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This weekend Able accompanied me to an agility show in Dunedin. He hadn’t been to an agility show since he was about 11 or 12 weeks old, so I was interested to see how he would take it all in.

He was a super well-behaved puppy. He enjoyed meeting lots of new people – and playing with lots of new dogs. He walked off-lead in the exercise area without chasing other people’s dogs (I did keep him quite a distance away) and he was even able to focus on some impromptu training sessions with lots of distractions around him.

On the down side, he also spewed all over his bed as we drove through Herbert.

Fake Relaxing

The thing I was most pleased about was that he never got frantic about watching other dogs doing agility. We kept a good distance away from the rings, but we were sometimes quite close to the practice area. He watched a couple of dogs doing their warmups but he stayed quiet and the lead stayed loose.

He spent a lot of time lying on his hip and looking calmly at me. He got lots of bikkies for this behaviour when I first took him up to agility club, just because it was the first thing he did that wasn’t obnoxious. It now seems to be his default behaviour that he offers whenever we’re out in a busy environment and I’m sitting quietly. He looks semi-relaxed, but I don’t think he is truly relaxed – he’s a Border Collie in working mode and he’s offering “fake relaxing” because that’s what I’ve been rewarding him for. Nonetheless, it’s a much nicer behaviour than many others he could do, so I’ll keep paying him for it.

The Relaxed Beaver

Speaking of relaxing … last week Able lay down for a nap outside of his ex-pen for the first time. This is something that’s been worrying me. My other dog can only tolerate him in very short doses, so he spends a lot of time in his ex-pen. I get him out several times a day, but usually only for half an hour or so at a time.

Continue reading “Agility Show Weekend: Paw Waves and Quiet Watching”

Able is now 17 weeks old. Last week he went for his “real” off-lead walk, with no long line.

We’ve been “walking” at Knottingley for several weeks now. These are not really “walks” in the exercise sense of the word – at this age he can get all the exercise he needs in the back yard. They are chances for the puppy to explore new things, and for me to work on his recall in new, very distracting locations. We don’t go very far on these walks – under a kilometre – and after every 60-90 seconds of exploration, I call Able and we play together. We usually do our first little bit of walking alone, and then I get my older dog Rik out of the car to join us.

The first time I called Able while he was eating sheep poo, he ignored me so I walked up to him, took him by the collar and removed him from the sheep poo. I got him to do a hand target, then I let him go back to his sheep poo.

The second time I called Able while he was eating sheep poo, he tried to trot off with it in his mouth. I stopped him (gently) with the lead after one stride. The poo fell out of his mouth and he couldn’t reach it. I waited calmly and quietly through a little puppy meltdown, until he decided to come to me so we could have a game.

The third time I called Able while he was eating sheep poo … I was running out of daylight and the zen-ness required to train a puppy, but he didn’t want to get back in the car. I picked him up and popped him into his crate and we drove off.

Continue reading “Able’s First Off-Lead Adventure”

Last weekend was the Waimate Big Easy. This is our equivalent of a Round the Bays run: a mountain-bike race/fun run/fun walk which attracts hundreds of people. The finish line and prizegiving ceremony were held in our local park, which is also a dog exercise area, so I was able to take Able along.

Most dog owners know that socialisation is crucial during the puppy’s first 3-4 months. This is true, but it doesn’t stop there. You need to keep taking your puppy out and finding new things for him to see and hear and explore regularly throughout his first year of life, or you may still end up with a dog that is nervous in strange situations.

The biggest event on the agility calendar is the NZ Dog Agility Championship (NZDAC), held at Labour Weekend every year. Over the years the NZDAC has grown larger and the atmosphere is now a bit offputting to some dogs. In particular, there’s usually a loud, echoey sound system (think racecourse) and there might be somebody talking on that right before your dog runs. There might also be lots of people applauding, which some dogs don’t like.

Continue reading “Sounds Scary”

Since he was 9 or 10 weeks old, Able has had to sit and wait every time I open his ex-pen door to let him out. If he doesn’t wait, no problem – I just shut the door and wait for him to remember his manners. He is only allowed to move when I give his release cue “OK” (see previous discussion of release cues).

At 11 or 12 weeks, I started doing more formal Crate Games with him, and the learning from the ex-pen transferred over almost instantly.

One of my training focuses last week was on holding a sit stay while I throw a toy for him to retrieve. I started this in a crate, with one hand on the door so I could shut it, and the other hand putting a toy down on the floor. He was OK with this, but it was a real struggle for him the first time I actually threw it a short distance.

He cottoned on very quickly. I only had to shut the crate door a couple of times during the first session. The next night I couldn’t get him to do it wrong it all, so I parked him on the ground just in front of his crate, and he was still perfect. Good puppy!

A reliable sit stay in the face of temptation is an important agility skill, vital if your dog can run faster than you. 99.5% of my agility runs start with my dog holding a sit stay while I move out towards the second or third obstacle. This is called a lead-out and it is a behaviour that commonly breaks down in competition because the dog is more excited. It’s important that you always wait until your dog is sitting still with his bum on the ground whenever you are training anything that starts from a sit position, or you are likely to run into trouble with this down the road.

