kelpiechick

There is both Warragul AND Warringal in the files list. And no problem with the format on mine ??? Warringal's is also included on the club website. Warragul's is usually included on the club website, but not this year for some reason? Now I'm getting confused - LOL. Problem with having to go to the files list is that it is in some sort of strange random order, not sequential so is a pain in the butt trying to find exactly what you want. And once a club has a file, they keep adding info. in the same file so you may have to scroll down quite a bit to find what you want. Heidii, it's free to join Agility Victoria list (another yahoo group) and might be worthwhile for you if you are planning on doing any more trials in Victoria - especially as the 'holy grail' website has now gone - HATE the idea of now having to look elsewhere for trial schedules as it was brilliant having everything you needed in the one place and easy to access. Hopefully someone will take on the job of creating another one if Pam doesn't want to get it up and running again - and I believe it's a bit of a thankless task, so don't blame her once Geocities folded. Wouldn't it be great having one website Australia wide, divided up into states, that you could then find all trial information, schedules, etc. for the whole country????? I can dream, can't I.

If you're getting a 'handstand' at the end of the AFrame, then your dog doesn't have its weight back on the rear enough. I would try to do some more foundation exercises to teach dog to get its weight back- as weight to the front can cause shoulder damage down the track. If you have access to Clean Run there have been a few articles over the last couple of years from memory that dealt with this. If you have taught your dog to shift its weight back when tugging then tugging in position on the end of the frame can also be helpful. Also get someone experienced to look at the position of your target to make sure it's not too far away from the end. Also best for someone to actually see your contact performance before advising whether to switch to running or not - not something I would do on a forum.

You don't need to go all the way to Queensland for bottle crunchers either My kelpies must be strange - neither of them are in the least bit interested in the i-squeaks I got them last time there was free postage, new puppy is pretty mad for them though.

Have you only tried the Black Dog version? While I am a huge fan of Black Dog products in general, I don't especially like their halters and neither did the 2 of my dogs who are 'halter trained'. Unlike some others, I am a big fan of halters - when used correctly with the right dogs, but just like all tools they certainly don't suit all dogs, which is why only 2 of my 4 adults were trained to walk on them - and phased out when no longer necessary. Susan Garrett has a really good article about conditioning head collars, titled 'Falling in Like with a Head Collar' - not sure if it is available free on her website or not but you could try : www.clickerdogs.com With a dog that resisted wearing it to a large degree, I would be starting with very short sessions in familiar locations and tons of reinforcement at first and then re-assess if you think it is going to be 'doable'/ the right tool or not.

Well Aidan, yours must be very different to mine - I tried to clicker train mine during a brief period of insanity and gave up after a couple of weeks. It certainly wasn't 'easy'. He was the most stubborn, cranky goat that showed no initiative to offer any behaviours, or indeed move at all for that matter (despite a fair bit of luring which goes against my instincts as a clicker trainer) and liked to head butt you if the treat wasn't forthcoming quick enough. Almost made me question my clicker training ability. Bob Bailey may have been able to train a chicken to weave but I couldn't train a goat to go through a gate. My horse has been a lot easier though. Good Luck with it. Maybe breeds of goat vary like breeds of dogs - with some being the 'BC's' of the goat world and others like my Angora male being the *won't name a dog breed at the fear of offending others !

But doing the above, isn't that rewarding the dog for looking at whatever distraction? I thought clickers were supposed to mark desirable behaviours? The 'Look at that' game is more for reactive dogs rather than simply building focus although it does help to build focus by default. McDevitt (author) uses it with dogs that react around other dogs - she believes that with a lot of counter-conditioning the focus is on getting reactive dogs to ignore their 'triggers' and look at handler instead, (training an incompatible behaviour) which she describes as a band aid approach. With her approach, the click is to reward the dog for looking at their trigger with no reaction and then looking back to handler. This description is simplifying it a bit, you need to read the whole thing, but I agree that it is an excellent resource and not just for reactive dogs. Lots of great games to help build focus.

