# Starting Agility - Video (questions)



## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

Abby's try at agility - YouTube

My trainer has been letting me use her equipment as fun time for Abby during training. Abby loves it. I'd like to disclose that I didn't catch the "see-saw" board on time so that was my fault. Also, I rushed to get the leash at the end of the video because her recall isn't so great but we were in a Fenced in area.

I've watched some of the videos of members on here doing the weaving differently. My trainer told me to use a treat and get her to follow it but saying the commands "Weave" then "In". Of course, everything my trainer has been teaching me works great! but just want to see other methods out there that might work better?

The tire: My girl is always hesitant of jumping through it so I've had to pull her leash through the tire several times before she jumps through even with a treat. We celebrate like it's her birthday everytime she does it but she's still hesitant. Any tips?

The tunnel: as you can see, she always turns back. There's been times when she just lays down in the middle. I'll sometimes be at the other end encouraging her to come (even with hot dogs) but she still doesn't. It's a matter of luck with her. How do you get her to go through?


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

In two of the three..last two obedience classes, the trainer set up a small jump, the tire, and the tunnel. Early on we taught the dogs touch...when I put my finger out and say touch they take their nose and touch. We carried touch over to agility...so we point and say jump, they go through, we point and say tire, they go through...we point and say tunnel...then throw a treat through the tunnel so they go in after the treat...2-3 times of the treat in the tunnel should do the trick and the dog should go in as soon as you point and say tunnel Here is a small video of my dog(6 months) doing a small course..I can't wait to get her going on agility when she turns 1

video 2012 04 12 19 38 01 - YouTube


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## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

That teeter looks dangerous. Is that an 8' plank on a 24" pivot point? The teeter extends well above your head in the video, so I'm guessing it's at least 5'6" in the air. That height would be the result of a plank that is too short. Regulation in all North American venues is 12' plank, putting the highest point of the plank at 48".


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

That's awesome! Well, I guess that's why. We're not "actually" training for agility yet. lol. What you're trainers are getting you to do is something we haven't even started. I guess I'm getting waaaay ahead of myself.


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

wildo said:


> That teeter looks dangerous. Is that an 8' plank on a 24" pivot point? The teeter extends well above your head in the video, so I'm guessing it's at least 5'6" in the air. That height would be the result of a plank that is too short. Regulation in all North American venues is 12' plank, putting the highest point of the plank at 48".


I had no idea. I'm 6'0 and it's a self made teeter. My trainer's husband made all of them.


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

GSDkid said:


> That's awesome! Well, I guess that's why. We're not "actually" training for agility yet. lol. What you're trainers are getting you to do is something we haven't even started. I guess I'm getting waaaay ahead of myself.



We weren't training for it either, its just something fun that the trainer added on her own in the intermediate and advanced obedience classes, but I'm glad she did. Now I know that my dog likes it and I have a goal in mind

Have you tried getting your dog to do it off leash? I think the leash gets in the way!!


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

What are your goals for agility? Is there a chance you want to pursue training in it beyond playing on the obstacles during your regular training class? 

I have to say Abby seems to have great environmental soundness! A lot of dogs develop fear of the teeter if not taught in a very careful manner.


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

llombardo said:


> We weren't training for it either, its just something fun that the trainer added on her own in the intermediate and advanced obedience classes, but I'm glad she did. Now I know that my dog likes it and I have a goal in mind
> 
> Have you tried getting your dog to do it off leash? I think the leash gets in the way!!


That's even better! It's really great to find out when your dog finally enjoys a sport. I haven't tried the off-leash, her recall isn't great as you can see me rushing to grab her leash at the end of the video. lol. 



AgileGSD said:


> What are your goals for agility? Is there a chance you want to pursue training in it beyond playing on the obstacles during your regular training class?
> 
> I have to say Abby seems to have great environmental soundness! A lot of dogs develop fear of the teeter if not taught in a very careful manner.


 My goals? I really haven't got a clue. As of right now, I'm just aiming for the CGC and solidifying her obedience. 

When it was her first time, she went right on it but very slowly. My trainer has instructed me to grab the teeter at mid-point so it doesn't leave a bad first impression. I would say she's really comfortable on it now but it can still go either way.


