Contact Work Progresses

We revisited "touch" and added a target - which was a piece of cake; she's been doing "touch" to my open palm since she was about a month old ;-)  So I quickly advanced to asking for "two-fer's" in prep for repetitive nose taps, and she almost immediately offered a few pecking-type touches.

Then we started combining the 'back up' with  the target touch by placing (OK, actually kinda tossing) a rubber disc down, then actually under her belly. I am very pleased with the resulting rocked-back, head low and centered, position. THIS is what I am hoping to get on her 2o2o contact position!

Then we worked on the "H" of  Susan Garrett's D.A.S.H. program - we changed the habitat by taking it outside. She did great, showing almost the same focus in the front yard as she did inside. (My baby's growing up - the front yard used to be so overwhelming she would zoom around on her long line like a bee on a string, to borrow a phrase from Sharon and Gee!) Neither the back up nor the target touch are on cue yet as they are both very much works in progress. When she's reliable and accurate, I'll name them - haven't decided if it'll be one name/one behavior, or two distinct actions/cues. Neither have I decided on what words to use. Gris backs up to the "beep beep beep" of a truck in reverse... so that's been done (and done and done.) How does "Yo Gitch!" "Back off" and "Peck it" grab ya'?

Anyway, I'm not seeing this contact position thing as so daunting a task as I did for the last 51/2 months while I was putting off deciding what I wanted it to look like and how I was going to teach it . I think Gitchi agrees - this is actually kinda fun, and coming along much faster than I anticipated!!

Here's some snippets of Gitchi assuming the position (well, approximating the position, anyway) strung together into a video:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ViqfkV0dTo

Suse 'n Gitchi