First Obedience Comp - 29/03/09

In order of completion:

Novice - Jemma
Jem worked really well, tried really hard and only lost 8.5 marks, one of which was for me and my lead (which I was jiggling about without knowing it!!), her recall and retreive were good. She had slightly crooked presents and finishes and lost come for chomping on the dumbell. Her turns were much better too. Everything she lost marks for were things we know we need to work on, which is always a good sign. The other handy thing is that she works exactly the same in the ring as she does at home!

Beginners Stays - Both
Well ... Elliot was a naughty boy in the sit and got up (he had only been out the car 10mins and as it was his first comp and the first time he had seen so many dogs he was just his usual excited self!!) and took a wonder to say hello to some other dogs before the judge could get over and get him. Jemma then dropped at about 55seconds (missed by the steward though because they were retrieving elliot!! They both did their down though :)

Novice stay - Jemma
She dropped after 12seconds in the sit stay but did her down.

Beginners - Jemma
She only lost 7 this time. I felt her heelwork was sloppy but actually she wasn't too bad, she got confused on teh retireve because i threw the dumbell a long way so she got lost half way and started coming back to me, but when I told her to go again she did! Her recall present was very crooked so I tried to correct it thus loosing us 1.5 marks, oops!! I think her main problems are that she is used to getting a reward after each exercise, that she is not used to doing the heelwork twice and consequently worries about why she has to do it again thinking she did it wrong first time, and that she was tired ater doing so much bless her.

Beginners - Elliot
I was really worried about doing this with him as he was so excited about everything else that was going on and wasn't really very focused at all but i decided I would go for it and just see what happened. I was a LOT more excited than I normally am (according to my good friend that dragged me to the comp!!:P) and this worked wonders for him, he kept really well focused apart for one point when he went miles in front of me so I stopped and got him back and then he did some lovely heelwork after that. His recall was excellent, his present and finish were both realyl straight! :) I then took a big plunge and did the heel free, he did this just as well as his heel on lead, if not better bless him. Finally the retrieve was really good too despite me again throwing it a long way, it is just his present that needs work, he still doesn't like coming back too close.

So overall there were some REALLY good points, but there was also some not so good points, and one very disappointing bit. But I now know exactly what needs working on so we can take it from there :)

Double training again!!

Agility this morning

Elliot:
We did lots of contact work to start with and he was brill, we even did full dog walks and a-frames and he did them nice and fast and (most of the time) stopped very nicely and nose touched his target at the end :) we also did full see saws with Char letting the end down and he was ok at that but was a little bit scared of the movement. We then did some tyre and he loved that. We did some work on his jumps - tunnel and then jump with his toy after the jump to get him running on when he came out the tunnel because he kept checking back. Then some same side turns with jumps, leading in to then doing the same four jumps into the weaves, then jump weaves jump, and then slightly angling the jump before the weaves. He got the weaves every time and they are now about a foot apart.

Jemma:
We did aframe tunnel jump aframe to try and build her speed up. And it worked to some extent, Char then but in some interesting contraptions to get jump to bounce down the aframe which worked ok, she then just needs to work on stoping at the end. We will get there with her, at the moment it is all about compromise (on my part, not hers!!) :) We did some straight weaves - four, a little gap, four and she was ok, until I started running fast, we then added another four a foot a way and again she did it fine until I started running, so this is really the area she needs lots of work on now. To really push her we did two jumps and then four weaves but with the two jumps making it a really sharp angle in to the weaves, she struggled quite a lot with this but we worked with it until we got a couple of right ones by over exagerrating the turn :) Then we reworked on her tyre and shaped it rather than forced her threw it and it seemed to work, but it was on low height, we shall try it next time higher up :)

Obedience this afternoon

I went to the downs with my two friends to do some extra practise ready for our first competition tomorrow!!

Jemma:
She worked really nice over all bless her, I just got a few pointers for helping to improve her. With her heelwork she was drifting slightly yet not realising she wasn't really supposed to do this, so by stepping right and getting her in (by using her collar) she seemed to realise what it was i actually wanted and did a lot better. On the about turns I kept only doing three-quarter turns, so i need to remember to go all the way round!! Right turns I was leaning over her and rushing it a LOT so I needed to calm it down, the same with the left turns!! With her finishes after her recall i need to hold my hand behind me for long to get her to go further back and come in straight. So if I get all of that right she should be great!! Now for her retrieve, she was VERY chompy so when she dropped it we made her pick it up and keep on working and bringing it back to me, it took a while but eventually we worked through it and she did a really nice retrieve in the end:) Lets keep our fingers crossed for tomorrow!!