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

GSDkid said:


> That's even better! It's really great to find out when your dog finally enjoys a sport. I haven't tried the off-leash, her recall isn't great as you can see me rushing to grab her leash at the end of the video. lol.
> 
> My goals? I really haven't got a clue. As of right now, I'm just aiming for the CGC and solidifying her obedience.
> 
> When it was her first time, she went right on it but very slowly. My trainer has instructed me to grab the teeter at mid-point so it doesn't leave a bad first impression. I would say she's really comfortable on it now but it can still go either way.


Are you doing obedience classes with her? I just finished the last one and mine got her CGC last week...now I'm in limbo waiting on her to turn a year(5 more months) to do the agility. I think I'm just going to do drop in classes to keep up on the obedience part until I can get to the agility part


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

llombardo said:


> Are you doing obedience classes with her? I just finished the last one and mine got her CGC last week...now I'm in limbo waiting on her to turn a year(5 more months) to do the agility. I think I'm just going to do drop in classes to keep up on the obedience part until I can get to the agility part


Aww! Congrats to you! I'm so late on it. I'm one of those stubborn people that thought I didn't need a trainer. :headbang: Yes! We're getting through Obedience. Coming along good. Definitely take advantage of the trainer's equipment.


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

GSDkid said:


> Aww! Congrats to you! I'm so late on it. I'm one of those stubborn people that thought I didn't need a trainer. :headbang: Yes! We're getting through Obedience. Coming along good. Definitely take advantage of the trainer's equipment.



You can't go wrong with training or obedience class I did it with my golden retriever and loved it..when we got the shepherd, my other half said "we don't need to take her to school, we can do it at home" Needless to say a week later me and my pup were starting our first class The trainer looked at me and said "you won?" I said, "did you think I wouldn't?"


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

GSDkid said:


> My goals? I really haven't got a clue. As of right now, I'm just aiming for the CGC and solidifying her obedience.
> 
> When it was her first time, she went right on it but very slowly. My trainer has instructed me to grab the teeter at mid-point so it doesn't leave a bad first impression. I would say she's really comfortable on it now but it can still go either way.


 I ask about your goals because if you think you my want to get into agility training, this is not really the best way to start. If you have no real interest in it other than playing around on the equipment, I guess it's ok as long as it's done safely and positively. One thing I noticed is that you may need a better reward, she doesn't seem all that focused on the equipment or the reward you're offering but just seems to want to surge forward. I get the feeling if she was off leash, she likely wouldn't be doing any of equipment? Make it more reinforcing for her by giving her extra, super good rewards after each obstacle. Treat on the contacts instead of after. Throw a food reward or toy after the tunnel to make her drive through (same with the tire). Don't rely so much on using the leash, getting her to really want to do the obstacles is much more important than making sure she does them all in a row.


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## llombardo (Dec 11, 2011)

AgileGSD said:


> I ask about your goals because if you think you my want to get into agility training, this is not really the best way to start. If you have no real interest in it other than playing around on the equipment, I guess it's ok as long as it's done safely and positively. One thing I noticed is that you may need a better reward, she doesn't seem all that focused on the equipment or the reward you're offering but just seems to want to surge forward. I get the feeling if she was off leash, she likely wouldn't be doing any of equipment? Make it more reinforcing for her by giving her extra, super good rewards after each obstacle. Treat on the contacts instead of after. Throw a food reward or toy after the tunnel to make her drive through (same with the tire). Don't rely so much on using the leash, getting her to really want to do the obstacles is much more important than making sure she does them all in a row.


Is it possible to have a dog that doesn't need rewards to do the agility? I never had to give mine a treat and she just went and did each obstacle(granted there were only 3), but she would be at the start line crying to go and she just went


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

AgileGSD said:


> I ask about your goals because if you think you my want to get into agility training, this is not really the best way to start. If you have no real interest in it other than playing around on the equipment, I guess it's ok as long as it's done safely and positively. One thing I noticed is that you may need a better reward, she doesn't seem all that focused on the equipment or the reward you're offering but just seems to want to surge forward. I get the feeling if she was off leash, she likely wouldn't be doing any of equipment? Make it more reinforcing for her by giving her extra, super good rewards after each obstacle. Treat on the contacts instead of after. Throw a food reward or toy after the tunnel to make her drive through (same with the tire). Don't rely so much on using the leash, getting her to really want to do the obstacles is much more important than making sure she does them all in a row.


