Agility Training Talk Thread

[B-Q]

I hate missing training for weeks on end!

Can't wait to see Daisy flying through a course one day, does she love it?

Quinn is still having some issues with reacting at other dogs playing, she can handle watching dogs tug now but not chasing toys or running through tunnels or just sprinting flat out in general. I'm nervous because we go into beginners in 2 weeks and she'll be expected to be offleash a lot more, she's fine while she's concentrating on me but if I loose her I loose her. I'm unsure of weather or not I should have held her back again but I know she's probably not learning anymore while we're just repeating Pre-Ag and the border she is the more likley she is to get distracted and find something else to look at...

Edited July 17, 2011 by B-Q

[huski]

I hate missing training for weeks on end!

Can't wait to see Daisy flying through a course one day, does she love it?

Yeah she does enjoy it, we've only done a handful of classes though really, but she loves it so far.

Hope you can get your issues with Quinn sorted, she and you definitely have stacks of potential!

[The Spotted Devil]

We are missing a lot of training too due to the state of our training grounds....quagmire sums it up I've been doing lots of work with just 2 jumps, tugging and motivational games and it is really paying off. This week training is cancelled as well so it will be all about weave entries and threadle arms at our muddy oval.

Em will start training modules soon too, which is so exciting!

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

That's an interesting list of Criteria, Agility Dogs.

We've got fails on two of them.

* Drive to toy / bait and bring it back. Pretty good at going to it, intermittant about bringing it back.

The problem with toys at class is that other dogs tend to be distracted by them - enough to leave their work way over there and try to come steal the squeaky ball over here. And my dog just thinks - chase me with my toy - is the best game ever.

* drop on the table. She's good at drop at the end of a run, but not so good at drop during it. At the moment she equates table with stop with no fun - so is rather reluctant to get on it at all - especially since they've shortened it. I think she'd be more enthusiastic about jumping on a 1m table than a 40cm one. Better view or something. So we're back to food reward for getting on it when I ask.

Really really need to ask our instructor to let us train individual equipment from time to time instead of all sequences - where the only thing we're really doing is shadow handling - for which we don't need any equipment at all. Sigh.

[lovemesideways]

I haven't read my way through this whole thread yet, so hopefully you guys won't mind me asking again. Really want to get into agility (and maybe flyball) with my boy riddick. So where should I start? We have done a lot of formal obedience. He has fantastic heel, 100% recall. I really want to improve his drive and confidence though! He is food driven but he likes a good game with a toy, I feel like his confidence isn't really there yet so would love to improve on his tugging/ play drive.

So what sort of exercises should I be doing? Any specific books that are really good for beginners in agility ? YouTube channels/videos with good tips? I am here to learn :D

Edited July 17, 2011 by lovemesideways

[Agility Dogs]

That's an interesting list of Criteria, Agility Dogs.

We've got fails on two of them.

* Drive to toy / bait and bring it back. Pretty good at going to it, intermittant about bringing it back.

The problem with toys at class is that other dogs tend to be distracted by them - enough to leave their work way over there and try to come steal the squeaky ball over here. And my dog just thinks - chase me with my toy - is the best game ever.

That's exactly why we put it in there. We've had a couple of problems with dogs running off into the fact of other dogs that are working. Ideally, they should be able to work with their handler regardless of what is going on around them, but in the real world there will always be accidents, we just want to make sure we aren't putting dogs in a situation we know they will fail in.

* drop on the table. She's good at drop at the end of a run, but not so good at drop during it. At the moment she equates table with stop with no fun - so is rather reluctant to get on it at all - especially since they've shortened it. I think she'd be more enthusiastic about jumping on a 1m table than a 40cm one. Better view or something. So we're back to food reward for getting on it when I ask.

REWARD, REWARD, REWARD, REWARD. In ADAA trials drop on the table is part of the course - no drop, no get off table and continue. The dogs need to see value in dropping on the table. Remember - these aren't dogs that have been doing agility for any length of time so this is more a shaping exercise than anything else.