Elliot
Well he was VERY distracted. I havn't trained him much outside so I have to work a lot on his focus!! Once I did get it and realised i needed to do lots of little bits and reward him for them rather than just keep perservering with long bits of heelwork with him not being focused. He did a nice recall and nice retrieve - soming a little closer than normal. I think tomorrow I am just going to see how he is doing and if I need to I might train the round :)

Agility weekend - Agility Nuts 22/03/09

Last week I went up to the downs to do some obedience training with the dogs and got a few new ideas for their heelwork from Sarah and Steph which will hopefully help is in our first obedience comp next weekend :D (for some reason I always forget to write up my obedience!!)

So, now for Jemma's agility weekend (Elliot stayed at home with his daddy):
We had an agility lesson on Sat with Char (Nat and Asher came too :) ) and we did lots of work on Jemma's weaves and even added a jump before them, we also did it with the two lots of four quite close together, with me moving and with me crossing behind her and she only had to be tied up a couple of times!!! :D we did some jumping work as well and she did some nice work, we then had a few issues when trying to tidy some of her turns up (mainly because I am stupid!!) but we got there in the end!! We worked on her a-frame as well, she is getting there, slowly!! Her are some clips Char put together for us of the videos Nat took of us :



Now for the Agility Nuts competition on Sunday:

Jumping:
No weaves or anything other than jumps in the course and my little star did very well, she got an 8th with 21.916 (winner had a time of 19.402) so I was pleased with that bless her :)

Gamblers:
Hmm, well when in the queue someone else was clicker training their dog and so Jem just wanted to leave but luckily about 3 dogs from her turn I managed to rally her round. Although she wasn't as good as normal so think she was still a bit distracted, then going up and down the a-frame over and over again and me trying not to let her slow down wound her up so then she started being silly and wouldn't go in the right end of the tunnel or the last jump - she is a plonker at times!!

Agility:
The only course of the day with weaves!! Sadly it was a tunnel entrance on to the weaves and by the time Jem got to it the tunnel had moved so it was no longer a straight exit onto the weaves so she didn't see them. When I eventually calmed her down she did see them and then did them perfectly!! :D sadly she then went in a tunnel she wasn't supposed to because I crossed behind her too soon but nevermind, she did good weaves :D

Up & Under:
Sadly when we were three dogs from the front the clicker training person joined the queue and I couldn't rally Jemma round so she went in the ring totally unfocussed and she wasn't working like I know she can and kept being silly so I took her out the ring!!

Here is the video of the rounds:

Wow, what a day!!

It was another double training sunday!!

Flyball this morning:

Elliot:
We loaded the box for the first time today as the new box is working!!:) After stumbling a bit the first couple of times he was then doing perfect four footed turns with full runs as well, just got to get him to realise he is now running back to his tuggy and not to a ball being thrown. As usual his run backs/changes were fine, he is now going from 40ft, can't wait till his first starters in May!!

Jemma:
Hmmm, not a great day for her. She was quite distracted in the run backs and so didn't do many proper changes, although she did only have one real paddy where she wouldn't look at me. Her box work was brilliant, she did two/three perfect runs with perfect box turns but then decided to go back to her old trick of over one jump and then over to play with the other dogs but she then got shut in the car and didn't get to have another go and I brought her back in two dogs later and just did one one jump and box which was perfect. We shall just have to see if this has an effect next time at training!!

Agility this afternoon:

Jemma:
Wow, what a mammoth session!! We started with some jumping but my trainer and I had a little bit of a disagreement with the handling method but eventually came to some kinda of agreement, I think!! Weaves were amazing - she even managed to do them on her bad side once we put a wire in, she was really nicely wrapping round the first pole. After doing a lot of work on the four poles and her only getting it wrong about 3 times we tried her on 8 all together and she was a hell of a lot better but not brilliant so we did four then break then four and she was amazing at that too!! we then tried four with me running along side of her and it all went to pot but after tying her up twice (maybe three times) she did it really nicely 4 times with me running. We then finished with some a-frame and found the best way to get her to go faster over the a-frame was treats rather than her ball but her ball is good for "teasing" her and making sure she stays on the contact and doesn't come off when she feels like it.