That's something I didn't really consider. Thanks for the tips. My trainer just wanted my girl to try it out and see if we both like it. Kind of like a teaser. I haven't really considered what I want her to get into. As of right now, I'd just like for her to get her CGC and be solid on her commands. As you stated, her recall isn't so great thus me keeping her on a leash. It's more of a play time in between the obedience training. I'm really considering agility though but again, I've got to have a better off-leash with her so we're working on that. That's why I love this forum. Lots of helpful tips from different experiences. 

The difficult thing about my girl is that she's not so food driven nor is she toy driven so it's kind of hard to get her to do things. So I'm having to cut down on her meals for the training.


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

llombardo said:


> Is it possible to have a dog that doesn't need rewards to do the agility? I never had to give mine a treat and she just went and did each obstacle(granted there were only 3), but she would be at the start line crying to go and she just went


 Again it depends on your goals. Some dogs naturally enjoy running, jumping, climbing, etc and for such dogs doing obstacles may be naturally reinforcing, at least to a degree. However, just doing a couple jumps and a tunnel in a straight line is barely even scratching the surface of actual agility training. If you want to train for agility, you will need to have rewards that build reinforcement for the obstacles, make the training fun, get the dog into drive and encourage speed and focus. Some obstacles are less likely to be naturally reinforcing for dogs (for example the teeter or properly performing contacts), some just don't naturally make sense to a dog (weave poles) and with others, you will need a way to explain to your dog how to correctly perform them (contacts, jumping extended vs collected, obstacle discrimination, etc).

My trained agility dogs don't _need_ rewards for running agility. They find running agility with me fun and enjoy it. But that is after a lot of training and building reinforcement in the early stages. And I still use rewards as feedback for them. For example, Whim occasionally needs "teeter maintenance" to maintain a good teeter performance. Without it, over time she will start flying off sooner and sooner. Also she has needed some weave maintenance both for entries and staying in and rewards given in a certain way, in a certain place is what is building better weave reliability. In practice runs, she always gets a toy thrown past the last obstacle as a reward. This reinforces driving forward, not slowly up or looking at me because she thinks the course is done and speed. She doesn't _need _that reward, she runs fine in trials without it but using it reinforces things I want to maintain. 

I recently went to run thru's put on by the World Agility Open team. These run thru's were on the courses the team was practicing on that day and the team was giving feedback in the form of written comments on each run. For my standard run, one of my comment sheets said " Nice dog. Glad to see you use clicks to mark good behaviors. Great relationship". In this run, I had opted to stick with maintaining teeter criteria and rewarding full weave performance, instead of running it like it was a trial. 

Ziggy the crazy corgi is so reinforced by running that he wants to keep running more than he wants food or toys. While that may sound ideal from a standpoint of "great your dog doesn't need any reward for working", it actually makes things much more difficult for him. Especially with the obstacles that require he stop running or slow down. Or set ups that require he alter his obstacle commitment from the line he sees to the line that I need him to do. If it's just as reinforcing for him to take wrong courses, ignore cues, skip poles or flyoff contacts it makes it harder to communicate. I would like to title him to higher levels and I think ti is going to require going back to some basic with him and building reinforcement for handler focus and building desire for rewards. He likes to tug, chase toys and likes food but sometimes when running agility, he can't be bothered with such things because he wants to keep running.

Part of this is just part of his temperament - he's extremely easily overstimulated and loves movement. But part of it is also making the mistake of taking the "Get'r Done" approach to his early training. He was introduced to agility in a fairly typical intro to agility class, where the focus was on getting the dogs to do the obstacles as quickly as possible so they could move to the next level. Contact behaviors weren't addressed, foundation work wasn't addressed and the class progressed quickly enough that in 8 weeks the dogs were expected to perform all equipment expect for straight weaves. Ziggy was the star of the class in many ways, he was fast, fun to watch and took to everything without any hesitation. But that approach built some less than ideal behaviors into agility that now, many years after the fact I am still struggling with.