Murray's ladder has adjustable rungs so might be worthwhile looking into one like that - or he may be able to design something specific for you as he is good like that. Would a physio disc/balance disc help at all? My older kelpie broke his leg a couple of years back and now runs with no flexion in one wrist joint so I am forever working on stuff like that. (Poor thing can only turn in one direction and struggles the other way - some Masters courses are nightmares ) Maybe you could teach her to back up onto the disc??? Hart Sport have some good prices with these. How tragic to have to go through that with both your dogs - hope it all works out with Dyzney. Your mention of Robyn is a 'blast from the past' too - haven't seen her around a ring for a long time and coming up through Novice and Excellent she was one of my favourite judges.

I wouldn't bother going to the expense to buy them - and don't tell Murray that I am trying to do him out of a sale - LOL ! If you are using them to train rear end awareness, etc. all you need are some standard jump bars with one end raised up off the ground - I use empty drink cans with the middle pushed in a bit. ( have also used these when teaching class at ADCV.) If you are using them to train jump grids, you can also use them with a can on either side, although jump bumps would be a lot safer as they don't displace if the dog steps on them. (Large diameter PVC sawed in half lengthwise, like a stride regulator) These tend to have replaced most cavaletti in the dog world now as they are safer. You can also make them yourself from wood. Two thin bits about 20cm or so, screwed together to make an X - one of these for each end. Then another piece glued into the middle for the 'bar.' Nancy Gyes uses these at Power Paws - if you google 'Power Paws Agility' there may be a photo of them somewhere on their site. If you have access to the very first 'Agility in Motion' DVD there was a segment where she demonstrated exercises using them. The beauty of these was that she had angled the X pieces so that the cavaletti could be 2 different heights depending on which way you turned them over. What did you want to use them for? We rarely use cavaletti at ADCV any more as there are ways to teach rear end awareness, foot placement, jumping etc. that use different equipment and in general are probably safer and just as effective. Edited to add - should read other people's posts in full first ! I just looked at Kavik's link and they are exactly like the ones from Powerpaws - except theirs are wooden. I have been at ADCV for quite a few years and I have never seen anything like what you are describing, except possibly for our ladder ???????? Two large PVC lengths with displaceable rungs so you can angle the rungs all over the place like cavaletti if you want. Would this be what you mean? This would also be fairly simple to make - it just has some offcuts of small PVC bits attached at intervals along the top of each side bit to hold the rungs and the rungs are loose - you slot them in wherever you like. Love the photo BTW. Think I can remember Ruby - she was running in Masters when I first started out as a beginner with my BC X (now retired, where did the time go????)

And ours is even more 'elitist' in that only the top 10 dogs are able to qualify and run off. So apart from a small number of outstanding dogs here that truly deserve to qualify, it almost becomes a roll call of who attends the most trials. I also much prefer NSW system. Not that I am ever going to get back to trialling again at the rate I am going ........... but it would be much more exciting to have such a wide open field as NSW appears to have.

All the 'agility only' clubs have a waiting list at the moment, so you would need to look for an obedience club that trains agility if you wanted to start now. What area of Melbourne are you in? If you are willing to wait until early next year and Melbourne's north is not too far away you could possibly join a potential new 'agility only' club to do foundation work. There will only be 6 places in the first foundation course and 3 are filled already so PM me if you would like more details.