“but he Does It at Home” Syndrome

Also last week, I tried to get my puppy to sit and stay in everyday life for the first time. I just wanted him to stay put while I moved some hedge trimming from one side of the gate to the other side. He wouldn’t do it. He could sit, but as soon as I took a single step he was off again. Eventually I just shut the gate a bit so that he couldn’t escape while I put the clippings in the bin, and captured the super-cute photo above.

What Able had was a case of the very common dog training complaint: “But he does it at home!” This cry of despair is heard almost weekly in every obedience or foundation agility class in the world.

Continue reading “Sit Stays, In Captivity and In the Wild”

Able still spends most of his time in his ex-pen or out in the garden. One of the benefits of this is that he hasn’t been able to get into and chew up any of my stuff.

Until last week. Turns out he is getting very clever at moving his crate around on the floor by pushing at the bottom of it with his nose. And also very clever at somehow hooking stray objects through the bars -usually a dog toy or the ever-present roll of paper towels (this puppy pees with truly astonishing frequency) … but this time he found a new victim. A victim that I dumped in the corner of the office when I was unpacking some boxes, because it’s 2021 and I don’t actually need an alarm clock any more.

The Importance of Nail Trimming

Long toenails increase the risk of arthritis in the toes, and also of the toenail getting caught in something and ripped. Keeping your dog’s nails short is one of the simplest things you can do to help them enjoy a sound, injury-free agility career. Once the quick of the nails grows longer it’s quite difficult to make it recede again, so it’s best to start with frequent nail trimming while your puppy is very young.

Continue reading “The Alarm Clock Assassin and Daily Torture Sessions”

Able is now 13 weeks old. Things are going pretty well in some regards. My other Rik has accepted his arrival much better than I thought she would. He’s learned how to sit and down on cue, he loves to play with me, and he’s getting better at his baby body awareness exercises.

But there is a double-edged sword that comes with being a smart cookie.

Our First Knottingley Park Adventures

I take Able to a local park 2 or 3 times a week. There’s long grass and gravel and uneven terrain and logs and sheep poo and all sorts of other things to explore. It’s important to get your pup out to explore new places and to give him new challenges to his balance and coordination, although at this age fifteen minutes is plenty.

Continue reading “But I Don’t Wanna Get Back in the Car, Plus Agility-Style Recalls”

Able has been to two agility shows now. He was a bit overwhelmed by his first experience (I probably should have set his ex-pen up in a less high-traffic area so he could watch from a distance) but he gained more confidence as the day went on. He loved meeting lots of new people, especially Isaac and Kate.

He also has a new nickname – “Beaver”. I have never met any dog so obsessed with chewing wood. He spent his first morning at home trying to chew the hardwood floors. He’s given that up but he’s still keen on ripping all the rotten wood off the railings of the deck, or just digging up the deck itself, or chewing on the edge of a door… Hopefully my house will survive his puppyhood more or less unscathed!

My main focus this week has been our retrieve. I taught my previous dogs to retrieve by … well, I never taught my first three dogs to retrieve. I started it but didn’t make a lot of progress and then one parent or the other swiped the puppy off my hands and taught it how to retrieve. The basic method I was using was Chuck It and Pray – grab an exciting toy, get the puppy engaged with it, then throw it and spend the next ten minutes begging them to bring it back while they had a whale of a time without me.

Continue reading “Shaping an Awesome Retrieve”

I’ve had my puppy for two weeks now, and I swear he is getting bigger and heavier every day. He is quite a confident pup and loves exploring new things, especially with his mouth.

I had a list of over twenty things I planned to do with him in the first couple of weeks. I’ve actually managed to do a little bit of most things with him, although of course we are only at the baby steps of everything. Unfortunately he has to spend a lot of time in his ex-pen as Rik is not quite ready to meet him face-to-face yet, but I shut her in my bedroom with a Kong every few hours so that he can come out and have an adventure in the garden.

Here’s The List … most of these things will be works-in-progress for many months.

Continue reading “Able at Ten Weeks”

Paws in a Box is a great fun trick to introduce you and your puppy to training through shaping. It’s also useful to develop your pup’s understanding of where their back feet are at they move around. Most pet dogs need to improve in this skill when they first start agility training, as they aren’t used to thinking about it too much – the back legs just tend to follow the front ones.

Shaping Behaviour

A lot of dogs learn how to sit, lie down, and come by following a piece of food in their owner’s hand. There’s nothing wrong with this, but for agility training it is easier if the dog is more thoughtful about exactly what he is doing. We like to use a process called shaping to encourage the dog to invent new behaviours that he can offer to us. If you have used a clicker previously, this can be useful in shaping – if not, you’ll need a verbal marker such as “Yes”, as shown in this video.

Continue reading “Paws in a Box”

This is not a post about how to stop your puppy piddling on the carpet. If you need help with that, I’m sure there are lots of other great resources out there on the internet for this. My basic approach is to confine the pup when he’s not supervised, take him outside very frequently when he is, and gradually extend his level of freedom.

Agility dogs lead a slightly different life to most pets. They often travel in the car for several hours at a time (and stay the night in there too), and are required to toilet on a short time frame in unfamiliar, high-distraction settings. There are a few extra things you can do with your toilet training to help make these situations easier for both of you.

Continue reading “Toilet Training for Future Agility Superstars”