Vickie

I think most clubs are still on holidays... Maybe a bad choice of words. Wool flying is exactly what you DON"T want to see.

I am just wondering whether some of the agility exercises done with puppies would be useful for him. There are a number of exercises that can be done to teach rear end awareness in pups. Things to help them understand where their body is & how to use it. I will go & have a look for some articles. I guess they can't do any harm. Do you take him for walks in the bush? Things like creeks, logs, slopes & ditches etc? Walks like that can be good for pups, as opposed to open flat areas. And the bonus is, if they are not able to negotiate things correctly. they run into water & branches, rather than into you, LOL.

Agree about the motivation bring focus (exclusion of surrounding). I don't do agility, so prehaps I'm off base here, but isn't it the case that agility courses are set up in much the same way wherever you go, weave poles always to the left of the tunnel or whatever. In which case, the layout of the course is familar to the dog, even if the location is not, and that familarity helps the dog with it's routine. Just a thought, like I say, I'm clueless about agility. No the courses are always completely different everywhere you train & trial. The dogs shouldn't need familiarity with the course nor the location, their sole objective is to get direction from you. There is no time to look around nor is there any interest in that, they are 100% focussed on where your shoulders are pointing & which obstacle you are telling them will be next. That's the plan anyway I do however think it works the other way...my dogs know they are going to do agility when we go to certain places, they know by what I pack in the car, by what I am wearing & by seeing the equipment on the ground. I have a friend who brings one of her dogs to my house. Since that dog assocaiates my house & me with agility, she will immediately go to my backyard & find a piece of equipment to do a contact on. If there is nothing available...she uses my childrens slippery dip. She will wait there...up to 40 mins if we let her...just anticipating a command .

I don't do obedience, as you know, so you can take this with a grain of salt, LOL, but I certainly train & run my dogs in a lot of different environments. I think you need to address the issue with the OH first, because I predict that it is all linked in together & if you can solve that, other things will fall into place. Is it possible that he is using your OH as avoidance to the exercise? What happens if you train in your backyard & your OH is there watching? Compared to a familiar training ground, compared to an unfamiliar one? What if OH is sitting right in the middle of your training session at home & you & Diesel have to literally work around him? Personally I would work on upping the ante (as others have suggested) in a familiar environment before asking for too much elsewhere and then take it slowly from there. I don't think "simple" exercises should be the key when you start going to a new location, I think it should be the most "enjoyable" exercises for him...often they will be different to the simple ones. Another thought... If you asked Diesel what he expected would happen when he goes to a new place. what would his response be? For most dogs, it would go something like this: "Usually when we go to a ground/park, it is for a an offleash run, I get to investigate, sniff, run like a loony & play with other dogs". I think it's similar in agility, the people I see who have distracted dogs in training are often the ones who let their dogs play on the ground before & after the class. I think that's kind of confusing for some dogs. I also think it depends on their level of motivation for what they are doing. It is much easier in agility than obedience because I think most dogs are generally more likely to be rewarded by doing the agility, often so much so that they hardly even notice they are in a new location. JMO Vickie

That is ADORABLE Emmark! Very cute, both of them!

Ben & Trim sharing breakfast:

I just found this on my old computer. I thought it was pretty cute, LOL, especially extracting the toy from the swimmers at the end.

:D Well the good news is that although places are awarded, you are really competing against the course, not each other. That was a fairly common Novice course, just 2 big loops & not many places to go wrong. Maybe by the time you have trained your 3rd dog you will feel differently. I sure did.

I feel exactly the same way. Dogs can & need to learn to watch where they're going. Mine certainly know it if they run into me.

Just wondering what software people use to get their videos from their camera onto the web? I downloaded Windows Media Encoder which was free. I don't fully understand it (just got it right once & kept that setting, LOL), but can produce a Wmv file from pretty much anything & can produce the size by about a sixth, although I lose significant quality. What does everyone else use? Do you encode & reduce the file size? Any tips would be great.

;) Well that's your story and you're sticking to it right?

;) that is hilarious! Is it the same vacuum cleaner...or did you have to get a new one?

Was just thinking as well, now that we have a video forum we can use it for discussion in between meets.