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At only 50% accuracy I would be considering 'backing up' and going back to really work those entries with 2, then 4 poles. The thing about this method is that once your dog truly understands the entry, they should pretty much never miss it and certainly not 50% of the time. They might still be making errors with skipping poles along the way, but not the with the actual entries. (This is what I found anyway) The fact that you have noticed that he is moving really well when he does it also suggests to me that he is understanding the weaving process but not necessarily the entries, which are the holy grail of 2X2's. I wouldn't be using a clicker, I use a clicker in agility training but not with the weaves, no matter the method. There are just too many variables at play to ensure that you are actually clicking what you want, whether entries, staying in poles, speed, footwork, etc, so I don't find it practical in this area. (Not to mention detracting from driving down the reinforcement line, as Garrett says) Can I play 'devil's advocate' and ask a few questions........... Have you followed the process exactly? I know I posted an opinion on this topic a while back that appeared to offend some people when I suggested that this is not a method that leaves itself open to 'tweaking' as other methods sometimes do - and I stand by this opinion. You need the DVD, plus the e book plus Susan's website/blog combined to get the most out of this method - I am a massive SG fan but in all honesty I think there were a couple of things that weren't fully explained in the DVD. Anyone running the Greg Derrett system of handling (as she does) would not find that it mattered (has to do with which side of the poles/dog you stand on so as not to flick your dog away toward the poles) but you only have to have a look on youtube to see just how much 2X2 training is being done very badly- so obviously it isn't fully understood by everyone. In the early days of her blog she posted footage that had been sent to her of 2X2 weave training and critiqued it (with permission) This was extremely helpful to me and you can most likely still access it. Have you kept detailed records not just relating to reinforcement, success rate, etc. but also relating to your position when your dog went into poles, whether you were stationery, moving, etc. This might reveal a pattern to missing the entries. Have you worked both 2 and 4 poles in different locations before adding more poles? With distractions? Where is your dog looking when he enters the poles? Can you get some video footage to help you with this. This can be 'eye opening'. Have you created your reinforcement line strongly enough ? Is there too much value associated with finding the reinforcement line for your dog so that the entry is 'rushed' in order to get to reinforcement line? (eg: dog doesn't fully understand the connection between the two) Is there a particular reason why you want to teach this method? I'm not sure how experienced you are and whether or not this is the first dog you have trained to weave, but you can certainly still get good results with other methods (as I said, I am playing devil's advocate here - I love the 2X2 method) But other methods still work and will give you more 'support' in many ways as there are still not too many teaching 2X2's in Vic. from what I can gather, only know of a handful of poeple. I taught my youngest kelpie to weave using the channel method, then once he could weave 12 poles accurately and with reasonable speed, I retrained him using 2X2's to work on entries. I am very happy with the results I have got combining these 2 methods and his entries are way better than my Masters kelpie. With my new pup I will go straight to 2X2's when the time comes, but it has taken me a lot of experience in teaching weaving before I was ready to lose the 'safety net' of not having anyone to help me and going it almost alone. It's not the teaching, it's the troubleshooting when things go wrong. What will you do at Club training when you are presented with channel weaves? (I think you are at ADCV ????) It will be perfectly acceptable with some instructors to explain you are teaching another method and not join in weave training, but it possibly won't be with all of them and you will confuse your dog if you alternate between one method at club and another at home. (especially as the 'theory' of channel weaving and 2X2 is very different) Do you have a plan to deal with this? Have you asked Susan herself? This is what I would be doing - you can contact her via her blog and she is usually very helpful and generous with her time. Also, are you on the Clean Run discussion list? There were quite a lot of questions relating to troubleshooting 2X2's a few months back from memory and you can go back and access these also. Anyway, just my 2cents worth and I hope some of it helps. Once he truly 'gets' those entries you will be amazed !

Have another look at 12-1:30 - Page 1. I see black dog jumping, complete with handler !

Awww - what a great face ! I would recommend getting a copy of the book 'Kelpie Basics and Beyond' available by mail order from this site A lot of really valuable information about understanding the kelpie temperament, plus the training advice would be great for any breed, not just kelpies. In general, most kelpies respond very well to positive training and love to be challenged mentally. They are great problem solving dogs and love to have a 'job' to do - agility, herding, trick training- the list goes on. Mine are both clicker trained and this worked very well with them. Good Luck with your training.

