Vickie

I do that every run! Maybe that's why we DQ so much!

When you ask him just for the end position, how fast/enthusiastic is he? Not saying you've done this, but I see lots of people getting their dogs running super fast over a DW, but the dog is slowish to assume 2o2o on the plank. Once they are put together, the dog starts fast but slows on the descent to get into position as that is what has been practised. Also how much have you proofed 2o2o on the plank? I find that if the dog has a super understanding of position, they are more confident driving into it. If there is any uncertainty about position, the dog will always slow going into it.

Difficult to say without seeing the dog. When you put him back in at a trial does he do them perfectly? Or does he still fail? Are your home & training weaves the same as trial weaves? Lots of dogs learn on flexible poles & then do not like the rigid poles that trials have. If his biggest reward is truly to continue the course then that is a problem that I would work on first and the weave issue should resolve itself. Does he hold contacts in trials? Startlines? Is he taking off course tunnels? If the answer to all of these is no, then I suspect it's a weave issue, rather than him finding the course more rewarding. My approach to things like this is always to break them in training first. You need to get him hyped enough in training that he blows the weaves. Then you can provide consequences that you can use in a trial. Those consequences really depend on the drive & temperament of the dog. I have successfully worked through this exact issue with someone's dog and what worked for her was to remove her from the ring (without any emotion whatsoever) if she refused to attempt the weaves. We did it in training first so she knew what to expect. It only took a couple of trials to fix & she was weaving full speed in the ring.

Or those judges who have never trialled or trained an agility dog...

I think there are a couple of prerequisites to being able to drive hard around a course. One is that it relies heavily on being able to read your dogs commitment to lines & obstacles. Mostly we tend to hang on, well after our dog is committed, allowing them to jump long or wide. The thing is, the harder you drive, often the earlier their commitment is. Pair that with a large striding dog and it can get difficult. The other is how much your dog actually understands your cues. I find that the harder I drive, the more I need to exaggerate the turning cues. With my young dogs, I often need to stop and reward their response to a cue, such as decel, recall to hand etc. then when we put it back together it seems to work better.

Elsie looks great Discodobe

Choice of judges will impact my decision as well.

The best advice I ever got was that any pup in a litter has the potential to carry the best traits of each parent or the worst traits of each parent or a mix of both. It's a lucky dip if you breed 2 dogs who have different strengths & weaknesses and if you can't live with the possibility of the worst traits of each combined, then it's a bad choice for you. Obviously if both parents & grandparents have optimum & similar desirable traits, there should be very little variation & not much left to chance.

What a great video :) nice dog!

Everything you do with a puppy should be in preparation for later life. Start as you mean to go on. I would no more encourage my puppy to bite me than I would encourage it to poo on my bed. Neither is a behaviour I want from it in the future. Would it be acceptable if she initiated a game of play fighting with another person? A friend's child? Your child?Would it be acceptable when she's 10 weeks? 6 months? 6 years? There are 1000 constructive things to teach & do with a puppy, I would focus on those.

Yes. When I am teaching something to one, I put the other 4 away. The dog I am teaching needs & deserves my full attention. Occasionally I expect the other 4 to sit & watch, but only when I am practicing, rather than teaching & only once they have a solid stay. As your hand moves towards her with the food, watch her feet. If any feet move, pull your hand back. She will soon learn that the only way the food makes it all the way to her mouth is to keep her feet still. This really works!

The green stuff arrived a couple of weeks ago, thank goodness. I was starting to worry about my dogs legs going down the massive cracks that were forming Actually I probably left her too soon, she slowed down a bit as I had to decel for the 2nd jump after weaves cause I got there too early. Sounds like a good plan! Yes, heaps of Australians :). Seems we are starved for ideas

Thanks Sheena, you would definitely be able to remember it if you broke it down :). That's what I did.Re weaves, just lots of proofing I guess + the fact that she's been weaving for nearly 8 years .

Is anyone else doing the Happy Hurdle courses from Ann Croft? Such a great idea ,every week on a Wednesday, she posts a course on her Ann Croft Agility Coach facebook page. Then people all over the world post clips of their attempts. Very interesting to see the different handling styles & choices. The courses are mostly very challenging, but well worth breaking down. Here is our latest attempt...I found it a very challenging course & needed to break it down before I could put it together, even though Trim is an experienced dog. Just did bits & pieces with the pups

For tunnel work, you could improvise with a large rectangular cardboard box, or buy something cheap, like the blue ones on eBay Not really a fan of circle work, so can't help you there And for the stay, just take it slowly. Put her in a sit & feed her while you move around her. Resist the urge to move away until she is really solid and not moving her front feet while you feed her. Once she is solid, take one small step and move back immediately to feed her. One solid on that, 2 steps etc. I was trying to find a YouTube clip which showed teaching a good stay, but couldn't find any I liked.

Agree! It's not something I would do, but honestly the last thing we need is authorities making general laws to further limit the places we can take our dogs! And It is already hard enough to get the RSPCA to respond & act in cases of genuine cruelty, wasting their time with things like this is probably why.

Another one here who would strongly advise against training with a harness. I would suggest that if he is wandering off between exercises that your reward system is nowhere near high enough to be doing too much agility yet, especially anything of a complex nature. There are SOOOOO many things you can do to change this without the need to run him in a harness.

WOW! Amazing pics, the colours & detail are spectacular

Awesome weaving RS Pippa looks like a lot of fun!

I have a bunch of fetch obsessed dogs here. I do 3 things Use their games for training. I notice if I have been slack with training as the fetch requests increase :) I teach them "That'll do". I have a hanging pot on my back deck. Every time they bring me something (and i cant/dont want to play) I say that'll do, stand up & put the object in the pot. Initially i might do it for 40+ minutes. The older dogs now understand this...the younger ones still need some work . However this command never seems to work for visitors, so... I crate or pen them so they don't drive visitors crazy.

This may be simplistic, but I like to think teaching self control is as simple as first building desire for reward and then offering or withholding that reward based on the dogs responses/behaviour.

Was watching a Michael Ellis clip the other day. He was talking about the fact that teaching behaviour once you have engagement/focus is really easy. Teaching them without it can be very hard and can do a lot of damage to the behaviours and relationship. So true! So often people try to get focus because training is not working, rather than using focus as a starting point. These are the ones you see begging their dogs to stay or play with them during training. It's bloody hard work!

A few things to add... As handlers, we need to be prepared to give as much (or more) focus to our dogs as we are wanting to receive from them. The habit many handlers have of delivering a single reward & then disconnecting from their dog even for a few seconds promotes lack of focus in dogs. Rather than deal with distractions as they come up, it is better to set them up so that the handler is expecting the distraction & has some control over it. Extended focus needs to be trained gradually and needs to be continually rewarded. We tend to skip from rewarding every 1-2 steps in the beginning & then once the behaviour is starting to look good, we think we only need to reward at the end of exercises. It is always good to go back to foundation engagement exercises...even with mature, obedient & trained dogs.