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

I do tend to look at any distraction as a training opportunity these days.

When I started tho - OMG. What a naughty dog. She did learn after a while that getting off the lead then on the lead was not the end of the world, and she's starting to learn that there are more fun things to do than chase possums from the middle of class.

I just have to deal with the new distractions ie trying to cadge treats at inappropriate times from willing treat dispensers no less. Sigh.

I also have to talk to instructor about rewarding or training or re-training or maintaining training for individual bits of equipment - especially the big chunky stuff I don't have at home like scramble and dog walk. Contacts? But what's wrong with leaping off from the top???

[Agility Dogs]

Contacts? But what's wrong with leaping off from the top???

ROFL - if you ask my Xena that is what they were made for. I've resigned myself to the fact that I've let her go too far and short of pulling her out of the ring for 6 or 9 months I'll now be managing them for the rest of her career (not the end of the world and its not stopping us from getting some great results).

We've had two moments that have meant that the rules are somewhat enforced - she didn't hit the down RAMP (as opposed to contact) on a dog walk one day - far more fun to jump........Then she did the same on an A Frame.

Needless to say my puppy has amazing contacts and will not be allowed to break criteria in the ring....EVER.

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

We had the scramble in our sequence tonight.

I had a small square of artificial grass and with instructor's agreement, went (leading my dog) out to the landing side of the scramble and placed the grass and a very high value treat on top and went back to the start (four jumps then scramble), and we had a nice startline stay.

I say "go" and she goes over the first jump and directly to the treat and eats it. It's hard not to laugh, ok I laughed a lot - everybody else was laughing too.

I call her back to the start, she comes (woo hoo) and we start over, and she does all the jumps and good contact on the scramble - looks for a treat that isn't there, gets one on the table and does the rest of the course properly.

After that I get the instructor to place the grass and the treat for our turn. Worked much better. So hopefully giving the evil hound a reason not to jump off the top will work.

If I don't get my timing just right with the dog walk - she jumps over the contact at the end, or she turns around on the top and comes back or she jumps on top of me. I have to be just fast enough to keep her moving but not so fast or slow that she jumps off.

[Kavik]

Have you tried training a specific contact behaviour?

[Agility Dogs]

Have you tried training a specific contact behaviour?

[Vickie]

Have you tried training a specific contact behaviour?

X 3

[sheena]

We had the scramble in our sequence tonight.

I had a small square of artificial grass and with instructor's agreement, went (leading my dog) out to the landing side of the scramble and placed the grass and a very high value treat on top and went back to the start (four jumps then scramble), and we had a nice startline stay.

I say "go" and she goes over the first jump and directly to the treat and eats it. It's hard not to laugh, ok I laughed a lot - everybody else was laughing too.

I call her back to the start, she comes (woo hoo) and we start over, and she does all the jumps and good contact on the scramble - looks for a treat that isn't there, gets one on the table and does the rest of the course properly.

After that I get the instructor to place the grass and the treat for our turn. Worked much better. So hopefully giving the evil hound a reason not to jump off the top will work.

If I don't get my timing just right with the dog walk - she jumps over the contact at the end, or she turns around on the top and comes back or she jumps on top of me. I have to be just fast enough to keep her moving but not so fast or slow that she jumps off.

I am lucky enough to have a scramble at home to practice on. I was having lots of trouble with her missing the contact. For training purposes we have it lowered to a height where it is not too taxing on her body to do repeated scrambles. She now never, ever misses a contact at a trial & the only thing I can put it down to is that she is so used to running it in a lowered position. For see saw & dog walk she does two on two off.

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

I've got a set of three stairs at home outside that I could try using to train a nose touch, she does great hand touches. But I don't know how I'm going to train a "specific contact behaviour" with our current club set up. We only got three goes at the scramble last night in total as part of three sequence runs. And the instructor - while she understood what I was trying to do with the grass and the treat, put the grass so far away from the bottom of the scramble that my dog was still jumping off, though she did make contact anyway which was better than last week.

