Here comes your new homework:
1. straight line as a serpentine: now that you mastered straight lines too, it's time to show the dog they can come in different forms 🙂 Let's try angling the jumps as you can see in a video, still working on extension vs. collection. Keep angling the jumps all the way to a serpentine. You should still throw in some wraps to keep them attentive to possible collection cues.
Showing the angling in 4 steps, but try to go even more gradually and make it a serpentine in 6 or 7 steps:
2. sequencing
With long-strided dogs, 10 will be hard - so you can simply take the other entry instead.
3. let's check how far you have got with weave entries: send in your "top 5" - choose the 5 hardest entries your dog found, the 5 you are most proud of.
Okay, this is where we are with our channel. As you will see in the video I get a little excited that it’s starting to look like weaving and she’s still fast. How gradual does it need to move from this point until totally closed?
I can’t believe how helpful the straight line exercise has been for Leia’s speed and commitment to both the jumps and the tunnels. I can turn and run in the other direction so much earlier than I could just a week ago! I’m going slowly with turning the jumps but, we’ll keep working at it. I’m not fussing with Leia about too much (going behind my back or dropped bars). I want to keep the speed. Do you agree? I read your comment about redoing the dog going behind your back and will make that my policy going forward. We haven’t tried the sequence yet but hope to try it this weekend.
Thank you,
Mara
Wow, Mara--I can’t believe the difference in Leia’s drive from your first video! She looks great & so fast! GREAT job!
Thanks Kathy! I’m really pleased with the improvement in her speed and drive. It looks like she’s starting to enjoy agility, yeah!
Great, the speed sure looks great!!! AND, she is still very tight on her wraps, on the one she ignores you were really running so hard that she didn’t take it seriously because of that. But when you support it with body language, she responds really well to it. You’re also very good at saying your cues in time. The one time she crosses behind you, I think you didn’t pick her up after the turn enough -- you do need to check back with her some. So yes, when your body language is not sufficient, then you really can’t blame the dog. But when you call to the right hand and the dog ignores it and takes an obstacle that he thinks is right, I do redo (even if he is right 🙂 ). You also don’t need to stop her for dropped bars as she doesn’t seem to be dropping many… If it’s just here and there, I ignore it too. the weaves looks great too. From now on, you can still narrow the channel often, but every time for just a little bit. She might start to pop out some and that’s fine -- just try again -- if she doesn’t pop out too often. If they do and at one particular spot, I widen that one pole some -- mine are never in such a straight line as yours anyway 🙂 -- But yours are also stick in the ground right, not a real channel?
Thanks Silvia! Everything you say makes sense. I also thought I was running too fast into the turn she ignores. I try really hard to know where I’m going and call my cues as early as I can, now I just need check back with Leia a little more. I like knowing I can ignore the dropped bars. They really are just here and there and we had just gone from 10″ to 12″ so I thought she might be adjusting to that too. I’ll keep closing the channel little by little. They are just stick in the ground poles.
Sounds like a good plan! 🙂 Where did you get your poles, they look so much better as most stick in the ground poles?
Actually, a friend helped me make them. We bought some hardware store bits and used the poles from an old set of weave poles with 21″ bases that rusted out. I measure them out each time I set them and hammer them into the ground so they are as secure as they can be 🙂
Cool! Maybe you can post a picture of how the end that goes into the ground looks like next time you need to move them?
Hi Mara—I would also be interested in seeing a photo of the ends of your weave poles. And how far do the ends go into the ground? Mine just push into the ground about 6″ and maybe that’s the problem…
Thanks.
I’ll take photo’s tomorrow.
You two look great!!!
Awesome -- you guys look like you’re having a great time 🙂
You two are doing so great!
Hi,
Here is my first attempt at the sequence from this lesson. I’ve been away so I will work on the sepentine for a few days and post that. As always, I welcome your comments, they are so helpful.
