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Wing wraps I do with random tall obstacles such as trees, goal posts, bushes, etc. I do this all the time. If you get two chairs and a stick, or even just two of something, you may not even need the stick, you can train probably a few of the handling techniques. If you had 4 chairs or things your dog can run around, you can practically train most of the handling techniques. http://baddogagility.com/handling-practice-with-two-jumps/ (of course, instead of jumps, you can use the substitute, and just gently learn the techniques) You could practise the dog walk with the target practise you did, and get the 2 on 2 off position on a stool or box or something, and then practise running into that position perhaps? Get it perfect, so that your dog doesn't break the position, and add speed to debug it. For the dog walk, my dog really struggled with it due to him falling off or loosing balance, so we found a very low brick wall, and practised him running along there, and that pretty much worked fine. For weaves, you could use sticks again, though they may not be straight enough, and use the 2 by 2 or channel weave method which you can find out about online. Hmm, chairs and trees may be a bit difficult though if you have a long line, so perhaps you could try with 4 small cones and two long sticks? you could try to tie the long line to your belt or something perhaps? Im not sure if you would have any cones lying around though, sorry. I don't know, just offering suggestions. You could also get some really cheap PVC pipe (which I did) and use them instead perhaps? could work well as the weaves, poles, and jump wings even by sticking them into the ground. We got some cheap rigid PVC pipes, and they even cut them to the right length for us at the store for free. Was good _____________________________________________________ Sorry if none of these possible suggestions are what you're looking for, I may have misunderstood what you meant or something.

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The height probably does show more movement, I definitely think that, and as for breaking poles, my instructor mentioned that some dogs do break poles (referring to the UK ones) I guess it would depend on material (which I think is the same), diameter of the pipe, and the thickness of the pipe. I think also the longer the object is, the easier it is to break, and the easier it is to flex, but I'm not sure if this would effect on 6" difference really, idk. Guess there's no way to check, perhaps if you compared crufts/olympia large finals with the american equivalent maybe you could tell (if you don't look at the tops of the weaves, but the "give"), maybe not

(UK) Hmm, not seen any wooden weave poles yet. Though they can be taller than this, this does seem to be the usual hight, 76.2cm (30 inches) is the minimum for weaves it says. They seem thicker than the USA poles too, but that could just be because they look shorter, IDK

Bar is absolutely fabulous! Haha, <3 her When I hand timed Bar just, I got 2.5 and 2.65, and I got 2.41 when I tried to get it in time with the timer, goes to show how gosh inaccurate hand timing is! Really bad, thank god for electronic timers! But then again, we're talking .30 of a second here, thats difficult for human reaction times! _____ Though getting fast weaves would shave perhaps .5 of a second, it really isn't important in the grand scheme of things, but its still fun to see how much better you can do! My agility instructor said for those entries, at first I had big troubles with them, and she gave the advice to make the entrance easier by going slightly more to the left of the pole so they have to still slightly weave the first pole rather than enter the gap, and once the dog has that nailed, slowly go from a bit further to the right, and has seemed to help since its much easier for the dog to enter from there, and it helps in competitions too. I'm not sure if that's obvious or not though! Probably is really obvious. I don't know, im a simple person, not a top competitor. Though when I get my dog going too fast, he misses out poles in between sometimes, which is a shame, I guess its just finding that balance of speed. _________________ Tessa is such a lovely dog <3 I like watching videos of her! _________________ @CptJack Aww, 11" is around half of my dogs height! Yeah, it can be a lot different in trials, for me its because im also much more careful in competitions so I won't push my dog as I don't want to mess up the round, however, he also is faster in competitions too due to the excitement in the air, so I wouldn't know his actual speed in comps at all, but it does feel slower. Though its a shame she gets stressed Though it sounds like its been getting better from what you said, which is great if so

There's been the conversation before that time does not matter to many people for agility, and that's fair enough! I myself when training my dog do want to get the most out of him, and am a competitive person simply because I want to improve my dog. Of course, handling is the most important, but bad handling would be a fault at my end, not the dog, so with the dog I focus on accuracy and speed (if I cant keep up, well, I got to be a better handler) ________________________________________________________________ So anyway, I'm wondering roughly the timing your guys pups weaves may be? Of course, its difficult to time properly, as with human timing there's a certain margin of error, but roughly? My pup got 2.75 and 2.81, and he also had a faster one, but sadly the person timing didn't get it that time. The other dog in the class got 2.68 and 2.75, so a little faster. Such a nice bc (3 in the class, but the other couldnt weave fully yet) Either way, we timed the weaves today because... why not haha! (have no idea how these measure up to other dogs btw, so im not trying to brag/complain/i don't know either just to let yall know) These are so close, it is very easy for it to be down to about .2 above and below perhaps? I don't know. We didn't repeat it many times to get a good average, or use electronic equipment. This is a full set of weaves btw.