Think they just seem to get the most 'profile' for some reason At the Club where I train we have several Golden Retrievers who do well in agility. One has Masters titles. Apart from Kelpies and BC's we also have (off the top of my head ......) ACD's, GSD's, Aussie Shepherds, Labs, Springer Spaniels, Cocker Spaniels, Tollers, Rough Collies, Poodles, Koolies, Pomeranian, Jack Russell, Tibetan Spaniel, Shelties, Papillon, Boxers.... and I'm sure there are many I've left out. I think most breeds can be successful with the right mindset and training. Hope you have fun on Sunday.

And that's why I really like this current 'mixture' - something for everyone ! You don't enjoy 'racetrack courses' and I don't enjoy the ones we get that are so tight that only the small dogs are able to negotiate the turns economically most of the time - and many times are the only ones to go clear. This also happens a lot in Vic. So it's good to have a mix thrown at you - which also helps you become a better handler. (Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be much 'in between' being put down a lot of the time) I think 'finding the most economical line and not deviating from it' should be the goal for everyone, not just small dog handlers. To have that run where your dog asks you no questions and you know you probably couldn't have shaved any more time is an awesome goal. And in Vic. most of the small dogs 'don't get the same time put down there' - most trials offer extra 10% for 200 and 300 dogs here - plus they get extra 'restricted to height trials' that the rest of us can't enter, and even more planned I believe. Plus there are a number of small dogs here who have no trouble making times, even on the 'racetrack type courses.' My kelpie has had his butt kicked by a poodle and a papillon on several occasions. (There is a poodle coming up the ranks here at the moment that I can only dream of ever being able to go that fast - it also kicked butt with most of the BC's at Nationals in the Novice Jumping final.) Some of the courses with extremely tight times are unrealistic for everyone, not just small dog handlers. I would like to see a more realistic rate applied across the board so that all dogs that run a reasonable speed regardless of height have a chance to qualify. Would also be interesting to see any data collected on which height categories have the most 'bar drops' - especially when applied to the body type and structure issue.

ANKC (in Vic.) is very much a 'mixed bag' these days. It seems to go in trends here. Last year leading up to Nationals we had some of the most disgusting courses you could ever find in Masters- it was like many of the judges seemed to think that the only way to 'prove themselves' was to see who could set the most technical courses - and some of them were just absurd to the point of being dangerous. My record of scratching from runs in the period last year from May to July was higher than it's ever been - after having had a year off trialling due to my dog's injury I won't run anything where I am worried about the safety aspect - I even scratched a run at Nationals. (which was a big deal as I could only run on one day, but my dog comes first) This year the trend in Masters seems to be a number of speed courses (with very tight times though so they are not always popular with some) mixed in with the more technical courses and it's been a lot more fun. Even the tight crap isn't as demotivating when dogs get to have a little 'speed fest ' thrown in every now and then . The thing I like about these is that it has been interesting to see some of the dogs that dominate the technical stuff not do so well on the speed courses and vice versa. Plus the speed courses usually see a lot more off courses as it's harder to be where you have to be to handle the discriminations which are still included. Sad thing I have noticed though is that the crap seems to have moved down to the lower classes - my young boy is just starting out trialling, he's had four trials so far and last week I went straight from Masters jumping to Excellent Jumping with him and the Excellent course was way harder than the Masters one I had just run. I'm not the best person to ask about NADAC as I'm not a fan and have given up running it - used to like it years ago when it was ADAC, but there have been a lot of changes since then. One thing about it that I believe is detrimental to dogs jumping(and may very well cause bar knocking) is that they use identical spacing between jumps so after a while many dogs start to pattern their striding and don't learn to be 'intelligent jumpers' by having to judge different take off points. I always find it funny where I train as several of the instructors run mainly NADAC and when they set a training course they will move all the jumps to 'identical NADAC spacing.' And many of their dogs do pull bars when another instructor sets a course and varies the spacing.

