DeltaCharlie

I would try putting the lead for every meal. You want her to associate the lead with really good things. Start off allowing her to drag it behind her to the food bowl then progress to actually holding it and walk with her to the bowl. If it were me I wouldn't be going past the front door for quite a while. Put the harness and lead on and go and sit in the front yard (or front step if need be) and just play some games with her. Make going out the front door the most fun thing in the world to do without actually pushing her too far out of her comfort zone. Wait until she is really comfortable with going out before you go further, then progress to the footpath, the neighbours tree, etc.

Just do a search for "gin border collie" and it will come up with heaps of them. They have their original audition video on there as well as the semi final routine.

Is this a qualified trainer or just a normal trainer for a local club? Either way they have their facts wrong, I spoke to a lot of people when I got Delta as I wanted to start her off on raw straight away. I was already feeding it to Cody by this stage, but had never fed it to a puppy and wanted to get it right. Everyone I spoke to (nutrition people in the States, vets, other trainers etc) all told me that bones would be fine and that was how I heard about feeding them frozen. I am a trainer for one of my agility clubs and Im sure I have said some things that people find a little odd, although I try to refrain from commenting on things I don't really know much about. I have heard other trainers give some ridiculous advice to people though... While your trainer is probably a dog lover (although Ive met a few who aren't) and they are not intentionally giving you bad advice, it pays to ask around and get a range of opinions rather than rely on one persons point of view. Delta was able to eat bones fine when she had her Elizabethan collar on and so was my current foster. Have you tried giving them to her? They cant hold them with their paws so it takes longer to eat them, but they do manage it alright.

These are the ones I use, they start off very exaggerated but as the dog gets used to them they become more subtle if that makes sense. SIT Heeling: I don't use a hand signal, the signal should be the left leg coming to a stop. Unless you have given a different command, the dog should sit automatically. In Front: I hold my hand out flat, palm up and raise it about 10cms. DROP Heeling: Hand flat, palm facing dog, quick movement towards the ground. Starts off going right in front of the dogs face all the way to the ground if need be but eventually my hand only moves 5-10cms (which happens to be above their head). In Front: Hand flat, palm facing down, lowered about 10cms (pretty much just the opposite of sit) STAND Heeling: Hand flat, palm facing dog, swung from right to left in front of the dogs nose. Starts off going all the way along the side and touching their back leg (or under the stomach) if needed but eventually it just goes in front of their nose. In Front: Hand flat in front of me, palm up, moved towards my side (kinda just bending my elbow to 90 degrees while keeping the hand at the same height) if that makes sense.

I have actually read the article Skip, I have the mag at home. Only problem I can see with this is that it would require a lot of time and dedication and I don't know that I could provide that. My dogs have training 5 days a week for their various sports, Im not sure how much time I would have for teaching this on top of that. I have a feeling it would be a daily commitment and taking shortcuts or rushing through it could be disastrous. I also have rather nutcase dogs who would probably forget it all in their excitement at a trial My biggest problem with Charlie at the moment is missing the up contact, he is so excited to go over it that he jumps almost to the top then launches himself over the top and then to the ground. I have actually seen him reach the top in one bounce, then miss the down ramp completely... That level of excitement is hard to harness LOL

Cody used to do a running contact because that was all I knew and nobody told me there were better options. 9/10 times he would hit the contact but I wanted something better. He died before I realised there were actually better options. I heard about 2 on 2 off just before I started training Delta and Charlie so I set about doing the foundation work with them. Charlie took to it immediately (much to my surprise, he doesn't have much going on upstairs) but Delta just wanted to lie down on the target and even the best timed clicks wouldn't stop it. One night a different trainer came over to me and suggested doing 4 on the floor with her as she insisted on lying down at the end. I wasn't entirely sure as I had heard bad reports about it, but I started doing the foundation work for that and she took to it really well. We have now hit the wall in terms of her training though. She has generalised the behaviour to be "find a patch of grass somewhere near the end of the contact and lie down" which means she is just randomly lying down and sometimes not even facing the right direction. It hs also thrown her teeter behaviour out the window as instead of running to the end, dropping, and riding it down; she is running to the end, hanging on for dear life, then lying on the grass next to it. I can go back to basics and retrain it but Im not sure I want to. I can see me having to retrain it every 6mnths and I can see Delta getting really frustrated with it as well. You can see her thinking "I lay down on the grass like I am supposed to, what was wrong with that?" Unfortunately there is no way to explain to her that this bit of grass is better than that bit over there. Last Friday she started offering me a 2 on 2 off :rolleyes: and did the same thing on Monday. I would really like to do a 2 on 2 off with her as I feel it is a much more definite behaviour and tells her exactly where she should be in relation to the contact. Im hoping to maybe bypass the target and work the nose touch in after she is confident with the position or we will go back to square 1. Charlie's nose touches rarely connected with the target itself, he was simply bobbing his head up and down so I removed it and left him bobbing. If I add it for Delta she will lie down on it again, so Im hoping I can get her in position and shape the head bob from there if I need it. Now, I am left with the same dilemma I have for Charlie now that I am training him again- what do I do about the A-Frame? I have heard so many people talking about how bad it is for them to do a 2o2o on the AFrame as it is a steep angle and puts alot of pressure on their shoulders. I already worry about their shoulders as they do flyball and I don't want to be putting extra pressure on them. I have also spoken to people who have done it with their dogs for years and have no problems with it. Alot of people seem to be going for a running contact but Im not sure I have the time to really train that well and I would rather have one that involves them stopping at the end to allow me to adjust my position if need be. Someone told me they have their dog sit on the end but that seems kinda awkward to me, I would rather have head down and bum up. The only other thing I can think of is to get them to lie down on the end, 2 feet off if they prefer. Pretty much just after some ideas.

