In which he remembers he's a Min Pin, not necessarily an agility dog!
These are from last weekend.

Saturday Standard. Overall I was actually pretty happy. I don't think
those contacts are legal and have reported them (i.e., the contact area
should be painted a highly contrasting color, usually yellow. But on the
other hand, I think he was just spaced and that's why he ran by it. I
loved that he downed and stayed down on the table. In fact, after the
opening I was pleased in spite of a couple of moments of inattention and
no completing weaves. He got the entry. The wide after the chute was my
fault. Note that I don't call him until *after* he's out. Bad me!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i-tLBBlheew

In Jumpers I made him do weaves. As for the other refusal...that's
Zipper's patented "run right toward the jump then duck out/stop last
second" trick. There was something on the floor he spotted. So he
stopped to look at it. Note that he goes to sniff it after he jumps. The
snot.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gHFPgUnBNjs

Sunday's runs were in general more hectic/less focused. I'd been
inclined to call both disasters, but looking at the videos there's stuff
I do like.

Standard: Hard to see on the video but the tunnel was actually totally
blind to the dogs coming over that first jump. All they saw was dogwalk
or table, so getting that tunnel was great, but also why he tried to tag
the DW coming out, resulting in the hi-larious "where's the Min Pin"
skit. Also, lovely sit on table. I need to work on crosses and tight
turns out of tunnels.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gXm309Zi0AA

Jumpers: Um, well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUK5t7Niiro

On 2008-09-21 10:30:54 -0400, Robin Nuttall said:

In which he remembers he's a Min Pin, not necessarily an agility dog!
These are from last weekend.

Those are wonderful and I love how everything looks when it's scaled down.

In article yUsBk.298357$TT4.176459@attbi_s22,
Robin Nuttall wrote:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUK5t7Niiro

But he's so damn CUTE!

--
Janet Boss
www.bestfriendsdogobedience.com

montana wildhack wrote:
On 2008-09-21 10:30:54 -0400, Robin Nuttall said:

In which he remembers he's a Min Pin, not necessarily an agility dog!
These are from last weekend.


Those are wonderful and I love how everything looks when it's scaled down.


Well nothing is scaled down except the dog and the jump heights. All the
equipment is full-sized...

Janet Boss wrote:

In article yUsBk.298357$TT4.176459@attbi_s22,
Robin Nuttall wrote:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TUK5t7Niiro


But he's so damn CUTE!

And that is a very good thing, otherwise I'd want to throttle his perky
little ass on a daily basis.

On 2008-09-21 11:20:54 -0400, Robin Nuttall said:

Well nothing is scaled down except the dog and the jump heights. All
the equipment is full-sized...

Oy. I meant the jump heights. I'm not writing clearly and I apologize.

He really can fly. He looks buoyant / weightless.

montana wildhack wrote:
On 2008-09-21 11:20:54 -0400, Robin Nuttall said:


Oy. I meant the jump heights. I'm not writing clearly and I apologize.

He really can fly. He looks buoyant / weightless.

Jumping is really, really easy for him. He tends to be a bit
inefficient, especially when he's distracted. He's more
efficient/flatter when he's focused so I have hope that over time that
will get better. He's very green.

Chris Zink has a weight/height ratio that is very clever and tells you
what kind of body your dog has for jumping. You take the dog's weight
and divide it by the height. So Cala is 60# and 24", giving her a
weight:height ratio of 2.5. Chris says that dogs with a w/h of less than
2.5 should have good jumping careers (taking into consideration overall
structure, joint health, etc.). Between 2.5 and 4 are dogs that you need
to watch carefully. Over 4 is a dog who is in the danger zone for jumping.

Zipper is 12 1/2" and weighs 10#. That means his w/h ratio is 0.8. He
can levitate 3' from a dead standstill, easy-peasy.

In article 6UtBk.353446$yE1.122210@attbi_s21,
Robin Nuttall wrote:


Chris Zink has a weight/height ratio that is very clever and tells you
what kind of body your dog has for jumping. You take the dog's weight
and divide it by the height. So Cala is 60# and 24", giving her a
weight:height ratio of 2.5. Chris says that dogs with a w/h of less than
2.5 should have good jumping careers (taking into consideration overall
structure, joint health, etc.). Between 2.5 and 4 are dogs that you need
to watch carefully. Over 4 is a dog who is in the danger zone for jumping.

That makes Marcie an even 2, Lucy a 2.69 and Rudy a 2.62 . Very
interesting. Right now, the only jumps Marcie is asked to do are
flyball jumps at 8". She races flat over those. 10 more days until she
turns 1!!!

--
Janet Boss
www.bestfriendsdogobedience.com

Janet Boss wrote:
In article 6UtBk.353446$yE1.122210@attbi_s21,
Robin Nuttall wrote:


Chris Zink has a weight/height ratio that is very clever and tells you
what kind of body your dog has for jumping. You take the dog's weight
and divide it by the height. So Cala is 60# and 24", giving her a
weight:height ratio of 2.5. Chris says that dogs with a w/h of less than
2.5 should have good jumping careers (taking into consideration overall
structure, joint health, etc.). Between 2.5 and 4 are dogs that you need
to watch carefully. Over 4 is a dog who is in the danger zone for jumping.


That makes Marcie an even 2, Lucy a 2.69 and Rudy a 2.62 . Very
interesting. Right now, the only jumps Marcie is asked to do are
flyball jumps at 8". She races flat over those. 10 more days until she
turns 1!!!


Yeah, you don't want to give her full size agility jumps till she's
adult. Actually I probably wouldn't be doing flyball either, for a few
reasons. First, even though they're flat I'd be concerned about the
speed and especially hitting a flyball box hard as a baby. Second, do
you want to do agility with her? If so, letting her flatten considerably
at very low heights is not a great idea. We do work dogs at elbow height
briefly when they're babies, but then make sure growth plates are closed
and get them on full height. The current prevailing theory is that too
much work at too low a height when puppies predisposes the dog to
flatten too much and take bars. All that said, I think that's more a BC
problem than a non-BC dog problem.

In article A9uBk.298456$TT4.201521@attbi_s22,
Robin Nuttall wrote:


Yeah, you don't want to give her full size agility jumps till she's
adult. Actually I probably wouldn't be doing flyball either, for a few
reasons. First, even though they're flat I'd be concerned about the
speed and especially hitting a flyball box hard as a baby.

She's not yet. She's learning a box turn, but nothing that would be
considered hitting the box. The only reason I was willing to start her
this semester was because I know it takes awhile before we're doing
"runs". My other dogs have been summer-borns, so starting them in the
fall was perfect at about 15 months. I'm pretty cautious.

Second, do
you want to do agility with her? If so, letting her flatten considerably
at very low heights is not a great idea.

Interesting. No, I doubt I'll do more than backyard agility with her.
I just don't have the time for it since I teach on weekends and want to
be doing field work with her (she does training now and has been for a
bit), along with flyball.

We do work dogs at elbow height
briefly when they're babies, but then make sure growth plates are closed
and get them on full height. The current prevailing theory is that too
much work at too low a height when puppies predisposes the dog to
flatten too much and take bars. All that said, I think that's more a BC
problem than a non-BC dog problem.

I think she tries to emulate the BCs! At 21" and 42#, she's built a bit
like some of them. I'll make sure I balance her jumping styles -
that's something I had not thought of. We haven't done anything with
jumping of any kind until last week. Of course, she leaps tall
buildings on her own whenever given the chance!

--
Janet Boss
www.bestfriendsdogobedience.com