Mimzy's Progress

Well, Mimzy continues to surprise me. Every time I assume she doesn't know something she proves to me she does. I guess I should start trusting my dog. In the past few weeks we've finally really started to mesh, and I'm getting very excited about it! She has moved up to intermediate class at Terry's (it's about time!) because she's finally getting her contacts down, and last Monday night in class she actually did an entire standard course (a hard one) with little difficulty! I plan to enter her in several classes, including standard, pairs, and gamblers, in College Station for the USDAA trial in August. I'm also hoping to finish both Landon and Deets' Performance 1 Dog titles.

This afternoon, Mimzy and I worked on some discrimination, which for you non-agility people is exactly what it sounds like- when there are two obstacles placed right next to eachother (for examble, a tunnel and a jump) you must use your body to tell the dog which one to go to, so you either push to the outside obstacle, or pull to the inside. With Mimzy, because she is so tunnel-focused, it is best for me to give her an RFP (reverse flow pivot), or as Terry likes to call them, a "Reach-In-And-Grab"... where you turn your body into your dog and say their name to get their attention pulled off of the obstacle and onto you. Mimzy is actually really good at this... when I can make my body do what my mouth says.

We have also been working hard on "go", so that she is learning that "go" means to go out in front of me and take whatever obstacle is there. She's finally to the point where I can tell her to "go" on a straight line of jumps and she will dart out in front of me and take the jumps as fast as she can.

The big thing we've been trying to master is the weaves. Mimzy has just gotten to the point where I'm really happy with her 24" weaves, but she seemed to have a lot of difficulty with the smaller-spaced pole, like the 20". She finally demonstrated to me today that she knows how to do them.

College Station USDAA 6/19-20/10

Friday we made the three hour drive down to College Station Texas to go to a USDAA trial at the Louis Peirce Pavillion at Texas A&M. I had only entered Deets, thinking that despite being air conditioned inside, Landon would still refuse to run in the heat of Texas summer. When I got there and found myself shivering and teeth clattering in the arena, I wished I had entered Landon after all.

Saturday, Deets just didn't seem to be on the same page as me. He was running ten times faster than he usually runs, but wasn't listening to me, either. We NQ'd in Standard, and in Gamblers, and by our last run of the day he was finally listening again. He got his first Snookers leg with a first place and a really nice time. Unfortunately, I do not have it on video.

Sunday, Deets was in a better place and he and I had a great time running. He got his second Gamblers leg with a 1st place, and got his third and final P1 Standard leg for his P1S title... the first title to his name. He also got a blue ribbon in that, class, as well.

His P1 Jumpers run was fantastic, but he dropped a bar because I called him to me too soon. Even still, it was one of the most fun runs I have ever done and we both had a blast doing it! He finished in 16.89 seconds.



Monday night I took Landon to class in Deets' place since Deets ran so hard over the weekend. He had fun but was so hot he wasn't really into class.

Mimzy, on the other hand, had a GREAT class and is really starting to show potential and demonstrate that she knows what her job is. She is moving fast and deliberately, and is learning to really listen to me. In other words, she's learning handler focus instead of obstacle focus. She's finally getting her contacts on the A-frame and the dog walk, and doing so well. I have a few things I really want to get her working on, like getting her to hit the down-side of the A-frame hard and fast and clearing the apex. I also want to work on her go-outs, so she really knows that when I say "go" I mean for her to run as fast as she can away from me. Her weaves are looking good but are not accurate, which is simply my failure with working on them lately. Either way, she should be ready to try her hand in the standard ring at the trial in College Station in August.

Landon and Deets have an obedience practice trial this weekend, as Landon is ready for the Open ring and Deets is ready for Novice... or so I believe they are. This weekend will demonstarte to me if they are or not. If they are, we will be going to an AKC obedience trial in Longview in a few weeks.

