Sorry I only had time to watch your first video so far, but it looks good. I would neutrally reset her from trying to throw/offer/guess/be confused about "orbit." I would not mix orbit and twist or pivot right now, because orbit is basically a super pivot. In the future, you can mix, but it will be an intentional cue discretion exercise. And I don't work cue discretion until the behavior is on cue and super fluent, which I'm guessing "orbit" is not for her yet.
This is the first clip where I see her drifting towards forging a bit. (2:29)
What's nice is that she's actually self correcting a LOT. (So thoughtful, Luna!) The next rep after the forgey rep is excellent. Look at 3:02. See how she moves herself back? I want you to mark & reward that. This is where our "yes" marker really comes in handy! We can reward the exact moment she makes that awesome choice.
Other things I want to see you play with, if you need more homework:
1) Striding out:
You're going to have to basically charge at your fence, but I want to see you play with lengthening your stride a bit. Since she's a bigger dog, that's what you're going to need for her to really prance with you.
Relevance to competition OB:
Prancing is purty/a smoother look.
Relevance to Rally:
If you compete in Rally in person, it is timed. If there is a tie for scores, time determines how you place.
That being said:
You might see more forging crop up as you practice striding out! It's all about balance. Mix slower pace and left turns as needed, reward her for self correcting.
2) Signs:
I told you awhile ago to not do too much heeling from sign to sign, but I think you have the skills to play with that again! Lemme see it.
Awesome, thank you! I was contemplating requesting to level up but I know how hasty I can get 😂 will definitely play with the signs and striding out more and see how she does!
Right turns in heel: Looks excellent! These are your 360 rights. You got em.
Down stay with distraction:
Once she's there, she's great. You can't fool her with those moves!
The initial popping up from down to sit is just a communication error somehow. Does your "stay" signal look like "sit" or maybe even "touch"? I see her misreading what your hand is "saying" to her.
The 1 pop up at the end of the down stay is a reward sequence error that usually happens because the handler says their release word and does a big body movement at the same time. This is just like how you want to say "get it" before you throw your treat.
Awww, that little march in place is so cute. I love that she did that but didn't charge forward.
The last sit is wide. Since she is coming off a right turn, she keeps following that path and doesn't stop herself soon enough. You can help her here by using your hand signal BEFORE she gets head, to physically guide her to the right spot.
Once she has already sat, if she's wide, you can:
Reward her but lure her into the right spot with the food.
Or
Do a hand signal (like your left finish signal) that sends her back to the right spot - as long as that's not too mind-blowing/frustrating for her.
If you wanted to be really fancy, you could teach her to fix herself by setting this up:
With her free, tell her to sit and stay.
Step in so that you are set up as if she sat wide. (But you made that happen, not her.)
More left turns and some target. per your advice I warmed her up on target before. Then we hit a point in heel where I had to pick the target up Bc she kept trying to go to it. 😂
Yes, it's all about balance - how often you send away from heel, what direction you send from, etc. If you find she is forging ahead towards the target, you can send away a little bit less, do more left turns if she starts to creep ahead, and/or heel AWAY from the target and then send to it.
If she just started getting generally wacky, just slow things down, make it easier, reward more.
I'm also curious to see you play with going from target back to heel! This would be like the "catch the dog in heel" exercise, except she's at the target first. (So you would be moving before she got to you.)
That way you can play with flowing between heel, other skill, heel, other skill, without as many treat resets. (Treat resets are wonderful and good, but this advice is for trial prep.)
This is nice! You might have already done it to warm her up, but since she goes the wrong direction at first when you cue "target," I would recommend doing more reps of sending her from stationary heel to the target, so that it's something that she's expecting more. Sometimes even if the dog knows both skills very well, the new combination/pattern throws them off. They hear you, but they're like, "Wait, no, really!? No way."
I don’t want to count my chickens BUT it feels like allllllllll the trips along the couch line are paying off as we get into these more complicated motions in heel. 🤞🏼
Left turns - I'm sooo proud of this. Keep up the good work. We discussed via instagram making sure you balance duration so that she does not burn out.
Right turns - This looks great too! She's actually lagging slightly behind, but because of her previous heel history, I don't want to really do anything about this yet. Keep playing with the right turn games.
Twist in heel - Great start! She'll need less help from you soon enough.
q: in one of the videos (I think twists in heel) she’s starting to orbit naturally. Should I stop this or maybe use it to train orbit? Thoughts?
More heeling with turns
Down stays with extra distractions, word to the wise - don’t skip in really old, beat up UGGS. 😐
Twists in heel
Moment 45 seconds is the most important and just melts me
right turns in heel at the park this morning, took her a moment to realize what we were doing 🙃
Twists in heel are getting tighter! Broke it up a little this time, let me know if that’s a no no! 🙃
More left turns and some target. per your advice I warmed her up on target before. Then we hit a point in heel where I had to pick the target up Bc she kept trying to go to it. 😂
Left hand heel turns with different rewards (going to target)
Figure 8’s
Left turns - I'm sooo proud of this. Keep up the good work. We discussed via instagram making sure you balance duration so that she does not burn out.
Right turns - This looks great too! She's actually lagging slightly behind, but because of her previous heel history, I don't want to really do anything about this yet. Keep playing with the right turn games.
Twist in heel - Great start! She'll need less help from you soon enough.
Twists in heel ... kind of
Heel with right turns