Cool, it'll be great to catch up. I'm assuming the foot is good? So that makes 14 people & 20 dogs!!! COOL! We need to come up with a date. Any ideas? Maybe we can do sessions over a day, for the different levels?

Very nice runs FHR, I have always admired how smooth your handling is and these clips are perfect examples of that. I can't believe how high the jumps look & the table looks enormous, thank god for new height rules!

Thanks. I'll get some of her doing just weavers soon, I'd like to see it anyway. RFP (reverse flow pivot) is basically a false turn, kind of like tricking the dog. You can't really see it on the video but for the last tunnel, either end was an option for her. So I rotated (way over done) away from the one she was supposed to take to make sure she didn't go in the other one, as I got her attention I turned back & sent her in the correct end. It is a very useful move when they have more than one option in front of them. Since then I have learnt a few other tricks that I find more effective, so tend not to use them too much, but they are good to know.

It will fly by so fast you will start to hate the thought of each day as she ages. My "babies" are already 10 years and are at the opposite end of their agility careers. Hardest part about that is that their mind still says Yes while their bodies slowly fail. All the while they are watching my younger dog & will soon be watching my pup as well. It's very sad for them.

Please ignore my ridiculously overdone & unnecessary RFP at the end. It's something we had been working on & I wanted to try it in a trial .

This is Trim just over a year ago...it was our first weekend of trialling & she got her Novice Agility Title and won the ring for each run. I know the quality is poor, LOL, my friend taped her & had never seen agility before, so missed the first couple of obstacles. I have some more recent runs where she/we are more experienced, will try to load on Youtube over the next week

This is incredibly old, she had only been on sheep a few times, but about all I have & since no-one else has posted, I thought I'd put it up. I have a video camera again now so hopefully will get some stuff in the next few months

I hope to. I have somewhere to stay, 5 mins away...just need to work out how I will get there. Would love to drive & do some photography along the way. No need to worry about confusing mine WL it's fun to run an experienced dog. They keep you honest. Noah really is a bit psycho, but despite getting old, he's still fast & if you don't get your timing right, he's gone Zeus is a lot more steady, dependable & much more forgiving. The terriers :p

Some gals have all the luck in life! Mine has never even once bothered to watch, needs to mow the lawn everytime I set up equipment & lied about posting my Fundraiser trial entries ;) . Wanna swap???

WOW! Sounds like we have have equipment pretty much covered. It might be worth finding somewhere to train that will suit everyone. Here is a list, let me know if I have it wrong. I also added what I know of dogs, seems like we have a pretty good cross section & enough pups to do some puppy work. D=Dog, H=Handler, A=Advanced, I=Intermendiate, B=Beginner, P=Pup Vickie - Nthn Districts - HA, DA, DP Sidoney - Western - HA, HB, DA, DA, DI, DB SnoopyJocks - Nthn Districts - HI, DI Myszka - Southern - HI, DI, DP Kavik - Nth Shore - HI, DP LmyWS - SouthWest - HB, DB Squeak - ? - ????? Maverick - Nthn Beaches - HA, DA, DA Westielover - Nthn Districts - HB, DB, DB SAS - Nthn Districts - HB, DB Dougal - Nth Shore - HB, HB, DB, DB Dasha - Western - HA, DA, DI I also have 2 older dogs who I am willing to lend for basic stuff to anyone who wants to have a go at running a trained dog (Zeus) or slightly psychotic (Noah).

I agree, it could be a heap of fun! I will keep a list of names & pm everyone who is interested next time we plan one...maybe we should aim for sooner rather than later. I think we can do any/all levels and we will bring different ideas together from various places. Just so everyone knows, we don't have a full set of equipment, but each of us have bits & pieces. I could certainly work effectively for the next year just with the few things I have. If you want to be added to the list, either pm me, or add your name as a reply.

I still think you would be better with just one visit to a behaviouralist/trainer to assess him. Maybe he's just being a stubborn pig & maybe not. I can't see how anyone can really diagnose it over the web. But, if there is something else going on...and you start really correcting him, you are just adding another potentially damaging training tool to the list of methods you have tried to get him to drop. You could end up with more problems & if they effect his eating issue...health risks as well. JMO.