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

GSDkid said:


> That's something I didn't really consider. Thanks for the tips. My trainer just wanted my girl to try it out and see if we both like it. Kind of like a teaser. I haven't really considered what I want her to get into. As of right now, I'd just like for her to get her CGC and be solid on her commands. As you stated, her recall isn't so great thus me keeping her on a leash. It's more of a play time in between the obedience training. I'm really considering agility though but again, I've got to have a better off-leash with her so we're working on that. That's why I love this forum. Lots of helpful tips from different experiences.


 Keep us posted on her progress and good luck with your CGC!

If you think there is a chance you'd like to pursue agility training, I'd encourage you to start some "foundation work" at home. It is never too early to do so and it will only benefit other areas of your training. 

This thread has a lot of good discussion about foundation work: http://www.germanshepherds.com/forum/agility/175805-where-heck-start.html



GSDkid said:


> The difficult thing about my girl is that she's not so food driven nor is she toy driven so it's kind of hard to get her to do things. So I'm having to cut down on her meals for the training.


 What sort of treats have you tried so far? Have you tried hand feeding her/using her meals at home for rewards? What sort of toys have you tried? What sort of games/play have you tried?


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## gsdheeler (Apr 12, 2010)

Mary Ellen Barry has a great DVD set on teaching agility foundation skills, and I used the 2X2 method for weave poles.
www.CleanRun.com is a good site for all things Agility.
www.Bowwowflix.com if you want to rent training DVDs.


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

AgileGSD said:


> This thread has a lot of good discussion about foundation work: http://www.germanshepherds.com/forum/agility/175805-where-heck-start.html
> 
> 
> 
> What sort of treats have you tried so far? Have you tried hand feeding her/using her meals at home for rewards? What sort of toys have you tried? What sort of games/play have you tried?


I'm reading through that thread now. Thanks!

As for the treats, I've tried BB chicken jerky, beef, pupperoni, occasional table scraps, Canyon Creek (now avoiding), Milo's Kitchen (now avoiding). She rarely even eats her meals. Recently, I've had to crate her with her food (Nutro). Otherwise, she'll go on days without eating. I also do the Nutro canned food. We feed her 2 cups a day. One in the morning and one for dinner and for training in the morning, we cut back on the dinner before. Using the Nutro kibbles as treats, she'll spit it back out.

Games we've tried are tug-o-war. It takes some time before she actually gets into it. I have to constantly bug her with it. We play fetch (inside). It takes some time to build her drive for the ball initially. She's now used to the word "Ready?" to get her pumped up for whatever game is coming. She won't drop the ball for me unless I have treats. I've extended the reward time to about 5 or 6 consecutive throws before she becomes greedy again and chasing just encourages it. When playing fetch outside, she's never retrieved it.

She has a Kong wobbler but doesn't take much interest in it unless she REALLY wants a snack or if we stick some high value treats in it. She has many squeaky toys, most of them, she's taken the squeaky out. I play hide and seek with her. She also likes "Find it". I'll keep her in a stay and throw a treat in the grass and let her sniff and "find it". 

My trainer and I was having a difficult time in finding a way to get Abby to do focused training so she told me to be very observant and see what works best. Later that night, I was eating dinner and saw that she was VERY focused on me because I was eating. That's how I found that if she sees me eating the treat/food, it becomes a greater value to her. I'd say it works for 8 out of 10 commands; better than how things were before.

Sorry for the long post. I'm just trying to be very detailed to see if I can get any further tips.


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

GSDkid said:


> I'm reading through that thread now. Thanks!
> 
> As for the treats, I've tried BB chicken jerky, beef, pupperoni, occasional table scraps, Canyon Creek (now avoiding), Milo's Kitchen (now avoiding).