Great!!! What a nice front cross on 6! He read your handling really well there, took 5 nicely on the side because of your lateral movement and then collected over 6 because of your front -- but he might wrap it even better if you also said cik, that’s cik too!!! He really wraps beautifully on first and last jump! 4 could be even tighter though if you said it even earlier and give him more time to prepare -- he needs it, coming from a straight line!
Thank you Silvia. I feel my handling and my dog get better with each of your lessons. Should I stay at 16 inches or should I go up. He jumps 20 and 22 in competition.
Thank you again!
Sure, you can raise it some, he looks ready! Just do some multi-wraps and figure 8s first when you introduce the new height, I always keep coming back to those two exercises with every new height.
Hi Silvia,
This is a sequence from lesson 3 & weave pole entries for lesson 4. I’m still working on sends in hopes of getting a little more obstacle focus. I think the sends are helping & Elsa seems to be doing better with refusals & dropped bars.
Her weave pole entries are not all like this--we have good days & bad days, I’m afraid 🙁 These stick-in poles are not holding up either--almost every one of the metal ends is bent which is a problem when trying to close the channel. They now swirl around at an angle with any pressure from Elsa. I’ve tried to straighten them but they just bend again…grrr. I think I need to get real poles. I’m wondering if I should hold off closing these anymore where they don’t hold up to pressure of weaving. What do you think?
Thanks!
You two look fantastic, Kathy!
Kathy, You and Elsa are doing great! You are a very smooth handler, nice job!
Thanks, Kristin & Mara! We’re definitely having lots of FUN! And I think Elsa is teaching me more than I’m teaching her 🙂 She is so sensitive to any movement from me that she has forced (or perhaps “shaped” is a better word 🙂 ) me to get clearer with my signals…or at least attempt to do so. 🙂
I feel pretty lucky to have her as my first agility dog!
SO much like Callie!!!!! You are doing great.
You two look great, Kathy!! I want some of that toy drive!!! 😉
Thanks, Jen! Yeah, Elsa does have a lot of drive for her toys! Maybe too much 🙂 Every day we have to work on “ignore the toy” before we train--it’s a constant maintenance thing & if I don’t do it she goes right over the top & can’t focus on anything else but the toy! 🙂
So be careful what you wish for! 🙂 🙂
Would be nice if we could divide it between Buddy and Elsa 🙂
Hey! That’s a great idea! I might try that before heading out with Da Vinci. He sometimes focuses on the toy in my hand…especially if he needs to come from behind me and send to something ahead. Thanks! Plus, I never did the ignore the toy game with him in Puppy/Tricks class since he was all about the food. Changing boy!
That looks great -- i love watching Elsa! You look so relaxed when you’re doing the sequence.. 🙂
Thanks, Camilla!
Wow, GREAT job with the sequence! No bars, beautiful wraps, very smooth and fluent and precuing the turns really nicely! You sure look like a pro! Cik&caps are early enough for now as teh bars are still low, but once they get higher, she will need an info even sooner, so try practising saying it really early already now. You can also raise the bars some. The entries are going really well, gradually make them even more extreme -- but yes, the weaves as such are moving more as you would want… You would need to fix those somehow or try to get another weaves… Mara’s stick in the ground poles look really nice and stable, maybe you can ask her where she got hers?
Thanks, Silvia! Nice to know we might be making some progress here. 🙂
I think I’m done with stick-in weave poles 🙂 Elsa really pushes the poles hard & our soil is not the best (lean with lots of rocks) so I’m not sure anything would hold up. I was wondering what you and others would recommend for a good set of channel weave poles that would hold up for the long haul. I did a search online but there are so many options it was a bit confusing. 🙂 I think I want a metal base but not sure what would be the best type of slider--there appear to be several. And is the tipping option necessary?
Any suggestions?
Thanks!
No, you definitely don’t want tipping option as they soon start to tip on its own with strong pushers 🙂 Metal base is good yes, not sure which slider would be best, I always used stick in the ground poles… Maybe somebody else have a recommendation?
I love her speed in the weaves! It’s beautiful to watch. Great wraps too 🙂
Here is our first attempt at the Lesson 4 sequence. We had to work our way through it. My biggest challenges seemed to be #4 and getting him into the correct tunnel entrance!
