wildo

The 2013 WAO Team USA eBook has an awesome article on foundation tricks for agility dogs. Many trick ideas in there. Plus a great cause (if you're in the USA- and even if not... ;)/>/> ) Silvia Trkman has a few DVDs with TONS of tricks Control Unleased, as mentioned above has tons of tricks. You might try the Puppy Program for a 5 month old. Susan Garrett's book Shaping Success (my favorite agility book, as it were) also has tons of tricks. And then if you're really ambitious, you could start working on your Trick Dog titles, which I believe use this book series.

No- no real blogs to share, I can never remember them LOL! I frequent FB, the GSD forum, and this forum. I love AgilityNerd, but tend to only get there when I see Steve post something on FB. Same goes for Susan Garrett's webpage and Daisy Peel's webpage. I tend to only get to those pages when I see activity via FB. If I were smart, I'd set up an RSS feed, but oh well. Sorry- in the blog respect, I'm pretty boring. I find that I tend to seek out info more than just randomly stumbling on it. [EDIT]- I will note though that if you're looking for blogs, the Dog Agility Blog Events website would be a GREAT way to find new agility blogs! http://dog-agility-blog-events.posterous.com/pages/the-blogs

There are some who believe (Tori Self included) that all of the names for maneuvers that have minute differences are pretty ridiculous. For her, that move was just a straight blind cross followed by a curved blind cross- nothing more, nothing less. That's what I love about agility: no, you don't have to learn a new term. You can take it as deep as you want to!

I wish! I've searched and searched and found few. Actually- that's how I found this forum- looking for an agility forum (and to get BC info). But I have to say even our GSD agility forum is more active than this one. Having said that, I still get frustrated with the lack of activity there. I'd LOVE to find an actual ACTIVE agility forum. I read some big name player (I have a terrible memory, btw!) say recently when asked how often they practice agility: "I practice maybe 5-10 minutes per day, but I think about it constantly!" That is sooooooo me.

Ha! I was just about to link to BadDogAgility's analysis of Daisy's run. Just found it this morning for myself when she linked to it on her FB page.

How do I personally go about it? Well, I'm not much of a reader; I'm really slow at it. So I personally prefer to rent or buy DVDs. Or, a cheaper option that I do regularly- as in, a LOT- is just browse youtube for big name runners and study their handling styles- especially in the challenging FCI or WAO World level courses. I eat up those videos!! If you truly want to see this in action, I can point you to a post I made just today doing exactly that-- watching Tori Self and her amazing Rev do some very fine handling! She did an interesting move that I wanted to learn more about. Here's me learning more about it: Jaakko turn vs Ketschker turn -Youtube -AgilityNerd -Anything on CleanRun -WorldTeam fundraisers are GREAT places to learn handling skills! They often have ebooks FULL of useful info! (Support your 2013 WAO Agility Team!) -Lots of running/handling! Take video. Watch the video back. Dissect why what you thought would work didn't work. Watch what you're doing and how you can improve. I post lots of short clips of myself trying out new handling sequences on youtube regularly. For example, . Or really !-I started a "Course of the Week" club on the GSD forum. There we posted challenging (well, *I* posted challenging) courses and dissected them. . This was a great way to learn different sequencing options. When you run it one way, and then see video of someone else run it differently- it really opens your eyes to possibilities!-Finally, I'd say another way to learn is to get the best instructor you can find/afford. I'm so incredibly happy with my current instructor. She runs agility aggressively. I love that! She's there to run HARD, FAST, and WIN! She's an amazing wealth of info, and I'm sure she gets tired of my finding FCI World's courses to post on her FB page and ask her questions about them... ;)/>/>/>

Funny- so I looked up who the "big name" is in that DVD, and it's Kathy Keats- who owns "The Agility Coach." I've never been to the site, so I just went there to check it out. What do I find? "The Art of Reading Agility Courses."

