The newest installment in "Unorthodox Sighthound Tricks with Kili" is the dog catch. It's exactly what it sounds like... catching your dog!
This trick did present a slight problem. Okay, 2 slight problems. The first is the obvious... having to catch a tall, long, leggy dog that is about half my weight. The second, more serious problem, was Kili's distinct dislike for being held. I worked on desensitizing her a bit by just picking her up and giving her a treat randomly, and while she didn't love it, she accepted it because... food! But then I needed to convince her to jump at me (not a problem since we have a rebound and a couple of vaults) but in such a way that it wouldn't be completely awkward to catch her. For a dog that doesn't like being held, nothing would be worse than being dropped or fallen on. At first I tried to just get her to jump up in my general direction and I would try to catch her, but once she figured out I was trying to grab her in midair she started jumping further and further away from me. I scrapped that plan.
The next thing I tried was similar to how I taught the rebound. I thought if I could teach her to jump ON me and literally into my arms, it would make it easier for me to catch her without any awkward falling or grabbing. This ended up working extremely well as she basically jumps into the perfect spot. Take a peek at the step by step training that went into this.
We started sitting down where I was nice and stable so she could feel perfectly comfortable and confident that she wasn't going to fall.
Then we moved to leaning against the wall, and finally standing. We still need to perfect it, and I'd like her to be comfortable doing it with a run up. I'm using the cue "Trust" for this one as I think it's very appropriate!
This is a fun little trick that Kili and I worked on in the late winter. I decided to call it "orbit". Kili's job is to spin backwards circles around me. Ultimately the goal is for her to do this until told otherwise.
This video shows all the steps involved in training this trick.
Kili and I have been hard at work on a new trick. I wanted to hold off on posting it until it was finished, because, honestly, when I decided to train this trick I wasn't sure how long it would take. But yet again, Kili is a super star and she learned the vault in a little over a month.
As with all tricks that require a lot of body movement, this one had to be broken right down. The thing with greyhounds isn't that they can't be trained to do the tricks you see Border Collies doing... it's that it requires more time and sometimes creativity, not just so they mentally "get" what you want, but also physically. Our greyhounds just don't move the same way as a border collie, and what comes naturally to a smaller, more compact breed, is foreign for a leggy, long sighthound. I looked for videos on Youtube: "How to teach dog to vault" and I got lots of hits. But basically all of them said "set your dog up a short distance from you. Show your dog the disc. Hold it up high and invite them to take it" and their little border collie would vault right up there. That does not work with a sighthound. As you'll see... we had to start from beyond square one.
Step 1: Teach the dog to jump off an object. The idea of the vault is for your dog to jump off your body. So I started by teaching Kili to jump off a box. But there's a difference between vaulting off a box and just jumping off a box. The former involves jumping UP and OUT, and the latter is jumping DOWN. The key was to find a way to teach Kili that I wanted her to jump UPWARDS.
Step 2: I tried several things before I finally found a winning combo. I set an agility jump right on the other side of my box and then lured with a cookie, keeping my hand (and therefore the cookie) elevated to convince her to stretch for it. Once she was consistently vaulting from the box I started to lower the height of the agility jump and switched to a disc instead of a food lure.
Step 3: Introduce the handler. With the bar on the agility jump gone I wanted to start introducing myself into the equation since eventually she'd have to be jumping onto and off me. I started by kneeling behind the vaulting box and offering the disc for a take. Eventually I removed the jump completely and then started to slide my way further and further onto the box. This got her used to working with a smaller platform sine I am clearly not as wide as a rubbermaid container.
Step 4: Vaulting off the handler and catching in the air. I needed to get Kili to start jumping onto me as her vaulting platform. I took the blanket off the box and used it to keep consistency. I sat on the box and covered my lap with the blanket. My legs were now the target for her to launch off of. I used the disc and offered her a take. However, we also needed to get her used to the idea of catching the disc instead of just taking it from my hand. For that I went back a step so she was using the box again. I didn't want her worrying about her footing as well as catching.
Step 5: Catching during vault and moving on up. The next step was putting the two actions of the previous step together. She needed to jump off me but also catch the disc. For this I simply went back to having her vault off my lap but offered a throw instead of a take. Once she was comfortable with catching during a vault it was time to start taking this vertical. We moved from the box to a stool and continued with catching during a vault. At this stage I also faded out the blanket as a target.
Step 6: Going vertical. Kili now had a pretty solid concept of the vault. It was time to get this trick free standing. I will obviously not have a chair or box to sit on during a freestyle routine. I needed to be standing. This was the simplest part of the whole training process because I just had to find ways to slowly increase my height. I used an adjustable stool and slowly raised it until I was just standing and leaning on it for support. I've left a blooper in there when I lost my balance. I just started using the stool less and less for support and finally removed it completely. Ta da! Free standing leg vault!
I really loved this trick. There's still some work to go into it with fine tuning and making it a really solid behaviour. I can't wait to get this trick outdoors in the spring and get some video from further away to give you a better appreciation for how cool this trick is. Next? A back vault!
