Weaves

Well today was definately a weave day:

Elliot:
We did quite a lot of 4/5 obstacle courses, just simple turning stuff just getting him used to following body language and driving on - he did very well once I sorted myself out and moved in the right places!! There was one point when he was facing the field with the donkey in and it was moving around and he went in to stalk mode but once he came back in to agility focus and I released him (only took a few seconds) he stayed with me and didn't dart after them like i thought he would!! In fact he was in general a lot more focused today and less interested in the animals next door!!:) We then started him on channel weaves for the first time and had them a good 2 foot apart but gradually took him further back from them, the idea being we will take him further back and do it from all different angles each time before we move them in at all, I am looking forward to having at least one dog that understands what weaves are!! We then did a little bit of seesaw - he was a bit nervy at first because he had been up it himself earlier in the lesson and had frightened him self but he soon got the hang of it and was doing some lovely touches on the end :) Also we did some "basic training" because a couple of times he didn't come back to me when I called and wanted to stay with my trainer as she had the toy, so when he didn't come back on the second call we took him out of sight and tied him up for a few seconds - it seemed to really work as we only had to do it twice and then he was coming back to me really nice and quickly.

Jemma:
Her two biggest problems are weaves and a-frame (coming down really really really slowly!!) so today we had a weave day. We just had four and worked a lot on me sending her at them from quite a way back and then from VERY slight angle ie one/two paces from the straight line. It took us a long while but by then of the session she got 3 out 4 right which was a HUGE improvement. So this is what I am going to be working on all week with her and in training sessions from now on, lets hope it works!!

So all in all it was a good day and we can't wait till next week :D

Agiliy Nuts 22/02/09

We had a really good day:

Elliot:
Although not competing he still made me proud - the exercise area was next to the carpark and although cars weren't really moving around we managed to three times go there and play ball off lead and not with his harness on and he didn't run off at all - he is getting to be a clever boy bless him :D

Jemma:
Helter Skelter: 20th
We were clear and as she was going over the final jump (a spread) and I went "yay" so she dropped her legs and knocked down the poles - doh!! At least I have now learnt not to get excited until her feet touch the ground after the finish line!! After having now shown my trainer the video she reckons Jem would have dropped her feet anyway but at least it is still a lesson I have learnt!!:)

Agility: E
The third obstacle was the weaves - after talking to my trainer I decided that as in training we are still doing weaves on their own that I would collect jem and make her sit before the weaves, sadly this still didn't work and even after 2 attempts she didn't mange the weaves. However we carried on and she did teh rest of the course really well :D

Snooker: 20th
We managed the first part really well although was slowing down quite a lot on the way down the a-frame. Sadly she then dropped a pole 3 obstacles before the weaves which were 2nd from the end, but she dropped the pole because I turned too early so it wasn't her fault :)

Jumping: 21st
She knocked the long jump because I drove her forward at the wrong time. She also got another 5 faults because she knocked the second to last pole because I had decided to front cross her but I didn't have time - oopsies - I need to work on sending her away from me on two right angled jumps

She is now 21st in the league despite having missed one of the competitions-this seems to be around her favourite position bless her!! :)

I will post the videos once I have got two of them off nat and movie makered them :) Sadly they are quite distant as we had to use our phones as the batteries we had for the camera were dead!!

Videos as promised:

Agility lesson back home

I went back to nottingham for the weekend this weekend and managed to get an agility lesson on sat pm, so here is how it went:

Jemma:

We worked on front crosses which i had completely forgotten how to handle but by the end of it finally remembered and jem did some nice ones :) Also worked on some front and back crosses which went quite well, it was basically just a lesson of handling :) it was two days ago so I cant really remember much ooo but what I do remember is that she had brilliant waits after all the work I did last week in Bristol - I managed to do three jump lead outs consitantly without any twitching - woop woop!!