Elliot:
Did some wide channel weaves and started doing them at angles which he didn't like much to start with but then he got the hang of it! :) We also did quite a lot of jumping work, mainly on some long straight lines which he was quite good at, although we had to do a bit of work on a long lead out as he kept running round the first jump. Also included the tunnel being at an angle away from the jump and me getting in the right place to send him over it, and a tight turn back towards me. We then did some dog walk and he was REALLY good today, at one point stopping so fast he nearly went head over heels (the polite version as my mum occ. reads this!!).

Our First KC Agility competition!!

Well today Jemma and I had our first KC agility competition, and here is how we got on:

Agility; sadly it was jump then weaves to start and bless jem she did the weaves (right to the end of the eight) but went in on the wrong side so I decided to make her do them again (in hindsight I would have let her carry on in this stage of her training with the weaves!!) and then she got all confused and silly but as they were so early in the course i decided to carry on (sorry char!!) and she only dropped a pole and that was because I was too lazy and didn't go close enough to one jump and turned too early!!

Helter Skelter; No weaves or contacts - my little star went clear!!! and not only that, (out of the 20+ dogs that went clear & 100+ in the class) she came 3rd!!!!!!!!!!! That made me a VERY proud mummy!!

Jumping; Jem knocked a pole because I turned too early and got a refusal because i stopped too soon to do a turn and so she slammed the breaks on just before the jump and then ran past the jump a little bit. We then had to do a pull through into the weaves - sadly jem just wouldn't see the weaves so after three attempts we left the ring (there was only one jump left)

Here is hoping to us having learnt to do the weaves by the end of the season!! :)

Naughty Jemma

Well tonight was obedience training;

Elliot:
He seemed a bit over excited to do his heelwork properly although I am floudering a bit with him at the moment and need some help from my wonderful friend Sarah to get a push in the right direction!! We did some of the exercises where you leave them in a sit/down/stand and walk past them and he did them all really well, even the stand which he had never done before. The static exersises we did he did well although he did keep over shooting a bit on the right turns, however he seems to be finally getting the hang of his left turns :) We also did some control exercises and he did well in those, just struggled with the stand but we havn't done much of that. His recalls were also off tonight, he kept coming in and sitting sideways, not a problem I have had before with him but I think it might be because I have worked on his heelwork during the week and not done any recalls so he had forgotten what he was supposed to do. He also got up on one of them but then that was because he had an itch bless him. In the stay, he did a good sit until Jem broke hers and i returned to her (he just got up to say hello to me). He broke his down but it was after a long time which was hard for him so i will forgive him, and he only broke it the once.

Jemma:
Whilst tied up during Elliots class she managed to get hold of someones treats they had left on the stage and ate the whole bag (I was v embarrassed!!). She broke her sit stay but again after quite a while so she did well for her. Her down stay was brill as always :) I wasn't overly pleased with her heelwork, she wasn't really with me, after lagging behind in training at home she decided to go ahead of me but also away from me and was a bit all over the place (she did however stay down on the a-recall!!). She also did a very nice present in her novice recall. Her about turns are getting better, but her lefts weren't very good in the big bit of heelwork we did, she wasn't sending her bum all the way round - again I think we are well over due a session with Sarah, hopefully this will be rectified next week!! :)

A busy dog day!!

I have just realised I didn't fill my blog in after obedience training on tuesday and now I can't really remember what happened. I think Elliot needs to work more on his turns in heelwork, especially the left, and in his retrieve at not mouthing the dumbell and bringing it back really close. They both did their stays :) Jemma managed to do a recall from a sit and from what I remember did some nice heelwork apart from her about turns which are our biggest problem, but i think this may be because if i do a tight about turn with my feet i have a tendency to fall over (something i clearly need to work on!!)!! Anyway, now on to training today (in a bit more detail).

Flyball this morning:

Jemma:
Wow - the only word I can think of using for her turns on the box, they were amazing today, I was really pleased with her. I also managed to do four jumps upto the box and only once did she get a little side-tracked between the last jump and the box and had a look at the other dogs. In the power training, well she was good overall although at one point decided she would rather have a go at another dog (tyne) and run to me, but she did eventually refocus herself. :)

Elliot:
Definately a little star in the making here, he did some proper change overs and just kept running in a straight line, didn't waiver at all!! :) We managed to get him doing four jumps before the box but it took a little while, he didn't have much confidence to run that far away from me whilst not chacing a ball or anything but once Nat went up the box end as well and gave him some really loud calls he got the idea bless him!!The only problem I have with him really is that once he has his ball he isn't overly interested in his tuggy, but i am thinking of ways of working on this!!

