We tried a new marking drill- double doubles. It is just as it sounds, you set up a double and run it twice reversing the direction of the memory birds and go birds. You get a lot of concepts in one- swing right, swing left (either can happen in the field and they are each hard for different reasons), different angles in a different order, long short vs short long (the short is a breaking bird that makes them want to break) etc.
It is a new concept so I set it up simple with a short angle in left to right and a long flat angle right to left through simple terrain, they could see them both come down.
One of my Thunder launchers was malfunctioning (these things are touchy) which messed up Q’s second double, I had to rerun it and the short mark was just a weak little pop but he still saw it so I sent him, he did an awesome job stayed steady for both doubles went right to all but the first memory bird which he hunted for a little, he was super fast on all, with his main issue being over-enthusiasm at the line… I’ll take it! … but I do need to work on those manners. In training I have the dog hold the dummy until I send them for their next retrieve, this keeps them focused for training but out in the real world I don’t do it.
Prinz did a great job I made a judgment call to handle him to the first go bird because the Thunder launcher malfunctioned causing the bumper to land right next to the machine, it’s never done that and he was looking far and wide so I sat him and have him one cast, he took it beautifully! Nailed his memory bird. Second double, he thought, for the go bird I just did this (it was the memory bird from the first double), went the wrong way but I didn’t let him switch marks, he took a really nice cast from about 100 yards I was impressed (even though he had messed up), and nailed the memory bird from the malfunctioning machine.
video will be posted to the YouTube channel, we will definitely be doing this concept a lot.
Starting to see strengths and weaknesses differences between the two dogs. Love seeing how happy they are with tails wagging and really enjoying themselves even though I challenged them.