USDAA McKinney Memorial Day Weekend 2010

Memorial Day weekend was a very successful weekend for us! We went up to McKinney for the USDAA trial and came home with quite a handful of ribbons! I didn't manage to get videos of all the runs but I got most of them.

Saturday first thing was Gamblers, and Deets was the only one entered. He Q'd to get his first Gamblers leg and first place and an admirable 56 points!

Then came Standard, where Deets got his first Qualifying leg with 2nd place and a time of 40.61 seconds.



Landon got his third Q in P1 Standard to finish his P1S title, with third place and a time of 47.09 seconds.



Jumpers was after standard. Mimzy competed in Starters jumpers at 26" and had a nice run and would have qualified but took down the double. She and I are still learning to mesh well together and I think I need to let her grow up a little before she competes further, so I do not plan on entering her again until the fall or winter.

Deets had a very nice jumpers run but took down the penultimate bar. I am still proud of the run because I felt we worked really well together.



Landon competed for the second time in P2 Jumpers, and Q'd with a second place and time of 34.57 seconds. This was his first leg toward his P2J title. He was mister old reliable this weekend, and I really enjoyed running him.



On Sunday, I actually had to walk Mimzy off the course in Jumpers, as she decided to go visit the judge and a ring steward and then got pretty out of control on the course, and I decided I wasn't going to permit her to get away with those antics in the ring and picked her up and walked her off. That's okay, she's still such a baby.

Deets broke his start-line stay in Jumpers on Sunday and ran right into me and took out a jump. He was in trouble for that, but the rest of the run was nice.

Landon Q'd again in P2 jumpers on Sunday and now only needs one more leg to move up to Masters Jumpers. I didn't get the run on video and I wish I had, but he did get 2nd place with a time of 30.69 on a pretty gnarly course. I was very proud!

Sunday was MY very first time to ever compete in Snookers, and with the help of a fellow TOTC club member plotted out a very nice course for Deets. Again, not on video, and I so wish it were. We took the weaves twice because they were the 7 point obstacle and we got all our opening done and got mostly through the closing, but we got whistled off because Deets bailed on the teeter totter. That was very unusual for him and I was confused, but oh well. The judge complimented me on a very nice run and Deets still got first place. Not a single P1 dog qualified in Snookers on Sunday. Deets was just shy of Qing with 31 points.

Last on Sunday was Standard. Landon had finished his P1 standard title on Saturday but wasn't able to move up the next day, so he got another P1 Standard leg (a fourth) which was just icing on the cake. He was having fun this weekend and was a joy to run. He got third place with a time of 54.87 seconds.




Deets had an adventure in P1 Standard on Sunday. I think he was very tired and wasn't really into the run, but still did what mom told him to do. After dogs had been running down the dog walk all day, Deets happened to be the unlucky dog who suffered the dog walk falling out from under him after the pin that held the down-ramp onto the board fell out, and wasn't noticed by any of the ring crew. Deets did not seem phazed, but the noise of the board collapsing made me nearly have a heart attack. I didn't want to make a big deal out of it so that Deets would not get upset reading off of me, so I sent him to the table and waited to hear what the judge would do. He finished the run and still Q'd for his second standard leg, and the judge ran up after we were done and said she would let me bring him back in the ring and run him over the dog walk as many times as I wanted to make sure he wasn't upset by it. He wasn't, but I sure was glad it was him and not Landon who had gone just a few dogs before. If it had been Landon, I would be re-training the dog walk from step one again. What a good boy, Deets!



So, a few things I noticed this weekend that I want to work on with the dogs... Landon and I still need to work on our cross-behinds, because we are getting to the point where we are going to have to perform them in the masters jumpers ring. Deets has a nasty habit of stopping on top of the A-frame and that needs to be stopped. Mimzy just needs to grow up and learn not to go visit people in the ring, so I am going to start setting her up for that in class and having people ignore her.