 Except for the table scraps (that depends on what it is) those would all be medium to low value treats for most of my dogs. There are a lot of treats you can experiment with for training that can be more interesting. Here are some of faves (of my dogs and friend dogs):

* - Liver *You almost can't go wrong with cooked liver. There's all sorts of tips for preparing it from simple to making "liver brownies". Google liver treats and you'll see a lot of options. The easiest is to boil it, cut it up then dry it out in the oven on a cookie sheet. Some people use seasoning such as garlic, some leave it plain. Experiment and see what your dog likes. I give the dogs the broth with dinner. 

*- Chicken* Like liver, there are a gazillion ways to make chicken into dog treats. I usually prepare it much like the liver. Or boil it and store it in a paper bag in the fridge (helps dry it out but still retains more meatiness longer than drying it in the oven). Play around with seasonings and preparation. Usually the cheapest chicken is buying thighs and boiling until you can easily remove the meat from bone. Or if you want easy, buy prepared chicken at the grocery store and cut it up. Or prepared frozen chicken. Sometimes I use McNuggets for training but sparingly - those things aren't healthy!

*- Beef Tongue* Gross for sure but it smells (and other than the taste buds feels) just like steak when you cook it. And usually it's much cheaper! 

*- Assorted other meats* Just about any sort of fresh meat you can buy at the store can be cooked, seasoned and/or dried out to make dog treats. Again, experiment and see what your dog likes!

*- Cheese* Some dogs love cheese, others are just so-so on it. Try different kinds and see if any spark your dog's interest. 

* - Canned fish/food/Peanut Butter treats* You can make easy treats in the microwave by mixing together a can of food (try Tuna or other fish, various canned dog or cat foods or a cup of peanut butter) with an egg and enough flour to make it dough-y then slightly greasing a plate spreading the mixture on it and microwaving it for several minutes. It tends to be sort of rubber-y when it comes out and I cut it apart with scissors.

* - Hotdogs/Sausage/meatballs* Ready made treats! You can try anything from the cheapest hotdog to the pricey flavored sausages to see if any spark your dog's interest. If they are too greasy cut them into small pieces and put them in several paper bags in the fridge for a few days. And/or dry them out in the microwave in a glass bowl, stirring every 2 minutes. Mini frozen meatballs can be a great ready made training treat too.

* - Dried tripe treats* You can buy these online from various places. VERY stinky and gross but some dogs love it!

* - Dried Rabbit ears* - Same as above but only gross, not stinky 

*- Freeze dried all meat dog food* - These have become more common for raw dog food companies to offer and there are a lot to pick from. I've seen all the normal stuff - chicken, beef, rabbit, pork, turkey and some really different ones like llama and ostrich. 

*- Bowser's Buffalo Bites* Seem to be a pre-made treat that many dogs really like. Welcome to Dogwise.com



GSDkid said:


> She rarely even eats her meals. Recently, I've had to crate her with her food (Nutro). Otherwise, she'll go on days without eating. I also do the Nutro canned food. We feed her 2 cups a day. One in the morning and one for dinner and for training in the morning, we cut back on the dinner before. Using the Nutro kibbles as treats, she'll spit it back out.


 Have you tried other brands of food? Sometimes dogs don't eat well because the food doesn't agree with them. I knew a dog who was picky his whole life and plagued by allergies until as a 9 year old he was switched to raw food. His allergies cleared up and he always ate very well after that.

If she is picky no matter what kind of food, it can be behavioral. Some owners accidentally encourage their dog to be picky. You may need to teach her to eat: Teaching Your Dog to Eat



GSDkid said:


> Games we've tried are tug-o-war. It takes some time before she actually gets into it. I have to constantly bug her with it. We play fetch (inside). It takes some time to build her drive for the ball initially. She's now used to the word "Ready?" to get her pumped up for whatever game is coming. She won't drop the ball for me unless I have treats. I've extended the reward time to about 5 or 6 consecutive throws before she becomes greedy again and chasing just encourages it. When playing fetch outside, she's never retrieved it.


 Good use on the "Ready"!