There's also a DVD on CleanRun called "Walking the Course." It is specifically about one course. A big name handler (sorry don't know her name- lol) walks you through and shows you numerous different options. I don't think there's anything mind blowing in there- but if you're on a mission for course analysis, it should be right up your alley. CleanRun also has an entire subsection dedicated to course analysis. Not surprisingly, you'll find a few books on handling systems in there. In my last agility class, my instructor let me run her ultra fast BC. (No, really- she placed 6th in semi finals in PGP at the nationals last year. Unfortunately missed his weave entry in finals. She really does have very, very fast dogs!) I think the fact that I love and study handling systems helps me to understand and execute a good handling strategy on the fast dog. I handled him from the front, and was able to stay ahead. My opinion is that course analysis begins with the study of handling systems. (I didn't say embracing a handling system- I said studying handling systems.) The more options you're aware of, the better you will be at applying those options to analyzing a course.

If you're going to eventually replace the surface with aluminum/rubber- then it might be wise to not spend a ton on the current surface. I went plywood/paint/sand on my a-frame that I built. It's lasting fine so far, but it's pretty new and this is the first winter. I read a tip on the agility yahoo group where someone had mentioned a good way to preserve the plywood where it hits the ground. Take a length of garden hose (same length as the A-Frame base), slit it length-wise and put it on the end of the plywood.

Completely agree. The pug sounds like the dangerous dog to me. It's the one who bit first (according to your story). I cannot stand it how little dogs get away with nipping/biting. If my German Shepherd went around nipping/biting, she'd be labeled a "dangerous dog." In my book, little dogs don't get off just because they're little- EVER. Little dog owners should have to be as responsible as big dog owners, and should be held to the same standard! Pug owner should have removed their dog when stress signals were first being displayed. And yes, of course, larger dog owner also should have stepped in if play was getting too rough. Never the less- little dog bit first.

Just make sure to get cold pressed, hexane free coconut oil. If it doesn't say it, then it isn't. It's easier to extract the oil if they heat it, but in doing so, they destroy some of the nutritional value. Hexane is a gas that is sometimes used in extraction- but it's also poisonous. The brand I linked to above meets both requirements. Amazon is the cheapest for this brand, but you can find it local in grocery stores. Costco also sells a large container of coconut oil that is very good. I've never used it, but know of plenty who have. It's something like $16.99 for 54oz which is a crazy good deal. If I ever renew my membership there, I'll likely switch.

Yikes. Yeah, my numbers are all over the place. Here's the silicon pan I bought: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B003VPZ14Q/ref=oh_details_o05_s00_i04 The description says there are twenty-four 15ml cavities. Google converter says that 15ml is 1.01 US Tablespoons. And there are three teaspoons in a tablespoon- so that's 3.03 teaspoons, twice daily for a total of 6.06 teaspoons (or 60 pound dosage). Sorry for the confusion. [EDIT]- I corrected the annotation in the video. I realized the issue. The numbers I said in the video were right in the video, I just accidentally said "tablespoons" instead of teaspoons. Each cavity is, in fact, 3 teaspoons. :)/>

I use coconut oil and find it works WAY better than fish oil ever has for my dog. I use the brand Nutiva, which you can get on Amazon for pretty cheap. I give my 69 pound female 4tbsp/day which is lower than the recommended dosage of 1tsp/10lbs body weight. I saw results in 7 days- seriously! I always thought her coat looked pretty nice on fish oil, but since being diagnosed with Addison's Disease and having to be on prednisone every day I put her on coconut oil instead of fish oil. Someone had recommended it to me as a way to counteract the skin issues often found when using prednisone. It can be kind of a pain to scoop out of the container and properly measure (almost certainly end up being more generous and wasting some) so I found this method of per-measureing. I recorded a video to show how I do it. Here's a photo of my girl last summer when I thought her coat looked just fine. You can see it actually looks a little dry. And that was in bright sunlight. (This is also one month prior to the start of finding a diagnoses for her exercise intolerance. Look how tired she looks! Poor girl...) And here's her coat 5 days after starting coconut oil. Note that this is in the setting sun even and her coat looks amazing. Nice and shiny, soft too. Very healthy: I should note that coconut oil doesn't have all of the omegas that fish oil does, and for that reason it really isn't a direct replacement. I, personally, did stop feeding her fish oil since she appeared generally healthier on the coconut oil (at least by appearance). I also feed a salmon/fish based food- so she should be getting plenty of omegas through that anyway. But for you ultra health conscience- you'd probably want to use both oils.

Just wanted to say thanks everyone for your stories. They really sound no different than any other breed- which for my case, is a good thing.

Thanks for the info. Is it common for a border collie to live this long? I'll be ecstatic if my GSD lives this long. What nice long lives.