canine fun sports

I tried my best to ignore this but I have to comment: I am getting a little sick of people believing that we are spending a lot of our own money to improve our sport in an attempt to be unfair to other competitors. I have not seen anyone here insinuate that the 2012 Nationals Committee are attempting to disadvantage us "out of staters". Where, in any of these posts are out-of-of staters mentioned??? Or any reference to the Nationals. In fact, we are discussing the Armidale trial.

I had the opposite problem. My dogs learnt on rubber ship and had great difficulty addapting to some of the surface with less traction. It was certainly responsible for a couple of failures at Pace's first Festival of Agility, and this variation in surface is why I went back to a 2on2off contact on the scramble for murphy - she could not keep a regular stride length on the different surfaces. You are very correct, Delta Charlie, our dogs have to adapt to a lot of differences. Cheers,

I tried my best to ignore this but I have to comment: I am getting a little sick of people believing that we are spending a lot of our own money to improve our sport in an attempt to be unfair to other competitors.

First up, amypie, thank you for reposting the link. It has already been posted under the nationals heading and in several other places. Yes, the table timer is going to Armidale. It will be made available as soon as practicable. By that, I mean that it will probably not be set up as soon as I get there, becasue it will probably be late in the evening and those trying to sleep will probably not appreciate it. It will not be done first thing in the morning, becuse I will first be looking after my own dogs and myself. It is up to the club and the judge as to where and when it will be used, but to date, each of the clubs have been very happy for me to set it up on a table outside the ring, early in the morning, fefore the trial starts for triallers to give it a go. In fact, early in the morning it can become quite irritating with the thing going off all the time, because everyone is having a go on it. It will be up to the judge whether it is used or not. Eddy Szmelter used it; Jane Caulton chose not to, becasue she felt the dogs had not had enough opportunity to have a go on it; Keith Millingotn chose to use it but allowed anyone who did not want to use it to opt out and have the judge do the count, with the warning that, due to a human's time to react, the count would probably be less accurate, and probably a little bit longer. I SUSPECT that Jill Kaldor will use it and I have no idea what Gayle Jarvis will choose. I do recommend that everyone does some prior training, just in case your dog surprises you (or the table's beeps sruprise the dog). So far most dogs just ignore it. Some look a little curious about where the noise is coming from on the first time they jump on, but ignore it the second time. We have had 3 or 4 that I know of that were worried about it, but the owners felt they would be OK with a little extra training. Advised training techniques: Get a device that beeps similarly to the table - you can get egg timers, or just record the table noise (from the link) on your phone or similar deivce (from now on this will be referred to as a "noise-maker"). Get your dog used to the noise away from the table. Put you dog on the table and play the "noise-maker" nearby, say 5 to 10 metres away. Gradually move your "noise-maker" closer to the table then under the table. EXTRA PROOFING - repeat the process with all sorts of different noises. Cheers, Le Edited to correect my awful typing and grammar re-edited to add in the extra proofing.

We do classes during the day, both at St Ives and here at Castlereagh. Check the website http://www.caninefunsorts.com.au tghen click on <<cfs venues>> button. Drop me a quick email for details. Cheers,

Me neither, it looked pretty good to me. Well done and contratulations. Cheers,

That is correct.

Someone can probably give you the exact answer - but I cannot be bothered looking it up. An in-exact answer is that it is the equivalent of an agility champion in one of the agility codes in the USA - I cannot remember exactly what the initials stand for, and I cannot remember which trialling code. In ANKC agility trialling, the equivalent would be Ag Ch, and in ADAA trialilling, it is also called an Ag Ch. Cheers,

At this time, nothing is available, although rumour has it that the person owning the Australian franchise might be getting something going in north western Sydney. I am not "close to the source" of the rumours - but I believe it might happen. Cheers,

