We did some water training with the 2 brown dawgs this past weekend.  The water is still very cold, so the swims were kept short.  We trained land-water-land marks.  These marks required the dogs to run a bit on land, swim, get out of the pond, pick up the bumper and return in a straight line back through the pond.  Since we were to the side of the pond, it was possible for the dog to try to attempt to cheat and run around the side of the pond.  We were training them not to do that.

Thunder was up first.  He splashed into the pond, but then attempted to cheat his way back, (of course that is because I had just said that normally he doesn’t run the bank  :lol:).  We haven’t run a lot of marks on water and few with a longer land entry, so this was a good training opportunity.  I tried to video Thunder and I did get his swim over, but turned the camera off when he was running the bank.  I really didn’t want to use my memory card up on that.  I should have left it on, because after a few “sit” whistles and “here” commands, he swam back over.  After all the dogs ran, we repeated the mark and he was great the second time…straight out and back.  Unfortunately, I had a tough time getting good video because there were objects in the way.  I edited the first mark together with the second (what I had on video of both).  You will notice the second splash was not quite as big as the first–that water was cold!  (The squealing in my all of my videos is a Chessie puppy impatiently waiting for his turn.  🙂 )

Next was Storm’s turn.  One of the things that we asked the trainer to work on with her is her bank running.  She likes to cheat rather than swim straight back.  We all expected her to try something so the trainer advised her handler what to do while handling her.  Low and behold….no bank running!  Straight out and straight back.  Good girl!

Next we ran that same mark, but with a second bumper hand thrown across from where the dog was sitting.  This is a more advanced mark because it is in combination with the land-water-land and because the marks cross in front of the dog.  Both Thunder and Storm had a bit of a problem with this one.  In this video you can see that Thunder pops and is confused when he tries to get that second mark.  (He may have been confused by the placement of the marks, but I imagine him thinking do I have to swim in that cold pond again for a stinking bumper?)  He is re-heeled, receives a correction and is re-sent.  We will run this kind of mark again at some point because something similar might show up on a test.  Of course when a bird is involved, I am guessing there won’t be any confusion!

Storm also had trouble with this, but the marks were re-thrown for her and she got them.  I took a couple of pictures of her waiting for the marks.  Notice how the little stinker looks like she is sitting, but there is that little foot at the ready to spring…

 

After we finished on water, we also ran some long land singles.  I will try to post on those in the next day or so.