17/06/2024
Sharing this as I do believe this is super important and often sadly much overlooked.
This was a fun but challenging course that had a tonne of eliminations, quite a few runs with faults and a handful of clears at each height - it was a great course, this post is not about the course itself.
This was Biathlon Jumping - the first round in the Biathlon competition so stakes were pretty high and competition was intense - as it should be! again not moaning!
Pixel was incredible, working really hard and we were clear until number 18 of 21 obstacles - tiny blip resulting in a fatal elimination.
The handlers reaction to mistakes like this can massively affect a dog, especially over time.
I see lots of dogs that go wrong on courses - 99% of the time its actually the handlers fault, either an incorrect body cue or an incorrect or late verbal cue, sometimes its that they are asking the dog for a skill they haven't yet trained properly - and that other 1% of the time the dog makes a mistake, you know why? they are dogs not robots!
Lots of handlers reactions to this could be disappointment, frustration, even annoyance with the dog for making the mistake.
I see lots of handlers tell the dogs off, even if its something as small as telling the dog no that was naughty, often times its much more than that, a short verbal tirade or even downing the dog or similar, most of the time they verbally reprimand the dog and make the point that the dog normally does this correctly, or they did it last week in training!
Whilst some dogs may not be affected by this, most are, they lower their hears/ears/tails, show appeasment signs etc - note that not all dogs will dog this, some are so high on adrenalin they literally do not care! Or they are so used to it that its a normal part of their sports routine!
Does that mean it is right to reprimand your dog in this situation?
What about all the mistakes we make as handlers? Do your dogs reprimand you for every one of those? What about at your work, do you get reprimanded for any tiny little mistake you make?
Our dogs put so much trust and confidence into us as handlers/trainers/owners/friends that we owe it to them to return that confidence/belief/trust.
In this video, at this point I simply threw my arms up (like I do when i'm asking him for a cuddle so its a positive visual sign), I said "nearly buddy!" he has no idea what this means but it was a positive, happy and a bit excited voice so it didn't knock his confidence.
I turned on the spot and sent him from the incorrect obstacle directly to a previous tunnel (which he shot off to do super happily and confidently) and redid the sequence - which he happily and super confidently nailed the second time round!
I am so so happy and proud with all of his hard work on these super tough courses
I am so so grateful that he wants to enjoy playing this game with me - even when I screw up!
I never want my dogs to not have the joy of playing this game with me - if we are going to get it wrong, we are going to get it wrong together.
NOTE: I am not saying that people are wrong to verbally reprimand their dogs - personally I don't like to see it as most people believe their dog is being naughty which normally is not the case, its normally handler error (whether you believe that or not ;) )
Help your dog to keep their joy in their sport, their confidence, belief and trust in you and don't ever lose the joy :)
P.s - I regularly tell my students to apologise to their dog ;)
ALL of my dogs know that if they hear the word "sorry!", they get extra treats at the end of a run!
could we have achieved this same result second time around with a stop and a recall and a reset - probably, but it would have been a little slower, less confident and definitely less happy ;)