USDAA Trial May 15/16

Well, this trial was interesting. Saturday it seemed like the dogs just couldn't get their heads screwed on straight, and Sunday I just couldn't seem to find mine! But, it did give me a chance to see what we need to focus on, so that is a good thing.

First, Landon and Deets competed in standard, and Landon blew a contact on the A-frame and Deets went off-course so they both NQ'd. In gamblers, Landon just wouldn't go out to the tunnel across the gamble line, which is something we have been working on and he really seems to only have an issue with it at trials, but not in practice. Deets went off-course again, and both of them just didn't seem like they wanted to be there.

Sunday was a much better day. Deets had a really fantastic standard run and ALMOST qualified but I made a stupid little skip-step right at the last just and he took down the last pole. Woops!



Landon had a great, steady standards run and qualified as well as taking first place. That is his second leg toward his P1 standard title so he only needs one more to move up to P2.



Landon finished his P1 jumpers title last trial so he was moved up to P2 (advanced) jumpers for this trial. He went off-course, despite my best efforts to keep him on it... and what do you know, the jerk of a dog who wouldn't go out to the tunnel the day before in gamblers just trotted right into a tunnel I was trying to pull him off of. Blah! Again, my fault, and something we need to work on.

Deets, however, had an AMAZING jumpers run! He used to be such a bar-knocker but I believe he's finally gaining his confidence over poles and now most knocked bars are my fault. I wasn't expecting him to Q in jumpers because there's so many bars he could possibly bring down, but low and behold, he Q'd with a blue ribbon and a time of 16.29 seconds, less than half the allotted course time. He also beat 7 Border Collies for time! It was Deets' first Q in USDAA.



Sunday was Mimzy's USDAA debut, and the first time she would be running in a new place that wasn't her home training center. I was doubtful, and convinced we were just in the ring to have fun and get used to being in the ring. She really surprised me, and competing at 26" at the Champion level took her first Q at her first USDAA trial, and first place!




Her run around the jump in the pinwheel was my fault... just me and Mimzy not being well meshed yet, along with me having trouble remembering how to run two very different dogs back to back on the same course. Her little detour right before the last jump to see the scribes at the judge's table was a repeat on the CPE trial a few weeks ago, and I attribute that to her little baby-brain. Again, something we can work on.

Monday night Deets and Mimzy went to class with Miss Terry and Deets and I worked on a very gnarly jumpers course from 2005 that Terry said was the hardest course she'd ever seen. Deets and I managed to do it perfectly the first time, with not a single bar knocked. Mimzy was goofy Monday night, and Terry and I spent most of the class time laughing at her. She's such a babyface, it's so easy to forgive her. :)

We have a USDAA trial in McKinney on the 29th and 30th, and then we will slow down quite a bit for the summer. Landon just absolutely refuses to run agility in the summer because of his big black coat so he and I will focus on obedience. I have joined the Tyler Obedience Training Club and Landon and I joined the drill team. We have our first practice tomorrow night. I am hoping that by the end of the summer Deets will be ready for Novice and Landon will be ready for Open.

It's starting to get really hot out there so remember your dogs need lots of water and lots of fun time at the lake or river or whatever is close to you!

CPE Trial 5/8-9/10

Well, we competed in our first CPE trial this weekend and had a blast! It was hosted by CMStreek, our home training center and Terry Dyck, our instructor. All three dogs ran in multiple classes, so I'll take this in order.

Saturday, Deets and Landon both competed in Standard Level 3, and both NQ'd because they took off-courses and went in a tunnel instead of up the dog walk. My fault, a learning experience.



Then, Deets competed in Jackpot Level 3 which is just like Gamblers in USDAA but with a different name. He had a flawless run, the distance obstacle was the weaves which Deets is amazing at thanks to his 2X2 training, and he won first place and got his first ever Q!