I'm coming to Victoria then! I am sick of tight crap, it is so much less fun. Good idea starting a new thread. Now don't get too excited about Vic. courses - unfortunately the lovely flowing ones are still few and far between the tight twisty crap - but what fun to run when they do appear. I believe they have come about from a certain NSW judge who sometimes comes to Vic. and a couple of other judges have listened to us raving about how much we love his courses - and so are obliging with similar ones every now and then. Not everyone likes them though - they tend to get extremely fast times put on them so a lot of small dog handlers don't like them - although the faster small dogs have no problem making time. Some good observations about bar knocking - different structure in different lines is a good point too and not one that I've thought much about before. Also many BC's here that have problems with bars tend to have an inefficient take off point and launch themselves much too early. (not just BC's, I am generalising here. Personally I love jump grids - not just for teaching how to jump collected and extended, but for working on striding length between jumps and bend work. But just repeating the same grid over and over and not varying the set up causes some dogs problems too IMO.

Sorry to disagree, but I think drive & temperament come into it too, there are lines of dogs that have such drive they really don't care about running into things & I would probably put some lines of kelpies at the top of this list. Kavik, I run 2 kelpies in agility and neither are what I would call big bar knockers. (although we did a lot jump foundation training before they ever got to string jumps together on a course) The younger of the two jumps 600 - missed out by 5mm on jumping 500 and still has no problem with bars. Biggest problem I have with him is because he jumps so long compared to my 500 dog, I am not always fast enough to be where I need to be - but am working on it. I think the 'lines' comments in kelpies is true in that there can be a massive difference in temperaments, etc. - but must admit I haven't seen too many lines with little sense of self preservation - although I'm sure they are out there. As a generalisation, in Vic. anyway, the BC's jump way flatter than the kelpies - and are way bigger bar knockers. The trend in agility at the moment here is that a handful of judges are starting to put down what I would call 'speed courses' in Masters - a nice change from the usual tight crap we still get most of the time - and the BC's are totally wrecking them, but the kelpies are keeping the bars up and dominating on these type of courses. (Getting a kelpie to work close to you and turn tight - that's another matter!) I don't think drive and self preservation are mutually exclusive - trend here with the 'over the top drive' dogs is that some trainers are not teaching any self control exercises in the fear that it will ruin the drive, which I don't agree with, think it's more like the way control is taught in some cases that does the damage. Vickie, do you think the jump style and tendency to bar knock in BC's is line related, training related, combination of both or generic to BC's ? Just curious as I've never taught a BC to jump before and would really like to hear thoughts from someone experienced with BC's. To the OP, many apologies for hijacking your thread - hope you've been convinced to give agility a go when the time is right. Personally, I like to see lots of other breeds out there doing well and not just the BC's and kelpies - makes life much more interesting.

No, not the one I am talking about, it's a purebred from a registered breeder. And agree PF - the old style conformation is becoming a rarity.

I know the one in Vic. you are referring to and this one is the exception here rather than the rule - if you look at its structure you can see why. There are 2 others trialling in Vic. that are both running at Masters level, although one is a country dog, so don't see it all that often. The other one recently completed ADM, JDM and UD all in a matter of weeks and has no trouble clearing the jumps. I think there are less competing nowadays due the conformation that is considered desirable now, not all that conducive to jumping any more. The ones doing well here are more what I would consider the 'old type' GSD's, where the rear legs don't tuck under quite so much.

I'm not SW, but when the agility used to be held on 2 afternoons we used to stay at Wangaratta North Family Motel just out of town. They used to have a website, not sure if it is still current but you could google. They also used to let the dogs stay IN the rooms with you (which was why we loved it) but as it was on the market, there may be a change of management so this may not still be the case. Worth a try though.

Good thinking Ness - should have done that first ! Thanks Guys

One of the members of our agility club is moving to Tasmania (Hobart) next month and is desperate to keep doing agility with her two labs. (One is in Foundation class and the other in the next one up, which is learning obstacles and beginning sequencing) Can anyone please help out with some contact details / information?

Have PM'd you some contact details for Victoria.