gonetotervs

Denise Fenzi has some very good video on Facebook and other places on managing arousal levels with her adolescent male working dog. She uses food scatters as one tactic. Her goal is for her dog to self-regulate rather then her managing his arousal, so she’s doing the long slow route to getting there.

Questions I would ask either a rescue or a breeder: How is this dog to live with or how are dogs from this kennel to live with? to work with? Is there epilepsy or any other health issue in the lines? (Hint: there are no perfect dogs.). How well does the dog/do these lines get along with other dogs/with other dogs of the same sex/with non-border collies? Are they reactive to cars and/or motion? Are there any issues with thunderstorms or noise in general? I’d also ask about the strengths of dog or the dog’s lines, and why the breeder picked those dogs to breed — does the breeder’s vision of the perfect BC match what you want? Why does the rescue think “this” dog is good fit for you versus another dog? There are no right or wrong answers and there are no perfect dogs. But information, honestly given, is always good.

Also, put away the remote, your glasses, and your shoes and whatever else needs to never be chewed. If you have want, you can leave appropriate chewies out -- antlers, rawhide chips, etc. All of my dogs know "five more minutes" -- i.e. a verbal that tells them that something may be happening soon, but it isn't happening NOW. I tend to hit the snooze button on my alarm, and added that verbal. After x months, even the puppy knew I wasn't going to get up just then.

Great job! Also with that rear cross! Proofing weaves -- Send, recall, step into their space, layer, toys on ground, other teams working....

I did some nosework/ scent games with my youngster as a way to keep her occupied and thinking while waiting for her to grow up. If you can find that type of class offered, it is something puppies can do and the other dogs around will be a variety of breeds and ages. Socialization resulted even though it was not on the curriculum....

Shirley Chong has been recommended previously on these boards, but not for a little while. You might want to look up her website, shirleychong.com, and download her (free) ebooks. I recommend doggie zen and a whole lot of her other exercises to install both calmness and self-control in little heathen pupsters. Shirley is a professional dog trainer whom I've never met but her stuff has worked on my dogs. But teaching self-control first makes teaching anything else later just so much, much easier.

I seriously doubt I want a RC because I like being able to hold my dog on a contact if necessary while I move into a position -- but yeah, teaching foot targeting in addition to the existing nose target is now on my list of things to teach..... thanks for this update and good luck in making this stick. RCs are hugely impressive!

I'm looking forward to it!

alligande, I have an auditing spot for the foundations class. My experience with a couple of other online seminars has been that my dog manages to get injured if I have a working spot, and I'm not technologically proficient so videoing myself from a decent angle, etc. is not my forte. I currently train here with someone who does international style with verbals and distance but doesn't have much in terms of puppy/young dog classes. I've started some foundation stuff but am looking to see what can be done better and what I've missed entirely. I'm starting to add verbals to my older competition dogs and find that it is helping keep bars up and commitment as well. I've also ordered the Sylvia Trkman extreme foundations Dvd after seeing a graduation video on Facebook. My youngster is hugely smart, brave and resilient, but she's not got a lot of working stamina yet -- i.e. I can get short amounts of good work out of her but she doesn't have that go-go-go drive some pups do. It is enough to work with, but that's also another reason to audit rather than have a working spot; I won't put pressure on us to keep up if she's not there yet.

Thanks! I'm starting the Shape Up foundations class with my 12 month old youngster, having heard good things about their teaching re handlers who are no longer able to really run. But updates on contact foundation stuff would be great.!

A lot of barking and spinning is IMHO related to a lack of foundation in working at a distance. Poor pup wants to run and jump but doesn't know about "go on" or have any lateral distance skills. Some dogs naturally want to work distance and they really don't do much over-threshold barking. But a dog that has done just heeling or walks on a tight leash can get frustrated by having to be as slow as the handler. While you are checking out resources, I would also check out basics of distance handling. Send your dog around a tree until you can do it from a 15 or 20 ft distance and teach your dog a " go" to get a stationary toy 20 ft away. See if that resolves stuff. It is hard to run and spin at the same time (lol).

Denice -- got my jefferspet rake today -- and THANK YOU! I'm not going to try to get all the mats out today but he's putting up with it and it is getting the mats out. I really appreciate your weighing in on this. It is also doing a very nice job on my girl with the crappy spay coat.

Denise, he doesn't stand. he'll either sit or lie down, and he'll struggle if forced to stand. But I'll try for a mobile groomer and get the jefferspet rake. thanks much Jeanine

My oldest dog, male BC about 12-13 years old, lost a hind leg to cancer. He's great, but I'm having an issue grooming him. He dislikes clippers so I've been scissoring his hair and furnishings but it seems that all I do is cause the fur to mat closer and closer to the skin. Ugh. I'm not sure about letting it grow longer and brushing it -- I hate to pull on his fur near the scar tissue. Anyone else had this issue? Any advice? He's a big enough boy that I don't lift him at all easily. I'm not sure how much experience my local groomers have with amputee dogs and he can't or won't turn around even in the 42" car crate so loading him to go someplace is a pain.