After that, Deets and Landon competed in Jumpers Level 3 and Landon Q'd with a first place but Deets knocked too many bars and went off course into a tunnel so no ribbons there. Then, Mimzy competed in her first show ever, and ran Jumpers Level 1. I was actually very pleased, despite the fact that she went off-course and took down three bars and decided right before the last jump to go say "hi!' to Terry. Oh well! She ran with me and that was what I was worried she wouldn't do!

Sunday was a much better day! Landon hit a bar and NQ'd in standard but Deets had an awesome run and got his first standard leg with a first place!



Then, Deets and Landon competed in Level 3 jumpers and both got a Q, but Deets knocked a bar and incured a fault so he got 2nd place to Landon even though he was 12 seconds faster.


After that, Mimzy competed in level 1 again and did SOOO much better! She got a little distracted by the yummy food cart and then had an off-course because I pushed her too far foreword, but did very well otherwise and even got her first qualifying score and FIRST place!


The last run of the day was Deets' Jackpot level 3 class again, and he ran beautifully and did a great job and got his second Q toward his title and first place again!



Some random pictures from the weekend...

Mimzy Weaves and Teeters

Well, today is all good news. The specialist said that there is nothing wrong with Deets other than the fact that his L2 vertebrae is just a tad funky-shaped in the arch on top, but that it isn't causing him any pain or discomfort and gave him the all-clear to run and compete as normal.

Mimzy is progressing quickly and while working on her jumping on the end of the teeter board and targeting to the bottom she decided that it was just easier to run up the whole thing and do it herself. She's even got down that she has to run all the way to the end of the board and crouch down to hold on, and she did it over and over again and loved it! I will get video soon.

She's also finally progressed to doing all 12 weave poles, and doing them quickly and well. She likes to do them too!

This weekend we are off to northern Arkansas for a bike race/fishing trip on the White River, something all the dogs always enjoy. Pictures soon!

A Day at the Lake

Well, it's been an interesting week. First, the foster puppy we obtained who was supposed to go to her new home Friday was diagnosed with parvo Tuesday night, so the last week has been one big parvo puppy mess. "Sam" went downhill fast on Friday night and has been hospitalized all weekend, and was not expected to make it, but she has! So we haven't been out to train just out of courtesy because we're dealing with parvo in the house.. er... garage.

Wednesday morning I took Deets to see Dr. Reeves here in Tyler to rule out the possibility of his bar knocking being caused by any pain, and Dr. Reeves said that his L1 vertebrae is raised and that I should stop running him immediately and pull him from all competition, we should do an x-ray, and start on chiropractic adjustments. At first I was very upset by this news, but the more I have thought about it and the more I have discussed it with my vet at home and with a friend who is a musculoskeletal specialist in canines I have decided that stopping Deets from running altogether right now is pretty extreme, considering he is not showing any sign of actual pain and he loves his job. I am going to continue to run him at lowered jump heights and go easy on him, and I am going to let him compete in our USDAA trial the third weekend in May, though I pulled him from the CPE trial on May 8/9th. This week Deets and I are going to Dallas to see the specialist and have x-rays done and see what needs to happen. I like Dr. Reeves a lot and I greatly respect his opinion, but I think that stopping Deets from running altogether right now is a little extreme and I trust the opinion of the specialist more... who wouldn't?

So, since we haven't been running this week the dogs and Yater and I went on a day trip to Lake Tyler to have fun. Enjoy the pictures!




Here is Landon being my guard dog... he loves to just sit and watch mom.





























The Catahoulas LOVE to fish! They watch the cork bounce up and down in the water and then try to eat the fish when you pull it up.














Look! We got one!















Deets is in his element.















Me and my little girlfriend.















This was funny, I can't believe Yater got it on film. I'm pretty sure the dogs were plotting against me.

