I’m not sure where I heard this quote; “Take 10 minutes right now and ask yourself, ‘what one thing should I do tomorrow that will have the biggest positive impact on my life?’ and then don’t stop until it’s done.”
Simply acting on that quote makes a huge difference in my day – and when I apply it to agility, my dog feels the positive impact. While most work is never done, and agility sure isn’t, (what fun would that be?) the concept holds true. Think about one thing that would be best to do, or change, or practice, and then just go do it.
It’s beautifully simple, and wonderfully powerful.
Tonight’s Yahoo – which I can not even begin to sketch (there were jumps and tunnels and an A-frame and – was a clean run for Quick and I! Our very first! Oh, what a rush… I can see how addicting this sport is! We didn’t refuse anything, drop any bars, or get zoomies! I credit this to treats. Since we were allowed to have them, I treated him after every obstacle!
I still believe that counts as a clean run, he’s still just a baby dog.
Other moments from tonight – he did his first full-height A-frame and dogwalk. Contactacoat really makes such a huge difference in his comfort and confidence! He’s back to being happy on the teeter, too. I really regret getting too excited and raising the drop too quickly, but I’m glad to say he’s bouncing right back – literally. He leaps on his teeters. I’m sure he’ll settle back down to just trotting.
Completely and utterly confused is how I would describe Quick last night. We started playing ‘the weave pole game’, and he lost steam very very quickly. He enjoyed all the cookies he gets as part of the game, but since he couldn’t see the point in looking at a pole, then putting his side against it… he got pretty upset. I’m not sure that’s the best way for him to learn weaves. I may go back to using the channel method with wires (and 2×2 to learn entries). There’s no real right or wrong way to train weaves – there’s what works for you and your dog, and what doesn’t! I don’t like it when he shuts down!
However, he was on fire for everything else! We re-lowered the contacts since most of the dogs had been having trouble (last class, Quick took a nose dive off a full height dogwalk. Talk about heart attack!) and he did very well. He is also doing amazingly well on his teeter! We’ve graduated to about a 10” drop, and a run-back both ways. I’m beyond grateful that he really enjoys teeters. There are a few dogs in our class who would rather go to the vet than get on a teeter, and their handlers are doing great with them, but I’m grateful I have the dog I have.
Especially when he surprises me the way he did! We were heading to our corner of the agility course to practice (he was leading me like always) and he decided that today would be a great day to try out a triple jump! He cleared it beautifully. I know that I hadn’t asked it of him so it doesn’t really ‘count’, but at the same time, it was very exciting to see!
Teaching a dog to walk backwards is easy and fun! It’s also useful for several things, like stepping away from a swinging doors, improving foot dexterity, and just flat-out cute!
I trained my dog to back up with his breakfast bowl. I would hold the bowl and move it towards him, slowly, and he would back up to keep his eyes on it. Eventually I could simply make the hand motion, without the bowl, and say back-back-back, and he’d shuffle along obligingly!
Now, however, I want to take this trick to the next level, and retrain it to him using shaping instead of luring, and maybe add some low-level cavalettis. I think it’ll help him improve his dexterity even more! Here’s a great video of shaping a dog to walk backwards.
In class last night we set up a ‘yahoo’ – a last run of the night, using lots of obstacles in sequence. It was set up like the scribbled drawing on the right – I’m certainly no artist! (unlike Team Small Dog. Their courses always look amazing and awesome.) It was incredibly fun!!! Quick did pretty well, I think. He refused the tire, and I lost him after the A-frame – I have to be more careful to look back at him! Otherwise, he bounded along beside me happily.
We’re still not proficient enough at weaves to use the ones you can see set up in the middle, but to be honest, only one person in the whole class did it, so I didn’t feel bad at all! We had fun.
Quick needs more work on his one-jump exercises. He knocks the bar a lot, but I’m sure we’ll get there!
His rewards aren’t exciting him much, either! I use charlee bears because they’re easy and he likes them, but I can definitely tell a difference in his work ethic now that I’ve switched to only using charlee bears. He likes them, he does not love and adore them. Back to freeze-dried liver or something soft and smelly to mix in with the charlee bears, that way he’ll have a lottery experience, I think!
I’m not sure where I heard this quote; “Take 10 minutes right now and ask yourself, ‘what one thing should I do tomorrow that will have the biggest positive impact on my life?’ and then don’t stop until it’s done.”
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