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2009 12/3/09 Decoy Work – Part 2 – Presenting the target Posted by admin under Decoy Work Yesterday I posted about agitation, which is often the first step in a training sequence. Normally, what follows next is offering the dog a grip, or presenting a target. As I mentioned in my previous post, what I normally see are decoys taking the bite down to the dog or shoving the sleeve in the dogs mouth. By doing this the decoy is diminishing the dogs drive, causing hesitation in the bite, negatively impacting the entry, and teaching a dog to wait on the target for a bite; instead of going up for the bite. When targeting a dog on the sleeve the presentation should be parallel to the ground, leading slightly with your elbow (do not let your dog get comfortable targeting near the hands). Keep your head and back upright, do not lean over the dog. During agitation, cause the dog to miss the target a few times. Get as close as you can to presenting the bite without allowing the dog to make contact. A good indication of whether or not you are doing this correctly is if you are getting a committed clack of the teeth on the miss. After a miss or two, the sleeve should be presented in the exact same fashion, but the decoy steps into the dogs leash line. The sleeve presentation during misses and the actual grip should should look exactly the same to the dog. I would encourage most decoys to wear bite pants if you are working a dog that has already had a lot of man orientation work. Remember to vary the number of barks you require during agitation, the number of misses you give and the direction you move when offering the grip. When giving a grip the dogs front feet should leave the ground and he should have to jump and lunge to bite the sleeve. He must come up to get the bite every time. Making the dog come up to the grip will teach him to hit harder, strike faster, and work for his bite. This also allows the decoy to target the dog much easier as well, because the dog will be at the very end of his line. You end up with some really poor grips sticking the sleeve in the dogs mouth. When you are teaching targeting on a suit the concept is the same, but will take a little more coordination depending on the area you are teaching the dog to target. The key is that the target is always moving away from the dog, even if only slightly. When I am targeting a dog to the shoulder, I agitate, normally in prey, giving the dog a few misses stay just outside of the leash line. I lead slightly with my shoulder to keep the rest of my body out of the picture, only offering the dog one option to bite. The misses look just like the bite; I just step slightly further into the dogs leash line. I do not bend at the waist down to the dog, but instead make the dog come up to my shoulder to get the bite. I want the dog to come up hard for the grip using his whole body. Targeting and presenting the grip are best learned through experience and repetition. The key is the dog always comes up to the bite…never take the bite down to the dog. Mic Foster – www.policek9.biz – mfoster@policek9.biz – 888-315-1733 12/2/09 Decoy Work Part 1 -Agitation Posted by admin under Decoy Work, Patrol This post is the first of several on decoy work for police dogs. Most of the decoy work I see during inservice training is doing more harm than good. Most of the time the rookie is selected to either suit up or put on the sleeve. The decoy starts bouncing around in front of the dog to get the dog to alert. Once the dog alerts the decoy walks up to the dog and shoves the sleeve down his throat. The decoy then proceeds to swing the sleeve back and forth, fighting the dog. The handler the tells decoy to stand still, outs the dog and the decoy puts his hands up and walks away. The dog hasn’t learned anything productive in this situation. Let’s start with agitation. The first thing to decide is whether or not the dog will be worked in prey or defense. If the dog is to be worked in prey the majority of movements will be from side to side and away from the dog. If the dog is to be worked in defense most of the movement will be forward, towards the dog. Of course, most sessions are a mixture of both. The handler should always begin the session by alerting the dog BEFORE the decoy moves (I will be writing an upcoming post about the importance of a good alert). After the dog has demonstrated his alert, some agitation can begin. More often then not, the decoys I see are moving far to much. Decoy work should be fluid, smooth, and relatively calm. The majority of police dogs have plenty of drive and do not need a great deal of agitation to show interest in a decoy. Excessive movement encourages a frenzied bite , makes it hard for the decoy to channel the dogs drive and often makes the out unnecessarily challenging. If the intention of the session is to work the dog in prey, the decoy should show “fear” to the dog after powerful