Swim-by, Water Series, Ditch Crossings

Summary. At Cheltenham, a session of drills and water series suitable for each dog's current level.

LADDIE

Notes on Laddie's work today:

• Laddie had high quality swim-bys in both directions, which I believe means that he's now ready to begin work on cheating singles.
• I used a different set-up for Laddie's swim-bys today than I've used with Laddie before, also different from the set-ups I used when Lumi was learning the swim-by. After putting him in a sit at the end of the channel we've been using as our "swim-by pond", I placed two white dummies on one side bank and two more on the other.
• Laddie had a good day with LWL retrieves. We ran a number of LWL/Ds with ducks and dummies, also LWLW/Ds. We also ran one LWL single in a location of the property where we've never trained before. Laddie had no hesitation on any of the returns. This is similar to a stage he reached a couple of weeks ago, after which he had a relapse of marooning for several days that got gradually better. Hopefully he won't have another relapse. I wish I knew what caused it so I could avoid it. I suspect that I introduced too many LWL singles too soon, that he still relies on the LWL/D structure for motivation to complete his return instead of marooning. I also may have tried him on too wide a channel crossing, the bigger water perhaps intimidating him in that context.
• Today's work included two short send-outs from the top of the bank of a ditch to a duck thrown to the shoreline on the other side of the ditch, one thrown 45° to the left, one 45° to the right. We'll gradually start further from the edge of the ditch, and throw the duck further, while making sure that the dog stays on line across the ditch.
• Laddie had some singles in a couple of areas that Lumi finds scary, but they were not scary to Laddie. To the contrary, he seems to intentionally pass close to stumps and decoys, and to climb on underwater branches, even if they move under him, for fun.

LUMI

Notes on Lumi's work today:

• Lumi had several delayed cheaters — throw mark with cheating opportunities, retrieve a pre-positioned blind in a different direction, then retrieve mark — including one 140-yard swim. She's required no handling for several challenging cheating situations and responded well in most cases when handling was required. We still need to work on responsiveness at greater distances, with more triple land blinds.
• Lumi had several blinds and singles across water that she finds scary, and is making good progress dealing with them. She still uses roundabout routes to avoid close contact with visible stumps, and is especially edgy about underwater debris.
• Lumi had the same ditch work as Laddie, described above. In fact, they honored one another as the other worked.