The Spotted Devil

Well done wuffles Awesome score with Ava - what a way to title her!!!! Ness - you must be thrilled after all this agonising waiting and wondering. Go Kenz OK, so what happens when your agility training grounds are a quagmire and unsafe for training so you've only focussed on weaving pole entries for a few weeks....then add a handler who is a space cadet after a flu vax? A leetle scary On the upside Ziggy had such a hoot today and his weaving entries were brilliant. He attacked his nemesis, the seesaw with more and more confidence as the day progressed and entertained the judge and onlookers by jumping right over the new low height table My lovely lad pulled it all together despite my attempts at saboutaging him to get just the one pass card but it was in Excellent Agility (his first) and with a first place to top it off. Unfortunately he didn't get to take the "best handler" home :D

Thanks for updating, Jules. Maybe see you Sunday (will be there with Em for agility at 11am)? Take care xxx

MonElite Dobermann? ;) Only kidding! But if you want Ill lend you Fury for a week ;) that should teach you a bit more about over excited dogs that want to do more. She does have an off switch, but on occassion when you want to turn it off it keeps flicking over to on Mon, you send her Fury and I'll send her Em :D

Are they expensive RV? I don't use dokkens - just dummies and birdies. Interestingly Em seems to have a preference for the 3" dummies, which surprises me for such a little dog. ETA: RS no idea on the whistle. Mine is LOUD!!!!

Oooh, and guess who turned 1 last week

What a sad end for a bumper That's why I toss my dummies away from trees! LL was in tears over some of my throws this week :D

This

At last Em's season is done with so yesterday I caught up with LL for training. Such a beautiful day that we decided to work on water. Em started out strongly but then managed to frighten herself silly so I took her away to make a huge game of retrieving a bird in the mud and shallows, getting deeper until she was really enthusiastic and swimming strongly. LL did blinds over the lake with her dogs and then threw a single mark (bird) for a well rested Em. LL threw it on land but Em was required to cross the (narrow) body of water - good girl retrieved without any hesitation so we decided to finish her training on a high. I had a play with LL's dogs - sending them on triple water marks - was a very funny experience..,like switching from a racing Mini Minor to driving a Mack truck or an aeroplane The boys were a handful but dear old Pepper looked after me This afternoon we went back to the same training ground to capitalise on yesterday's success. Em was off her nut with excitement but I still started her slowly on the bird/water. LL threw a bird in the same place as yesterday - Em attacked the water fabulously, picked up the bird (cheer from me) and went to cheat....I stopped her and sent her back in the water and she jumped straight in and came back. LL threw the next one right on the edge of the water. Again Em thought about cheating but entered the water as soon as I directed her to. We stopped there and gave Em a good gallop as a reward - of course I couldn't keep her out of the water after that! Warmed her up on a single T and a few land blinds - had barely forgotten a thing despite not having trained for 3 weeks. Both of us tired and very happy.

That's great Jules - please keep us updated x

Why a stand and not a sit RV? I teach a sit for field and retrieving but I would teach a stand the same way. Get the behaviour on cue first, lots of steady feet and 2 food game (with increasing distractions) then start rolling/throwing items past the dog when they are in various levels of hunting (might need to start easy), give the command and go over and reward the dog - do not let them retrieve the item but pick it up yourself. I've been playing this game with Em whilst in season and she thought it was a great lark.

Bloody hell Jules No words for what you've been through the past 12 months More positive thoughts for Amber's prognosis xxx

I've had good and not so good experiences with Priceless Pets. They mixed up my order with one from QLD and it took a bit of mucking around to sort it out. Sounds like it is run out of a vet clinic and they're just a bit short on time to fix things when they go pear shaped. The end result was fine though.

