New Year, New Training Goals?

[TheRedQueen]

What are your training goals (short or long term) for this upcoming year? I have a few already...but I'll list each dog with what I hope to accomplish:

Inara: she's probably going to retire from flyball this year (sniff, sniff)...my goal is to get her to her 50K title in flyball...then she can play or not as she feels. I'd like to try her out in some other venues perhaps...she's quite good in obedience, so maybe some rally if I have time.

Score: he's still going strong in flyball, so no new goals there. I would LOVE to get him competing in dock diving...which is a possibility since he finally learned (grew some balls) to leap off the dock at the beach house in DE. I think he'd be really good at it...so my main goal for him is to keep building his confidence and try and compete maybe this summer.

Puzzle: nothing for her...she's for decorative use only. Seriously...she has a hard time learning new things, and doesn't really enjoy it...but maybe something easy for her like nosework...but I doubt it. She comes last on the list of dogs that NEED a job.

Figment: I have to work on his flyball box, and get him running like he used to...this is a short term goal, that I need to work on asap. I also want to get into competing in dock diving with him...he already loves it, and is a crowd pleaser...so it's a natural fit. I also need to get Michelle working on his behavior around strangers...he's becoming a dachshund for reals.

Odd: Working on his ball retrieve is his main thing. We have to get him bringing the ball back so he can play FLYBALL! I also need to work some more basic obedience with him. He's such a good boy, that I hate wasting his potential! He's also shaping up to be a fantastic dock diver...so I hope to try competitions this year with him. He's such a goober...he leaps into the water just for fun...no toy!

Trillian: getting her into flyball full-time is my only goal for her this year. I'd actually like to get her basic obedience polished up too...and to get her into dock diving competitions too. I am also scouring lure-coursing info...to see if there is an upcoming CAT test...for her and Fig.

Swagger: starting his basic flyball skills...since he has NONE. Letting him grow up and be a puppy and experience everything.

[Tubular Toby]

I'd like to continue having Toby mingle with guests and old friends. I'd like to be able to walk him without him reacting at the sight of people. He's far less reactive to people than he is other dogs, so I feel like a lot of conditioning could make a huge improvement on people sightings. I have no intentions of ever walking him in a crowded area, but it'd be nice to handle remote sightings.

[pitbullmamaliz]

I intend to actually get Inara sniffing out cell phones instead of just talking about it.

I intend to finally train her to walk nicely on just her collar.

I intend to do more training out and about in the community with her.

I intend to do more BAT sessions to keep working on her dog issues.

[Hundilein]

I hope to actually do some training with Renee this year. She did great in Rally classes and actually seemed to enjoy it, so I might pick that up again, and possibly even try competing.

The mama dog I have right now needs some serious independence training (she whines like crazy and licks me in the face and generally makes me nuts with her neediness), as well as basic manners. We started with leash walking, sit, down, leave it, and touch this afternoon. She'll only be with me for another 5 weeks or so, but my goal is to have basic obedience and a few tricks down before she leaves. And hopefully get rid of some of the annoying behavior.

I'm not going to kid myself thinking I might actually be able to do much with the 8 puppies, but I hope to at least start a foundation for basic manners. I also made a claim at work that I would have them sitting and giving high fives at four weeks old, so I feel like I should try to do that with at least one of them.

And dare I say, this may be the year that I take the plunge and get a second dog. Perhaps one that I could play flyball with. Or I might just foster more. Or start training professionally again.

[amalie79]

Robin starts back into classes this Sunday-- it's a Therapeutic Agility (Agility for Confidence) class with just 2 other dogs that I have worked with before (assistant training): another pit bull and a VERY human-shy rough collie. Excited to get Robin back into classes, as it has been a long time for her, and her responses to new people have improved so much since then; reaction to dogs still needs work, but I know that *I* know more now than I did then. I'd love to maybe do some cyber-agility/VALOUR with her, or even some cyber-rally. She is the happiest worker, and in true middle-child fashion, she's been over-looked far too much.

River completed Rally Advanced this year. I'd like to get her Excellent title this coming year. We need to work on the "go out over jump" and cues-at-a-distance stations primarily. River generally feels like I don't spend enough time with her, so that's priority one. If we do well with RE, we might start considering formal-o. MIGHT. However, I honestly don't know how much longer River's joints can hang in there.

Luna's motion triggers stopped us from going further in rally (she saw a dog in the adjacent ring go for a retrieve and hit the end of the leash and became fixated; we still qualified, but it's the main thing we need to work on)-- she got her RN; I'd like to pick back up on her motion triggers, and I think she will be starting a regular agility class later in the spring. We've spent the last year working on her resource guarding and lack of impulse control. She's come a long way and has continued to be a wonderful ambassador when she goes out into town with me, which is often. The other SUPER fun thing we started doing was disc. She really didn't have a clue what to do with the disc. I shaped grabbing the frisbee, and within a few minutes of training, she had it figured out. Now we are working on distance and timing and the retrieve, but she already goes around me and gets a running start on my left. I really want to continue that. Not necessarily compete, but continue. It's fun. Mainly, I need to work on throwing :\
Teaching the "grab":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G5L_VpVjFuc
2nd or 3rd training session:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjXBfVF2t-0

An Andre. Andre is the new guy, a slightly smaller black lab. We've had him 3 weeks. He has some basic manners to get under his belt (jumps, mouths, and good lord, climbs; I came out of the kitchen today and he was standing on top of our short book shelves). But he is so people-oriented, that I think he'll make another great rally-dog, maybe even formal. He learns through context very quickly, and is so NOT distracted when we go out that he'll work for regular old kibble. He'll be a great dog when we get some of these things under control.

[call2arms]

Jack: he's 10, he's getting rusty from arthritis, and he just wants to play and play and play and doesn't care if he loses a leg in the process. So we'll play as much as possible without breaking him.
We'll also keep working on behaving on leash around other dogs, Iggy is helping a lot and we've come a long way (or he's just really getting mellow with age).

Iggy: he's a fragile little one, built by an architecht on crack or soemthing. so we'll continue with agility in hopes he doesn't bust an acl or something... aah. I know it sounds bad like this, but he looooves agility and so do I. We're moving into intermediate class next session, and it should be fun but I think I'll keep him at a measly 10 inches, and just have fun!

[Malli]

Oscar does what he wants, our big goal is to try to get him out fairly regularly for a couple block walk.

Just training with Uzi at all. I don't do it enough to make progress really, and have not refined the sit, down, and recall (though that will be difficult). More on eye contact from him and more with distraction. Particularly important for a dog that spooks easily and is really not-so-bomb proof.

[furever_pit]

Raven: Ideally she will complete her PSA PDC this year but we may push it back depending on how her training continues to progress. I'd rather take the extra time and do it right but it would still be nice to be done with it so that we can move on. I recently tested her for detection work so we will keep up with that with the end goal being certification with NTPDA.

Gigz: We are focusing on obedience and I'd like to get his BH. I may look into Rally and a handful of other obedience trials with NWDA. I would love to continue to work on his detection and PSA work but with a rather serious injury that has been put on hold indefinitely.

For myself, I would like to do a good deal more behavior modification and pet obedience rather than just focusing on the working dogs. I'd also really like to improve in my handling of the trailing dogs because I am really lackluster/inexperienced in that department currently.