I don't think I've got room for a full sized scramble at my place even though I've got a big back lawn.

[Kavik]

You don't need full sized equipment - I don't have space either

You can train the behaviour initially on a short board you can make at home (or stairs). Do you know how to train the contact behaviour you would like? When you have the behaviour good on that you can transfer to the end of the equipment. Will your club let you practice on just one piece of equipment for your turn instead of a sequence? What does your club suggest you do about contacts?

[J...]

I don't have agility contact equipment and taught a confident and reliable 2o2o contact with my young dog. Started off with a 2o2o on a stack of phone books taped together. Then started putting it on a balance disk, a caravan step, my own steps, anywhere I could think of before I put it on a travel plank. She also has a nose touch in there as well.

Any time I had the chance I put it on contact gear, even at club where they do mostly sequences, I would take my turn, do the contact and then reward and get out before someone complained. Best thing about travel planks is you can take them anywhere.

At just gone 2 that behaviour is holding up really well, despite having no contact access at all at the moment unless it's at a trial. I do have a contact trainer but I almost never use it as it's so awkward to set up and move.

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

So what kind of contact behaviours do you guys use for scramble?

I have a basic understanding of how to get a 2o2o and maybe a nose touch on the ground (transfered from a hand touch) for the dog walk and a convenient plank that I ought to set up (was going to use it for getting into the back of the car which is very high). Would teaching her to target a ball on a stick help?

But the problem with the scramble is the angle of it - ie her back end tends to over take the front end if I do manage to persuade her to come to the bottom of it without jumping off (eg food lure).

I guess I'd mostly just like her to run down to the bottom of it and not leap off from more than half way up.

[The Spotted Devil]

So what kind of contact behaviours do you guys use for scramble?

I have a basic understanding of how to get a 2o2o and maybe a nose touch on the ground (transfered from a hand touch) for the dog walk and a convenient plank that I ought to set up (was going to use it for getting into the back of the car which is very high). Would teaching her to target a ball on a stick help?

But the problem with the scramble is the angle of it - ie her back end tends to over take the front end if I do manage to persuade her to come to the bottom of it without jumping off (eg food lure).

I guess I'd mostly just like her to run down to the bottom of it and not leap off from more than half way up.

I still use 2o/2o for the A-frame and teach it like others have mentioned - just using a plank angled on the stairs.

Ziggy has had trouble sticking his A-frame contacts of late. At training it has been so wet that he's been slipping and struggling to stop his hind legs overtaking him so I've not stressed about it too much - you can't NRM a dog for what it physically is struggling with. What I am working on is some more hind leg strength and awareness - so begging (which is very hard for his longer frame), more perch work and I'll add walking backwards when I have a little time to spare.

Can you lower the A-frame to reduce the angle??? That's what I will do if I need to - and have a private lesson if necessary to access the equipment.

[Mrs Rusty Bucket]

Thanks TSD

I think I will work the stairs and the plank and maybe do some perch work and try for the "sit pretty". My dog isn't very good at balancing on her bum either, so some angled strength work ie if I can get her to pivot with her back legs on the phone books... that should help. But I haven't done much with her front legs on a perch either.

And I will talk to instructor about doing some contact work in some of the earlier classes (eg for "beginners").

I meant to talk to her about doing "stations" for five to ten minutes at the start of class eg we could line up at different bits of equipment and practice, five repeats maybe and then move on to the next station... before we run sequences, by way of maintaining or retraining what we were supposed to have learned in "beginners".

[skip]

Mrs Rusty Bucket

When you say "maybe a nose touch on the ground (transfered from a hand touch" I am confused. I wasn't sure if you knew a easy ( using simple tools) way to teach contact behaviour.

I wrote a long post on the way we were taught a "specific contact behaviour" and my new laptop just lost its connection as I finished. Crap!!!!

So do you know a simple way to teach a contact behaviuor? We only used a target ( piece of plastic or lid ), a short plank of light wood and a thicker longer plank for the final end of training.

I was curious how others learnt but I'm off before this bloody computor dies again!