Considering a blind cross...

I've never been much for blind crosses. Usually I like that moment of a front cross to reconnect with the dog and make sure we're on the same page. Generally I only do blind crosses now when the dog can't see me anyway - but even then I usually elect for a front just to "make sure" the dog comes up on the side I wanted. Lately I've been wondering just how much time a blind cross (in certain situations) would shave off - particuarly when used in certain 180's or serpentines. The results? See for yourself.



Analysis: first blind cross - 2.5. second blind cross - 2.5. front cross - 2.9. The blind cross was almost a half second faster.

Does that mean I'm going to turn all my front crosses into blind crosses? No, but I will definitely consider them more when analyzing a course - particularly since Hawk seems to enjoy them. I would like to try them with Merlin also, since time is our nemisis on course :) If he likes them as much as his sister does it may make for a better game :)

Current Focus

Thought it would help to put what we're currently working on (or hope to improve) into words :)

Merlin - just chilling out for a while, not doing agility again til Spring. This winter we'll build up to fun play and maybe train some tricks.

Rhymer - ironing out teamwork and getting contacts more consistent, work on weave entries/independence.

Hawk - faster, more consistent weaves. improve distance/gamblers skills.

Cloud - build up teamwork, improve weave consistency, work on looking for obstacles/light distance skills.

Trinket - work on crosses, basic jumping skills, work on 2o2o, re-intro weaves.

Flutter - after recovery from spay, help her build her rear back up with bar-less jumps, tunnels, and dog walk/teeter.

Coyote - teach crosses, intro to tunnels and beginning jump skills. teach 2o2o.

Selkie - teach sit, follow a hand, and come when called :)

and if you're wondering, yes I train 8 dogs :)

Motivation and the Performance Dog

This has been bugging me for a while so I figure I might as well ramble about it.

I was talking with a friend of mine explaining that in my next puppy I would like to get a little more drive.

My friend replied that I am just not being motivating enough -- that there must be something in the world that the dog enjoys enough to give the performance I'd like, and if not then the dog must not be hungry/lonely enough to find it motivating.

Do WHAT? Why on Earth would I want to starve or ignore my dog just to get a faster obstacle performance in a GAME? It's supposed to be FUN for pete's sake! Now I don't mean I don't think you should train when the dog is hungry for breakfast or dinner - but that's very different from withholding several meals on a regular basis, or leaving your dog in a crate for the entire day so they're so happy to see you that they'll do anything for you.

I love my dogs and I love this sport, but BECAUSE I love my dogs I don't want to try to "force" them to love the sport! I do what I can to show them it's a fun game and to reward their best efforts, but if they don't enjoy it why should I ask them to do it? Maybe they find something else more enjoyable, or maybe they just have a laid-back attitude about life and don't get riled up about anything at all.

When it comes down to it, my relationship with my dogs comes first. Some say the above attitude will keep me from "getting anywhere" in agility, but so what? It's a fun game that I play with my dogs -- and as long as my dogs are happy doing it, so am I. :)

Spread jumps

Today Hawk and I focused on spread jumps. I'm in Kokomo this week, so I don't have an actual double/triple here like we do in Muncie. Instead I had to improvise, by setting up 2-3 normal jumps such that the distance between the bars and the heights of the bars were correct. It looked a little odd, but didn't seem to phase Hawk at all. It could actually be good proofing in the future, for odd-looking jumps/jump wings I suppose. Hawk had no trouble with the triple and double, and I was pleased to see she took their size into account when wrapping(1) - in order to leave the bars up.

She hadn't seen a broad jump up to this point, so I decided to work on that a bit as well. At first she attempted to do a 2 on, 2 off (2o2o)(2) contact on it. When she realized that wasn't getting her anywhere, she proceeding to jump over it. Bingo! Lots of cookies for the smart girlie. After that she had no problem doing the broad jump regardless of where I was at.

Her rear cross is coming along nicely, but she's not comfortable enough with it to ask for it in trials yet. She understands it on the flat, but we're not very consistent over jumps yet (still need to work out timing to not turn her before the jump).

If anyone's interested, here's a video of Hawk doing agility. There's one spot where a rear cross would've been preferable, but given the above issue with the rear cross, we went for an ugly front cross instead.



(1) Wrapping - taking the jump and then turning as tightly as possible to the left or right upon landing (depending on which side the handler is on), around the side of the jump, and back to the handler.
(2) 2o2o (2 on 2 off) - method of doing the bottom of the contact such that the dog stops at the bottom with his/her front feet on the ground and the back feet on the board.