Weekend Respite

Clover had a short break this weekend from training. I only practiced jumping drills her for about 20 minutes on Sunday. We worked on directional cues. Clover knows left and right if she is facing toward me, but gets confused if she is facing away from me. ...Also it is difficult to know if she is following oral directional commands or going off of body language.

The way I am trying to teach her directions is by using 4 jumps set up in a circle. I stand behind her and when she jumps the first jump and I give her "left" or "right" command to tell her what jump to go over. I reward with a ball if she is correct. "Go" is straight ahead.

As we learned at the trial last weekend, oral directional cues are very important in tunnelers, where it is more difficult for her to see body cues.

We also went for a 3.5 mile hike on Sunday.