Wow, he’s moving! Nice Kristin. It’s so fun to watch you guys run. DaVinci looks like he’s having a blast.
He is so fast and tight for a larger dog!!! Great fun to watch you two!
Great job, Kristin! I love watching you two work together! You keep it so light & fun even when DaVinci has his own ideas of how the sequence goes. 🙂 I’ve learned a lot from you. Thanks!
Great job!!! He looks much more independent on cik&caps now, it’s only that 4 that didn’t make sense to him at first 🙂 Collection-extension exercise should help with that too! For the correct tunnel entrance -- run more! 🙂 FC was a good idea, it’s just that you really need to run then as you put the yellow tunnel so far (I had mine closer, so it was much easier 🙂 ) He sure is running!
Wow, you two look wonderful! He’s so fast and fun.
I can’t believe how much he’s grown and how well he is doing for such a young dog. You two look like you are really having fun and he loves it. His wraps are great!
Hello!
Tukaj trening od danes zjutraj. Slaloma nisem nič delala, tako da ne bom poslala videa od tega. V bistvu sta mi 2 tedna ful premalo za delat vse: ravne linije, parkurčki, koridor, most…. Wey pa dela 20 minut največ…in ne uspe mi vsak dan trenirat. Čeprav vidim da drugim kar rata…. Ti bom pošiljala videje še par mesecov po zaključku, ha ha ha….
Se vidimo jutri!
Lp, Maša
v
I know you said to only send the best weaves, but we haven’t done them at all, so this is all the weaving we have done so far. I don’t really get what I’m supposed to be doing. I think I have to wait until she gets more commitment to doing them before I start with the distractions -- right? The 2nd video is what we did today. Tibby was having so much fun! I’ve started doing a ‘dying rabbit’ sound that Tibby likes. Later in the day I tried to do the sequence, but Tibby was too tired. I think she likes the straight running parts the best. I left in a lot of the parts where we are playing.
Whoops! First video is the one from today. I got them mixed up.
Wow, Catalina, you got Tibby to tug with you!!! Cool! She liked the hide and seek game, and so did the cat 🙂
Yeap, for the weaves, you are trying too complicated stuff too early in the process. I would still work with something at the end for her to focus on and releasing her to it from very slight angles. With something at the end for her to focus on, you should be able to do some work for independence (doing different stuff when she is in), but you sure need something at the end for now to be able to do that. Rewarding from hand is not yet a good idea. And yes, she sure seemed to like that straight line! You can mostly work on that for now if that’s what she loves the most. Still, make sure to not do too much, I think two sessions per day, if they include more as for example one or two straight lines, are too much for her for now. Definitely don’t push her to do it if she doesn’t feel like it!
Ok we can do that. She is very good at going to a touch plate (a small clear plastic square). Do I start with the plate close to the weave poles or start farther away? In your video it looked like the plate was very close to the end of the weave poles.
I only train Tibby when she wants me to do something with her. She has been very pushy recently -- biting/pulling/chewing my clothes, pulling on my socks or biting my toes, staring at me, jumping up on me. When she gets like that I take her out and try to do some training -- I have to do something with her! Last week it was 95F/35C, so it didn’t take long to tire her out, but this week it is much cooler, only 45F (7C?), so it might take longer to tire her out.
I would also like to try putting the jump poles closer to the ground to see if Tibby will go faster. Now that she understands that I don’t want her to stop in front of the jumps, paw the jumps and knock down the bars. She is jumping 12 inches/30 cm right now. It seems kind of high.
I put the bowls min. 3 or 4m after the poles. It needs to be visible though -- I think a bowl is better as small clear square… And yes, I agree, lower jumps would be better.
This is a video of Tibby doing the weave channel today. I did the 2 bowls. Could you tell me if we are doing it right? I included the whole session. At one point Tibby gets scared of something, but she eventually works through it. My favorite part is when she jumps over Catty.
