Those of you who get Clean Run magazine have seen the articles about training "Pigs Fly" dogs. I like those articles because they present a perspective that is not so border collie-centric. Not knocking BCs, mind you. Some of my best friends are BCs.
But not all dogs come with the same hardware and software as a border collie and a training program that is perfect for that breed is not always the right fit for another dog. Sometimes a creative approach--and a lot of patience--is needed to get some dogs to excel at agility. My smooth fox terriers are a type of "Pigs Fly" dog--they have drive and enthusiasm in abundance and are perfectly willing to do things over and over again. They are happily motivated by food and toys. But my fox terriers do present certain interesting training challenges.
Both Mimi and Gracie are relatively unencumbered by gravity and put a tremendous amount of effort into boinging up beside me as often as possible. They are quite savvy about this too, boinging just so they brush me but not actually boing into me. They tend to boing often when they get excited. This makes it hard to accomplish training tasks like getting them to sit at the start line or go over the jump in front of them.
This is a little video I made of Gracie working on her contact board and the slanted weave poles this afternoon. She actually did make progress but you can see there is lots of boinging and dithering and excitement that competes with learning.
But, in the end, for my dogs, play is work and work is play. So if they aren't behaving like crazed white fleas, then they aren't having a good time. That's what it's all about.
1 comment:
I particularly love the way she bounces through the weaves - too funny! She is obviously and extreme bouncer - she needs a few tricks that play on that! Maybe one that she can do at the end of her run to get the crowd laughing - those foxies they love a good audience!
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