Instead of trading the ball for treats, try using two balls. When she brings one back, get her interested in the one you have in your hand. You can also try a "flirt pole" or toy on a rope and see if that interests her. Here is a video of me and my PyrShep where I'm using the flirt pole as a reward: Savvy Play-Train-Play-Train-Play! - YouTube

And Denise Fenzi has some good articles on developing tug drive in dogs and choosing the best toys:

The Dog Athlete / Choosing Toys

The Dog Athlete / Playing With Prey Drive



GSDkid said:


> She has a Kong wobbler but doesn't take much interest in it unless she REALLY wants a snack or if we stick some high value treats in it. She has many squeaky toys, most of them, she's taken the squeaky out. I play hide and seek with her. She also likes "Find it". I'll keep her in a stay and throw a treat in the grass and let her sniff and "find it".


 Those are good games!



GSDkid said:


> My trainer and I was having a difficult time in finding a way to get Abby to do focused training so she told me to be very observant and see what works best. Later that night, I was eating dinner and saw that she was VERY focused on me because I was eating. That's how I found that if she sees me eating the treat/food, it becomes a greater value to her. I'd say it works for 8 out of 10 commands; better than how things were before.
> 
> Sorry for the long post. I'm just trying to be very detailed to see if I can get any further tips.


 No problem on the long post 

Definitely observing your dog is a great way to see what they find motivating and fun. Since her interest in treats can be so breif, I'd suggest working her for very, very short sessions. If you know you can get 8 reps before her food interest wanes, do three or four then give her a break. Even when you are at training...maybe especially at training, since an hour for a dog who you have a hard time getting interested is definitely way too long. In these cases, I'd give her a break by crating her or tying her up, which will help build her enthusiasm too. The breaks should last at least 3 minutes but initially she may need 5+ minutes to build her interest back up. Over time, stopping before she is ready to stop will make her want to keep going. "Hey I wasn't done yet!". Then you can get to the point where she is asking you to work instead of you asking her, which is ideal!


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## GSDkid (Apr 19, 2011)

Great breakdown!  and thanks for the info!



AgileGSD said:


> Except for the table scraps (that depends on what it is) those would all be medium to low value treats for most of my dogs. There are a lot of treats you can experiment with for training that can be more interesting. Here are some of faves (of my dogs and friend dogs):


 Awesome! I'll pick up some smelly stuff when we go grocery shopping this week.




AgileGSD said:


> Have you tried other brands of food? Sometimes dogs don't eat well because the food doesn't agree with them. I knew a dog who was picky his whole life and plagued by allergies until as a 9 year old he was switched to raw food. His allergies cleared up and he always ate very well after that.
> 
> If she is picky no matter what kind of food, it can be behavioral. Some owners accidentally encourage their dog to be picky. You may need to teach her to eat: Teaching Your Dog to Eat


 Looks like I'm going to have to teach her. When she was a pup, she had a very sensitive stomach. We started from Wellness, Blue Buffalo and ended at Nutro. The other 2 brands were giving her loose stools and diarrhea. I try to switch it up with the canned foods (with the gravy) and her kibbles but she's starting to lose interest in both. Teaching her to eat is my best option. I love the concept of it of that article. I'll try it out. 




AgileGSD said:


> Good use on the "Ready"!
> 
> Instead of trading the ball for treats, try using two balls. When she brings one back, get her interested in the one you have in your hand. You can also try a "flirt pole" or toy on a rope and see if that interests her. Here is a video of me and my PyrShep where I'm using the flirt pole as a reward: Savvy Play-Train-Play-Train-Play! - YouTube
> 
> ...


 Bookmarked all articles. I love the vid! lol. Unfortunately for me, I don't have access to a fenced yard and her recall isn't so great yet. I've tried the flirt pole with Abby on the 30 ft lead but things were just getting tangled and frustrating for the both of us. We'll get to that point though! Definitely!




AgileGSD said:


> No problem on the long post
> 
> Definitely observing your dog is a great way to see what they find motivating and fun. Since her interest in treats can be so breif, I'd suggest working her for very, very short sessions. If you know you can get 8 reps before her food interest wanes, do three or four then give her a break. Even when you are at training...maybe especially at training, since an hour for a dog who you have a hard time getting interested is definitely way too long. In these cases, I'd give her a break by crating her or tying her up, which will help build her enthusiasm too. The breaks should last at least 3 minutes but initially she may need 5+ minutes to build her interest back up. Over time, stopping before she is ready to stop will make her want to keep going. "Hey I wasn't done yet!". Then you can get to the point where she is asking you to work instead of you asking her, which is ideal!


