Stewie and Danny Boy

Club Practice!

Club practice tonight, and it won't be hot! I hope to get a good practice in with Stewie

Club Practice

We had beautiful weather and a great practice Wednesday at club practice. We set up a USDAA Masters standard course. It was a great course except for the threadle, I hate threadles. That is probably because I don't do them very well, I admit it!
Anyway, Stewie did fabulous weaves every time and got the entry every time, hurray! I handled the dogwalk from outside of the weave poles then called him over 12 and then turned and sent him to the poles. It worked great.

Practices this week

Stewie has had great practices the last three nights. Monday and Tues, in the backyard, and tonight at the tree farm. I guess a lot of it has to do with the cooler temperatures, but I don't think he has ever been faster or more focused in the yard before. Let's hope it keeps up!
We had a good practice tonight also. He did some great weaves all three nights, if only we could get that in a trial. Someday...................
We worked contacts at a distance, discrimination between the A frame and tunnel and tunnel and dogwalk. He got all his "outs" to tunnels tonight, good boy!

Wed at club practice

We actually had a completely rain free club practice on Wednesday night, and Stewie and I ran a standard course and practiced our distance skills. We worked on sends to the dogwalk, laying a line of jumps, and had no problem with it. There was also a tunnel under the A frame that I sent him to and send him on out of the tunnel to another tunnel, also without a problem.
He did blow one dogwalk contact which is unusual at practice, usually he only does it at trials, so I had the opportunity to correct him for that.
All in all a good practice

Club Practice this week

Here is the course map from this week's club practice. Sorry it is a bad scan. I worked on distance skills with Stewie on this course, trying to stay in the center of the course for the whole thing. Also we did put in a set of 12 weave poles instead of a set of 6. The spot we had trouble with in the beginning was after the A frame. I decided to send him to the two jumps after the A frame and then layer the a frame while he was weaving. This was a difficult move but I am trying to push the distance envelope during practices. It took us 3 tries but we did it and then Stewie got the weave entry and continued weaving like a champ! The rest of the course was pretty easy, after the weaves he continued on no problem to the next two jumps, the tunnel, jump and dog walk to finish. After our 3 run thru with this course, Stewie had it down pact, so we did it backward the next two times and then called it a night.

Club Practice this week

This is the course we set up for club practice this week, at least as close as we could get. I am not a good course builder at all! This was a fun challenge to try. Stewie and I didn't have any trouble with the beginning, and he sent out to 5-7 with no problem. He came in after the dog walk the first try but we got 7-10 the second try. I feel we are getting a bit more consistent and smoother with our distance work.

Club Practice!

NEAT had its weekly practice last night, not even a sprinkle. Stewie had several good runs. We specifically worked on distance and me letting him know earlier when a turn was coming up. Great stops on the dog walk and after the A-frame which I have not been seeing much at trials!

We had great fun and Stewie was ready to settle down when we got home.

Practice field is ready for fun

Our club, NEAT, put up the fence at our summer practice field (110 ft by 110 ft) and set up our agility equipment last night. Hurray! We did a short practice last night and had a blast. We have our regulation dog walk along one side and another low dog walk on the other side for beginners. And our beautiful brand new aluminum A frame is all set up. Now we can get back to practicing contacts at big distances!