Water blind and land triples with flyers

I got to have Lumi with me last night, and this morning, I left the house at 5am with Laddie and her to pick up four ducks in Cheltenham.

Since my friend Tony had done such a nice job of having the ducks in a crate ready to be picked up, we had plenty of time for the next leg of our journey. So I asked Tony to suggest a Master water blind, and he pointed out a line to a peninsula with points tight on both sides. Turned out to be too easy. Laddie lined it and didn't even vocalize. Good for confidence anyway.

At 9am we met Dave and two assistants. First Laddie ran an xmas-tree land triple with the flyer as the go-bird. The memory birds were both under the arc of the flyer go-bird (Dave calls that a wipe-out bird), and formed a reverse hip-pocket, with the memory guns hidden behind hay bails. On top of that, the duck calls for the two dead birds thrown first weren't audible, and the pistol shots weren't much louder, so Laddie didn't get too much of a look at them, of course also much more interested in the flyer than the bumpers being thrown for the memory birds.

Yet he was steady for the throws, then nailed the flyer and the left bird, with a short hunt for the center long mark.

One of the assistants then ran Lumi while I honored with Laddie. We had a double made up of the long mark and the flyer, which landed 30y in front of Laddie. To increase difficulty on the honor, I stood on Laddie's left rather than where I usually stand when honoring, on his right, and that meant he was between me and Lumi, potentially reducing my influence compared to having me between them. Perhaps even more challenging, Lumi had to run across Laddie's field of vision, just a few yards away, when released for the flyer. I had cautioned the assistant that Lumi's personality would change when that flyer was thrown, but Lumi still got away from her as soon as the bird was down. Laddie just sat and watched like a good boy.

The second land triple was also an xmas-tree, this time with an out-of-order flyer as the second mark. The #1 and #3 formed a hip- pocket in the opposite direction as the flyer, so Laddie had to look well away from the flyer to watch the first throw, then watch the nearby flyer, then swing nearly 180 degrees to watch the go-bird. However, the assistants did a better job sounding their duck calls, and each fired twice before throwing, plus we used dead birds for those marks. Laddie got a good look at all the marks, remained steady till sent, and nailed all three marks in the reverse order of the throws.

Laddie again remained sitting for the honor, as Lumi watched an out-of-order double and then went straight for the flyer, ignoring the go-bird.

Of course the level of excitement is higher at an event, but I think we've fine a reasonable job of preparing Laddie to be steady at our Master test next Friday. We'll see.

LL&L

Land blinds in the rain

For some time now, I've stopped recording most routine training sessions. However, this week, I just wanted to record our training in preparation for the Qual on Friday, so I or others can look back on it in the future.

Today I probably would have run Laddie on big land triples if I could have, but I was only able to line up one assistant. So I decided to run Laddie on Qual-level land blinds. I asked my assistant to watch our work closely, and let me know if she saw Laddie slip any whistles or go the wrong way on any casts. It's surprisingly difficult to remember those things when you look back on a blind, even just a few seconds after it's done. Videos are great, though a bit tricky at FT distances. Anyway, an assistant is one way to get the data, assuming she understood what I was asking her to do.

The first blind was 140y, with a tight keyhole thru a gap in a cluster of bushes at 120y out. The second blind was 220y, over diagonal inclines, declines, and ridges, then thru a line of shrubby cover. The third blind was 230y, diagonally crossing a dirt road and the aligned terrain on either side of it, with a wrap on the left at 180y that the dog could veer behind and out of sight.

Laddie, who is an excellent lining dog, had little difficulty with any of today's blinds. When I lined him up the keyhole and sent him "back", he did try to veer around the outside of the shrub cluster at the last moment, but I stopped him in time, repositioned him in front of the obstacle, and then he took the cast into the gap. He two-whistled the second blind. The wrap never became a factor in the third blind because he chose to stay on the other side of the line most of the time.

Unfortunately, neither I nor my assistant are proficient enough in the ways of Qual judges to know for sure that Laddie would have been called back from each of those blinds. That's another example of the fact that, no matter how good your dog is, training without experienced field trial trainers is such a huge disadvantage competing against the better dogs in a stake.

LL&L

Pigeons

This morning, Laddie had his third recent session with flyers, once again thanks to my friend Dave getting birds and then shooting
for us. In this case he got four pigeons, and also brought along an assistant to help us.

I ran Laddie on a tab, as I have for weeks, and today I brought along Lumi. That gave Laddie a dog to honor, and gave Lumi a chance to be excited out of her gourd and do her favorite thing in the world, retrieve flyers.

Series A was a flyer single at 25y, first Laddie, then Lumi with Laddie honoring.

Series B was an out-of-order double, with Dave shooting the flyer at 25y and then the assistant throwing a white bumper at 45y. Dave significantly added to the level of difficulty, by watching the pigeon as circled and the bringing it down 10y in front of Laddie. Laddie was still able to pick up the go-bird bumper first - a good job with his flyer lying just a few yards away. I then ran Laddie on a 200+y blind featuring a cast over a steeplechase fence in the last 20y. He then honored Lumi running the flyer as a single (we only had one assistant), Dave again patiently dropping the only a few yards from both dogs.

In both series, I had Laddie run the more difficult honor, between me and the working dog so that I was out of his field of vision when the working dog was sent, rather than with me between them.

Today Laddie showed what I wanted with the flyers: the intensity needed for high quality marking, yet an ability to stay seated till sent as working dog, and to stay seated and not break as honor dog.

A few more sessions like this, and I think Laddie will be ready to try another Master test.

Land triples

Although I've decided to focus on Master tests for Laddie, I did enter him in a Qual for next Friday. In preparation, we went out with three assistants to a nearby new construction site to run a couple if land triples.

The terrain for both series was similar: hilly, large patches of high cover, steep inclines and declines, diagonal ridges, ditches, and diagonal dirt road crossings. However, the triples had two different characters.

Series A was big and wide open, with all the guns left out. Laddie nailed the first and third, while needing a big hunt for the difficult center mark. I did not call for help, giving him an opportunity to hunt up the bumper himself, hopefully reinforcing a frustrating performance carried out without a pop.

Series B was completely different. The distances were shorter, the angles were tighter, and the picture was more difficult, with the memory birds converging and both retired. Laddie nailed the gop-bird and the center mark, then took a wide line to the long mark and circled right in on it.

This seemed like good prep for our Qual next Friday. I hope so. Laddie seemed to be having a great time, anyway.

Active weekend

Between long hours of work and temps in the 90s, Laddie and I had little opportunity to train this last week. But we made up for it on the weekend.

On Saturday (yesterday), we participated at club training day. I got to lead the advanced group, and we ran two setups. They were intended for dogs training for Master, but some of the blinds may have been a bit harder than typical Master blinds.

The first series was a walk-up land triple, with the second two marks 180 degrees apart and thrown into high cover. The setup had three blinds available: (1) 40y into cover, to the right of the rightmost mark, (2) 160y on a line between the center mark and the mark on the right, with an angle entry into high conver at the end, and (3) a difficult 110y blind with the line across a corner of high cover on the left, then under the arc of the leftmost mark, then diagonally across a mowed strip with an angle entry into high cover on the right.

