dogdude

I might take puppy for a "meet & greet". Forgot to add that I am available during the week up until about the 24th after my fishing trip ends Wednesday.

I can make some of those dates Sat April 12th - Yes Sun April 13th - Yes Sat April 19th - Yes Sun April 20th - Croydon & Districts Obedience Trial (entered) Sat April 26th - No (working) Sun April 27th -No (working)

Yes. I am available after next Wed till the end of the month (on annual leave) I don't mind where we train.

Don't worry luckydog, dogs retrain quite easily most of the time. You won't have long lasting effects if you go back to square one, with the heeling exercise in particular. Each dog that you train from now on will learn faster, and will look sharper and happier in the ring as your learning curve progresses. FOO is a great place to inhale ideas (and stalk trialling gurus) ! A number of us Melbourne DOLers attend. Pitty the current FOO season just finished

Ok........Sent off my entry today (scammed more time off work)

Well done everybody for all of your achievments!!! ETA: Oscar hit some good form today, so I am hopefull of making it to the Croydon trial.

It will depend on how well you have trained focus and where the focal point is...........but clear, concise signals outside you body's silhouette are easier for your dog to read from a distance. I would think that finger signals on one hand would make things difficult.

Thanks LP I will lodge it f/t Monday. I will also post off my entry.........but I'm still not 100% happy with some of his work. Struggled to put in the time needed to polish him up cause of the new skin kid born Wed night. Missed the last FOO too!! I won't turn up on a wing and a prayer but he's really not far away.

I would be training about 4 to 5 times a day for a new exercise. The thing is not to bombard the dog with multiple exercises. Concentrate on one at a time till each one is mastered and proofed under distraction. I would imagine teaching clean up would be quite a complicated form of retrieve. Basic retrieve is complicated to teach properly on its own unless you are experienced but good luck. Keep the training sessions to about 5 to 10 minutes at the very longest. Its good that she finishes wanting more.

I plan to enter. I'm very slack and havn't applied for Oscars novice title yet though. Anybody know the turnaround time for the paperwork?

There is a dog obedience club based in Kyneton, but I don't know if they have agility equipment. Bendigo or Ballarat have eqipment but you will really have to travel to learn at a specialist club because there are not many even in Melbourne. My advice is to get as much out of good reading and the net as you can. There are many top agility trainers right here on DOL too!

This post is not aimed at any particular person. It is really aimed at newbys. Many of the common distraction based problems that you see at dog clubs are caused by poor socialization. The common conception is to let your dog play and meet as many dogs as possible which creates a dog that is less interested in you and more interested in the other dogs and what they get up to. Positive experiences with other dogs are important, but it is only a small peice of the socialization pie. The more you dog is used to the big bad world the less he will wonder about it. Male dogs are more likely to be distracted for a variety of reasons like marking/sniffing and looking for bitches and even when they are desexed they seem to be more likely to be distracted than bitches although there are exceptions. In trying to fix the distraction problem you can not simply teach your dog how to heel because that is not what you do on a leasurely walk when you actually need the dog to behave. It is a great tool to have at your disposal but basic obedience training alone will not cure the problem. You "will" build a closer bond and understanding with your dog which will definitely help get the message accross, but the dog really needs to want to be interacting with you more than anything else. This is not acheived by attacking one front. Greater success will come if you use a combination of negative and positive methods in association with desensitisation to the said distraction and a closer bond with your dog. There really is no "magic cure". All dogs will respond if you put the time and effort in to change the relationship if they are of sound mind. Building a sound relationship with your dog with something like TOT would be a great start IMO. Not a pro and some may disagree but that is what I have experienced.

Helen: That is great to hear about Geelong, but sadly focus and drive take a back seat at most clubs.....If they get taught at all The reason of course is that pet owners don't see the point of heeling (proper heeling) and they are the clubs bread and butter. Unfortunately heeling with focus doesn't teach loose lead walking (but it does help) Geelong is a good club from an outsiders point of view. They are always getting in top trainers for seminars etc, so you know they are open minded and are always looking to improve. Croydon seems quite good too JulesP. Have not heard a negative word about it.

Way to go Janba!!

One of the most common things I hear from the inexperienced people nearing trialling level at dog club is that they think their dog will be bored with obedience trialling. .....And the way the way they are taught.............any wonder!!!!!! The catch 22 though is that their handlers have to learn somewhere. I don't think I have ever met an obedience trialler that did not own up to stuffing up their first dog.

Maybe a few of should get together for another training session soon. I have three weeks off just as soon as this skin kid is born (due yesterday).

