Great exercises. Thanks for sharing. Trying the circle one already after seeing the first video earlier in the week. Love making the dog work and feeling useful. Mind exercise is as important at physical exercise.
OldDogKen wrote:
Great exercises. Thanks for sharing. Trying the circle one already after seeing the first video earlier in the week. Love making the dog work and feeling useful. Mind exercise is as important at physical exercise.
Ken
It is fun to see people working with their dogs. Thank you for all people have shared. Hi Ken !!
Obviously it is important to know the drive of your dog before playing at home :-) We usually start with very young dogs(3 to 4 months) with whole hot dogs in your hand with just the end sticking out the back of your hand. The dog will follow you of course and you just dish out a tiny bit of hotdog as you walk at first. Then you start withholding the dog(less and less out the back of your hand) for longer stretches and before you know it the dog is glued to your side. Go from there to sit which occurs with one motion of you stopping your hand and moving it up over the dogs head and it will follow the hotdog up and sitz almost automatically. Then we usually move quickly to a training ball(ball with hand chord) and do the same things. Then before you know it whole Schutzhund routines are completed and the ball is given at the end for a reward.
BUT, if you have a very high drive dog, you can only flash the dog a look at the ball and they are in full hard core drive. Then if too much ball is shown the dog is in over drive and will hurt you just going after the ball. The thing we want is the hand close to the handler so all heeling and sitz, plats, etc. is done with the dog glued to your side.
Always remember consistency is the key. When you begin to heel do it from a sitz position every time. You always begin with the first step being with your left leg which is closest leg the dog. When you stop, you stop with the right leg first and the left second. When the treats are no longer in the picture, the dog will key off of your movements instinctively. He sits, you take off with left leg and the dog takes off as soon as he sees the slightest movement of your leg. Always start with the command of your choice, stop with the command of your choice, etc.. But the dog keys more off of your body than your voice.
That is my two cents worth of internet advice
Every dog is different and every one has to be read. They usually want to please but you are in charge of communicating in a way they understand. As someone earlier said, they need you to be the leader and things need to be black and white. When a correction needs to be made, you do it quickly and decisively. You can't nag and beg, you make a correction. The "bite" that was referenced earlier is probably perfect for some dogs. For a high drive working dog that is not going to be sufficient. You just have to learn what is sufficient for each animal, always be fair, always be consistent, it has to be black and white.
Buddy - Major kudos to your girlfriend for an extremely well-trained dog. I greatly enjoy seeing a working dog that has been given an opportunity to exercise its formidable skills.
I have never had a working dog. Most of ours have been hound mixes of one kind or another, so I'm generally pretty content once they are reliable off-leash. There are lots of strongly-held opinions with regard to dog training. Personally, I lean towards the least-coercive method that accomplishes the goal.
Anyway, here are a few recents of our 4-dog crew with the Nikon 70-200/4.
Such a unique look with the 1.2. Love the painterly way it renders but I also like the crisp sharpness of the sigma. 2 great captures of a beauty looking dog!
Hey guys, I just got myself a new D500, I haven't had a camera for almost 7 years because of health issues and the financial problems it caused. I really only shoot pets(mainly dogs). Any of you have recommendations for a starting point for what AF type to use for dogs running at you?
Hardcore wrote:
Such a unique look with the 1.2. Love the painterly way it renders but I also like the crisp sharpness of the sigma. 2 great captures of a beauty looking dog!
Thank you. This wasn't the 55mm f1,2 though. It was my girlfriends 50mm f1,4 K series Nikkor. Also a nice lens. A touch less magic when rendering backgrounds, but it gets the job done
I should mention, in regard to the images posted above, that the combination of D800 and Sigma 135mm f1,8 Art delivers far sharper results then these Flickr uploads suggest. Kristina is quite upset that lately Flickr as well as Facebook appear to render uploaded images significantly less sharp then the original image would look downsized to the same size
Buddy, I would upload to FB/Flickr at the resolutions I want them to display, rather than letting their algorithms come into play.
the solitaire wrote:
I should mention, in regard to the images posted above, that the combination of D800 and Sigma 135mm f1,8 Art delivers far sharper results then these Flickr uploads suggest. Kristina is quite upset that lately Flickr as well as Facebook appear to render uploaded images significantly less sharp then the original image would look downsized to the same size
Yesterday my wife and I said a tearful goodbye to Riley, our loving and faithful companion of 14 years. She was a sweet girl who will be missed and leaves a hole in our family.
For the Nikon part of this post, this was made using the Nikon Df and my 45mm ƒ2.8D PC-E lens with a slight tilt to the side.
I will need to try these exercises. 