The second series was a water triple. The first mark, in the center, was on a line past a point on the right, then past a point on the left, then to the vicinity in the water of a third point. The throw was supposed to be in reeds, but neither the original thrower, nor I when I relieved him, managed to put a single bird into the reeds, we always overthrew. After that mark was thrown, the second bird splashed down between the near shoreline and reeds 20y from the start line, an unusual competition fall worth giving the dogs some experience with. Finally, the go-bird was a cheaty mark on the left with a sharp angle entry.

The water series had two available blinds. One was to the right of the cheaty go-bird, so still a bit cheaty. The longer blind was the most difficult blind of the day; one of the trainers said it was more like an all-age blind than a Master or Qual blind. The start line was on the same shore as the one for the triple, but some distance to the side. The line was between the same two points as the long first mark of the triple, then thru the area of that fall (that is, past another point on the right), then up onto a fourth point, and finally another ten yards inland. So the blind featured several chances to lose the dog on either side of the narrow corridor.

After yesterday's work, Laddie and I got home after 6pm, and this morning we were back on the road before 5am. Arriving at our group location before the other teams, I ran Laddie on a 180y blind that required him to jump over an overturned canoe at 50y, then make a difficult water entry at 140y.

When the group leader arrived, he set up a triple intended to be run as three singles and modified as appropriate for each dog. Each mark was up-the-shore at the right edge of one of the ponds, with the wind blowing LTR. Because I had another training appointment (see below), I ran Laddie on the two outer marks, shortening them and changing the angle on the last one, which featured a swim diagonally across a channel, then a re-entry to a pond for the up-the-shore throw.

After I ran Laddie on those two marks, I made my apologies and drove Laddie half an hour to a steeplechase course. There I had arranged to meet my friend Dave, who brought two ducks and two assistants. We ran two triples with the flyer at close range, Laddie as usual wearing a tab, which enabled me to prevent him from breaking. For the first triple, the flyer was thrown as the go-bird. For the second triple, the flyer was thrown second, while the go-bird was thrown 180 degrees away on the left. The center mark, thrown first from behind a tree, on a line only a few degrees to the left of the gunner with the flyer, was difficult because Laddie, naturally, was focused on the guy with the live duck. In fact, I wasn't sure Laddie had seen the first throw, so I stopped the series and requested that we start again. It turns out that at least the second time, he did watch the throw, then quickly shifted his gaze to the flyer. Maybe that's what he had done the first time as well.

After we completed our training with Dave and his friends, Laddie and I drove back to the earlier location, where they were running the last dog on the series I described above. At my request, they let me run Laddie on the last mark again.

To end the day, the group leader set up three marks, all about 200y, again to be run as singles but with all the throwers standing the entire time. They were all within a 30 degree angle, but presented three separate concepts: the first was an obvious land single run to the left of the edge of a pond. The third was an obvious water mark, run across the center of the pond. In between was a cheaty water mark, featuring a run thru high cover so that when the dog emerged, she had to choose immediately whether to take the water entry in front of her or veer off and run the bank on the left.

After our three hour drive home, I rinsed Laddie off with the hose and dried him with the power drier, and at last our weekend of work was over.

LL&L

Trained with four birds

Despite Laddie's previous steadiness training and the fact that he is training for Master, we trained today as with a young dog just beginning to train for Senior: pigeon flyer at 25y (ducks not available), Laddie on tab runs one mark, then honors Lumi (being run by an assistant) for same mark (again Laddie on tab). Move start line and gun station, again 25y flyer mark, again Laddie runs first, then honors Lumi.

Without the tab, I think Laddie would have been steady on second mark as working dog, would have broken on other three, but hard to be sure.

Dave, my shooter, made clear he was amenable to continued work together on upcoming weekends, so I'm optimistic we can get this problem, at least, out of the way in preparing Laddie to run in Master again later this season.

Broke on flyer

As an unsurprising follow-up to last weekend's events, Laddie broke on the flyer in today's Master.

Smiley face not

With Laddie entered in a Master next weekend, I thought it would be prudent to work on his steadiness this weekend. Tomorrow being Mother's Day, I was unable to arrange for a shooter, so our only shot, so to speak, was today.

The logistics were complex. Besides making arrangements with the shooter, I needed three assistants (two to throw dead birds for the triples and one to run Lumi while Laddie honored), four flyers (for two triples, two dogs), and a venue with land and water at a location acceptable to my shooter. I also needed to arrange to pick up Lumi at my daughter's house, where Lumi lives now.

Lumi was half an hour south of me. The venue was two hours south of me. The birds were three and a half hours south of me. Not all in a straight line, but you get the idea.

To get to the venue with the birds at 2pm as arranged, I had to leave the house with the helpers at 9am. Since I can usually knock a good bit of time off GPS estimates on Interstates, 930 actually seemed reasonable, but to play it safe, I left at 830.

I'll leave it as an exercise to compute the costs, including gas and wear on the van, but that would be completely incorrect. It turns out that a combination of multi-vehicle collisions en route and heavy traffic added four hours to the trip, and we didn't arrive at the venue with the birds till after 5.

The shooter had a date so he wasn't willing to wait past 430, but he was angry -- or as he said, very disappointed -- because he said it cost him both the fee I would have paid and another that he canceled in an attempt to accommodate me.
Of course I will send him a check to cover his losses.

We still ran triples (both water), but that meant paying the helpers more, since they ended up being out much longer than I had originally planned on.

Without a shooter, the dogs saw no flyers, so no steadiness work for Laddie, the while point of the arrangements lost. But I have no place to keep ducks, so I gave them to the owner of the training property. I also paid for two dogs training.

Plus breakfast and dinner for the helpers.

Today cost hundreds of dollars, and much more if you consider the fact that I couldn't work and bill for my consulting gig.

Did I mention we didn't get to work on steadiness?

LL&L

Retired center marks with converging pairs

With freezing temps overnight this week, I still find it too cold to train in water, despite Laddie being entered in a trial next weekend. But we went out with three assistants and ran two land triples.

Conditions: bright sunlight but cold and breezy. Terrain: rolling hills, large patches of high but sparse grass. Dirt road crossings on every mark, various angles, including suction to run on or along the road on two of the marks.

Series A. Land triple with center gun retired

First mark was on the left, LTR from the edge of the road into a large patch of high cover at 270y. Second mark was in the center, RTL on an angle back at 190y. Throw was along edge of a large patch of high cover, so that the gunner (retired) was inside the patch, and the fall was also well inside the patch. Third mark was on the right, thrown by a prominent gun LTR into a patch of high cover at 60y.

Some of the challenges:

- Line mechanics: Though go-bird thrown to right, had to run Laddie on my left so that I could block him from turning too far after the first throw and never seeing the center throw.

- Memory-birds were converging throws.

- Center gun was retired, while long gun stayed out, increasing risk of confusion and a pop, or a switch if dog needed to hunt the second mark.

