Mocca doing the Weave Poles
Now that the weather has warmed up, and our agility field is dry and green again, we’ve started up our weekly dog agility training sessions. These consist of our trainer, Deb, and usually 2-3 other people with their dogs. Everybody in these sessions competes with their dogs, so they are tough classes – but we love them! The tougher the better because then when we get to our competitions, things look “easier” than what we have been doing. Or so that is what we like to think anyway.
Last time we had a session, we did something that I found really interesting and wanted to share. Not only does it apply to agility, but I was thinking it would for regular life as well.
What we did was run the same course twice, but with a twist. The first time, we ran it with NO VERBAL CUES. That meant no talking or yelling or anything. We could clap our hands but that was it for noise. We had to run it using our body language ONLY. The second time, we ran the course with NO BODY CUES. That meant basically running with our hands behind our back and trying not to lean. I’m sure it was amusing to see if you didn’t know what was going on! The goal of this was to see where our dogs were stronger, so that we could build up the weaker side, and then in the end, have a dog that is strong on BOTH ends: verbal & body cue.
I was quite certain Mocca would do “alright” with the verbal course, as she responds very well to my commands. And indeed that is exactly how it went. The body cue course was a whole other matter – I was convinced it would be a mess because I tend to verbalize A LOT (do I need to? this would answer that question!). I was especially worried about the Weave Poles. This is Mocca’s most challenging obstacle. We are currently working on me being able to stand a bit further from the poles (inch by inch), and not have to use my hands at all but it is a slow process and still tough for her.
When we ran the body cue course, I was amazed. Mocca actually did really well, although she could have certainly benefited from key “OUT” commands, we ran great! And then the biggest surprise of all was the Weave Poles. She did every single one of them perfectly, without a single “Weave!” command by me. Some of you may understand how amazing this is – if you are one of those people who have to command your dog through EVERY weave pole – shouting “Weave! Weave! Weave!” 12 times while running is quite a task. I was so startled by this and amazed. We’ll be practicing our weaves now more without my verbal commands. Sooner or later we’ll get where we need to be but this certainly was a great little challenge to do.
Give it a try yourself! Even if you don’t run dog agility – see what you can do with your dog at home. You might be surprised!
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{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m so glad you’re enjoying your classes- I just started classes with my dog, and he’s doing great and having fun!
My dog, Charley, loved agility courses when we took them. The weave pole was the hardest for me to teach him. The only bad thing about agility is that he was able to jump over the baby gates (we used to have) set up in our house.
Julie – we have a baby gate in the house too. At our last obedience class our trainer let me run Mojito around the agility course just for fun, and I was taking him over the jumps until my husband said “um… do we really want to teach him how to leap obstacles?” So you’re telling me he was right…
We do agility for you border collie too just for fun. He’s wonderful therapy dog but he certainly doing well on our first training but it’s all just running and few bridge trial but it was fun. Can’t wait to try other obstacle…