Elliot:
I did the same jumping course with elliot as I did with Jemma and he did very well - I have to realise I have to help him more with front crosses as he is not as experienced as Jem (a given I know but I always forget!!), he also had a few issues working a straight line and kept checking in with me after each jump but we did some go on work and he was a lot better at the end. We also did some work on the dog walk and he did really well, really driving to the bottom to do his nose touch - at teh start he kept running off the end of the dog walk but the he got the idea he had to keep his feet on it :) We started with just an end plank raised a foot off the ground and then put the whole dog walk down to the baby height (about 3 foot off the floor) and we tried doing the whole dog walk as he does much like being picked up but then he kept running of the end so I did pick him and once he realised it meant we were going to do something fun he was ok about it and then did he good touch work. The only thing I had to then work on was getting him to then drive for his tuggy as he kept just wanting to go back and nose touch for food.

Obedience

Elliot:
So...obedience last night was Elliot's first night in the higher class. He did very well, the trouble is, because we are doing "harder" stuff there is a lot of waiting around as a lot of it is done one dog at a time. Anyway, we started with a recall, i left him in a wait with lots of dogs/people talking behind him but he didn't move a muscle :D Then his present was almost straight, I then walked round him, I had never done this before so he kept getting up as he wasn't used to me going behind him. On the second recall we did the same thing though and he sat still :) We then did retrieve and again he was brilliant, and cam in a little closer each time than he had been at home :) We then did heelwork with all the class in and he managed once round the room with some beautiful heelwork but then started getting confused as we had never done that much before so I just went in to the middle and worked on just doing a few good steps with him.

At the end we did stays, Elliot did a perfect sit and on the down stayed down until I started going back to him after breaking the excersise but I was really pleased with him as they were long stays for him :D Jemma on the other hand got up as soon as I took a step away in the sit stay but did however then sit back down without me saying anything. Naughty dog, I did another sit stay instead of a down with her and she managed that one, although she spent the whole time looking grumpy as usual bless her, so...

Jemma:
First recall - got out of the down, stayed where she was and eventually went back down when I gave her her hand signal. Second recall she stayed down but this time i remembered to remind her down a few times and tellnig her it was a good down.Her presents wern't very straight but nevermind. The little bits of heelwork we did were good although she is still not staying very tight on her about turns and slightly over rotated on her left turns. Retrieve, yeah not bad but still not coming in straight, we'll get there eventually (I hope!!)

Think thats it for this week...got an agility lesson back home on sat ready for our competition on sunday :)

Racing

At flyball today as well as having the separate box (with two jumps in front of it this week) and lane work we had two lanes racing each other, this meant we had more dogs in at once and each dog had longer training.

Jemma
In the two lane racing she was really good, going from a good distance back and not even looking at the other lane but she is always driving to me and never away from me. When it was her turn on the box she went back to her normal self and went over the two jumps and then saw all the other dogs racing and turned to look at them, saw the netting was in her way and tried to come back over the jumps to go and run over to them. Luckily because there were fewer jumps and it was in netting I was able to jump over the jumps and shout at her to get on the box and make her do it. She then did it every time after that but I wasn't convinced she wasn't looking at the other dogs, we shall see - this is her area that needs lots of work!!

Elliot
Well what can I say, what a star!! He ran in the lane without netting towards the end and wasn't bothered at all by the other dogs and he had a gorgeous box and recall back over the jumps. He is definitely a good flyball dog in the making - looks like I am going to have to find some pretty good reasons not to go to competitions once he is a big boy!!

Now we are off to be measured for KC agility - I have a feeling they are both going to be full height!!

Naughty Mummy

Had another agility session today and it was great, even though I kept getting told off for doing things wrong :)

Elliot
We had a big discussion about him running off and me being scared about this and how i deal with it because i was tending to get panicy if i thought he was going to run off (mainly after the donkey/pony in the next field) and so would start goin all high pitched and offering him toys/treats to try and get him to come back which, as pointed out to me today, only encourages him to run off more as then he gets a reward. so now i have to start being firm with him, something i was always scared to do because of his history even though i knew deep down he has come on far enought now for me to stop letting him take the mick i just needed someone else to point it out to me. So when he did go towards the field in stalking mode i told him off (just with a wierd kinda noise) and made him sit i then told him to come in the opp. direction with me and as soon as he did gave him a reward and on the second time he came with me without me having to get firm with him :) This also applies for when I am standing talking and he goes off to sniff - i get panicky and call him bak - whereas i should have confidence in letting him sniff and then reward him when he comes back on his own/stands near me and only every so often when i actually call him back.