- Easiest trip to long gun would have been to run along the road to the gunner, then cut right to the fall, rather than take a straight line on a sharp diagonal across the road and into high cover.

How Laddie did:

- Watched all the throws

- Nailed right mark

- Took good line to center mark well back in high cover, but then needed hunt. Though hunt took Laddie toward gunner on left at one point, he turned back to the center fall, never switching or popping (yay)

- Nailed left mark, including sharp diagonal road crossing and angle entry into cover

Series B. Indent land triple with center gun retired

First mark was on the left, thrown LTR behind high cover at 290y. Second mark was in the center, thrown RTL into high cover at 70y. Third mark was on the right, thrown RTL behind large patch of high cover at 240y.

Challenges:

- Nearly 180 degrees from first to third throw, with center mark halfway, unusually wide angles for us

- Line mechanics again: This time the risk would be that Laddie would keep his gaze on the second throw and never see the third throw, so although go-bird was thrown to left, I ran Laddie on my right so I could visually push him, if necessary, to the go-bird

- Another risk was that he would "lie", that is, take an initial line to the go-bird but then veer over to the center bird

- Easiest trip to go-bird would have been to run along road to gunner, then turn left to the fall, whereas desirable straight trip was on a sharp angle across road and into high cover. This was a mirror image of the long memory-bird in Series A.

- Converging memory-birds probably not too confusing because of wide angles, but center bird the shortest and retired, still a potentially confusing configuration

- View of long memory-bird was thru branches of a small tree 50y out, making gunner a bit difficult to find

- Trip to long memory-bird included run thru cleared area, then entry into patch of cover and small trees. Would have been easiest to cheat around that last patch of cover.

How Laddie did: Watched all the throws, nailed every mark, not succumbing to any of the challenges mentioned above.

A good day of work.

LL&L

Laddie's confidence improving

Laddie has now run eight triples in a row, over about two weeks, without a pop. Every one featured a retired gun, a 300+y mark, or both, and every one was run on rough, variable terrain with irregular crests, depressions, and embankments. Some of the marks were difficult enough to require a hunt, thus difficult enough to challenge Laddie's confidence. So I'm pleased that none resulted in a pop. That has been my greatest concern over the winter.

As an example of our current training sessions, today we ran two series. The first was an around-the-horn indent with the 110y center gun retired and a big memory-bird. The second was an xmas tree with the big center gun retired and the memory marks converging.

The money bird on the last one was the center memory mark: It was over 300y, angling into a head wind and the late afternoon sun, uphill, across a dirt road, a boulder-filled drainage ditch, and another dirt road, and over any number of ridges and depressions, some steep-banked. The fall was in a large, featureless patch of thick, long, dead, bent-over grass, while the gunner was retired behind a mound well to the right of where he'd thrown RTL from. When I sent Laddie, he looked at first like he might be headed too far right, but he was just navigating the terran and angled back left onto a good line once he's crossed the drainage ditch. He needed a hunt once he got to the area of the fall, and I was ready to call for help if he popped or got lost, but in a few seconds he picked up the bumper and headed back.

I always enjoy Laddie nailing a mark, as he had all the others today. But it was also good to see him needing a hunt and yet not popping.

Tonight I think I'll be entering Laddie in our first trial of the season. I haven't decided which one yet.

LL&L

Re-throwing memory-birds

At the suggestion of a training buddy, and based as I understand it on something that Alan Pleasant and perhaps other trainers frequently do, I'm experimenting with using re-throws on memory birds for Laddie's marking series, starting in today's sessions (three triples; that is, doubles plus a side throw).

The way I'm doing it is this: Laddie watches the throws as usual, and picks up the go-bird as usual. Then, before each of the memory-birds, I have the gunner silently throw another bumper before sending Laddie to pick up that one.

I'm working on converging memory marks these days, which I realized two or three weeks ago can be quite confusing. We haven't had a lot of practice sessions since then, though, because of time and financial constraints. Another reason was that Carol, our holistic vet, suspected that Laddie might have a slight muscle tear somewhere, and the next day after she said that, Laddie had a poor training session. With all those factors conspiring, it seemed like a good time to take a week off, difficult as that is for Laddie and me.

Anyway, today we did converging memory marks with re-throws, and Laddie had zero problem with them. He ran a good line to every fall, and showed no sign of the confusion that seems to lead to popping.

Since the goal was to improve marking and confidence, while making popping less likely, the approach seemed to be working. However, I'm not so sure it really was. Those marks seemed awfully easy.

While I can see the potential for improved performance by using re-throws, I can also see some possible downsides:

* It could be that training that way is just a waste of time, "aerobics" as Alice says. Laddie might not actually be learning anything that will help him in a trial.

* It could be worse than that: I could imagine that for some dogs, they could gradually become somewhat lackadaisical about watching the early throws, with the result that their focus, drive, and marking would actually diminish, especially under trial conditions where they didn't get the re-throw.

* It could be even worse still: I could also imagine that if the dog came to expect the pattern of throw-then-go on every mark, and then in a trial the dog was sent without a re-throw on the memory marks, you could see a no-go, or a confused outrun leading to a pop.

I think all those problems could be eliminated by using re-throws intermittently, and the second two would seem unlikely for a dog as prey-driven and experienced as Laddie. However, the problem with intermittent re-throws becomes, What's the rule? How do I know when Laddie's going to have trouble with his line or confusion, since those are the marks I'd want to use a re-throw for.

It does feel good to go out and have Laddie run a whole day with no confidence issues. I just don't know yet whether this is a good way to achieve the desired goals.

LL&L

Convergent memory-birds at Byron's farm

This morning, Laddie and I trained with the same FT group again, this time at Byron's farm. I'm so grateful we're having opportunities to train with other FT trainers again.

Today we ran a long key-hole blind, then an FT-scale triple, then a Master-scale triple complete with duck calls and hidden guns, and finally another FT-scale triple — this time in indent configuration, around the horn with the middle gun retired — with two more key-hole triples, one Master-scale and outside the triple, the other FT-scale and behind the middle gun.

Between yesterday and today, I noticed something that for some reason I haven't really appreciated in the past: what a difficult concept convergent memory-birds within a triple or quad can be. I think it seems to be especially difficult if the two marks are different distances and within a relatively tight angle, but not in line.

I also noticed that retiring the short gun makes it worse, assuming you want the dog to pick the short mark first. The reason I say this is that with the long gunner visible, the dog is likely to select the long mark as the first one to run. But if you want the judges to see your dog nail every mark, depending on the wind, you may not want the dog to head for the long mark first, because the dog might suddenly change direction on the way out because of catching sight or scent of the short bird. So the dog needs to learn to pick up the short mark first in that picture.

In addition, I think retiring the longer gun may actually make setups like those easier. Leaving the long gun out makes it more likely the dog will "lie", that is, take an initial line as sent to the retired mark but then, catching sight of the long gunner, swerve over in that direction.

Convergent memory-birds: Definitely something for us to work on.


