Last night's target training went really well. For both feeders, he moved his whole body a short distance to the target before I fed him. I'd say this puts him at stage 4. Stages 5, 6 & 7 basically entail making him travel progressively further to the target before he's fed. I'm confident we can do that.
The reason I'm so excited is that two weeks ago he didn't really react to the target at all, so I just fed him with the target present (stage 1). I started to doubt my ability to do this, but, then, last week, I was shocked when Wiggles struck at the target twice. I realized, "Ah, so you do know what the target means." Armed with that realization, I was much more patient this week. When I presented the target, Wiggles just stared at me. I said to myself, "Be patient. He knows what the target means." It was only a couple minutes before he broke. He started to move toward the target. I fed him when he reached it. It went the same with the second feeder.
My problem was that I lacked the confidence to be patient. I've never done this before. It's easy to doubt that I'm doing it correctly. I see now that I am doing it correctly, and Wiggles is progressing. Armed with that confidence, I know I'll have the patience necessary to see Wiggles through the final stages of his training and I'm very excited about that.
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