Mimzy and 2X2s

Well, Deets can do everything he needs to be able to do to compete and do well in standard classes, and Landon is doing well on his distance work, so now it is time to focus on Mimzy and get her up-to-speed. Mimzy still has a baby-brain. She's only 18 months and still acts like a little puppy and is still a little unsure of herself. Obviously, she's doing really well with jumpers and has pretty good distance work, but we still really need to get it in gear and get out contacts and our teeter totter and our weaves. We have been working steadily with the 2X2 weaves at home, but she is not as mature or fast-learning as Deets, and I haven't had as much time to work with her as I did when I was committed to 2X2s with Deets, which is my own fault. However, in a fairly short amount of time she has gotten up to doing 6 poles.

As you can see, she's still a little unsure of her footing, but she is driving foreword fairly well and understands her entries and what her job is. Once we can put two sets of 6 together and get her to twelve, I will go back and do some exercises that Susan Garrett shows in her dvd to show the dog how to properly navigate through the weave poles. It is amusing to me that Mimzy will be weaving before she has contacts or even the teeter totter.

We've been clicker training the teeter totter and she's getting the idea, but we still have some steps to go through before she can do the whole thing together, and because she's a little fearful it may take a while. She is entered in standard level 1 at a CPE trial the second weekend of May, where she will not have to teeter or weave, but I am concerned about her making her contacts on the dog walk and A-frame. I need to get her going on her contacts, but since lovely big Deets broke my contact trainer, I can only work when we get out to CM Streak.

Cross-behinds

I have really been working lately on getting to be a better handler, with better distance work and more fluid and directive commands. With the help of my trainer, Terry, I feel I've made a big improvement in the last several months. My worst maneuver, by far, is the cross behind. I've been working hard at this with all three dogs and with myself, even practicing the maneuver without the dogs. This week I finally felt like I really got the feel of the move itself, mostly with finally understanding that the cross behind occurs behind the dog, not behind the obstacle. For those of you who don't know what a cross-behind is, it's a maneuver where you send the dog slightly ahead of you and cross behind the dog to change directions. Such as in the picture above, Mimzy was on my right side, but I sent her ahead slightly and crossed behind her to put her on my left. We really started to get it while practicing a masters level jumpers course from the DAWG agility trial in McKinney this last weekend.



Deets' weaves are really coming along and looking great. He's got a great little duck paddle going through them. Mimzy and I are still working steadily on 2X2s and she's down to 4 straight poles, ready to add another 2. Her contacts are coming along slowly, and I'm honestly getting frustrated with how long it's taking her to catch on. Deets' contacts look good but need a little polishing as I think I've rushed him a bit, but he generally gets the idea to go to the bottom and stop. Deets and Mimzy are really coming along, and all are surprising me. Landon who is really awful at cross-behinds even got them down today. Mimzy is forever thrilling me and I'm convinced that as she matures and starts to really get this down she will just be a blast. I'm astounded at how fast Deets has progressed. The second weekend in May Deets will compete in Standards for the first time, and Mimzy will be in jumpers. The weekend after that is a USDAA trial here in town and Deets and Landon will be in standards, jumpers (Landon in P2) and gamblers. Mimzy will be in jumpers. I've decided to move Deets down to Performance in USDAA so that he can jump 22 instead of 26, because he's such a big, thick dog that I don't think it's fair to ask him to jump over his own shoulder height by that much. Mimzy, on the other hand, will be jumping 26" even though she is only 23" tall, simply because she's so lean and athletic.

USDAA Trial 4/11/10

We went to the USDAA trial put on by Dallas Agility Working Group this last weekend and brought home lots of ribbons. Deets competed in Starters Jumpers and although he did really well, he took out a bar and went off course. Still had fun though! And the off course really was my fault, I stopped and faced the jump rather than turning and continuing to move. Woops, I'm not perfect either!

Landon competed in Gamblers, Standard, and Jumpers all on Sunday. Gamblers wasn't so great because we had to do the teeter totter at a distance and he bailed on me. He got his first standard leg, though, and did the teeter totter albeit slowly. He also got his last leg for P1 jumpers and another blue ribbon, which makes him three for three.