NOTE: Although I highlighted convergent memory-marks in this post, I guess any setup featuring relatively tight memory-birds with the short gun retired is worth working on, and having the longer gun retired in those situations makes the setup easier for the same reason as mentioned above.

Training group at Bobby's farm

I was invited to train with the same FT group as last time again. Yay! Will be training with them again tomorrow, too, at another location.

Notes, in no particular order:

- One of the other trainers follows my blog, it seems, and commented on the radio that it was surprising Laddie had not been Force Fetched, with his good grabs of the ducks.That was nice to hear. Plus, another trainer then came up to me and said,"He wasn't forced?" When I told him how Laddie and Lumi were trained, he seemed genuinely surprised and pleased. This friendly reaction from a traditional trainer was a nice moment of reward for all that my dogs and I have been thru, and a tribute to my mentors, Alice and Jody, as well.

- For some reason, the others ran all singles on each setup, whereas I had Laddie run two triples before the ABCD drill at the end.

- First series was a biggish but easy triple, plus a Senior-scale blind outside the left gun (go-bird) and a 330y blind down the middle with two points of woods on the left as wraps. Only one other dog tried the big blind and did in fact get sucked behind the first point, then went OOC. Laddie ran last. I had him watch the three throws, then ran him on the short blind, which he lined. Then he nailed the three marks, and finally two-whistled the long blind. Sounds good, right? But we had one huge flaw: Laddie became very noisy when I called him off the go-bird to run the blind. Despite the otherwise high quality work, I know now that some judges would have penalized that noise.

- The second triple plus long, under-the-arc blind, with the 2nd, rightmost gun retired, went ok except for two problems (!): Laddie popped on the long middle memory-bird, and then (like all but one of the other dogs) hooked the gun. I wish I knew what confused him and the others so we could practice it, but to me it looked like a simple, longish mark on flat ground. Although Laddie took an excellent initial line, I guess he didn't actually remember the fall, so I guess the pop and the hook were just two symptoms with the same cause. But while almost all of the other dogs apparently were also confused about where they were going, Laddie was the only one who popped. Then again, he was the only one not running singles.

- A female who had been in heat in JAN was present. Laddie was greatly distracted and needed to be urged to get his noise up and watch the throws on all the series. I don't know how much that might have caused some of his performance troubles.

I hope I'm wrong, but Laddie may be nearing the end of his career. I don't seem able to fix either the popping or the vocalizing, and both would seem to condemn him to a ceiling of Qual JAMs. Not ready to quit yet, of course, but out of ideas.

Overnight temps will continue to be in the 30s in NC, where Laddie's trial will be on FRI. Still sub-freezing here, so if he makes it to water in the trial, it will be first time in the water since his last trial in the fall. I signed him up on the closing date as the 8th dog, but afterwards, a couple of pros entered their strings, and we ended up with 21 dogs. They've probably been practicing in the south and have been swimming all winter. Laddie will have his work cut out for him.

Faking the throw and other games

Yesterday, Laddie and I again went out, with three neighborhood kids as throwers, to work on marking accuracy. Because our focus was on marking accuracy, all of the marks were in the 100-170y range, and all guns stayed out.

With temps below freezing, and patches of snow still on the ground from flurries the previous day, of course we're not working on water. However, I tried to set up at least one challenge for each mark in the two land triples we ran. For example, I had the gunners throw into the stiff crosswind, requiring Laddie to shoulder into the wind to avoid getting on the wrong side of the gunner. And in one mark, the gunner sat in an arcing swale but threw onto high ground. The line to the fall required Laddie to enter that swale but then cut diagonally up the embankment. Other marks required Laddie to traverse a deep depression rather than take an obvious detour around it, to run over a mound rather than around it, and to run past the gunner and cross a dirt road rather than hunting short on the near side.

I also planted one of the bumpers where the gunner would have thrown it, and when I called for the throw with Laddie at the line, I had the gunner just fake a throw. The idea is that I believe that sometimes a dog, including Laddie, does not actually see the bird (or bumper) when it's thrown, and has to guess its likely fall from the position of the gunner, the arm motion, and experience in where the bird is likely to have landed. Having the gunner fake a throw simulates that situation, hopefully preparing the dog for occasions in events where he/she doesn't actually see the throw.

How Laddie does on these setups provides two different kinds of data: Laddie's skill as a retriever, and my skill in creating setups that Laddie can learn from. It's always nice to see Laddie nail every mark, and it's probably good for his confidence. But we also want him to push past his current skill level and become comfortable with greater and greater challenges. The question is, do I have enough skill to set up the kinds challenges that judges will present in an actual event? In a sense, Laddie having difficulty with particular marks validates that Laddie is indeed gaining an opportunity for increasing his skill, and that I am successfully creating challenges that enable him to do so.

Another question is what to do when Laddie is unable to nail a mark. Of course in some cases he's only off by a small bit and no opportunity exists to assist him. By the time you realize that he's a bit off course and react, he's already corrected himself. Then in some cases he's badly off course. At one time I was trying to create a lot of those to work on Laddie's Plan B strategy -- "If I don't remember where the bird is, look for the gunner" -- but these days it rarely occurs. When it does, I immediately call for help from the thrower, since looking to the gunner is the behavior I want Laddie to learn. And finally, cases occur where Laddie seems to have a clear picture of where he's going, but seems to make a conscious decision to take an easier or faster route around an obstacle rather than thru it. In that case, my approach is to blow a sit whistle, and then either handle him thru the obstacle, or call him in and run the mark, or the whole series, again. I think sometimes one of those strategies is preferable, sometimes the other. I'm not sure what the rules are for which.

One setup I do NOT have Laddie practice is obstacles he can't get thru, such as a large shrub on the line to the bird. Judges do sometimes set those kinds of situations up in events, and it might seem to therefore be a good idea to practice it. But detouring around obstacles is the one strategy I don't want Laddie to practice, so I try to avoid setting those kinds of situations up.

By the way, in case I haven't mentioned this before: One of my theories about Laddie's popping is that he doesn't have a clear enough demarcation in his mind between a marked retrieve, where he's on his own, and a blind retrieve, where he's running under control of the handler. In an effort to reduce the probability of his spontaneously looking to me for help, especially when running a mark, I've reduced his practices with blinds to only one or two blind-retrieve sessions per week, sometimes only one blind per week, and never on the same day as when we run marks. The exceptions are occasional group training days and, of course, events. That's why I rarely mention Laddie running blinds any more when I report on training sessions with our assistants.

LL&L

Pin-point marking

For the last few months, I've been training Laddie the way I imagine all-age dogs are trained: a steady diet of big, difficult triples and quads with most or all guns retired.

Of course being able to run such a series nicely will come in handy if and when Laddie ever runs in all-age stakes, and the setups also hopefully provided over-training for Qs. But actually, my primary objective was to build Laddie's confidence on long marks and lower the probability of a pop.