O.k., just vary your position more -- don’t always be in front. You can move the bowls to the side some to work on different entries. You can also make it more narrow. More speed would be good too, but we probably need to wait until she doesn’t need the bowls anymore and you can reintroduce a toy.
The cat is soooooo funny!! The way he runs when you were hiding for Tibby!! After all the AF lessons he/she will be a great agility cat I’m for sure! 😀
Grace & I weaved 4 straight poles for the first time tonight. I was very excited!
Here’s a snippet of our 2x2 training over the past 2 days…
One of my favourite entries was when i was getting her a treat and she decided to do the poles again. She almost took the wrong entry, sniffed her nose around the pole and seemed to realise that was the wrong entry and corrected herself
I realised I’ve tried mostly more difficult entries and very few straight entries. so now it turns out that straight entries are the most difficult for her 🙂
Whoops -- looks like i’ve posted my video as a reply Catalina’s video 🙂
Great job!!!!
Almost there! Keep up the good work and definitely mark with your voice if she offers any of one leg pattern (vs. jumping out with both legs). She is big enough to do it, she just needs to realize that staying closer to the middle is more efficient -- it might come with more poles. Not only it’s faster, I think it’s also more comfortable for dogs, big enough to do it.
thanks Silvia -- yes, i noticed jin is striding like this -- w the one leg pattern. Bc i have never trained this before, i don’t really understand how to get them to do this. Is it something you can train or just something they work out and offer and then you jackpot? I was wondering if slowing her down would help so she kind of trots through rather than leaping. It looks like G is making it much harder for herself making the big leaps -- hopefully it comes with more poles when she has to find a rhythm 🙂
Well, the major reason I like channel so much (over V for example) is that it promotes staying close to the middle and doing only that much side movement as absolutely necessary… So channel weaves will normally produce single-stepping with every dog who is physically able to do it. Even little Le was singe strepping for very long (as did Valerie’s Doucette if you followed her videos) -- but of course such a small dog won’t have enough reach to do it on closed weaves, so they need to switch at one point -- but with a channel, you always get single striding first, so I never had to go the other way… We once “retrained” GSD that was originally trained with V and was hopping with both legs (really ugly to see with a big dog like GSD!) with a channel to get single stepping -- was very easy with her.
Thanks Silvia -- I guess i’ll just see how we go and if we don’t get it i may have to look at going back to channel down the track 🙂
Anyone else in the class who has trained 2x2, have you had any experience with this?
🙂
Camilla.
I think with 2x2’s you can promote “swimming”/ single stepping through the poles by opening them all up slightly…which ironically makes them look like a channel 😉
I’m not certain of this though…
Kristin
That’s what I’ve heard too, but it sounded too ironical to be true, so I though my source of information is just joking 🙂
That’s funny because i was thinking of doing that as a way to make it like a channel!! I’ll give it a go and make a vid of whatever we come up with .. 🙂 Thanks
I asked our instructor today and, yes, you open them VERY slightly to work on single stepping. She actually did that with Da Vinci and I in class because he was bouncing a little. Funny.
Thanks Kristin!
I just watched the video again -- the entry she does at 1:17, looks to me like she’s trying to single step. Looks like she does it with her left leg but doesn’t quite reach out with the right. Am i looking for the right thing?
Exactly! That one was really good!
Great! Now i know what to work with 🙂 I’m so glad you mentioned the striding -- i would have had no idea to select for that 🙂
Wow Camilla! Grace sure is a GOOD GIRL!!!!! You two are doing great with the weaves, so many hard entries!!You can see she really likes it!! I see you’ve bought a toy, did she eat the towel 😉 Hihi just kidding!
Have you stopped with the RC class? I must say it’s a lot of work doing two classes. Now that we have to practice more I don’t have enough time to catch up with all the comments and video’s of others..I am really trying very hard but unfortunately because that takes me so much time, it even takes me more time to respond to everyone 🙁
So to everybody in de AF class: YOU GUYS ARE DOING GREAT!! 😀
I really hope ones we will all meet at Lolabuland!!