Jumpers with Weaves

Well, today all the dogs got worked again. My lovely boyfriend went with me and took the video camera, so I have a lot of footage of what we worked on today. Through the week, I've been working with Landon on getting the movement for cross behinds, which in case you don't know what that is it's when you send the dog ahead of you for an obstacle and you switch sides behind them. Our practice with it showed when we worked a jumpers course from the AKC Nationals this year.



Deets and I have been working on our 2X2 weaves, and now at day number 8 and less than an hour of combined training, Deets can get all twelve weaves with some amazing entries.


He is also doing well on his contacts, and does great cross-behinds... so he can do this very difficult jumpers course as well. He's pretty darn slow in the video because he was so tired at this point already, he was ready to quit. He got almost through the whole thing without knocking bars, but took down a pole on the double at the very end. He's going to be my darn little bar knocker...







Mimzy is still coming along steadily with learning the teeter totter game. Look how cute she is when she pushed it down!

Just another day of training

Well, today was just another day of training. I started in the front yard with Deets working on his 2X2s, and he still remembered perfectly how to get weaves his 6 poles. He's a little bad about getting his entry from the right side, which I recognize as my own fault for mistakes made with step 1 in the 2X2 method, but it's nothing I can't fix with good repetition, and now I know better so I won't make the same mistake with Mimzy.

All the dogs and I loaded up and went out to CMStreek to work on the field in the afternoon. Landon and I worked on going to the tunnel from a distance of about 15 feet, which is a skill I realized we needed to work on at the last trial when he wouldn't complete the gamble in USDAA gamblers. Then we did some weaves and I let him quit for the day, seeing as how good he's been lately and he was already getting hot and therefor tired.

Mimzy and I worked on going to the tunnel, too, but she's splendid at that so we worked contacts on the contact trainer. I was able to move the trainer to a steeper slope today, and she was still great about hitting the bottom and stopping. She's a little slow about it when I stay behind her... she doesn't like to go all the way to the bottom, and sometimes when she does she turns around to look at me. She's getting there, though. We played the teeter totter game some more and she actually went up the board and made the teeter go down by herself, but she was very hesitant about it, so I think we need to play with the obstacle on the ground more and maybe with the wobble board some more.

Deets and I worked on some distance jumps and tunnels, too, and he's so reliable at a distance. We worked on contacts on the A-frame and Dog-walk and he is just great with them. He stops two-on/two-off every time and waits for me to tell him to go. Then we grabbed a set of 6 weave poles and worked the 2X2 method working around the "clock" a bit, and even threw in a jump for fun.

A successful day for Deets!

Well, it's been a busy last week for the dogs. Landon has been working steadily at his 12 sets of weaves and doing a very admirable job. He's got about 80% accuracy... he pops out of the last two poles so we're opening up the weaves for him at the end so he has some good chances for success. His distance work is getting great and we're finally getting really good at it.

Mimzy's head has sort of been in the clouds the past few days, and I can't help but feel it's the weather finally warming up and all the nice smells of Spring coming out. She's slowly working the contact trainer to learn her "holds" but she's slower than Deets is at learning and I sometimes forget to slow down with her. She is very good at getting her two-on, two-off and waiting, but only when she sees me stop. If I keep running or hold back she doesn't go all the way to the bottom. We played the Teeter Totter Game again today, and she was much better about it than last session. She is not nearly as afraid of the board coming down, and is now jumping to push the board down from about 2 feet up in the air. She'll be doing her "C" in no time!

Today was really Deets' successful day. We went to train and he's finally really got his contacts. We moved up to the big A-frame and Dog-walk and he's got them about 90% of the time... he stops 2-on, 2-off and freezes with complete attention on me to go to the next obstacle. This means the only thing we have left to learn before we can compete in Standards is the weave poles. Aaaannnd.... we've just about got those! Today was Deets/ 4th day of 2X2 training, with several short sessions every day. In that time, we've added a second set of poles moving in toward the first, gone to weaving four poles, and tonight we added another set and now have 6 weaves in four days. We're going to wait here for a few days and get this really solid and taking the weaves from all over "the clock", and some hard entires. We'll also add in a jump before, so he learns to sequence the weaves in. After we spend some more time doing that, we will add a second set of 6 weaves and begin closing those together to get 12 poles. Should take us less than a week.

