Kavik

My DA dog is only leash walked. I also do some training off leash in my backyard (which is a decent size) - agility and fetch - I have a decent amount of agility equipment now. Very occasionally I will let her off in a small park that is rarely used if nobody is there and throw the ball a couple of times, but then it is right back on leash, I don't let her wander off leash at all. That is the price for being aggressive.

Interestingly I have not done any grid work with Kaos, and I don't have a bar knocking or jump style problem. I do need to work on teaching him to jump tight, as he tends to jump long, but that is another issue altogether

Sharp, sudden noise?

Maybe you are aiming too high at the start. Shaping can be frustrating Have you tried: 1) Clicking for any movement of her feet. When she lifts them at all. When she takes a step. or 2) using the felt circle, shape her touching it with her paw. So click for going near the felt, increase criteria til stepping on it. Ignore her attempts to nose touch it (she will try) only reward for foot movement. Reward for stepping closer to it if she won't step on it. Shaping is using baby steps, especially at the beginning.

Totally agree dobesrock! I think my dogs cried for a little bit for a few nights when I brought them home - nothing compared to the MONTHS of sleep deprivation and hours of crying a day with my son!

I was not remotely interested in having kids until recently - but had always wanted lots of dogs! I'd always daydreamed about having lots of dogs and training them etc and NEVER did this about kids - if you had told me 10 years ago I would have a kid I would have laughed at you Dogs are SO much easier! Once you train them they listen to you for a start and don't need 24/7 supervision. And when you train and work with them it is like teamwork.

Looks great! :D

Pepe is amazing! Such a pocket rocket!

The legginess and proportions suggest the look of a Brittany to me. She looks really pretty

Zoe does: Crawl Beg Bow Spin 'Bang' (play dead) 'Dance' (stand on hind legs) Touch (touch target with nose) has started walking backwards but haven't put it on cue yet Kaos does: Spin Touch (touch target with nose) walks backwards but I haven't put it on cue yet

Is everything OK koalathebear?

Thank you for the detailed reply stormie

Thanks guys Will send off the application now I know what to do lol. Good luck nikivds in dog of the year with Pepe! Are you in Jumping, Agility or both?

Thanks poodlefan we had lots of fun and it was great to have friends cheering me on

We got our JD title on the weekend! This is the first title I have gotten from DogsNSW and I am trying to work out the form. It says Date/Affiliate Name/Judge/Points/Qualifications etc So what do I put under Affiliate Name and Points/Qualifications? And how long does it normally take for them to process it and send it out to you? What do I do in the meantime if I want to enter a trial? I want to enter the Festival of Agility next week.

Agree with poodlefan - start with an area with less distractions and work up to markets - they are very distracting! Some focus work would help too ;) I love my clicker for busy situations.

Susan Garrett's Success With One Jump DVD The exercises are designed to teach the dog to find their line and to focus on the obstacles as well as handling techniques.

Those A-Frames did not look like early release 2o2o as the dog clearly leapt off from about halfway or just above halfway on the contact. Or maybe I just haven't watched early release contacts enough.

I've never done another course with as many tunnels :D Was a lot of fun! Well done amypie!

Well done everyone! Big brag for us this weekend - at the Northern Suburbs agility trial we got our 3rd Novice Jumping pass - giving us our JD title! :D Very fun Novice courses from Le with 5 tunnels - the dogs had a ball

Here is Susan Garrett - the seesaw is just amazing She does the nose touch for dogwalk and seesaw. I think she has running A-Frame?

Hey she will nose it, that is great You could use that for targeting. click/treat when she puts her nose to your hand. While you want them to offer behaviours you also then want to refine them - you don't want them offering random behaviours to a presented object forever. I like to go into a session with an idea in my head of what I want to achieve that session. Sometimes you have to be quite precise - when teaching walking backwards I stared intently at legs and c/t for any movement, then movement backwards. Any, small movements in the right direction are good to start. To get an idea of what it is like for the dog, get someone to clicker train you or you clicker train another person. Have an idea in your head what you want them to do - say lift their right hand up in the air, and later to refine that into doing circles with their right arm or something. Will give you an idea how difficult it is for the dog.

I think there are also ones that squirt a jet of cold air?

Here is another useful article http://www.clickersolutions.com/articles/2...gtheclicker.htm

That's a really good point. Interestingly though, since I got Xena's AAC title (Aust Agility Champion in ADAA) winning has started to matter. Not because I want to beat other dogs, but because now that we have 'all' our titles (I know I can get multiples) it is a good way to measure our progress. Divorced from the contact discussion I've started to look for more speed on course - I'm finding that the 'extra' steps Xena takes because of my handling make a MASSIVE difference. eg: 2 steps past a jump, turn, 2 steps back - .8 of a second. Do it 3 times on a course - 2.4 seconds. That's our goal for the next 12 months - to get rid of all the 'extra' time we lose on courses. For sure once you are doing well, you are going to start to look for placings! And you are going to start getting hungry for placings. But in order to get titles, while speed is important to an extent as it is not necessary to place, there is not the need to be as fast. I certainly plan on getting faster (me and dog!) and to tidy up those areas where we lose time and ground, but luckily they will not interfere with getting some titles in the meantime. At the moment I am trying to speed up Kaos's dogwalk and get him to go all the way into his 2o2o instead of stopping 4on. At trials at the moment this means actually taking more time and waiting him out until he does his 2o2o while I figure out a strategy for training where he doesn't tend to stop 4on as much.