Hi Steve,


Yeah, I agree.  Don't mean to criticize Laurie at all, but watching  
her Terv does bring up some issues of why do we do this?  Is it really  
for our dogs?  Depends quite a lot on the dog.  Sometimes the answer  
is Yes!  My dog LOVES the activity. That's what we want.  Can some  
dogs learn to love it?  Yes, I think Kit has learned to enjoy agility  
quite a bit.  But if I could go back in time I would not have  
rehearsed so much agility (including trials) when her motivation to  
work with me was not there.  I hope I learned from those mistakes.


marty

I view some of Moka's issues as somewhat similar to Kit's.  By  
bringing Kit into the ring when she was not really excited to do  
agility, I was putting her in situations (repeated) when she rehearsed  
choosing reinforcers other than what I had to offer.  Those avoidance  
behaviors got stronger and never fully went away.  I did not get her  
to love agility SO much that she chose agility.  She would reflexively  
chase me, so I used that to the hilt!  But that was and is not fool  
proof.  This underlying problem remains.


When I try to train Moka at Rosemary's around birds and the great  
outdoors I am essentially doing the same thing.  Allowing her to  
repeatedly choose other reinforcers to me and the opportunity to do  
agility.  Overcoming her distractibility and getting some good  
training in (eventually, in an hour session) is OK but I would much  
rather not have the rehearsal of unwanted behaviors at all.  That  
doesn't help us.  What if I took her to an outdoor trial or a trial in  
a barn now and she ran away after birds?


I am glad in a way that winter is coming and if I train at Rosemary's  
it will be inside again.  Get our relationship stronger, working  
indoors.  Do distraction training indoors, where I can control the  
distractions more.  Maybe when Moka is a year older the history of  
reinforcement will be stronger and it will be easier to keep her focus  
outside.