Teeter Totter

Well, it's been an interesting week. I haven't been able to continue the 2X2s because I had to run to Dallas for 5 days, and then had a week swamped with tests and homework at school. Monday night Landon and Deets had their regular classes. Landon and I have been working on distance work, because I have an awful habit of taking my dogs to every obstacle. We're getting a lot better about it and Landon is, in result, getting much faster. He's also slowly conquering his fear of the teeter totter, which we now call "See" (short for see-saw) and will do it now without bailing off the side, but he still does it very slowly.

Deets and Mimzy both need to learn to do the teeter totter. Deets has got it down, now, after clicker trianing him to do it. I started a few weeks ago by playing the "teeter totter game" with him, in which I hold down the "up" side of the teeter and wait for him to touch it with his paw. When he did, I clicked and gave a treat. Slowly I required him to do more and threw a bigger learning curve at him, so instead of one pay I wanted two on the board. When he was coming at the board with both paws quickly and without hesitation, I raised the end of the board up by about an inch, and had him slam it down and clicked. By this point, instead of clicking as soon as his paws touched the board, I clicked when the board hit the ground. Slowly I raised the board higher and higher with every try, so that, after two 10 minute sessions in a week span Deets was jumping up with his front feet and making the board slam from its full height.

I then started to vary my position around the board, making Deets run up and slam the board from coming around my side, or from ten feet away instead of right next to me. He LOVED the game, and picked up on it really quickly. Soon, I asked him to actually walk up the board and perform the teeter like it should be, and he did it without hesitation of fear. By the third time he did it this way, he understood that the whole point of the game was to make the teeter totter slam as hard as he could make it. I continued to click when the board hit the ground, so that the reinforcer is not the clicker itself, but the sound of the bang on the teeter totter. Deets learned to do the teeter without issue with less than 30 minutes of total training. By his third session working he is able to perform it in sequences with jumps.

Mimzy, however, does not like the teeter totter game. I just started to play with her yesterday and she quickly learned to put her paws on the board while it doesn't move and enjoys the game... but as soon as I let it up an inch off the ground and it moved under her paws she became very fearful and ran around me in circles and barked and got very frustrated. Instead of continuing the game, I decided to teach her to play on the wobble board with me, so we took the clicker and learned to get on the wobble board. She's still pretty frightening, so this will be a much slower process with her.


Landon's weaves are really coming along. He can do a set of 6 perfectly every time, but with the set of 12 he likes to pop out at the 3rd or 2nd to last poles. I've split the two sets of 6 so they are about 4 feet apart and I stop and treat him between each set and then have him continue. Slowly I'm bringing the sets together. Yesterday at practice he performed the whole 12 together two or three times with no mistakes. We've got to get on this because his first standard USDAA run is on April 11th.

2X2 Weaves

Well, the funniest thing happened last night. Landon and Deets both had class with Terry, so we headed out to Frankston and Deets waited in his kennel for his beginner class while Landon had his private intermediate class with Terry. We were working on obstacle discrimination, which Landon was superb at. There was a set of 6 weave poles in the center of the ring, but we were not working them as Landon has had to go back and re-train the weave poles. I have been working him in channel weaves but had not yet taken the guards all the way to the top, so we haven't tried any poles without guards. While Terry and I were standing in the middle of the ring talking, Landon was upset because we were not paying attention to him. We both turned around and Landon was walking through the weave poles like it was second-nature, and turned around mid-poles to look at us like "well NOW you'll pay attention to me!" We decided to test his skills, so we ran some jump/weave sequences from all angles (around the clock) around the weaves, and he did them perfectly every time! Today, I set up my poles at home and he did all 12 great... we had to work hard at the second set of 6 at first, but he got it! He's about 80% accurate with them right now... but we'll get better!

