When did you go from 6 to 12 weave poles?

[Raegan]

Marsh is weaving 6 weave poles on a competition base pretty solidly. Solidly enough that I feel comfortable raising criteria to 2 sets of six poles (we are training via the 2x2 method). I have two agility trials planned for this year: One in two weeks at our home club where he practices every Tuesday outdoors on grass and one in December indoors on mats where I have been and trained, but Marsh has not. In October he's entered only in JWW, in December it's JWW and FAST (which is the best class). Novice always, so he'll only encounter 6 poles in competition.

Should I work him up to 12 poles before or after he finishes Novice?

 

[MandyPug]

The transition to 12 doesn't seem to be too hard to most dogs. I didn't have room in my yard for 2 sets of 6 poles so over a week i added 2 more stick in the ground poles to my 6 and Izzie was weaving 12 by the end of the week. We needed to have 12 in our pockets before our first starters standard because the judges are opting to put 12 poles in more and more for starters (all three of the courses had 12 poles for our first trial that we did standard at.

If you want to i don't see any problem getting him going on 12 poles before finishing novice.

 

[Sekah]

If he's got 6 now there's no reason to wait on going up to 12 I think. Most dogs seem to do it pretty easily.

The first time Cohen ran into a set of poles she got a little confused about 3/4 of the way through, but I reset her with plenty of verbal encouragement and she's done really well ever since. Just keep up your proofing exercises to really communicate that once he's in the weave poles he shouldn't leave them until he's done.

 

[Sunnyshines]

I set Sunny up to 12 once she was hitting the 6 correctly 8/10 times. I didn't see a reason to wait longer when I knew we were going to compete soon after (as MandyPug says AAC is now putting 12s in the Starters Standard most of the time)

I just went ahead and added the 6 more right off the bat since I had the space. The first time through she kind of stuttered at about 8. The next time she had no problem and hasn't since. She actually weaves the 12 better than the 6, most of the time. Though speed and angle are still factors

 

[MafiaPrincess]

I have 4 2x2 bases. We just kept adding bases till I ran out.. Wish I had 4 more poles, but I don't and my soil is clay.. I tried stick in the grounds and they were dangerous.. wouldn't go in far enough. I care more that Smudge makes the entry than anything else for criteria.. So I still c and t super often for good entries.

Have to admit Smudge was in master snooker and advanced standard with the inability to weave. Felt stupid that I hadn't bothered to teach weaves - but the chiro didn't want him weaving under speed due to his back.. He's fast enough that we had time to lure through the weaves. Only in the last few months did I bother to finally teach him.

 

[adojrts]

Once they are good with all entries on 6, then I add a 2nd set of 6 about 20 ft beyond the first. They go from one set to the other, then close the distance quickly. I usually close the distance by halfs, therefore after 4 or 5 times the distance is closed and they are doing 12. Having said that, before moving to 12 the dogs should be able to do 6 with other obstacles esp. jumping going into and out of the weaves from different angles.