I personally think Silvia Trkman is a good example of training vs the dogs "talent" http://silvia.trkman.net/steps.htm She's a trainer I respect a lot! (And not because I'm aiming to be like her and reach worlds, gosh no, but her general outlook when it comes to dog training is great, and she made it really far with this mentality as well)

Haha, impostors, thats an interesting way to describe them Impostors vs working dogs then?

With the HTCh, I was just using that as an example, I am not to familiar with the different titles or abilities when it comes to this area, so sorry for my lack of knowledge there. Well, I generally mean a good quality working dog, or a dog which has shown its ability to work. I don't know to well. "BTW, we here consider the "average" border collie to be a working bred dog, the one you seem to be singling out as somehow not the "average" border collie." Oops! Sorry! Ok, I guess I mean the border collies bred for companionship (I guess, kinda) instead of herding work or showing? Sorry, my knowledge on this type of thing is very bad,

Here is something I have been thinking about. Say you happened to have a HTCh dog (of any breed), who has great herding ability. Would this dog also be a dog that would do well in other sports such as flyball, obedience and agility? Or say for example, you had a strong line of talented working dogs. Would this pup have a higher disposition to do well in sports than the average border collie? (I wouldn't know what to class as "average") I met a dog who was from strong working lines, and it was great at agility. It had a ton of instinct, practically herded the jumps, and looked weightless when running. This made me think, does a dog bred for work have a higher tendency to be good for sports? Do they really go hand in hand? If someone bred a dog for agility or flyball, and another person bred a dog for herding, would the dog bred for work have a similar ability for other sports? Or say, if someone bred an active dog which could enjoy all types of activities (with nothing in particular aimed for), and another bred a dog for work, would they have (on average) different potential? Does a dog bred for work/have working ability have a direct correlation with drive and ability in other sports? What qualities make a good working/herding dog? ______________________ This is just a curious question, please don't assume anything of me for asking this, im just wondering what others think

If I were to get a puppy that was, say, 15 weeks old, would leaving the puppy alone for 3.5 hours on 4/7 days of the week be too long? The pup would possibly be in a crate or play pen, and it won't be completely alone as it would have the company of a dog nearby (but not in there with it), though that is not much company however, and it will be with people for every other hour of the day apart from those 3.5 hours. Im assuming this is too long? This wont be through the pups lifetime, but perhaps for around month, maybe more or less, and after that time, I could dedicate every hour of the day to the pup. This is not a plan or anything of the sort, I just want to know if it is even possible? I'm guessing it isn't however, but I've never been in a situation when I would need to know if this is. I'm not the type to want to leave a pup alone, but I need to consider this before even thinking of making any other decisions. What do you all think? I'm not sure if this is the right place for this topic, if it isn't, sorry.

@CptJack In the UK, there are grades from 1-7. (in the Kennel club agility events) If you win an agility competition with a clear round, you move up a grade from grades 1-5 If you win 3 jumping competitions with a clear round, you also move up a grade at grades 1-5 The third way is points progression. A clear round will earn you 2 points in agility, and 1 point in jumping, and you need 100 points to progress to the next grade. If you are in the top 10, in agility you can get from 11-20 points from 10th place to 1st place in jumping, you get 1-10 points from 10th to 1st place So its definitely based on winning, or at least being in the top 10 with a clear round, or going to many competitions. In the last competition I went to, at grade 3-4, there were 120 competitors, and some places may have even more, or less. However, once you reach Grade 4, you have to win once in agility, or 3 times in jumping, you can't progress on points. Grade 5, you need 3 wins with a clear round, one of which must be an Agility win, And Grade 7, to get to Grade 7, you need 4 wins, 2 must be agility wins. And since in every competition I have been to seems to have such fast dogs, even at grade 1, you have to just try your best! Though I have seen some slower dogs in Grade 3 and other grades, so theres always a chance since so few people get clear rounds on the course from what I have seen. They also section it off so the same grades are only competing against other people in the same grade, except for combined classes I think. Im really not sure how America does it in the slightest. I think FCI countries do it by a clear round to AGI2, and a win to AGI3? I could be completely wrong.