Two days ago I got my Susan Garrett 2X2 weave training dvd in the mail. I spent all day Monday watching it over and over again and making notes. I did three sessions with Deets and Mimzy each through two poles, using the clicker method of training. Their shaping I"ve been doing with them has really helped. Both of them learned to run through the weaves in about 30 seconds. Our first session was only abot 2 minutes. By the end of Monday, both Deets and Mimzy could go through the set of poles from all the way around the clock at about 15 feet away.

Today, we did three more short sessions per dog and both of them go to the point of adding the second set of two poles. The poles start about 15 feet away from the first set, and both Deets and Mimzy figured out to run through both sets in about 2 minutes. Sessions once again were less than 5 minutes. By the end of the last session tonight, both could go through the two poles from all the way around the clock.

I am so thrilled with this method! This is my spring break so we have all week to do nothing but play with weave poles! YAY!

Welcome!

I suppose I should make my first blog an introduction. I started training agility at the age of fourteen after having grown up in the world of obedience and conformation. My first agility partner was a Beagle mix named Tweedy who was as stubborn as she was unwilling in the obedience ring, but after starting her in agility became an entirely different dog. She was a great first dog and taught me a whole lot... mostly patience. She also made up for a lot of my mistakes. Tweedy excelled at agility and earned lots of trophies and ribbons and even qualified and competed in the UKC nationals in 2004 and 2005. She went all the way to earning her UKC agility champion title.

In 2002 I got my first Belgian Sheepdog from my cousin and got him right into agility training at 6 months old. He also earned his obedience and conformation titles in no time at all. Training Landon was a breeze compared to Tweedy and he was competing very quickly. After about a year and his UAG1 title, Landon developed an intense fear of the teeter-totter that I could not get him past.

This was right at the time of my life when I graduated high school and moved off the college far away from home. I had no choice but to leave Tweedy and Landon at home. Tweedy by this time was 10 years old and retired, but Landon was absolutely devastated. After a year I came home and took a year off, and ended up going to college in Tyler, Texas, not far from my home in Dallas. The best part was I could take Landon with me.

During my time in Tyler my boyfriend and I adopted a Catahoula Leopard Dog who we named Deets, who turned out to be the most intuitive dog I've ever met, and wanted absolutely nothing but to please. Two years later we adopted Mimzy, a Catahoula/Lab cross who is my estrogen in a house of testosterone. She is stubborn, she has attitude, and she sniffs her own farts but she is an absolute blast to work with.

When Mimzy was a year old and Deets was 3 and Landon was almost 8 I decided to get back into agility with my dogs. I missed it too much. I contacted Terry Dyck at CMStreek Agility Training Center in Frankston, Tx and started all three dogs in classes right away. It was October 2009, and by December Landon was over his teeter-totter fear, and Deets and Mimzy were learning the basics.

In late Feb. of 2010 Landon returned to competition after four years off. We attended the USDAA trial in Tyler, Texas in Performance 1 jumpers and gamblers. Landon had a flawless run in jumpers and earned a first place and a leg toward his title. He missed the gamble because of an error by me (if wasn't the first and won't be the last).

On March 7th we traveled to McKinney Texas for another USDAA trial and Landon earned another leg toward his jumpers title and another blue ribbon, but had issues with the distance on the gamble. Deets competed in his first trial in Starters jumpers and did an absolutely fantastic job... we had a beautiful fun with great speed and distance and intensity but we took out two bars. Deets got third place but no Q.

This is where we've left of. This blog will be about the training of my agility dogs and our competitions. We are preparing for our next trial the second weekend of April in McKinney, so we'll be working on getting Mimzy ready for jumpers, Deets not knocking bars in jumpers, and Landon will be working on his distance and weaves so we can enter standards as well.