# Continued rear-foot awareness and balance



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Pimg has come a long way in her rear-foot awareness and balance skills. I'm always so impressed with her and am always on the lookout for something she can jump up on and practice such skills. Yesterday at the park, a post sticking out of the ground was the perfect test. I'd say Pimg aced it! :wild:


----------



## kbella999 (Jan 6, 2012)

Cool! How did you get Pimg to do that?


----------



## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

Very nice. Ok where is the training manual?


----------



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Well, for me, it started with perch work, which was really tough at first:





Then after Pimg got better at that, we started using a much harder perch object- the balance disk. This makes it hard to move the rear feet since the front feet are unbalanced:





Then I started doing more balance work like having a travel board up on some balance disks:










After that we started working on putting the two together, which means I would require her to get all four legs up on the perch (whether it's stable or not) and spin. I should note that we started with a really big balance disk (the blue one in the picture above which I think is 22" in diameter). Then we have moved down to the 15.5" diameter wobble board. Pimg is struggling with getting all four feet on the gray 12" disk, but clearly doing well on even smaller rigid surfaces like that post in the OP. I guess what I mean is that you obviously have to work to get to that point. I'd like to think that the "back up" command we've been working on also adds a lot to her skill set as it teaches weight transfer to the back legs which brings more awareness that they are even back there. We are still working on spinning while on a balance disk. In the video below you can see where we are with our perch work at the start of the video, and at 4:29 in (click that link to go directly to that point in the video) you can see her working on getting all four feet on a wobble board.


----------



## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

Oh, cool I am going to have to watch some of that.
I have Beau walking through downed ladders right now and on a 12 inch plank but this is more cool stuff.


----------



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

We do have a ladder as well, though I have admittedly not worked it in some time. This stuff I'm doing is heavily based on what I've seen in Susan Garrett's PuppyPeaks program. This is stuff I've seen her dog Swagger do for the last eight months now. Since we are starting over in agility, it's been phenomenal to get some of this training in and I really believe it's going to pay off once we get back to equipment training.


----------



## AgileGSD (Jan 17, 2006)

Very nice!!!


----------



## TaraM1285 (Sep 24, 2009)

Nice! She looks great, btw!


----------



## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

Ok I want to make a wobble board that is bigger in diameter than the one at training. Any design suggestions - Beau is pretty long and I want him to be able to stand normally because I want to use with Grim for rehab


----------



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

This is more of a "rocker" board, but it definitely was difficult for Pimg initially. It was also pretty easy to make:
http://www.germanshepherds.com/foru...nt-do-yourself-ideas-hints-3.html#post2018088






A FitPaws peanut (red- 80cm) would also be ideal, but they are very expensive.


----------



## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

Thanks. I was thinking maybe of using a wooden ball top from a fence like this
What do you think? I am no woodworker. 

Pressure-Treated 4 in. x 4 in. Unfinished Pine Final Ball Top Post Cap-429323 at The Home Depot


----------



## wildo (Jul 27, 2006)

Nice! It sure would be a difficult wobble board to start on since there's no give, but yes- it would definitely work. I might make one like that for Pimg! Ok... no, I'm not going to. I have about a billion balance/wobble things already! haha!


----------



## NancyJ (Jun 15, 2003)

I think this is all good stuff. Our breed tends to have a long back and the WL tend to have that more as a fault (and I believe it is one of Beau's) and anything we can do to make the core strong and build body awareness is such a good thing. 

Well I have some other projects (I wish my HOA would let me have a goat. Weeding. Ungh. This will be weedwack marathon) this weekend but may try it next. I could have a frame for the ball to sit in to kind of cushion/damp things to limit the motion of the board a little. Boy if I had a ton of money ..... and if my husband was handy ( he is NOT)


----------



## christinaekenn (Jan 10, 2011)

Way to go Pimg!! And awesome training! I love rear end awareness stuff.


----------

