep both of my herding instructors noted that she is a thinker because she pauses and studies the situation.  I just love that in a dog!  It is so much more fun to work with dogs who think first and then act.  The ones who are doers are much harder to teach to think.  It is very easy to teach a thinking dog to act.  When thinkers learn that acting and going fast is what we want they are very willing to give that to us! 

Those of you wanting to do agility with these pups be VERY careful to emphasize speed FIRST and accuracy LATER!  It is the key to getting the speed out of them.  If you worry about accuracy too much in the beginning you will teach them to be slow and careful and they will think that is what you want and it will be harder to add speed.  I encourage speed first and will accept "slop" in the beginning and then carefully refine for accuracy when I have the speed and drive I want.

Also for agility dogs and for these pups in particular be careful to not do a lot of attention when sitting in front of you or a lot of formal obedience first.  They will become too handler focused too fast.  I try to do all attention work at the sides but I am NOT working on formal obedience with my pup.  I love obedience but I can compete in that later.  I want the independence and drive away from me to be strong for agility and herding first.  It is very hard to add that back in later.  I can easily with these kind of pups add handler focus in later.  Thinking pups can be taught formal obedience later very easily.  Sinco is just now learning formal obedience and it is going so fast because she is so thoughtful and responsive.  If I had done a lot of it in the beginning I would not have the drive and obstacle focus and herding ability I have.

My pup doesn't even know the verbal cue for down or sit yet.  She offers sit a lot - to go out the door, to come out of her crate and when she starts to pull on the leash she will sit.  So I know I can add the cue but it is not a priority.  She is already taking responsibility for opening doors and not pulling.  I am focusing on games, building drive/speed, playing retrieving games, crate games and loose leash walking.  She is like her mom and has a lot of natural self control so I want to focus on building drive which she has too but it needs to be focused and channeled.  The self-control is there but if I do too much of it I will lose the drive ahead.  It is all about balance and working on those things that need more work and leaving alone those things that are fine for now. 

I am enjoying shaping tricks and getting her to be as willing to offer behaviors with objects as possible.  I want her to feel free to make mistakes.  I don't use negative markers when teaching new behaviors.  The only negative marker she hears is when she accidentally bites me!  She is a bit of a wild tugger - a couple of weeks ago she got her tooth caught in my ring and her puppy canine snapped off and was caught between my ring and finger!  It didn't slow her down much though but scared me a bit.

Now off to formal obedience lessons for Feisty and Sinco.