I am going to do my very best to go to the April camp. (I will check every minute in January when the registration will be open!! 😉 )
Jonina & Jin
Thanks so much Jonina! Gracie sure is a good girl -- we are hoping that we’ll be able to copy Jin’s weaves 🙂 🙂 So impressive
Yes, my little towel muncher goes through almost a towel per training session…lucky i’ve found $1 teatowels 🙂
Oh my goodness, i’d love nothing more than to come to lolabu land april camp! That wld be SO MUCH FUN! Problem is, i will have just started my first clinical year and expected to be at the hospital ALL the time -- I think the only way i could get time off would be to make it sound VERY official..something like “I’ve been invited to train with the multiple agility world champion for 1 wk -- A once in a life time opportunity” and make it sound as though my personal invitation arrived by telegram 🙂 It’s a long shot but not impossible. So sad i can’t bring G-dog- I wonder if anyone would lend me a dog
I totally agree, everyone in this class is doing an AMAZING job!! I’m loving watching all the vids. We definietly need to organise a lolabu land reunion (or should i say ‘union’ since none of us have actually met yet)
🙂
That would be REALLY cool if you can make it work!!! I can ask around if somebody would lend you a dog… Not sure, but I can try.
Oh, it would be so EXCITING if i can come to the camp!! Thanks so much for offering to ask around for me 🙂 I’m going to my new hospital for orientation Oct 4&5th so i will check out if there is any chance of getting the time off. If so, i would LOVE you to ask around for me. If i can’t get the time off -- i’ll come the following year 🙂
O.k.! Sounds like a plan!
Hi
here is two videos about serpentine, and we had some problems, 🙂
i think i wanted to go too fast with changing angles,
i asked to the kid to be there but silent, (to remember she’s affraid with children and it’s a problem at trials) and Doucette forgot him i think.
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secund session
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sequencing (because i had no internet i didn’t remember that last jump was a cap) and some weave poles, you can see when the child came and Doucette became anxious
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thanks for watching!
Very cute!! I will have start barking at Buddy, too!!! 🙂 🙂
some people will just think that you are crazy ^^.
Ha, everyone already thinks so 🙂
Cool! Some really nice, tight and fast serpentines!!! You could indeed progress somewhat slower, but you sure got some really nice ones. She seems to turn better on ciks as caps, so maybe practise caps some more. No problems with the second sequence either. For weaves, add distractions (kids 🙂 ) very slowly and always jackpot the successful tries in situations she finds hard.
thank you. Yes we’ll have all winter to practice slowly but surely.
I have great news, at today trial Doucette successed with jumping weave poles! (trial was at my club it was easier for her) i’m so happy! we had so much fun in each run, she was so happy to be here! and she was focused at me all the time. as i remember, first weave poles she missed the two last poles, secund she missed a lot (the judge said that he thought that she will learn to miss poles all the time 🙂 ) third run she missed just last pole and fourth run she did it all and won the jumping! i’m so happy happy, thank you so much Silvia you’re so precious! we’ll continue in this way, i’m very optimistic. she did so much progress! 🙂
Here are my straight lines. I am still putting in lots of wraps like you told me. He can easily get ahead of me with the three jumps to the second tunnel so I stopped doing that and got back to a couple of jumps at the most then a wrap. Any suggestions? The second clip has a little angle moving toward the serpentine. Thank you.
Great job, keep working like this. His wraps are really getting great even when coming with speed -- probably as your timing improved a lot too! No problem if he sometimes pulls off with early cik/cap, you need work through it and simply insist he still takes the jump, just like you do. Try to always finish the sequence with a wrap, in order to reward wraps, not going straight as that seems easy enough for him.
Hi, I have a question about jumps. Since I raised the jumps, Azja knocks them off very often. I have jumps made of PCV and the bars are knocked very easily and she doesn\’t mind it. I plan to buy jumps made of wood. Should it help? I don\’t know what to do, because I try not to reward her when she knocks those bars. And I can\’t practice a lot, because she knocks the bars very often 🙁 Here is a short movie. rel="nofollow ugc">