My youngster has been attending group classes for a couple of months. Each week our training gaps are made apparent and our homework is filling in those gaps in my training.
On Wednesday nights we attend an “intermediate” class at another club’s facility. It’s been marvelous getting T on new equipment and he’s shown himself to be a brave, bold partner.
This week was his first experience with their full-sized, rubberized teeter. He had no issues with the equipment, running to the end, riding it down, and sticking his 2-O-2-O position. I’m really pleased with his contacts and he continues to eat one meal a day on his contact trainer.
In the last 8 weeks he’s also learned to weave, but I’ve been focusing so much on jumping in the last 2 weeks that he’s missing most of his entries now (loss of focus as we run at the weaves). Back to weave training, interspersed with jump training.
On Thursday nights we attend Bud’s advanced-to-masters class here at home. Our course last night was 17 obstacles with all contacts, 2 sets of 6 weaves.
For the first time I ran Tempest at 20″ in the entertainment round. We do most of our practicing at 16″, and he’s been known to run with the 12″ dogs part of the time, but I wanted to see if 20″ made him more thoughtful and careful.
He dropped one bar due to my pulling away as he was jumping, and he missed both of his weave entries.
In general he was awesome and fun. If I can iron out the kinks in the next 6 weeks he’s got a chance to have a solid performance at his debut.
With regards to his general demeanor, I’m still really pleased with my choice of a middle-of-the-pack puppy. He’s not a bully, and he’s not a chicken.
Where he once became frantic watching other dogs run agility, he now observes keenly but quietly.
He’s a wonderful little house dog, choosing to lie quietly at my feet as I work. But he’s ready for any activity, any time of day or night.
He sleeps in bed and, generally, through the night without needing to go out for a potty break. The exception to this is on training nights he’s usually had a lot of treats and water, so he’ll often need to lay his head on my arm and let me know he needs to go outside.
He travels well, accepting hours in a crate, though he objected to being left in the back of Vicki’s truck while we ate dinner in Medina. He’d have been quiet in his crate, but was barking because he was loose.
I’m delighted that I took the time and put the effort into 1) choosing the right puppy, 2) teaching him good manners, and 3) training contacts-contacts-contacts.
Tags: 2-Minute puppy training, basic dog obedience, Bud Houston, dog agility, dog performance sports, dogs in motion, housemanners for puppies, Marsha Houston, puppy training
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