Frozen bones. I feed every bone frozen until I am positive the dog has learnt to chew it properly, even then I usually feed them frozen to be sure. Even my sister's AmStaff will meticulously chew a chicken neck if fed to her frozen, its simply too cold to swallow in one go. Also has the upside of making it last longer and she will appreciate it if she is still teething as it will numb the gums for her.

Any idea if these hit Australian shores? Could this be why people are saying that their Frontline etc isn't working anymore? http://www.epa.gov/pesticides/factsheets/petproduct.htm

Its near the shopping centre isnt it? I don't actually know, Im hoping to grab a lift off someone from training to make it easier just in case. Should be a fair few people around at that time making it safe enough. Or just get there really early to make sure you get a spot in front :D

I was talking to Bea tonight and there are still plenty of seats available. The response hasn't been anywhere near as good as we had anticipated unfortunately. If you are interested please contact Bea ASAP. It is such a good opportunity for everyone to learn invaluable information to help their dogs health.

In my experience, males tend to be snugglier and females are more independent. There will always be exceptions though and you need to consider the dogs on an individual basis. I have a preference for males now (always wanted females until Cody opened me up to a whole new world). If I was to add a third dog it would be a male but that is more to do with pack dynamics. Marking every tree on the walk can be annoying though, thank god Charlie doesn't do that, Cody used to drive me insane with the marking and he was desexed at 5months (started cocking the leg at 9months). Owning 2 females is usually the riskiest combination so if you intend to get a second dog down the track then perhaps a male would be better as you could go either way for the second dog. Once again always up to the individual personalities of the dogs and your pack leadership though. I would just provide the breeder with as much information as you can and let them match you up with a puppy, regardless of its gender.

Delta lifts her leg like that sometimes. Not as extreme as Tia though I envy you having a calm dog at the start though. I have so much trouble holding Charlie, he wriggles around and I quite often release him when he is facing the complete wrong direction or is in the middle of a flip I end up with a bruised chin by the end of the day from him jumping up and hitting me.

I have switched quite a few dogs over to raw and its the liver/kidneys that gets them every time lol. I have never had a dog eat them first time. I usually mix them with canned tuna or yoghurt (or in the case of my current foster- tuna, egg, yoghurt and gravy powder all together ) I feed it mixed the first few times while they get used to the taste, but they quickly grow to love it. There is nothing my dogs wont do for some raw liver now...

I was rather confused the first time I was told this. How does the dog know which meal is my dinner? The dogs sit there and watch me eat breakfast, lunch, and countless snacks without being given any, yet if I eat my dinner after them they think they are above me??? My favourites are the really old ones; -If you bite the dogs ear it will respect you -If you spit in the dogs mouth it will respect you. I just love those ones lol

The one that I took Delta to was a waste of time and money, but I think they can be a good thing. I took Delta purely for the socialisation aspect and it ended up being her, my sister's pup Missy (who she could play with any time) and a tiny little malt/pom that was too scared to come out from under the chairs and couldn't be on the floor when Missy was off lead anyway. There was nothing said that I didn't already know from experience and obedience/agility training; however, for a new puppy owner it can be a great source of information. For us the whole time was spent troubleshooting the problems the other owner was having with her pup. Delta loved it though as she was used for the demo dog for everything. The fact that she learnt it all immediately made it easy for the trainer to show the end result for all the commands. I won't bother with PPS again, Delta got more socialisation from going along to agility and obedience each week. My foster puppy has gone along to training with my dogs each night, the easter show for a flyball comp, as well as playdates with friend's dogs. She is a well adjusted little thing and I cant imagine she would be any better if I took her to PPS. If this is your first dog or you don't have access to friendly dogs for socialisation then I would definitely recommend going. Perhaps ask them how big the class size will be? Mind you there were supposed to be about 7 dogs in ours and the others didn't show up...