What I did not realize was that, once again, I was getting Laddie out of balance. This time, the issue was marking accuracy. Because it's  relatively unlikely that a dog can run 300+ yards on a laser and arrive at the exact location of the bird, not visible from the distance once down, I guess dogs need to develop a strategy for such marks of running to the area of the fall, then hunting the bird up.

That strategy, however, is not necessary on a relatively short mark. Instead, a good-marking dog can often simply take a straight line to the bird. The challenge becomes a memory test, combined with training the dog not to go around obstacles such as mounds, high cover, and of course water. The dog also needs to learn not to be diverted by off-line influences such as wind, scent and points of land. Of course those factors are important when training on big setups as well, but I think you can focus on them, and communicate more effectively with the dog, when big distances aren't also involved.

In Laddie's last trial, big distances weren't involved on the land and water triples. Laddie made it to the end and earned a green ribbon, but what separated him from the dogs that placed was his marking accuracy, or relative lack thereof. Actually, two of his six marks were perfect, and two more required only an small jag at the end. His two weakest marks were the two flyers, and the first of those was still a good mark: he took an excellent line, broke to the outside presumably distracted by dispersed scent a few yards early, then immediately turned back straight to the bird. He only had one long hunt -- the out of order flyer in the water triple -- but in this field, that was one too many.

In any case, now that our competition is over till next April, one of our areas of concentration will be trying to restore Laddie's knack for pin-point marking. I think this means not so many long, retired marks, and more short marks with well-defined obstacles and the white jackets remaining visible.

Today was a case in point. I had three assistants, and we trained at the huge construction site we've been using a lot this year. We ran two triples with no retired guns and distances in the range 90-170y.

With temps in the low 30s and a strong wind, the first triple's challenges were for Laddie to ignore the cross-wind, diagonal dirt road crossings, and terrain factors. He ran directly to each fall, but I wasn't totally thrilled with the arcing lines he ran.

The second triple was more difficult on it's #1 and #2 throws. The challenge on the second mark was a mound -- more of a mesa actually -- with the bumper not visible after landing 30y behind it. After nailing the go-bird despite a powerful and icy cross-wind, Laddie took an excellent line over the mound and nailed the second mark as well.

The #1 throw was the longest and most difficult of the day. It was thrown from a depression, into stiff wind, over a dirt road, and up into a large patch of high cover on top of the high ground on the other side of the road. Although I didn't retire the gun, this was the last mark Laddie picked up, so memory was still involved.

Laddie took a great line the first 150y, traversing rough terrain but not too difficult. Then came the moment of truth. Would Laddie hold his line, mount a crest of land, and plunge into the cover, or would he arc slightly inside toward the gunner, follow the road for 20y, and then dart into the cover to pick up the bumper, a much easier trip? An instant later, I had my answer: Laddie held his line and for the third time, nailed his mark.

Had Laddie improved between the two series, or was the second series somehow easier for him? I guess I'll never know.

In any case, that was just the kind of marking I was looking for. We'll follow up with another few similar sessions. Then, as our winter training continues, I guess I'll start mixing up shorter series with longer ones, and hopefully not get Laddie out of balance in that particular way again.

LL&L

Notes and more notes

Hi, Alice and Jody. I think I told you guys that the main reason Laddie was dropped after the third series in our previous trial was because the judges had noted that Laddie aired on several of his returns. By airing, they were referring to male-dog territorial marking, which is indeed one of Laddie's favorite hobbies.

Accordingly, in the weeks since then, I've immediately and unconditionally called Laddie any time he dawdles on any of his returns in practice, and I also came up with a sort of drill. Here it is:

I often throw hey-hey bumpers for Laddie to retrieve for fun, with or without steadiness, and in addition, I often toss a softball for him with the verbal cue "go potty" when I air him. Historically, he has aired when retrieving in any of those scenarios.

But starting after the last trial, I began to make a clear delineation. If I don't say "go potty" or "go play" (more or less synonymous), Laddie is not to dawdle on his returns. But if I do use those cues, he's free to eliminate, roll, sniff, explore, or any other kind of doggie activity he likes.

And here's the clincher: When I let him out of the van, or out of the house -- that is, times when he's especially like to have an urge to eliminate -- the first thing I do is throw a hey-hey bumper for him without a verbal "go potty" cue. In other words, even though he's likely to be feeling a pretty strong urge, he's required to bring the bumper back without delay. Of course, I cheer and immediately throw his softball, calling out "go potty". Thus I'm making a point of having him see the difference between the two scenarios -- cue or no cue -- even in the presence of a strong desire to air, and of course rewarding/reinforcing his correct response.

Results, Part A: Laddie did not air or otherwise dawdle a single time in this weekend's trial. Besides the above training, I also watched him closely on returns and blew a call-in whistle if I saw any hint that a delay was about to transpire.

Results, Part B: I had a nice conversation with the judges after ribbons, mentioning to them among other things that the reason I had used multiple call-in whistles on Laddie's returns was because of the previous judges' complaint about Laddie airing on returns. They seemed genuinely stunned. One of them commented, "I close the book as soon as the dog picks up the bird." They also barely remembered Laddie's vocalizing on the water blind, and said it played no part in their scoring. When I mentioned that the previous judges had also had a problem with Laddie's vocalizing, they suggested I make a note of who those judges were and avoid them in the future.  :0)

By the way, Laddie also didn't pop in the trial, and had quite a long hunt on the flyer in the water triple, so a pop would not have been surprising. I think the approach I've used, which turned out to be a good bit of training on 300y+ marks, with as many as three retired guns per series, might have paid off with respect to popping.

On the other hand, I think all those long, and retired, and long+retired guns might have hurt Laddie's marking a bit, so I think I'll go back to leaving some guns out more this winter, and running more Q-scale series than we have been.

One last note for now: I mentioned Laddie's hunts (one short, one long) on the flyers in this last trial to Milly in a phone call last night, and she said, "Well of course." She pointed out that the scent on the ground is more dispersed with flyers, and also that the dog is more excited (as Alice noted). When I described Laddie's long, deep hunt on the water series flyer, Milly said he might have been picking up scent back there, possibly from a previous stake on the same grounds, that the other dogs -- all Labs -- weren't as distracted by. She said that sometimes the Golden's superior nose is actually a disadvantage, and this might have been one of those cases.

Oh, well, one more note. As I mentioned to Jody when I spoke to her -- Saturday night, was it? -- I had forgotten that it's possible for a Q to go more than one day. So when one of my assistants asked to go to the trial on Friday, I didn't mention that possibility to him. Well, when we learned Saturday afternoon that the stake was being stopped for the day and I told my assistant we'd have to spend the night, he said flatly, "I can't."  He's a 16yo who's never been more than a few miles from home, and I didn't feel I could safely or fairly put him on a bus. So instead, I drove him the 370 miles back home, then slept a few hours and drove back to the grounds in the wee hours. For the weekend, Laddie and I drove 1500 miles and were in the van for 28 hours, including 700 miles and 14 hours of driving between the second and third series.

