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Thank you for posting this. I loved watching this session. I have a couple thoughts that might help with the tug work. The tug in this video looked smaller than the tug in the last video. It might be easier to use the wider tug for now, as it will make it less likely that she will shift to the straps. It will be easier to keep her more room to put her mouth. It also may help to use something softer for her young mouth and build up to a harder tug.
I did notice that there were a few times where she did try to pull the tug away from you, but that wasn’t rewarded so she tries something else. If you want her to tug and learn to pull away from you, you want to reward her anytime she starts to do that even if it’s just the smallest amount. At first, you may need to let go of the tug and praise her up just for putting her mouth on it and holding it for a second. Another way that you can help encourage this is: instead of moving the tug side to side and swinging her around, you just put slight back pressure and release and praise as soon as you feel the slightest resistance back.
I have some videos I can share but an easy way to think of it is the handler should not be creating the motion. The dog should be creating the motion. The handler should just be back pressure and resistance, this will make it easier for her to hold on to apply pressure to the tug. It will also make it easier for her to bite a non-moving target.
Once she understands this, then you can start coaching and rewarding her for driving in. Depending on what you are trying to teach, but whatever you reward is what you’re going to get, so it’s helpful to set them up to do the behavior that we want so we can reward it often. Hope this helps.
I did notice a difference in her response to the leash as you had it ready to go in your hand it looked really clean!!!
Something to consider about Koka’s growling is that if her growl is being ignored, and the item is still being removed it can create conflict in the relationship. Even though her growling may not escalate with you, I would encourage the same training, goals and expectations of trading her for the item or giving her a command to move away from it so that cynopraxis is still nurtured in your interactions with her. This may eliminate her feeling the need to growl as her perception will change.