barks. Quickly flinch slightly backwards, and show the dog he has power in his bark. Cover your face, keeping your hands close to your body, leaning slightly away from the dog. If you are coming in to give the dog a grip, work from side to side making an arc. Come in closer to the dog on the outside edges of the arc while creating distance at the center. This will keep from pushing the dog into defense. Work your way closer and closer to the dog continuing to react to the dogs barking. One you are a step or so outside of the leash line, make one more pass, coming into the dogs range allowing the dog to launch himself into the sleeve. DO NOT FORCE IT DOWN HIS THROAT! Make him come up to the bite. I will talk more about the actual entry into the grip later. If the intention of the session is to work the dog in defense, the decoy will show no fear, but instead will show confidence. The decoy should work straight towards the dog, making his presence as large as possible. Create as much pressure as is appropriate for the dog, carefully watching him so as not to push him into avoidance. Vocalizing at the dog, eye contact, clatter sticks, rock jugs, streamers, etc. can all be used to add pressure to the situation. However, the decoy, himself, is the most important piece in creating pressure. Very little movement is needed to work a dog in defense. Slow forward movements will be the most effective. The same rules apply when offering the bite. The dog must come up to the sleeve or suit; the decoy does not take the bite down to the dog. If you are concerned about stepping into the dogs leash line when training with a sleeve, put on some bite pants. It is hard to give a good sleeve presentation, if you are trying to bend at the waist and keep your legs back. The most important part of agitation is to READ THE DOG. Use all of your senses. Watch the dogs body language, listen to his bark. Watch his eyes, posture, ears, mouth, hackles, tail, and listen for the pitch of the dogs bark. Adjust your agitation accordingly to get the results you want. Proper agitation often determines the success or failure of a training session. Mic Foster – www.policek9.biz – mfoster@policek9.biz – 888-315-1733 11/30/09 Planning a training session Posted by admin under Decoy Work, Patrol The first step for inservice training happens before you even get your dog out of the car…PLANNING! It may be the least fun part of training, but is by far the most important part of training. Decide what you need to work on. Hopefully you can look at a very thorough training log and see where your issues are. Once you have determined the problem, setup training in a way that you can determine every single possible out come. As an example, if the problem is your out, it may be a bad idea to work your dog off leash. Discuss the plan with your decoy and walk through the exercise to make sure everyone knows what the plan is. It is the handlers job to explain to the decoy EXACTLY what you are looking for. Do not go through the motions to get to the part you want to work on. If you are planning on working the out, you should not rush through other bitework fundamentals. Do not create new problems to solve existing problem. Use your time wisely. Since training time is so limited work on a number of small things at the same time. To give you an example. If I am working on drive channeling with my dog, and that is the main focus of the session, my plan would be to as follows. Decoy (in a sleeve) stands calmly in front of my dog. I will alert him to bark. No decoy movement until my dog makes some noise. Short drag to the decoy. Allow for hard entry. Work the dogs grip making sure it is full and calm. Do drive channeling exercises. Out the dog or let him win…depending on your needs. Out to guard, and then recall or reengage. Repeat exercise. During this brief session I worked on alert, send, entry, targeting, grip, channeling, out, guard, recall. I controlled every aspect of the training session and created a situation where the only option was for the dog to be successful. The only way this is possible is with careful planning. Mic Foster – www.policek9.biz – mfoster@policek9.biz – 888-315-1733 ADD COMMENTS Upcoming blogs Posted by admin under Decoy Work, Patrol Midwest Police K-9 Academy has recently added a blog to our website. I am very excited about this undertaking and look forward to sharing lots of information with our readers. These next few weeks I am going to focus on bitework/patrol training. I am going to cover everything from planning a training session through tactical scenario based training. Topics covered will include: -planning a training session -decoy work -agitation -bite development -the send -entry into the bite -targeting -grip (calmness, fullness, etc.) -man orientation -environmental pressure -drive channeling -prey work -defense work -the OUT (tactical and on command) -guard -tactics and scenarios …and lots of other topics. I will try