by Denise Fenzi | Dec 29, 2013 | Brito
Go ahead and admit it; you’ve never seen such a cute little dog in your entire life:). Here we are working on some heeling, fronts, and the very beginnings of sit in heel position. He is just beginning to hand me the metal scent article; separately he has...
by Denise Fenzi | Dec 19, 2013 | Brito
I took Brito to his weekly ring prep class today. A miracle happened. For two minutes and fifty three seconds, he stayed in the ring with me and focused on his job. He did not run off to visit dogs outside of the ring. He did not leave work to look for a promising...
by Denise Fenzi | Dec 4, 2013 | Brito
The past few weeks I concentrated on a few things with Brito: Play with toys. That is coming along pretty well. Less good outside but hey, he’s a baby. Play with me. That also suffers outside, but still…we’ll get there. Retrieve. Super! Good boy...
by Denise Fenzi | Nov 1, 2013 | Brito
Here is an eleven minute training session of Brito from this morning. You can see a variety of things. Shaping with a dumbbell. I normally hold it because he tends to put his feet on objects sitting on the floor. That is not a habit that I want to encourage. (...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 27, 2013 | Brito
For those who are worried that Lyra may have disappeared…no worries. She’s doing very well and, if anything, has been rather brilliant this week. But…she’s getting to be a “trained” dog, which means there is less and less that I...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 21, 2013 | Brito
You can meet Brito in the following three videos. I chopped out the 80% where he sort of wandered about and behaved much like a puppy. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Is0d9zZ7qnY (tug) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZOn_w2lnxk (beginning of heeling)...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 14, 2013 | Lyra
It’s been a while since I posted a generic training video. So you here you have it, unedited, full of mistakes (hers and mine) for your viewing pleasure. Note that Lyra is working for food. I’m doing this for two reasons. One, I want her to learn to...
by Denise Fenzi | May 23, 2013 | Lyra
Heeling games are simply fun ways to practice your heeling. Basic heeling games involve some kind of movement – either vertical, horizontal or some type of trick behavior. More advanced heeling games are a compilation of movement, patterns, surprises, opposition...
by Denise Fenzi | Feb 5, 2013 | Training Videos - not my dogs
The earlier you add disractions to your training, the better. This video shows Ziva learning to ignore distractions while heeling. At 11 months of age, Ziva’s heeling is pretty good but the reward schedule is quite high. This is the best time to introduce...
by Denise Fenzi | Dec 11, 2012 | Lyra, Musings
If you want beautiful heeling, there’s something you need to know. It’s more important than your reward structure. It’s more important than verbal markers or clickers. It’s more important than throwing corrections into your training....
by Denise Fenzi | Aug 6, 2012 | Lyra
It’s Lyra’s birthday! In honor of Lyra, this is not a training blog; it is simply a training session to show where were at in terms of skills, play and drive when she trains at home. There are five videos here; they start as I take her out of the yard to...
by Denise Fenzi | Apr 26, 2012 | Lyra
As I worked Lyra’s heeling today, I was reminded of what a slow process it is to teach beautiful heeling. Lyra has been heeling since she was ten weeks old, yet with six months of consistent training we still don’t work for more than ten or fifteen steps...
by Denise Fenzi | Feb 13, 2012 | Lyra
I do not consider distraction training to be a unique stage of training; it is part of the overall process. Distraction training starts from the day I bring a puppy home, whether I wish to work on distractions or not. Regardless, there are periods in training where I...
by Denise Fenzi | Jan 10, 2012 | Cisu
Ms. Lyra managed to rip all of her pads off running around a wet pool deck, so she’s lying around looking very sad right now – no training until she’s chipper again. Ms. Cisu has offered to substititue in for a training blog today. For those who are...
by Denise Fenzi | Jan 2, 2012 | Lyra
Today I took Lyra for training with a few other trainers, and she was brilliant. She wasn’t afraid of anything. She wasn’t hyper attracted to the other people and dogs present. She needed very little sightseeing time before asking to work. Her interest...
by Denise Fenzi | Dec 18, 2011 | Lyra
Today I removed two of Lyra’s teeth playing tug. That second tooth forced me to admit that I need to put the toy away. Regretfully. What can I say; besides the fact that I have a very strong preference for training with toys, the other reality is that...
by Denise Fenzi | Dec 6, 2011 | Lyra
Most of my training time with Lyra is really structured play – play that gets me the behaviors I want with maximum joy and energy. There are also a few skills that are more easily mastered when the dog is calm. For these, I use food as the reward. Food leads to a...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 27, 2011 | Lyra
I’m switching from “time she’s been here” to “age” for the titles of my blog posts about Lyra. Makes more sense over the long run. Lyra’s doing great! Either her food drive is increasing or I’m doing a better job at...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 19, 2011 | Generic training advice
In 500 words or less. 1) Have strict criteria. Either your dog meets your criteria or he does not. If you do not know what your criteria are, your dog will not succeed. Do not reward your dog if the criteria are not met. Either lower the criteria if you asked too...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 18, 2011 | Lyra
Either Lyra’s food drive just kicked in, or I’ll be purchasing Freeze Dried Turkey Hearts in bulk. My friend gave me a few, and wow…..got some serious work out of her. Check out her heeling with something delicious. At the end I spent a bit of...
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 13, 2011 | Uncategorized
Sleep is improving by the hour! I still have to get up every few hours to let her potty, but the screaming is minimal now. Today she visited my son’s school. We went early in the morning, so there were very few kids around. After 10 minutes I took her home....
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 4, 2011 | Training Videos - not my dogs
Here’s Finn, an adult Golden Retriever who already knows how to work in obedience. He is now learning how to choose to work. Note the emphasis on choice. In Finn’s first lesson with me, it took about three minutes before he even glanced at his trainer....
by Denise Fenzi | Oct 1, 2011 | Brito, Training Videos - not my dogs
He’s growing up! Belgian Tervuren Gaetz is now three months old; this is his fourth lesson overall and his first on heeling. Gaetz and mom are doing a really nice job. This lesson introduced heeling (handler generated interest), recall from distraction and...
by Denise Fenzi | Sep 23, 2011 | Training Videos - not my dogs
There are many ways to start a puppy or young dog on work. This happens to demonstrate one of my favorites. In this video, puppy Kismet (11 week old Dutch Shepherd) and her mom are having their first lesson on recall away from distractions, a bit of heeling, and...