Remember our rebound? Here it is outdoors on grass! What a fun trick! We are still working on perfecting it, as you can see, but it is starting to become more consistent. Next step... getting pictures somewhere picturesque... Rockies anyone?
The long, miserable winter continues. Entertaining Kili has become both a chore and a joy. A chore because it has to be almost completely mental, which requires my mental attention as well even on days when I'm exhausted. But it is also so much fun to watch her learning all these new tricks.
Right now we have quite a few on the go. The big one is leg weaves... all sort of leg weaves! Forwards has been a pretty quick process but backwards has been interesting and slow work. To break up the monotony of learning a complication trick requiring hind end awareness we're doing a few easier, simpler behaviours like crawl, wave, and perfecting her sit pretty.
The backward leg weaves will probably require a whole blog post of their own, hence the reason I have not included any videos of it yet.
Here is the second installment in the rebound training. I really just wanted to show off the finished trick. I had not removed the blanket yet, and actually since this I've had to go back and re-train it as she was getting really slopping with her hind feet for some reason. The re-train is a work in process but I'm not worried. If she had it down once she can figure it out again. Here's what the trick looks like at full height.
With Kili I have been trying a lot of unconventional tricks. Unconventional for a greyhound. Most of these tricks are pretty common for other breeds. My favourite one that we are working on right now is the "rebound". You are probably most familiar with seeing a rebound at a disc dog competition. In between catching or as the lead up to the throw the dog jumps at the handler and bounces off the handler's body. Rebounds can be done off a number of body parts, and can even be done with inanimate objects like walls or trees. The typical first body rebound is usually off the hip area of the handler, but moving on from there people will teach chest rebounds, foot rebounds, back rebounds....
As you can imagine from my above description... a rebound is NOT something that you typically see a large sighthound doing. Once again I found myself wondering if this was something I could do with a greyhound. For one thing, many greyhounds are a little reluctant to really leave the ground except when running. For another, a greyhound is a pretty large dog to have rebounding off your body. However, undaunted we decided to try for a hip rebound. I have chronicled our progress so far.
I started by placing a blanket on the ottoman and asked her to jump onto it and then straight back off the way she had come by throwing a treat on the floor. I tried to click as she was jumping off (though you will hear a few clicks that are a little early or a little late... I'm only human!). Once she was happily jumping on and off I went and sat beside the blanket. Once again I asked her to jump on and off the blanket right beside me. At first I was having trouble with her trying to turn towards me (because I had the food) which was becoming very awkward for her to try to make the turn because she is such a long dog. I reworked it at this point to have her turn AWAY from me where she had more space. I also started to slide closer and closer to the edge of the ottoman, putting my leg under the blanket so that she started to have to jump almost right on top of me.
After this it became all about encouraging her to jump on ME (with the blanket draped over me). This was the tricky part since she didn't want to land on me and would try to aim for the ottoman behind/beside me. Lots of patience and creative positioning was involved.
Once Kili was comfortable jumping onto me while I was still sitting on the ottoman, it was time to start going vertical. This needs to be done slowly. So for our very first try I was almost sitting against the wall, just without the ottoman under me. This was Kili's very first rebound!
We are at the point now where she is fairly confidently rebounding off of me. The next steps are to very slowly start standing straight. For each increment that we straighten we will have to spend time getting her comfortable and confident before moving on until eventually I am standing straight with nothing behind me.
This is such a fun trick and I am so excited about it. That said, use discretion as to whether this is an appropriate trick for your dog and make sure you have good footing. Our house is mostly hardwood and there's 3 feet of snow outside right now, so I went to Canadian Tire and picked up this carpeted foam flooring to lay down to provide cushion and traction.
This winter has been difficult. We are in the middle of our second deep freeze with temperatures below -25C (before the windchill). The last deep freeze lasted about 2 weeks. They say this one will not be as bad (and we are leaving for Mexico this weekend!) and I am hoping that is true.
Below -15C I do not walk the dogs on leash. We do not go for our usual morning walk. We do not go for an evening walk and Kili and I do not jog. I will sometimes still take Kili for a hike or a quick romp in the park beside our house... but all outings are abbreviated as none of us can stand the cold for long.
To keep my sanity and Kili's we have been working on a lot of tricks. A few weeks ago we were working on perch. Basically asking her to stand on different objects. Once spring rolls around we will be able to do some fun ones outside. The idea is to get your dog to stand on objects with a small base. It's fun, makes for entertaining photos, and is also a good core workout for the dog. Oh, and it reminds the dog that she has hind feet and where they are... something I find greyhounds to be particularly bad at.
Here is Kili working on standing on a fairly small roasting pan.
And now working with some height on a small table and our overturned garbage can.
Like I said... entertaining photos:
Which brings us to our next proposition... can you teach a greyhound to do a back stall? So far no luck, but we will revisit this one in the future and I'm determined to at least try!