Well done. You should have a little boast about that. More than likely, the judge was not "yelling at you" because they we reprimanding you, but rather that they were desperately trying to stop a "newbie trialler" disqualifying themselves because they do not know the rules. It happens quite often. I have been accused of yelling at somewhen, when I was merely calling out to them to prevent them being disqualilfied because they were about to walk in the ring with extra "fixtures" on their collar. The intention was well meaning, but I apparently upset them, and their first ever run in agility was a very unpleasant experience. I do not think she has forgiven me yet, and it was years ago. As to your weave pole issue, you can simulate weave pole bases by getting some cloth tape, about the same width of the weave pole bases, and run it along the ground. Then place your "stick in the ground" weave poles through the tape, or next to the tape. If you are really clever with a sewing machine, you get the piece of cloth tape and put button holes along it at 60cm intervals, then you lay out the tape and it is easy to get the poles at just the right distance apart, every time. Cheers,

And yet my dogs would feel this is the worst positive punishment in the world. Great way to shut my dogs down, especially before they gain some experience and learn that they get another chance to earn there rewards. Cheers,

I have "a little" experience doing agility with my GSP's. The best way to sumarise it is go to my website at: http://www.caninefunsports.com.au Edited to add: I do believe the light framed dogs do better at agility, both between breeds such as labs and GSP, but also within a breed - I would choose a lighter framed GSP. But this also depends on your attitude to the sports. If you aim is to do the best you can with the dog you love and you love labs, then go for a lab from working lines. You may not win very often, but you can do well with lots of quallie cards and have a lot of fun. Cheers,

Everyone has made lots of good suggestions, and not having seen the dog and handler it is difficult to make specific instuctions. The dog may be timid, undersocialised, confident but not enthusiastic, or as the title of the topic suggests, a generally confident dog that is genuinely scared of making a mistake. So everyone has make good suggestions, that might be helpful in this case. I do, however, suggest that this in not the correct sentiment: The bit about not doing anything in the ring for a while is fine. But, to train a dog, you do not have to be its boss. In fact, with some dogs that would be counter productive. All you need to do is MAKE THE DOG WANT TO DO WHAT YOU WANT IT TO DO. You do this by controlling the resources that the dog wants, and this is what building a relationship is all about - creating things that you control that will make the dog want to react with you. You need to create a dog that thinks that there is nothing better than to tug with you (again, not my favourite) retrieve to you, have a rumble with you or receive food from you. The dog does not have to "feel he HAS TO do it so he gets something in return." You want the dog to "WANT TO do it so he gets to interact with you. For example, I have one dog (an Agility Champion) who I cannot tell to do anything. But I can ask her to do something, and she knows I will give her what she wants in return. When she has done it she barks at me, which I can only interpret as "Well, give me that piece of cheese now or I am going on strike." I obey her! If I attempted to boss this dog around, she would undoubtedly go into her shell and sulk. I have done it, and she does not forgive me for quite some time. And a sulking "Rabbit" is a very unhappy dog. This concept of being a dog's boss is irrelevant to training the dog. All you need to do is control what the dog wants, and part of being a good trainer is building that relationship so what your dog wants is doing a variety of things with you and is not worried about getting into trouble if they try the wrong thing. Doing the wrong things just means an oportunity to try again. Someone earlier suggested a No-Reward-Marker to maintain neutrality when a mistake is made. They suggested "whoops", but I find this is often still too negative. I use a FUN tone to say "That was silly, you had better have another go at that". Or I might say "I'm not going to pay that - you had better have another go". I like to have conversations with my dogs; it is really the FUN tone that is important, combined with the fact that they did not get their treat/retrive/tug or whatever. The emaphsis is on the FUN tone, which is not the same as the "good dog tone"; it can be a little bit "rousing on them", but still challenging them to have another go to get it right. Then, while maintaining excitement (and speed) I will try the task again. If the "failure" is repeated then the task is simplified. It is just so important that dogs are not worried about making a mistake. They need to know that what they did was the wrong thing to do or rather, if repeated still will not get themsomething they want), but if they worry about getting it wrong they will be more careful, and that usually means doing things slowly as well as carefully. Of course, we reward them for getting it right and the dog has a "light globe" moment: "Now I understand, I am supposed to do it slowly and carefully". How many times have we seen dogs, that were once fast, become slow and careful? Cheers, Edit: If you like, you can change the phrase "making a mistake" to "doing something my handler reacts to in a way that I (the dog) do not like". I am happy to do that, but "making a mistake" is the human perspective.