Hi Oceanaussi As Spotted Devil said (re making up the numbers). Obedience clubs (even ones that trial) are not necessarily the best place to learn trialling. They are usually torn between keeping the average jo bloe happy with keeping things simple for pet purposes, and the very precise requirements and finer points of trialling. The student then finds themselves at the crossroads after basic training and they then find that most of the exercises then have to be broken down and retaught to be competitive trialling dogs. There is also the the big and common problem of many clubs where by the time you get to trialling level, you have been taught 4 or five different methods off 4 different instructors. Great for you but your dog dosn't know if he is coming or going. A huge disadvantage of club training is that it is usually an hour long class. That is just way far too long to have a dog working with any interest. 10 minutes maximum is what is required. If you really must learn in a class, sit on the side lines with a note pad. You may feel stupid but your dog will be much better for it. Experienced triallers generally only take their new dogs to class for short socialising or distraction training. Most won't bore their dog by working an hour long class. It is important to maintain a dogs drive for trialling purposes. Drive is the key element to nearly all of the top scoring trialling dogs. It is up to the handler to promote and maintain it in their dogs to continue to be successfull. Clubs are however a starting point to finding a knowledgable trialling guru. By going to all your local trials, you will be able to work out who are the successfull ones. From there its just a matter of introducing yourself and stroke their egos a bit and beg to tag along to their training sessions. Most will be only too pleased to be someones guru, and it won't cost you a cent. Human nature is very predictable. People love the idea of telling others what to do. Especially if you are worshipping them at the same time. P.S: You are correct in saying that CCD, CD and CDX go traditionally in that order. You can however bypass CCD and go straight into CD (Novice) if you choose to. As MrsDog said though, in Q/L you need to enter Novice Sweepstakes? I am not familiar with that though. I suppose it is some kind of formal test to see if you are up to trialling level? ETA: Oops, sorry MrsD. I took too long to post this.

Yes, as stated the age restriction is 6 months. When you enter depends on what you want to acheive. Obedience school level has no relevance to trialling rules. You just need to be a paid up member of your state controlling body (CCCQ for Q/Land I think?). You do of course need to learn somewhere though. If trialling really is your final goal then I would suggest that you bypass dog school and find yourself a trialling mentor either at a trial or at a club, and ask if you can tag allong to their personal training sessions. Most won't mind one bit. There are many people who enter trials out there............and there are the TRIALLERS! Make sure you latch onto a TRIALLER ;) By starting off this way you will avoid stuffing up your first dog and avoid wasting hundreds of hours retraining your dog to get anywhere near a high score. You will know when your dog is ready to trial when he meets close to your perfect picture in every exercise. Don't just make up the numbers,..... you owe it to your dog after all that training!!!!!!!

Fantstastic news from you guys!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And a score in the 190s!! Guess we will see you in the Open ring at FOO now Glory!!!!!!!!!! Well done to Bel and Eddie!!!!!! What a great score to start off with!!! Go the Staffords!!!!!!!!!!

Hi deelee2 Ah.........If the problem is cats etc, then the problem is high prey drive that will be difficult to compete against in training without aversives. It will pay you to see a pro when the budget allows. Maybe e-collar training might be the go? No amount of food treats will compete with live prey if your dog is that way inclined.

Hi Deelee2 Unless you have trained your dog to a very high level using TOT, you can't really use it while walking your dog. Having food in your hand is different to TOT. There is no triangle in which to base it on. When you use food as reward fed from the hand, the energy and self control used in TOT is diluted due to the dog shifting his focus from "what you want" to "what he wants" (ie; where the food might be hiding on you, and when it might appear) Dogs are much more easily distracted while doing this. If the dog fails to give you focus using true TOT, then the reward is not good enough, and either more work is needed to build drive, or further proofing is required.

Sounds like he is not hungry enough? Skip a meal, and after that handfeed his meal to him when he works it out. He will soon get it. When he is sitting, stand beside him with a piece of his meal used as a lure. Get his attention by first putting it under his nose, and then let him follow it slowly down the front of his chest, onto the floor, pausing if his attention wanes while you are moving the lure down, eventually slightly in front of his feet, all the time keeping it close to his body so that if he follows it, he must crouch into a position on the floor. Mark and reward. No attention.........Not hungry enough!

deelee2 It sounds like you are confused about what TOT is designed for? It is a tool on which to base further learning off. This alone will not fix your loose lead walking. You need aversive methods to fix that.

Put your name on the list to borrow the Leerburg Tracking DVD that is in the book/dvd borrowing thread in GENERAL forum.

Hi Reddii That type of behavior will only improve if you train for it. Part and parcel of trial preparation is training at strange training grounds daily. I always go back to my "training cocoon" ground while teaching new exercises.........but when dog knows the exercises, move away to unfamiliar territory and continue your dogs socialisation and proofing by doing this. I think TOT is a fantastic grounding for focus and it is what I use. Most newby triallers that I observe at dog clubs are very inconsistant in their demands for focus. I very rarely see anybody stop during a trial run through to demand focus from their dogs. I can never understand why they would let their dogs get away with it during daily training..........but expect it during a trial. Quite simply.........the handlers who have dogs with great focus are the ones that demand it all of the time!! Focus is taught before heeling for a good reason. Without it, you are just walking the dog IMO. There are a number of ways to demand focus during training. You can lightly tap on your dogs head until you get it (mark focus and reward), or I like the way Gina O'Keefe does it by breaking off and reeling your dog in with a lure while running backwards until you regain focus, then mark and continue on by pivoting back into heel formation in the opposite direction. She also uses very basic heelwork patterns to directly target focus practice by leaving out all turns, and heeling in very large circles in both directions. I use the methods and find they give great results. Its worth noting that to maintaing a high scoring trialling dog, it is important that you plan your training to pay attention to going over the very basic elements of each exercise even when the dog knows what he is doing. Don't assume that your dog will do it picture perfect every time because if you fail to go over old ground, your dog will lose his sharpe edge over time. I have seen many previously high scoring dogs peter out for that reason. Pick on one previously learned exersise a week (be it turns, recall, focus...whatever) and make it his be all and end all before he gets his meal to keep it interesting.