Anyway, now on to some actual agility - we did a lot of work on setting him up at an angle to a jump and getting him to jump it because he thought he only had to jump a jump if he was straight on to it and so at the beginning kept running round this jumps, once he got the hang of it he decided it was all very easy. we did some flick flack with him which again he got the hang of towards the end. and then we did some a-frame - which was very good, am going to start taking him over the whole thing next week and not just do the bottom bit because he needs to realise that when he runs down it he still has to stop at the bottom. we also did some see-saw and again he was good at this too, he is a little smarty pants really!!

With both dogs i worked on their wait because as soon as i left them i was not saying anything and almost holding my breath for fear of them moving and actually realised if i praised them for a good sit it made life easier for getting them to look in my direction and not at the donkey/pony

Jemma
We spent a long time on her waits as she was sitting and leaning very far forwards to start with and was very twitchy but by the end she was sat much more upright and less twitchy which was good. We also did some weaves and she did very well on straight entrys on lead so we thought we would try her off lead but she still didn't get it - she takes too big strides and does two poles at a time so it was back on lead for her. when we started doing them from an angle she didn't really get it again - we have realised she thinks the first and last poles are important and it doesn't really matter about the bits inbetween so next time we are going to do four weaves, jump, four weaves, jump, four weaves and then get rid of the jumps and then start bringing the weaves closer together so she realises all the pole are important! we did some a-frame too which was much better than before and then some dog walk which was fine until i started running on and the ball was put away from the end of the dog walk - she kept coming off and just getting her ball - something we are going to work on next week. did some flick flack work with her and once i worked my body language, especially my arms out she did very well, so yet again it is me confusing her, poor dog!!

Think thats it for now - best go, im late for flyball!!

Moved up

Well last night was obedience night and here is how it went:

Elliot
Wow was there a lot of people in our class tonight, the last puppy class had finished so lots of them had been moved into our class. Elliot was a good boy and did some very nice 3/4 strides of heelwork, very good sit "waits" even with me tugging on his lead and a nice recall down the middle of the room where he came in almost straight!! At the end of the class we were told we could move up a class, one to cut down on numbers and two because Elliot was at the top end of the class he was in and so wasn't really gaining much, especially with all the newbies in the class. The next class up is between his and Jemma's class so it is also good because it means I dont have that half an hour to hang around in!! As I was waiting in around during the class elliot joined in for the retrieve (he was too tired to do the whole class) and did a very nice one but still need to work on him bringing it back closer (he is sitting about a foot away).

At the beginning of Jems class the two class did stays so I had my first go with both dogs together ready for the competition in march - in the sit jem was a bit fidgty but apart from that they both did very well - they were really long stays for elliot and he didn't move a muscle in either of them :)

Jemma
I have been trying her recall in a down to try and see if that stops her moving, sadly it didn't tonight - she got up into a sit, she then didn't come in quite straight but nevermind. She did some good heelwork but needs somework on her stand and wait and on her heelwork in a recall - she is quite slow on coming back to me and once she does reach me is very in her own little world, she did however stay in her down. with her retirieve she didn't come in straight and then sat chomping on the dumbell but it was better than it has been :)

I went up to the downs tonight to do some weave training with Jem and she got on well - by the end of the session she was really wrapping rond the first pole and i rarely had to correct her through the weaves, tried it once off lead though and she still jumps poles at a time but it was better than it has been :)

You Tube discovery

After wasting a lot of my day watching people's agility/tricks videos on you tube i decided i would dig out some of my videos, sadly i only found two worth sharing but it has taught me to take my camera along to more competitions/training I do so I have a better recording of how my dogs improve.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojhv7ouAR5c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrivppbSPQY

Bloody Snow

Well the snow this week has really messed things up - there was no obedience on Tuesday night because the village hall had no boiler. Then agility was canceled Saturday as the snow had turned the roads in to ice rink and the agility equipment/ground would have been too slippy for the dogs, and I also had to cancel a homecheck I was supposed to do for Wiccaweys and this has now had to be moved to a week away. And finally flyball was canceled today because the drive/carpark of the RDA was to icy!! I am hoping the snow goes away very soon so we can get back to our normally life and training!!