You can only select one so I went with Delta (4 on the floor). I personally like 2 o 2 o but it just wasn't working with Delta. Border collies naturally get down low and like to drop, it took forever to get her to do a nose touch on the target as she kept trying to lie down on it. We had to redo the whole nose touch training thing every time we stepped up to the next level of base work. Target on floor- she lay down on it, target at bottom of step- she went all the way to the bottom and lay down on it, end of contact- yep, you guessed it, she lay down on it. It was at that point another trainer came over to me and advised training the 4 on the floor as it was basically what she was doing anyway. So that is what we are now doing, she is at the point where her mat is right at the end of the contact, Im going to start cutting it smaller now. She is only 16mnths so by the time she is old enough to compete it will hopefully be removed completely. The issue I have with 4 on the floor is that it isnt as definite as 2 o 2 o. The dog just has to lie down on the grass and to the dog the grass would look the same at the end of the contact or 2 metres away. At least with 2 o 2 o, the dog knows where its feet need to be. I am sticking with the 2 on 2 off with Charlie though. He doesn't particularly like dropping and it is a bugger to get him to hold a drop stay lol. He hasn't had much agility training as he has done flyball, but I will be starting him again next month. I have done most of the base work for 2 o 2 o and he is at the "end of the stairs" stage. He picked it up straight away, probably the only thing that he has learnt quicker than Delta lol, he is usually pretty thick. Cody used to just do a running contact. He was not particularly comfortable with the heights involved with contacts and not once was he brave enough to try to bail early, he used to run right to the end. I didn't really know much about contact training at that point as everyone at the club did running contacts (I think they were the same as me- didn't know any other way) which meant the new members did running contacts and it became a vicious cycle Last year a new trainer took over and actually started end behaviour training with beginners so they got into it right from the start. I would never do running contacts again. I need something that will actually stop the dog until I release it again. I have incredibly fast dogs and it is the only way for me to catch up to them and get back into a better position

RIP Kaden <333 Hugs to you Kaffy, he was a special man.

Gus actually gets probably 50:50 chicken:red meat (as well as his offal, rmb's, etc) during the rest of the week. I don't feed him any beef so rely on chicken, roo and lamb. The majority of his RMBs are chicken too. Should I try and increase the amount of red meat overall do you think? Mine get a lot of chicken too. Red meat is a better source of protein which means more energy so if mine seem less energetic than usual I make sure I feed a little more red meat the next week. If they have a big flyball/ agility day coming up then I feed alot of lamb flaps etc the week or 2 before. I try to avoid any sort of lean meat if I want them to have lots of energy. Roo and chicken are both quite lean.

Should be fine. Fish only becomes a problem if it is all you feed, I feed fish to mine once a week and have no problems. Just make sure he is getting red meat for most of the week and the diet will be fine. Ive never fed whole fish to mine (except sardines) but I feed them salmon heads which are full of pointy bones. They seem fine with them (although I listen rather than watch, I can't watch them eating the eyes etc).

Pop up seal lids from jam jars etc work well too. Might be a duller sound than a click.

Either get a clicker with a soft click or wrap the one you have in a towel. That will muffle the noise until she gets used to the noise and realises it means food is coming.

It depends on the dog, the larger the dog the longer it takes to fully grow. I have no idea about maltese but my border collies have reached full size (or close enough to it) at about the 9- 12 month mark so Im guessing yours will be earlier than that. Why don't you look at how big an adult maltese gets and buy that size? Ive never used dog coats so I don't know if it makes a difference if they are a little bit big but I'm sure your dog will be close enough to full size that it will fit fine.

Charlie was a pain to try to teach a drop to. He lies down front legs first which meant luring him from a sit didn't work and I had to just wait around until he got bored with me and did it himself. Click and lotsa praise, then wait around for another few minutes until he did it again. Took me an entire day but we got there eventually lol. Another way that people use for puppies (Charlie was too big) is to sit on the floor with your knees bent at about shoulder height for the dog. Lure the dog underneath, it will have to go into a drop position to enable it to crawl under. Click as soon as it gets into the drop and it will get the idea pretty quick.

Adds a whole other meaning doesn't it

Charlie started off turning anti clockwise but one day he was turning really funny. Someone suggested trying the other hole and we did it that way for a while. It doesn't seem natural to him and he has a really bad turn now but everyone I ask tells me to leave it as is and not try to change him back to the original hole. Good thing he is so fast. I would like to get him turning properly soon though as I dont want him injuring himself.