Ahem, well, this, too: You know all that work we've putting in on Laddie's water honesty on marks especially the last few months? Well, forget it. Sunday's triple was a marking test, not a cheating test, though it had the added feature of the flyer thrown first, something Laddie and I have never, ever seen before in a triple. Laddie's water honesty never came into play. On the other hand, that out-of-order flyer blew my mind. First I was afraid Laddie wouldn't turn to the #2 and #3 birds, though he had no problem turning with me and got a good look at every throw. And second, I was afraid he'd lie to me when I sent him to the go-bird and swerve over to the flyer, though again it was no problem and he nailed the go-bird. In our conversation later, the judges commented that I need to relax more at the line and learn to trust my dog.

LL&L

Laddie's sixth JAM

Just a note to record Laddie's sixth Qual JAM, his fifth this year, in his last event of the year, this one the Cape Fear Retriever Club Field Trial Qualifying stake in Rocky Point, North Carolina.

Raw stats: 26 dogs entered, one scratch so 25 ran, 20 were called back after the land triple, 13 were called back after the land blind, work ended for the day and we came back to finish the next day (today), 7 dogs were called back after the water blind, and all of those received ribbons after the water triple. Both marking series featured a flyer, and the stake did not include an honor.

Laddie was one of only two Goldens in the stake, and the only one with callbacks. Five Chessies were also entered, none finished. By the last series, we were running running almost exclusively against Labs who had been trained by and were being run by pros. Of course Laddie was also the only positive-trained dog, and perhaps the only dog in the last series who was the owner/trainer/handler's first field trial retriever using any kind of training. The winner's sire was an NFC. So yeah, we were up against some difficult competition by the end.

Obviously I'm disappointed we didn't get a placement, but I'm glad that after Laddie's injury to his tail a few weeks ago, we were able to get to the end of another trial, and receive another field trial ribbon, before season's end.

LL&L

Improved marking

RRRC Training Day, Remington, VA

Morning: Gloomy, temps in low 40s. Afternoon: Blue skies, temps in high 40s.

After an eight hour training day, plus four hours of round-trip driving, I'm feeling increasingly comfortable with the return of Laddie's marking skills. 

To recap, during most of Laddie's life, he's often been one of the most skillful marking dogs on the field, in both training sessions and competitions. By skillful marking, I mean the dog's ability to remember where the birds fell and to take a direct route to that location. Other trainers, perhaps while dissatisfied with some other aspects of Laddie's performance such as his poor returns, have often balanced their comments with a complement to Laddie's outstanding marking (and Lumi's, too, when she was still involved with field work).

However, occasionally Laddie's marking seemed to deteriorate for a few weeks or months at a time. He's never been terrible, but he's come back to earth. I'm not certain what those intervals have correlated with -- perhaps long periods of no opportunity to train with human throwers -- but the most recent was after he broke his tail returning from his latest Reserve JAM and couldn't train at all for several weeks, and then not on water marks for several more.

Since I have been unable to solve the problem of not having a field trial training group willing to let Laddie and me train with them, several months ago I began hiring neighborhood high school kids to come out and throw for me. We had a break of several weeks after Laddie's injury, but once we could begin training again, we resumed work with three to four sessions a week. When possible, we go somewhere with water, since I think Laddie's most important weakness is water honesty (the natural tendency of field retrievers to "cheat", or run around, a body of water that's on-line to the fall), but most of the time we're limited by time to training on land. 

I think all this training with the kids, including training on water marks whenever possible, has paid off in Laddie's marking skills rising to his highest level ever.

On a typical training setup, I'll retire all the guns unless I feel keeping a gun visible provides some training benefit, such as acting as a diversion from some other mark, or making it less likely that Laddie will take the best path if seeing the gun risks acting as suction to some detour. At least one of the marks will be over 300y, and sometimes more than one. And of course I try to use factors such as slopes, terrain changes, and obstacles -- including difficult water entries -- to influence Laddie off line, "stacking" the factors if possible so that they all influence in the same direction rather than neutralizing each other.

When we train alone, it's not unusual for Laddie to nail every mark of every triple or quad we run, generally two setups per session. I sometimes come away pleased but wondering whether I just don't have the skill to design triples that sufficiently challenge a retriever at Laddie's level.

However, I do have some additional confirmation. At Laddie's last trial, he was one of only 2-3 dogs who nailed every mark on the land triple. And at yesterday's training day, he was the only dog to nail every mark on both the land-water triple that came first, and the water triple that came second.

In fact, I think he may have been the only dog to run that water triple as a triple, most of the other trainers running it as a double to the outer marks followed by a single to the long mark in the center, whereas my intended design (I was "running" the advanced group) was a xmas-tree configuration. The club's leader had asked me to give the setups a high degree of difficulty, suitable only for dogs training for Master tests, and I'd done my best to oblige, including incorporation of his suggestions for the first setup.

Here's a rundown of the marking challenges from yesterday's work:

• We were training with a hunt test group, so no one besides myself and one other handler wore white jackets, and all the guns were retired on every mark. I had the gunners stand out to throw when the logistics of the popper gun and winger permitted, but the gunners wore dark clothes and then retired behind their holding blinds after throwing.
• Because the group wanted to train on longer distances thanks to recent AKC Master rule changes, both of the setups had marks mostly longer than typical Master tests I've seen.
• The go-bird of the first series was a land mark consisting of a flyer shot over patches of cover at 150y. Virtually every dog, whether they took a good line till they reached the first patch of cover or not, was knocked off line by the cover and needed to hunt, in some cases requiring help from the thrower or handler. Laddie took a direct line thru each patch of cover, ignoring the diagonal entries, and nailed the mark.
• Shorter (and more difficult) memory bird of the first series was thrown on an angle-in on the far side of a gap in a row of trees. The route to the mark required traversing several patches of cover, then going thru the gap diagonally, and then a short distance to the fall. Virtually every other dog skirted the cover to the left, then followed a path of low cover beside the gap, keeping the dog on the near side of the trees, and even after catching the bird's scent, several of the dogs had difficulty going thru the gap. Laddie took a direct line thru the cover, drove thru the gap on a great line, and again nailed the mark.
• The longer memory bird of the first series had a 90y land segment, a 45 degree entry into the water, a diagonal 40y swim across the pond, water temp presumably in the high 30s, suction to square the bank for a shorter swim by veering left, an angled landing, and a 20y land segment to the fall in front of a mound. Virtually every dog who ran the mark reasonably well either squared the water entry or veered left during the swim. Laddie took a great entry and continued on a great line the entire swim, though he then hooked the gun station rather than taking a direct line to the bird.
• The go-bird of the second series was 60y throw into cattails, half land, half water. Most dogs veered left either while on land or once in the water in order to square the bank and shorten the swim. Laddie was one of only 2-3 dogs to take a straight line the entire way, nailing the mark.
• The relatively easy memory-bird of the second series was 110y, but had only 20y of swimming, across a triangular wedge of water a third of the way out. Virtually every other dog veered right to shorten the swim. Laddie took a direct line to the bird with his trademark big-air water entry, maintained a great line as he swam across the wedge without any attempt to square the far bank, then climbed onto the far shore and ran straight to the bird.
• The most difficult mark of the day was the long memory-bird of the second series. I believe Laddie was the only dog to see that mark as the first throw of a triple. Because of the difficulty of the mark, and also because the water was so cold, some trainers opted not to run that mark. Of the other dogs, all but Laddie ran the mark as a single. It consisted of a 20y land segment, a 40y water segment, a diagonal crossing of the end of a peninsula with high slopes and high cover, a 60y swim out of sight from the handler, and a throw that had been made from the edge of a stand of flooded timber to water's edge at the far shore (some of the early dogs had that throw fall a yard or two inland rather than into water). The height of the peninsula made it difficult or impossible for the dog to see the last few feet of the throw's trajectory, producing an optical illusion that resulted in several dogs hunting the point halfway to the bird, even though the holding blind was 60y further on the far shore. Most dogs who ran the mark with any success at all veered right after entering the first water segment to square the bank of the peninsula, then hunted the point of the peninsula, typically getting back into the water on the near side, disappeared on the far side of the peninsula, and with or without help from the thrower eventually got the bird. Laddie, the only dog running the mark as the memory-bird from a triple, vocalized as he took a big-air entry into the first water segment, was the only dog to actually lengthen his swim by veering right and around the end of the point, then (according to the thrower reporting on the radio, since the far side of the peninsula was not visible from the start line) took an almost direct line to the bird. When Laddie reached the far shore, he was a bit wide but turned the correct direction and lunged a few feet along the shore line to the bird.