My oldest dog, male BC about 12-13 years old, lost a hind leg to cancer. He's great, but I'm having an issue grooming him. He dislikes clippers so I've been scissoring his hair and furnishings but it seems that all I do is cause the fur to mat closer and closer to the skin. Ugh. I'm not sure about letting it grow longer and brushing it -- I hate to pull on his fur near the scar tissue. Anyone else had this issue? Any advice? He's a big enough boy that I don't lift him at all easily. I'm not sure how much experience my local groomers have with amputee dogs and he can't or won't turn around even in the 42" car crate so loading him to go someplace is a pain.

I'm NOT trying to talk anyone into this, but was providing information. This method works for me. And yes agility is a game, but if we really didn't care a little bit, we'd never compete but just meet for seminars and the like.

Shirley Chong -- a dog trainer I hugely admire -- said that it is easier to teach a dog "sometime" instead of "never." That, and a human tendency to not be entirely consistent (i.e. an tendency to not maintain criteria under trial stress) is why I have real stopped contacts and "touch and go" contacts. Some of this was trial (pun intended) and error, and then I thought about what was happening and made it more deliberate. I taught my younger dogs 2o2o contacts in the usual fashion, with a verbal obstacle cue ("Up"), and a cue for the end behavior ("touch). They had to stay until released by the release word. My BC boy is ditzy, so I started adding "stay there" in order to encourage him to remain on the contact while I ran past. We got some trial experience and I started letting them come off in a "touch and go" situation -- so I started repeating the "stay there" command when I really needed to get ahead of my dogs to handle the line (my Terv has a very fast dogwalk). So this has morphed into a deliberate issue, where I don't enforce criteria if I haven't asked for a stay. It makes me more conscious of whether I need my dog to hold a contact or not, as well as working out how far downstream I need to be before I release them. So far so good. My contacts are not true running contacts (too much training for me plus the Terv is so big he can stride over the yellow in extension) but they are pretty fast. And the choice of hold versus go makes me much more conscious about my criteria in running a course.

The problem with true running flat-out contacts is that you need to either be ahead of your dog all the time (not happening with me) or need verbals for left, right and backside jumps. If I were a judge and wanted to test handlers, I'd stick either a backside jump or an off-course obstacle directly after a contact obstacle. My older border collie who is fairly small has true running contacts and I blanche everytime I see an off-course tunnel entry directly after the dogwalk or a backside after an A-frame. She doesn;'t get called on her contacts more than once a year but she's small, sane and experienced. But for her, I have to work the rest of the course around my handling plan for off-course obstacles after the contacts. My younger dogs have a 2o2o with a self-release unless I tell them to stay. Very easy to train, and wastes very little time on course. They hit their touch and go -- unless I've told them to stay and then I can get in position for the next obstacle if I need. I don't need to waste seconds with a completely stopped contact all the time, but I have it if I need it. That too has held up in competition quite well.

The lady who started National Purebred Dog is, I believe, a longtime AKC conformation competitor. I believe in purpose-bred dogs which frequently-- but not invariably --overlap with purebred dogs. Pretty is as performance does. And good dogs come from all sorts of sources, including rescues, shelters, etc.

Just wanted to comment about protection dogs and agility -- at the last Worlds, the Italian Malinois that won bronze in jumping and the Estonian malinois that placed first in both Team events were a grand-daughter and daughter respectively of an IPO3 titled Malinois. I *am* getting my next puppy out of French Ring titled dogs and expect to get a sane, hugely biddable, drivey, pup with the sort of structure that can do agility for a decade or so. Border Collies are wonderful; they are not the only wonderful breed out there.

Has your vet checked for bladder stones? My boy gets a special diet to lower his urine PH.

Huh? My current sane and smart BC bitch is small but reasonably tough. She marks over pretty much all the males in the house except the elderly tri-pod. Nothing to do with reactivity or focus or stress. She's almost 10 and has been marking over any males in the household for some time. In my other breed (Belgians), pretty much all the really good bitches urine-mark too, and often get into ***ssing contests with the males. One of my trainers way back when had the German National Agility champion who used to get into leg-lifting contests with her tall son. Gora would half climb a tree with her back legs to pee over her son's marks. Urine-marking in bitches may run in certain lines but not in others. My experience has been that, out of dogs raised from puppyhood, the 2 tougher bitches I had marked over males pretty consistently and the one less tough marked ocassionally.

I'll just offer that in a win-out system, speed is NOT meaningless. FCI countries -- as far as I know -- operate on some type of win-out system, and if your dog is too slow to make miminum course times, which are generally a fair bit faster than ACK, you cannot and will not move up. The faster the dog, the better your chances of moving to AG3 or the highest levels. Consistency without speed may buy nothing, depending on the country.

The best bags to get are the ones that are squashable up top but have a firm base. My pup had to put with three planes and a substantial delay on one flight but we both made it home safely. Collapsible dishes, and a set of wipes are good. Also a newspaper makes a good insulating layer on the bottom of the crate and can be disposed of or replaced easily if peed on, unlike a crate pad.

When I brought home my last puppy (after total travel time of 30 hours due to some really horrible delays), I was determined to give him plenty of time to settle in. Well he'd been good as gold wearing his tight Sherpa bag all through flights and airport delays, not to mention traffic jams, etc. and when we got home, he decided to let out all that pent up energy. So we got out the clicker, and did clicker training of both tricks and doggie zen games to keep him and me both sane. The self-control games and teaching my pup to settle down were the more important skills I taught early, but tricks are good for teaching cooperation and communication.