 Wow! That's such a tease! lol. Great information. Can you elaborate more on the crating or tying up for breaks? I was told 10 to 15 minutes a day should be plenty of training.


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## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

GSDkid said:


> Looks like I'm going to have to teach her. When she was a pup, she had a very sensitive stomach. We started from Wellness, Blue Buffalo and ended at Nutro. The other 2 brands were giving her loose stools and diarrhea. I try to switch it up with the canned foods (with the gravy) and her kibbles but she's starting to lose interest in both. Teaching her to eat is my best option. I love the concept of it of that article. I'll try it out.


 Good luck! IME, this technique works very well. If she's prone to a sensitive stomach, you may want to try a probiotic supplement. Or even just adding a good, natural yogurt (be sure it has live cultures) or Kefer to her food.




GSDkid said:


> Bookmarked all articles. I love the vid! lol. Unfortunately for me, I don't have access to a fenced yard and her recall isn't so great yet. I've tried the flirt pole with Abby on the 30 ft lead but things were just getting tangled and frustrating for the both of us. We'll get to that point though! Definitely!


 Maybe you could try a much longer line that you could either fasten to something or just let her drag? Definitely could see it getting tangled if you're trying to control the dog in one hand and the pole in the other. Flirt poles are such a great way to build drive! 

Another idea would be to use a retractable tie out. Amazon.com: Flexi Retractable Tie-Out for Dogs 10 - 77 lbs: Pet Supplies





GSDkid said:


> Wow! That's such a tease! lol. Great information. Can you elaborate more on the crating or tying up for breaks? I was told 10 to 15 minutes a day should be plenty of training.


 It depends on what all you are working on and how much you need to work on it. On a good training day with my dogs, I might work on tricks at some point, agility in the yard and maybe some obedience. But it's broken up throughout the day and/or as I rotate through the dogs. So each dog is getting maybe 5-10 min sessions but it will end up being more than 15 minutes a day in the end. 

There isn't really a set amount that is "enough" or "too much" training per day. It is though, not usually ideal to work dogs more than 10 or 15 minutes at a time without breaks. Dogs seem to learn faster and be more into the training when you work short sessions with them at a time. So there's nothing wrong with having more than 15 minutes of training a day but if you do, it should be broken up. There's also nothing wrong with doing a total of 15 minutes a day.

Either way though, giving short breaks in the session will help keep the dog up and interested. Most especially though with a dog who is not as easy to motivate. Most training classes run about an hour, so ideally you'd want to work for a few minutes, give a break, work a few minutes, give a break, work a few minutes, give a longer break, work a few minutes, etc throughout that hour rather than asking your dog to work straight through an hour. I really think if you start using breaks and keeping your sessions short and upbeat, it will really improve your dog's motivation level.


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## MaggieRoseLee (Aug 17, 2001)

As far as training goes, for my dogs there's not a set amount of time. Depends on their age for sure, shorter (much shorter) for a puppy. But otherwise it changes day to day and with what I may be training.

THAT SAID...............

One thing I know is I HAVE to stop training BEFORE my dog wants to stop. 

The best and most productive sessions are ones we end with the dog doing a behavior (any behavior) right, being rewarded with whatever she values, and LEAVING the session with the dog standing there going 'What?" I want MORE!!!!

Stopping BEFORE my dogs want to is key to keeping all training fun, fast and an enthusiastic dog. The times I push it for just 'one more time' and then see the dog going slower, looking away, sniffing, no longer engaged and joyfully part of the session means I MESSED UP THAT SESSION! I then quickly have them do something fast and easy (sit?) and tear away from where we are to play tug/ball/something for sure fun and completely stop training for the (usually) day.

The MOST important thing to getting a well trained dog is keeping an ENGAGED dog during training. If they aren't poking you, staring up at you, OFF LEASH right there on you with a 'what's next, what's next, what's next' then you need to work on that before you really work on any behaviors.


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