So to summarize, I don't think it's just that Laddie marks well when we train alone with my assistants. Competing against other Q dogs in our last trial, and training with the most advanced dogs at yesterday's training day, Laddie has also showed a degree of marking skill.

By the way, since this is a rare opportunity for me to make the time to write a post, some other points:

• When we ran the first series, the guy who acted as my "judge" forgot to release Laddie after the triple had been thrown. Laddie and I kept waiting, as the cripple flyer fluttered around in the field. After a few seconds, Laddie broke, and ignored me when I called "Here". That's Laddie's first break in a long time, but we don't get to see many flyers. I can only hope the incident has predisposed Laddie to breaking, either from the line or from honor, at some future trial.
• These days, because of one of my theories about why Laddie might have become more likely to pop lately, I rarely run Laddie on any blinds, and virtually never in the same session when we're running marks. However, yesterday's first series had two blinds, both with a small water segment, and the second series had a difficult water blind involving three angled water entries, the last two with easy available cheats around wedges of water. Laddie had little difficulty with the first blind. He couldn't run the second blind as I had intended it be run, but neither could any of the other dogs, and Laddie was one of only two dogs even to get into the water. Laddie was also one of the only dogs to run the final water blind, and the only one not to cheat at least one of the water segments. I think the results say more about my lack of skill in accurately appraising blind difficulty in setting up the second and third blinds, which were both too difficult for these dogs, than really reflecting much about the dogs themselves. I hope the blinds on balance were good training for Laddie, but I can't be sure it's beneficial to run him on such difficult work, especially when the water is so cold. The three difficult water segments were quite short, but the easy cheats were still far more attractive.
• Laddie well understands that he is not constrained to take a direct route back after picking up a mark, and uniquely among the dogs at our trials as well as training days like yesterday's, invariably sought a route, sometimes quite lengthy, that minimized or eliminating swimming on his returns. As far as I know, this has never hurt Laddie's scoring at a test or trial, and I hope that continues to be the case, because I think it's a helpful counterbalance to the comparative difficulty I've had training Laddie's returns without the use of an ecollar.

Laddie dropped after third series

Tidewater RC Qual, Farmville, VA

On Saturday's land triple, around-the-horn with the long memory bird retired, Laddie had great line mechanics, watched every throw, and nailed every mark.

On the land blind, he needed only one whistle, with a prompt sit and an accurate cast.

On the water blind, he maintained a tight corridor, challenged the line, sat on every whistle, and took high quality casts.

In addition, Laddie did not pop all day.

Based on my admittedly limited experience, I thought we were in a tie for First. Instead, we were not called back to run the final series.

Of course I wondered why, and asked the marshal to check with the judges for me. One of them was kind enough to show me her book for Laddie and explain her reasons.  Though I don't remember her exact wording, I'll try to convey what she said, with my annotations in square brackets:

"It wasn't any one thing. Your dog marked extremely well, one-whistled the land blind, and ran the water blind well. But we just felt you didn't work together as a team. In particular, Laddie visited the gun stations after picking up the two memory marks. He aired on every return [that is, the marking behavior typical of an intact male]. And he was noisy lining up for the land blind [a couple of quiet, excited whines when I said 'dead bird'] and on several of the water casts [his usual mournful vocalizing]. We felt he was doing what he wanted to do, rather than what you were telling him to do."

A one-time National Open judge once told me, "We don't judge the returns." Well, it seems some judges do, since the primary knocks on Laddie's work was about his returns.

Look, I'm not going to say I'm ok. This hurts, make no mistake.  I was rare or unique as owner/trainer/handler of a first field trial dog in the stake, and Laddie -- one of only two Goldens -- was undoubtedly the only positive-trained dog, as he would be in any retriever trial. Yet I feel that Laddie and I put in a good performance against tough competition. I learned from previous mistakes, and Laddie showed off his natural abilities as well as the trained skills he's acquired. Nonetheless, we still have weaknesses, and unfortunately, our weaknesses happened to be the wrong ones for this particular judging team. We're never going to win them all. With other judges, maybe we actually would have been in a tie for First heading into the last series as I thought we were. So maybe this just wasn't our day.

Trial Notes

Series A was the fairly typical Qual combination of a land triple and a land blind by invitation, with call-backs to the next series based on the dog's work in both the triple and the blind. After 26 dogs ran, we had 14 call-backs. Few if any dogs had difficulty with the blind, so I'd say that most if not all of 12 dogs were dropped because of the triple's difficulty, almost half the dogs. The land triple was around-the-horn with the long gun retired and a short flyer as the go-bird. The two memory marks were tight and the flyer gun station was at least 90 degrees to the left, so line mechanics were a significant challenge. Quite a few dogs turned from the first throw to the flyer and never saw the middle throw. Of course, even among those who saw all the throws, some still had long hunts, returned to old falls, switched, or required a handle. Those were the kinds of problems that got dogs dropped.

Since I've seen and had difficulty with that configuration in the past, I knew to run Laddie on the opposite side from the attractive go-bird, even though that meant on the opposite side of the direction of the throw, and I knew to stand near his head as the first two birds were thrown, then step back and turn to let him watch the flyer. He got a great look at all three throws and nailed all the marks, one of the small number of dogs to do so. He then one-whistled the blind, with a prompt sit and accurate cast. He never popped, never dropped a bird on his returns, delivered all the birds to hand, and was in reasonable control while under judgment. I figured we were in a tie for First after the first call-back. I didn't actually see how we couldn't be.

