Some Agility/Obedience Work

[BoandAbby]

Abby-
Ok so yesterday evening I took Abby down to the park to work on some obedience and we worked on some heel work as well as some more long distance recall and sit/down stays. I didn't get a video this time =( but she did amazing. We've honestly never worked on heel work, but she did great until the wind started picking up and the little side coverings to the baseball field started moving and clanking against the chain links. She started getting a bit nervous when that happened and started to loose focus. So we started playing with her toy then went for a short little hike down an extremely short trail and back. I didn't have her offleash because I didn't trust her with so many people and dogs around however I did let the leash drag behind her so in case she started to take off(she did at one point after some kids cuz she wanted to say hi) I could grab it and get her attention. Here's one of our videos from last friday


Then this evening we worked one some agility/jump work. I had all three jumps set up in the front yard and started working with her. I was freaking scared to because I hate being the center of attention and nearly all the cars passing by slowed down or stopped and watched us for a bit before driving off. Then People walking by with dogs would stop and ask me questions which I happily answered then went along my merry way! One car passed by thee times and it was kind awkward, but the kids in the car wanted to watch us so I thought it was ok, but again extremely weird. Anyway I guess it was due to the wider space, but Abby did really well. I was able to do a few send overs and she did great as well as gained speed. I even got her in a down stay while a dog passed by and she didn't move a muscle which is extremely amazing as she always breaks stays to go see other dogs! Then my friends and their niece came over and helped tape me while I ran Abby which was pretty fun. And we had one really good run, but then she randomly stopped because a car pulled up that looked like my moms and she got all excited and was waiting for what she thought was my mom to come out, but then they drove off and I gained her attention back and we finished. I do have videos from today, but I'm working on editing them into one amazing vid!!!

Bo-
Lord that dog was extremely hyper! lol!!! I had to run him around in circles to get him a bit tired so that he would focus. After that he did pretty well, but was still all oooh what's that and just not in the right mind set to train. And of course I can't let him offleash because we are still working on recall as he has horrible recall... Sadly I didn't get a video of Bo cuz my batteries died and I couldn't find any working ones, but we did get a few good runs in and it was just a lot of fun! Then some friends came over to drop something off and their dog greta was in the car and Bo wwent mad! he was kidney beanin all over the place and just a mad man wanting to say hi to everyone! He even attempted to steal the money when they handed it to me. The idiot just jumped up and snatched it right outta our hands! Sigh I'll work with them a bit again tomorrow and we'll see how it goes

 

[BoandAbby]

Here's the video
YouTube - Agility Practice 08/30/10

 

[Dekka]

Cute dog You need to reward in agility more if you have any competition desires. Your dog's form could use some work needs more confidence. You might want to lower the jumps until your dog is willing to happily jump them every time as she is refusing some of them.

 

[BoandAbby]

Her rewards come after each run. My sister will toss me her favorite toy(her duck thing) and we play a game of tug and a bit of fetch then I toss it back to my sister and it kinda repeats like that (edited those parts out). She's usually willing to jump over them, but we had done a few untaped runs before the camera came out so she was a bit tired as well as since I have yet to get into some handling/agility classes(won't be starting till next year) my body positions etc aren't exact and sometimes it gets her all confuzzled which in turn makes her hesitate when it comes to a jump. Majority of the mistakes are my fault

 

[release the hounds]

What dekka is saying is even though you may be rewarding after each run, it isn't enough. You two look like you're having loads of fun, and I know nothing really of body position for agility or any tricks, but I can tell your dog isn't ready for full runs with no rewards.

For example when he was distracted by the car, then you got him back and asked him to do another and he got distracted again. If he's doing that, he's not ready to do a lot without good stuff (stuff he wants not what you percieve as good) coming from you often. Make sense. I would have rewarded immediately after doing that jump from being distracted, then did 2 or three more with good rewards right after the jump again then maybe tried linking a couple together.

 

[BoandAbby]

*cough* Ab's is a girl*cough* Yeah I see where your coming from and I shall try to be more enthusiastic as well as rewarding with her...

 

[release the hounds]

i knew that, I just forgot to put an "s" in front of all my "he"'s

 

[Dekka]

Yes, your dog looks like you two are having fun, but you can see where she starts to fade and you need to reward before she fades. Its common for newbies to want to do it with less rewards as its seems like progress. But really reward more and your dog will get better faster, and love the game more.