Crap Jules Hugs for the girl and for you x You know where I am should you need anything.

wuffles, you need to build value for the retrieve - my Dally did not want to know about retrieving and yet a few weeks ago threw himself in a dam (he hates swimming) to get Em's dummy as she was getting all the rewards. Funniest thing I've seen in a while Bring out the best treats you can think of and mix up how you deliver them. Make sure the dog is hungry and don't overdo the session. One game I have with Zig is releasing him to a bait plate - the running to the plate of treats is as much as a reward as the treats themselves. I run with him and whoop and holler and cheer like an idiot :D

It's all the same when they're doing a nose touch :D

It's amazing what you can see from the dog's point of view. I really learned to appreciate it in retrieving trials, crouching down to watch the marks and see the cover. In agility training I have been known to do 2o/2o on the dog walk

I even send Zig now and we both also love the 'Go!' command - it gives him speed, confidence and independence. The things that dog can achieve on an Open course stop me in my tracks sometimes. Which is of course when I stuff up

It depends on the dog a bit. Ziggy developed an unholy fear of Great Danes in the midst of show training. We had several in our class and he was fine with the 96kg Mastiff!!! As it only occurred during the line up I could work around it, ignore it and reward appropriate behaviour. Em went through a couple of weeks where everything freaked her out - brush, lead, anything. I completely quit training and spent lots of time just hanging out and playing with her - it turned it into a really positive experience for both of us. She let me know when she was ready to train again. A good thing to remember is that fear is an emotion - you cannot reinforce an emotion but you can reinforce the behaviour that stems from an emotion. It can be a fine line!

Sad. My neighbours have a BC that has been on a running wire on the verandah for 2 years. Since it was a puppy. Never exercised or trained and left alone for hours. It has become VERY human aggressive and territorial but is fine with their family. It has rushed me once on my property (luckily I was behind my own gate) but council didn't do much. An accident waiting to happen I suspect. Of course it was bought for the kids...

That's priceless! Go The Bitty

Thanks aussielover x Sometimes it's a challenge to keep up with her enthusiasm Try to teach a new behaviour and she whizzes through all her previously learned behaviours in rapid succession - I have to be very quick with the clicker and I now lure more just to get her started. Could not shape 2o/2o as she kept doing perch work on the board. Lured it yesterday and she got it this morning. skip - Em's breeder is in Vic. Happy to pass her details to you (just PM me) - she may be able to point you in the right direction in NSW. She is going away shortly so you might want to get in touch sooner rather than later.

I would like to have a huge brag by proxy :D Lablover's brood bitch, Pink (handled by a friend), won Novice today at the Lab Retriever Club's trial If that wasn't enough, 2 girls and 1 boy from Pink's last litter (sired by another of LL's dogs, Stamp) took out 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in Restricted These youngsters are only around 14 months old and a couple of them are entered in the upcoming Nationals - as far as I'm aware they are the youngest dogs to ever qualify. What makes it more terrifying is that I have promised to handle one of their litter mates for LL when Em is ready for Novice - talk about pressure

Hi there - best dog ever :D Not the easiest by any stretch of the imagination to run in agility but SO much fun when you find out what makes them tick. They are smart. Too smart actually!!! Ziggy has made me a better trainer as any mistakes I make are magnified for the world to see LOTS of positive reinforcement and variety in training - food, tug, whatever works - don't get grumpy in training or they'll take the first bus home. Don't be in a rush to start on equipment - LOTS of groundwork, focus and control first - it made our transition to agility much easier (we started agility training when he was 2). As a newbie to the modern way of handling I found that it was harder for me to get it right than the dog - so I would run the course 4 or 5 times and when I got it right I would run Zig through once or twice to save him from getting bored. Zig is in Masters Jumping (a couple of passes thus far) and Excellent Agility now plus the Open courses (a few passes) and we're both loving it. Happy to answer any questions you have. If you have access to a good agility club or a trainer that's a great start. One of my private instructors runs VERY fast Border Collies but is really understanding of breed quirks so I love getting lessons with her. The Dalmatian thread is a bit quiet of late but it would be great to see some more pics in there! Ah - just saw that you had posted - sorry, somehow I missed it! Also let us know the breeder as a history of dog sports in the lines help (message me if you don't want to post on the public forum). Video here but we have both improved a lot since that was taken - purely by concentrating on a couple of aspects of my handling and his understanding...

Thanks!! It thought I saw an ESS on a walk and I am guessing it was working line- it was one of those double take moments where I immediately thought ESS but then doubted myself Yes! I know exactly what you mean!!! I have done that a few times myself. You won't see a lot of them because they tend to go to working homes - retrieving, hunting, private trainers for detecting feral animal scat (in Austrailia and overseas), police, customs etc.

Woofen - it's dependent on the lines as working ability and soundness are more important than anything. Em will be a 400 dog, thus < 455mm but I haven't measured her as yet...need to teach her to stay still first :D The boys are a bit bigger of course.