My judge's briefing goes someting like this: Your steward will ask you to come into the ring when the previous dog is at obstacle "X". You can then enter the ring and take up your position. You may leave the dog on lead, or hold his collar at that time. But give your lead/collar or the steward as the previous dog finishes. I would like to be able to call out the previous dog's score and then turn and say "When you are ready go". (At large NSW trials, this will save 15 to 60 seconds per competitor, and the trial will finish an hour or two earlier - in daylight.) You may acknowledge me, but if you or your dog goes over the starting line, I will assume that is acknowledgement. If your dog goes over the start line before I ask, I consider that the dog is already in play so keep going. If the stewards, by chance are ready, you will get a score. If not, you will be disqualified using rule 7.5 which reads: MISBEHAVIOUR. If before, during or after the test, the dog or Hanlder is guilty of any breach of the Rules, or other misbehaviour, a minimum penalty of five faults and up to disqualification shall be incurred. I know a lot of people think this is a bit tough, but there have been several NSW triallers who do not pay attention to their over excited dogs that take off and do a few obstacles before the judge starts. They were doing it every time, and wasting the time of a lot of people (including making me stay out in the sun or rain longer than I needed to.Besides, I allow them to keep the dog on lead to position them etc. I do expect people to have their hands off their dog before they start, but I am not a stickler for this, but will certainly penalise a dog that may have been propelled over the line. As to your other questions, I think FRHP has pretty much covered it all. Relating it back to the Nationals (as everything seems to at this time) I am hoping we can get standardised starting procedures for all the judges, but failing that, I hope to get judges to print out their starting instructions so they can be posted outside the ring. I can see that it will be difficult for everyone to get to every briefing. Cheers,

I would also suggest a vet check. This "grumbling" may not only be inscurity - the may be some choronic pain, eg arthritis, spondylosis involved here.

I would be working on relationship building - playing games, being silly with her and just having fun. There are lots of relationship building games including tugging (personally my least favourite), retrieving, "slap-a puppy" (which would need to be VERY gentle at first), body rub-downs and the human just generally playing the fool. That does not mean you cannot try some agility obstacles intermingles with it, but I would not be doing any significant wequenceing until I had a dog that really wanted to respond with me. Once she is having fun with you, then you can teach her to repsond to your calls. It is hard to give specific advice without seeing the pair of you in action. Cheers,

Hi guys, I have a confession - I had not actually felt the material when I gave the previous answer - and I said it looked like a hessian type of material. Well, I still stand by that, but I actually thought I had better take a closer look at it and it is acutally a "rubberised" type of material, something like what is put on the bottom of shelving in caravans, etc to stop stuff sliding around when the van is in transit. It is extremly strong - I haven't actually taken a knife to it, but it would be extremely difficult to rip. Sheilaheel, if you are going, you will get a chance to see it at Bemboka, Canberra or Goulburn and any other trials we go to. For those up in Norther NSW or perhpas Q'ld, it will also be at Armidale. Sorry to those in other states - we do not travel that far for trials . . . well, not very often, anyway. We may also be using it at Sydney royal, but that will depend on the judges. Even if the judges choose not to use it at these trials, we will set it up for people to use. Cheers,

Did she do that in practice??? Admittedly, I do not see everything when I am looking through the camera but I do not remember her jumping off during this run when I took the picture. I do remember her looking in the direction of the beeping - that is what she is looking at so intently in this photo when she should have been looking at you and I remember the quizzical look on her face (as far as an Amstaff can look quizzical!)