Whatever she is, so looks pretty! I think she does look like she has sheltie in her, but I wouldn't know at all! Is she a rescue? That sounds cool, they seem far more useful than trees, goal posts and chairs when it comes to practising without much space and equipment for wraps and turns, though my boy would probably still jump it haha!

@CptJack Aww, shes precious! What breed(s) is she? Also, what are those hoop-like obstacles? Never really seen much like them, ive seen them once or twice in other videos, rarely, but never in RL. They were in Root Beers video too

I'm wondering what lines of border collies are there in the UK? This is a very broad question, so I'll narrow it down a bit. I'm talking about high drive working line border collies, which are built with a lighter frame possibly too, Im interested to know a few breeders or bloodlines that you would regard as great working dogs. Also, I've already decided on the breeder for my next dog, so this isn't for me to choose a puppy from, just curiosity. I'm just interested to hear about some different breeders and lines that you all know of and would classify as being "higher quality" working dogs (higher quality may not be the right word, perhaps renowned?) This type of thing really interests me for some reason, i'm not sure why though! (also, this may be in the wrong area of the forums, if it is, sorry!)

I remember someone in my agility class who is an extreme example. She bought herself a Border Collie from very strong working lines, presumably for agility. Its a beautiful dog, gives 110% into everything, so fast, so weightless, with so much instinct that it is giving "the eye" to the jumps when on the start line! Soo much drive as well, a little rocket! However, when she tries to handle the dog, all she gets is a frustrated dog spinning in circles barking at her. Its because her handling wasnt right for the dog, and it didnt work out. The dog works well when the agility instructor is handling it though, as she has more experience and can give clearer signals. They had their last lesson in our group the other day, because now the agility instructor will be handling the dog instead, which I do have to think is for the better, as this dog is one I can only describe in superlatives. ______________________ BTW im not trying to say anything from this, just a story I wanted to share based on the quote above

"The dog's titles are a better measure of success than how fast it goes" Hmm, the titles the dog has got also mean less than nothing to me. FI MVA EE MVA HeJW-13 AGI3 I know AGI3 is agility level 3, but I think the others are show terms? I have no clue. Yeah, I know speed isnt really important, im not too caring over it, but like I say, just curious. I guess its really difficult to tell ^^; Doesn't really matter though

Well, the dog is the height I said above, 41.5cm/16.33 inch tall, so they would be jumping medium height. Its not a border collie though, which I wish it was since this is a border collie forum after all But sadly, the agility forums are pretty inaccessible. Still a herding breed though... I have a video of them doing the course here: They look fast to me, but theres the case that short striding dogs can often look like theyre going much faster than they are, and larger striding dogs look slower, however they can cover more ground with each stride, so I dont know honestly. Its not my dog, by the mother of the pup I am hoping to possibly get, so Im interested to know. They have other videos of the dog on the channel as well where the dog may be faster or slower, as well as with different courses, so I don't know if this is the dog at its best or not either. Gosh, I really don't know. It doesnt matter too much if the dog is fast or not, but it just interests me to know, especially when understanding the agility scene a bit better. I have a large dog too, so I dont watch many medium dogs at all in the competitions we go to, so I have no clue how to determine this type of thing. Im the type of person who prefers speed to accuracy, only because it gets more fun for me to run the faster you and your dog goes, and agility is all about fun! Not like the mps really matter though at the end of the day, like mum24dog said, in the UK mps arent really measured, and since thats where Im from, I dont encounter it that often, so its a foreign concept.

I know nothing about how to interpret speed in agility, since it was never something I have needed to do. Im really curious to whether the average agility person would consider 5.28m/s (5.77yps) to be fast for a Jumping class, medium/20" (41.5cm/16.33 inch high dog) This isn't for my dog, I just know of a dog that reaches this speed, and was curious if this was considered fast, or whether its pretty average, or even slow? I'm talking about for the average agility dog.