Chris & Bits, 1 year old Toller, Canada

What a handsome girl and cool name! 🙂 Poke me went really well! You have nice feeling and timing. Given that she is food obsessed it is not a game you have to do a lot, unless you feel like she could benefit from being more confident and pushy overall. Generally I would just “throw it in” now in a mix with food throws and hide and seek, so that she is familiar with this concept if you want to use as a special reward sometimes.
Food pocket – I see two things happening in this session. In the beginning she was getting into searching for and trying to get to the food on her own – but at one point (as you noticed) it got a bit too much for her so she switched from natural curiosity and “hunting” behaviour to trying to guess what you like and “offering” behaviours to you. Both those things are useful – but for now I would like to focus on the first one, so we can really allow and encourage her drive to turn on. I wouldn’t worry about her not putting it in her mouth at the moment – because as soon as she is clear to hear that it is up to her to catch it to enjoy it, she will be more determinate and when the toy starts to move faster, she will use her mouth because paws won’t do the trick anymore. So for now just focus on being as much “out of the picture” as possible – move the toy really slowly at first you can also do just tiny jerky moves and pause it. Like fish flapping on land… You can fill the pocket full, so you don’t have to take it up in between repetitions. Just gently push her away with one hand while you move the toy with the other to start the next chase. When you feel she is getting more and more involved, slowly speed up the chase, but just straight lines, don’t change directions yet. If it gets too much for her at some point, just let the toy rest on the ground for a while and reward her when she goes to sniff it again.

Really great improvement with the food pocket! She is much more intense and “into it”, not anymore trying to figure out what is it that you want from her. You can see that in how determinately she goes after the bag and she doesn’t let go if it is not hers to use immediately. When you see that attitude you can easily try one round of a much faster chase, just make sure you don’t tease her by swiping the toy left and right in front of her nose – at first make the chase fast but straight and let go as soon as she bites into it.

Food throws – nice, I can see she knows this one as she engages immediately after getting each one. You can make it a faster game when you have the space available – throw one, run as far as you can get while she is after that first treat and when she is catching up with you (but before she really does), throw the next one, than turn around and repeat… 🙂 The goal is to develop as much speed as possible even just using food. When you are about to stop (because it is quite tiresome if done correctly – up to 5 reps are enough in one go), you can throw on ein the air as she is passing.

Barking – yes tollers are known for their screaming so I get that you are not trying to encourage that. 🙂 We can try to “shape it out” starting somwhere where she doesn’t get as excited as in agility ring. Will she jump on you in other situations? If she does, we can try setting up engagement game in a way that encourages that and mark and reward it every time it happens. If she doesn’t normally do it, we should teaching it first. In the mean time when she is engaged and about to/already starting to bark, you can lure her/ask her to do a different behavior, such as nose touch, figure 8 between your legs or even just lie down/sit/stand or a random combination of those.

Yes, nice progress with food pocket! Based on her enthusiasm I would say she is at a point where you can upgrade the chase to what is pretty much a normal toy chase – just make sure you give her enough fair chances to catch it and not jerk it out of her reach too often in a row. Changing direction sometimes is perfectly fine to present some challenge and provoke her a little… but than offer her a nice straight chase (where you just run away dragging the toy behind) so she can catch it.

“Question, do we need to be careful about marking?”
Good question. But the main thing that will prevent early releases is to stick to the rule that she has to win the toy first and than get a treat. So if she releases before you had planned to let it go, don’t give her food, have her catch it again. She needs to know that the objective here is not to please you but to catch the toy and fight for it until she wins it. So for example after 2.10 when she releases… just have the toy escape again. That is the most important part of this game. It is not trying to guess what pleases the owner but focusing on catching the “pray”.

And yes, food throws looking good! When you have a chance you can include a tunnel or a jump and have her run through/over on the way to each throw. It is not exact training, so don’t correct her if she misses… just try to help her more the next time. Dogs usually miss if the distance between where they pick up the treat and the obstacle is too small, so when they turn to follow you, they get out of line.