The water blind consisted of 110y land entry whose line passed inches from a tree whose limbs blocked the handler's view of the bird, an angle entry thru reeds into the water, a 130y swim tight to the shoreline with a small point of land at mid point and the shore receding out of sight behind the point, and a 10y climb up the steep embankment of a dam, with the bird planted at the top of the dam (all distances my estimates). Many of the handlers attempted to run their dogs within a couple of yards of the shoreline, and many of them lost the dogs into the reeds that lined the shoreline with that strategy. One pro ran a young dog far wide ("fat") of the shoreline the entire way, and I was sure the dog would be dropped for not challenging the blind, as happened to me once earlier this year when I ran Laddie the same way. It turned out that that dog was not dropped. Laddie and a few others were run fairly clear of the shoreline except at mid-point, when they were intentionally sent to the point and then sent back out wide again, thus demonstrating control and challenging the blind while staying out of trouble most of the way. Laddie never slipped a whistle, never refused a cast -- that is, he always went the direction he was sent -- and never popped. I figured we were still in a tie for first.

However, eight dogs were called back and Laddie was not one of them. I asked the marshal to ask the judges why not (you're not supposed to ask the judges directly), and one of the judges was kind enough to show me her pages on Laddie and explain why he was dropped. I don't have a perfect memory of her wording, but it was something like this: "It wasn't any one thing. We just didn't feel that you worked together as a team. Your dog was doing what he wanted to, rather than what you were telling him to."

Now, you might ask how a dog who watched the dead-bird throws rather than swinging his head to the flyer, and ran two blinds without slipping a whistle or taking a poor cast, could be dropped for "doing what he wanted to." The primary answer is that he "aired" (that is, the typical intact male practice of marking) on many of his returns. Adding to his difficulties with the judges was that he visited the gunners after picking up the birds on the two memory marks. And adding still further was that he was "noisy", meaning that he whined in excitement a little while I lined him up on the land blind, and that he emitted the mournful vocalization he's been giving on water casts since he was quite young.

I don't actually know why Laddie vocalizes on water or when I cue "dead bird". Apparently he has learned at some level that it helps him succeed. However, I'm not going to address vocalizing here. As I understand it, the world of field trainers is divided into two kinds of people: those who have never had a dog that vocalizes and in many cases are sure they know how to fix it, and those who have had a dog who vocalizes, tried everything to fix it, and were never able to.

As for visiting the gunners and peeing during returns, that's our old friend the field recall. Understand, Laddie brought back every bird on the run and with minimal delays. He even brought back the cripple flyer alive, rather than crushing it first to stop it from moving and trying to bite him, as he sometimes does with cripples. But yes, he did detour to show off his bird to the gunners on the two memory marks, and he did stop occasionally to mark the occasional tree or shrub to establish them as "his" territory. If all you cared about was fixing those behaviors using positive methods, I suspect it could be done. However, if you were also trying to train the dog to run field trial marks and blinds, you might find yourself somewhat constrained, since the last thing you want to do is to introduce any conflicts to the dog's otherwise successful natural and trained tendencies.

I'm not going to try to fix the vocalizing again. I've tried before and started getting no-gos, and I'd obviously rather we get dropped by those occasional judges who won't tolerate vocalizing than ruin Laddie entirely.

I guess I'll try working on improving Laddie's returns even more, though he's already come a long way from his dismal returns when he was younger. My initial thought is to call out "No" the moment he detours from a trotting, direct return, put the bird back where it was, walk him to the start line, and have him attempt the entire retrieve again. That might work. Things I can see going wrong: (1) He has no idea why I'm saying "No" so nothing changes except we both get more exercise and I spend more money paying for my assistants for their time (no field trial group will allow us to train with them, so I have to pay HS kids to throw for us). (2) Laddie enjoys the "correction" and the problem gets worse. (3) Laddie decides that his mistake was some behavior I actually want him to continue, such as picking up the bird and bringing it back, and thus a desirable behavior deteriorates. Of course I'll watch carefully and try to make sure none of those bad things happen, though it's never easy to be sure you're correctly correlating the dog's responses to the training methods you're attempting.

This was a psychologically expensive loss, since I felt we were in excellent shape for a placement, possibly even a win, with just one more series to go. At least one of the judges has known me and my training approach since Laddie was a puppy, and I guess she saw what she expected to see, a dog with excellent marking, line mechanics, and handling skills but nonetheless "doing what he wants."

The bottom line is this. The judges in this stake may believe, as virtually all traditional trainers do, that a positive-trained dog can't succeed in field trials, and they made sure of it in this one. 

Last week of 2012 competition

Tomorrow will probably be Laddie's last trial this year. I've been too busy with work to send regular posts, but I thought I'd record how we trained the last week before our last trial of the season.

Saturday and Sunday were off days. That would not have been my choice but none of my assistants were available.

Monday, Laddie and I went with two assistants to Cheltenham to run two water triples, with me throwing the go-bird as a side throw. Every mark except the first side throw tested water honesty, and Laddie was honest on every mark without the need for handling. For the first series, the long mark was retired and the second mark was semi-retired (thrower was mostly hidden once sitting down). Both had difficult lines and Laddie ran them well, but he glanced back at me (a pop) near the end of the long retired mark as he came out of the water after a long swim. For the second triple, our entire field was in shadow (it was after sunset), and the long mark was quite long and complex (four or five water entries), but I kept the gunners out. Laddie nailed all the marks with no popping.

Tuesday I ran Laddie on two land blinds. The first was 130y and featured a mound at 90y, with the line crossing the downslope on one side. I expected that Laddie would veer around it, giving me a handling opportunity, but he held his line so no whistle needed. The second was 310y over complex terrain and required a few whistles, to which Laddie was responsive on  the sits and accurate on the casts. Those were our only blinds of the week. I've been avoiding running blinds and marks on the same day because of my concern that doing so may make popping more likely, as the dog perhaps loses clarity on whether running independently or under control. I would have preferred to train on the weekend and have an off day Monday-Thursday, but at least Tuesday was light training.

Wednesday I was again only able to get two assistants (I usually try for three), but we still ran two land triples with me throwing side throws as the go-bird. Both memory birds were retired on both marks, both triples featured one mark over 300y, and all four memory marks were over difficult, complex terrain, the triples as difficult as I knew how to make them in those locations. Laddie nailed every mark with no popping.

Whereas I viewed Wednesday as a training day, with double-retired guns plus long, complex lines, Thursday was intended as a confidence day. With three assistants, we ran two triples which by size and difficulty level were scaled down to what I've seen as typical in Quals. For the first, a xmas-tree configuration, only the shorter memory bird was retired. For the second, a round-the-horn longest-to-shortest configuration, only the long memory mark was retired. The terrain was somewhat hilly but not too complex. In both series Laddie nailed every mark without popping.
I don't know what surprises await us in the trial on Saturday, and I remain acutely aware of the severe disadvantage we have in not being permitted to train with a field trial group. But I feel Laddie is as prepared as I know how to get him under the circumstances. I'll rest him today, and tomorrow at 330am we'll head out to the trial.

LL&L