Agility this afternoon:

Jemma:
Well her weaves have certainly improved, she spent very little time in "chill out" whilst we were doing them from straight on and to the right of them but as soon as we started doing them at angle from the left she got in a tizz, she is trying to do it the same as she does on the right and go between the first two poles but of course this means she is entering on the wrong side. She did however 90% of the time then go on to complete all four weaves which is good for her, she would normally not bother if she has gone wrong. She just needs to learn that she has to wrap around the first pole but that will come with practice I am sure, at least there is now most definately light at the end of the tunnel and we can see we are getting somewhere!! :) On her dog walk we realised that actually she needs to go back to basics and have the target at the end as she doesn't stop 2o2o if I continue running but as soon as the target is back she does. Therefore I am going to work on her with the target and cut it down a little bit each time to try and fade it out. Her seesaw was good but she did have a tendancy after touching the target to wander over to my trainer as she was the one rewarding her-cheeky monkey!! The same really applies on the a-frame although with this she really needs the drive to get to the bottom and to stay there, if her ball was put out a bit in front of the a-frame but out of ehr reach she would just continue running for it!! But all in all it was a good session!!

Elliot:
He did some beautilful straight line work and some turns/cross-behinds, if I get the handling right he makes it all look so easy bless him!! We then did some work on the dog walk and he doesn't really get the idea that he has to stay on the dog walk until i release him no matter where I am, as soon as I move away from him he wanders off, so i need to work on moving away and then when he touches returning to him to reward him, this will be a little tricky as the hallway at the bottom of the stairs in my flats is tiny, but I am sure we will find a way. His a-frame was better but he still likes to stop slightly sideways. We then finished with some very wide channels weaves which we did at a straight angle and he did every time!! :) I get the feeling he is going to be a little star at this as well!! :D

Sorry, its a long one!!

I apologise if this bores you, I am just trying to keep an accurate record for myself of how my two are getting on.

Firstly, I have now added the videos of Jem at the agility nuts comp to that thread!!

Secondly I have spent the past 3 days working on Jems weaves and yesterday managed to have a really good session, with her having a success rate of over 80% doing four weaves from a distance of about 10 foot. Still in a straight line but next time we might try to start doing it at a little angle, depending on if she remembers it all!!

So now for the stuff we have done today:

Flyball

Jemma:
Well she was still having a bit of a look at the dogs running out to her so wasn't doing full change overs but like I have said before that is not as much of a worry as she will just have to be start dog. But what made me really happy was that on the box section she did four jumps up and back with only netting between the final jump and the box and she didn't even bat an eyelid at the other dogs racing in the lanes which is amazing for her, especially after last time bless her!! Lets just hope she does the same next week!! Her box was pretty good too, still had nat in to really call her and drive her to the box but she only stumbled over a couple of them, the rest were four feeters, and the full run was with the new box, still not loaded yet though!! :)

Elliot:
Well what can I say - he is a little star!! On his box he had no natalie and did two jumps then box (but then running back over all four with me running too!!) on the old box, although he got a little oncfused when I first did two jump as he had never done it from that far back before. We then the same on the new box with no faulters, all four feeters too :) With his lane runbacks he got on fine, ran without netting, did change overs and everything - even nearly came level with asher (well almost nearly - was about a jump behind him) !!! :)

Agility

The club I train at was one dog short for their league match so I got a call and decided to give it a go, the more practise I get for Jem the better!!

So...
Agility
I forgot to say steady on the seesaw so Jem slipped of sort of mid air bless her as she tried to stop at the end!! Then we had 8 left handed weaves (straight entry and exit), I didn't call her off them or anything and she found the entrance straight away and did 6 perfect weaves, sadly for fear of making her speed up and pull out i had hung back a bit too much I think but anyway we then had another few goes at them but she was being silly and getting in a state so we left the ring!! She only missed out on a couple of jumps and a-frame.

Jumping
Again there were 8 weaves but this time right handed but in the same arrangement as before. The first time she just walked down the side of them in the way she does, second time she walked down the side and went in between 6&7. Was going to walk out the ring but gave her one last chance, made her sit and then told her weave and she did them bless her, I was then so pleased that I forgot where I was going but only for a split second. So apart from the weaves she did the rest of the course brilliantly bless her!!

Steeplechase
There were no weaves or contacts in this and she went clear so that was a good round bless her!! :)

Her wait at the start line for all three was brill, not even any twitching seen!!:)

So as I already know it is her weaves letting us down so once we have cracked them first places here we come...well maybe!!