The committee hopes they can let people on the arena on the Tues afternoon, but that depends on whether they can get everything done. We have done a few indoor trials on horse arenas here now, 3 in all, and a lot of the ADAA triallers have done their Grand Prix in the Equestrian Centre at Tamworth. Very few of the dogs have had problems on their first occasion. We will have the table out at times for people to practice on, but it will be up to the individual that they take advantage of that practice time. Lots of people are coming up with inventive ways to get the dogs used to "an unusaul noise" coming from under the table. Some one else suggested that their egg timer made a similar sound, so they will be placing that under the table. Cheers,

Here is a really good clip on U-tube of the electronic table counter. Cheers,

Hi guys, The automatic table timer is a 90x90cm pressure pad put on top of the table with a hession type of cover. so the dogs jump up onto the hession surface, maroon in colour - see the photos below. It is an excellent surface giving good traction to help them stop. It is hooked up to an audible timer that beeps once for each second of the count then multiple rapid beeps at the 5 second mark. The beek is very similar to the noise the automatic timing gates make, except that the noise comes from under the table itself, rather than from the steward area. The count starts as soon as the dog hits the table. If the dog leaves before the 5 seconds is up, it immediately resets, so that when the dog jumps up again, the count starts again. At the trial last Saturday, there was one dog that was uncomfortable with the sound, but still stayed on the table, and a couple of dogs who looked a bit puzzled about where the sound came from, but it did not change their table performance. The beauty of the table timer is, of course, now the table count is reliably the same for every dog. Placings and quallies can be determined by as little as .01 of a second and I know as a judge that I cannot get my count on the table to be that accurate every time! If you want to see it in action, borrow a copy of some of the recent FCI world championship DVD's. This is where we first saw it. I guess, if you want to get your dog used to the sound you could place the control box from a set of time gates under a table while your dog sits on the table, and get someone to walk back and forth through the gates! I suspect you would not get exact one second apart beeps, but it would get a dog used to that type of noise. It will probably only be used in the indoor arena, although if it is not in use there, it may be used in one of the outdoor rings. I would like to use it in my ring. It does get monotonous counting from 5 to 1 so many times in a day. Cheers,

And a retrospective study published after this advice was given in fact showed the opposite. As I said, I am sorry that I can no longer track the reference but from memory is was published in a veterinary journal Cheers, Le Hammer BVSc

There are three ways to used Proheart in puppies. This is because, when they are pups and still growing, it is difficult to estimate what the pup's weight will be in 12 months' time. So you may underdose, if you underestimate their weight. 1. Use some other form of Heartworm Prevention until they are fully grown. Then start Proheart when you know their adult weight. 2. If you have a good idea what their adult weight will be then dose as a pup for their adult weight. 3. Dose them as pups at current weight. That should be an adequate dose to give an effective prevention until they are about 6 to 8 months of age (usual desexing age) then a second dose is given at that 6 to 8 months time which should give adequate coverage until their first adult vaccination at about 16 months. I usually choose option 1 because I use a heart worm prevention that also incorporates worming and young dogs need to be wormed more often, anyway. Cheers,

Hi Guys, We had a training day out at the Equestrian Centre today, with the surface prepared as it will be for the Nationals. Surface was great and, even for just a training day, it is still exciting to run in the arena. Just 78 days to go!!! Cheers,

Not advised - eating with an elevated bowl increases the possibility of bloat. I cannot quote the research paper, but it was pretty convincing when I read it! Over nutrition and excess calcium can cause soft pasterns. I would advise one of the large breed growth products, but keep the pup VERY lean. No papers written about the effect of the surface that the puppy runs on, but I would advise not having the pup on a lot of hard surfaces or slippery floors. Cheers,