to write one a day and make them as thorough as possible. I really enjoy comments and feedback so please let me know what you think. Mic Foster Midwest Police K-9 Academy www.policek9.biz mfoster@policek9.biz 888-315-1733 11/23/09 SELECTING A PUPPY FOR PERSONAL PROTECTION TRAINING Puppy selection for a working K-9 is very complex, and essentially takes seeing many puppies over many years to get good at it. I will explain how I go through my selection process. First, taking your current pet dog and making it a personal protection dog is probably not a very good idea. While it may be possible, most pet quality dogs are not built to handle the stress that personal protection dog training brings. When I sell a personal protection dog I want to make sure the dog will 100% protect my client. I want a to sell a dog that is well prepared, stable, social, and most importantly, will protect you. So, if you decide a dog is right for you as a way to defend yourself, it is time to go shopping. I take a different tactic then a lot of other trainers doing puppy selection. To be completely honest this is not my area of expertise. I am not a breeder, and therefore don’t get the opportunity to spend hours and hours around puppies. So what can I do? I first decide what breed of dog I want. I encourage you to select either a Belgian Malinois or Dutch Shepherd. Why these two breeds? Basically, they are genetically designed for the work. Good breeders focus on temperament, working ability, and structure. These two breeds are also still reasonably priced. They can be a handful and I encourage you to start a training program immediately to learn how to handle these breeds of dogs. What I do is research breeders. I want to select breeders with tested breeding programs, and I normally select sport breeders over police dog breeders. We will get into the debate of sport dog vs. police dog later. I prefer to look at breeders that have had success in either PSA, French Ring or Mondio Ring. My preference are PSA breeders. You can look at the speciality training portion of our website to learn more about Protection Sport Association. PSA is BY FAR the greatest test of a personal protection dog. Once I have found my successful sport competitor/breeders, I find out when the next littler is coming and who the parents are. I then research the parents pedigrees. Most breeders will readily offer this info. If the pedigrees look solid, I will then explain to the breeder exactly what I am looking for. For a personal protection dog, I want a high PREY drive, stable, social dog. That’s right, I said high PREY drive! We will go in to the difference between PREY and DEFENSE in the next article. I then let the breeders select the right dog for me. No one knows more about the pups than the breeder. Why would I ever try and tell them which dog is right for me? If you are interested in finding a breeder for a Dutchie or Mal I will be happy to point you in the right direction. So, essentially, what I am doing when selecting a pup, is selecting a breeder. Aside form picking your trainer, there is no more important choice when buying a pup. Things to look for when selecting the breeder. Are they currently competing their dogs in a dog sport? What titles do the parents have? Do the breeders train their own dogs for these sports? Is the information they offer verifiable? Have the parents been bred before? Are the puppies of past litters currently competing and having success? What kind guarantee does the pup come with? The list goes on, but that’s a good start. The most effective thing I have do is go watch the breeders trial their dogs or at least see video. Do you like what you see? If so, start your research. More tomorrow.... 11/23/09 Unfortunately, when I attempted to move my 2009 blogs I lost the information and have been unable to recover them, so for the next month and a half I will right new blogs and start fresh in 2010. Today's topic: Personal Protection Trainers In our area (Cincinnati, OH) there are a number of trainers that proclaim to be personal protection dog trainers. Most of what you see is smoke and mirrors. What do I mean by this? Most of the personal protection dog trainers I see are teaching their dogs to speak on command, which they call an alert, and then play tug with equipment which they call bitework. However, when the bite equipment is not present the dog would not alert on a person, much less bite someone to defend their owners. Over the next few months I will be writing articles on K-9 Personal Protection. My goal is to cover personal protection work from puppyhood through adult. I will not cover every single aspect, because it is very involved. What I want to do is offer enough information to help people make an educated decision when selecting a personal protection trainer. I would also like to offer enough info to help some of these so-called trainers see where they are making mistakes. I hope you enjoy the articles! |
