Not Keen

[lucyandmeg]

My ellie is a strange kettle of fish. Shes a 3 year old goldie who is very bouncy and mad, but seems to dislike agility. Its a shame because although not collie fast once she gets going she can be quite good. She enjoys competitions as you only have to run once, but won't do any more than 5 minutes of training, 10 at the most! She'll be flying round and then decide not to carry on and will run off and hide behind something or someone and won't come back. I don't know why she does this i've never forced her or hurt her, but she refuses to come back to me and i have to go and get her. I feel like not bothering anymore if she seems to hate it that much, but then i see her flying round and wonder why she is like this. Has anyone met a dog like this? Did you carry on or give up? I've tried treats and toys but nothing works.

[Sophie]

This sounds very much like Morse used to be. He'd be fine for the first half of training, then decide that was it, time to go home. Some weeks he'd be fine right the way til the end of class, other weeks he wouldn't even start. When he was going, he loved it. But with what seemed to be a flip of a switch, he shut down and hated it and just wanted to leave. Like Ellie, there was no chance he was going to come back to me. And he looked so dejected and miserable, as if I was torturing him and forcing him to do somehting he hated. Yet when he was going ok, he loved it, was barking his head off in excitement, and clearly enjoying himself.

 

I did get to the point of thinking of stopping taking him to classes, since the bad times were about equalling the good times. But, luckily, we've come up with something that works with Morse - he's now making great progress and really loving agility again.

 

Firstly we have a routine that we do when we get there. Morse is a worrier and likes to know what he is doing - I think the chaotic-ness and waiting at the start of classes put him off a bit. He fetches his ball on a rope a few times, then we do some quick sits and downs and some heel work until the class is ready to start. This means he doesn't have time to fret about anything while we're waiting for class to start. Then, when we're waiting for our turn, I give him something to do - sit and down stays just after we've finished, then jumping, spinning etc when it is nearly his turn. Again, just to give his brain something to think about.

 

One thing - is ellie afraid of fireworks/thunder/loud noises? It wasn't until about October that I realised Morse was spooking everytime another dog made the seesaw bang. He wasn't scared of the seesaw, and does it fine himself, but is scared by other dogs going over it. It's something I didn't notice happening (it not being a very loud noise), but Morse certainly did. When it banged, he'd stop dead in the middle of a great run and run to the door to go home. After that, there was no getting him to do anything - even small height jumps. Sometimes he would go and hide in a tunnel and refuse to come out. It might not necessarily be the seesaw with Ellie, but there might be something going on in the background that you don't notice, but is putting Ellie of her run.

 

We are now making progress with the seesaw - it was left out of courses for a couple of weeks, then put in but not used, then only used in the last run of the night - Morse went first so he got a chance to do it, then the other dogs all went and Morse got to just sit and watch. Last Monday we had a major break through (for us), when Morse managed to do a course after another dog had been over the seesaw. Rescue Remedy is a big help - bread with a few drops on given a couple of minutes after the last dog goes over the seesaw.

 

Anyway, sorry this is so long. Basically just saying that Ellie isn't the only one, and it is possible to get them over it, if you can find out what is going on. It may turn out that there is no trigger, and she just doesn't enjoy it. If that's the case, I'd find something different to do with her that you both enjoy.

[LyndaTaylor]

Yes, I have one like that, Megan, she thinks agility is as much fun as watching paint dry or at least that's the impression she gave, some of it I felt was a little lack of confidence and she probably picked up my nerves more than the other dogs did. But she was a very good steady dog and a good pairs and team member as though not fast she was very accurate and got quite a few intermediate places

 

Things that I found helped -

 

She hated being in front, so I needed to work her from her shoulder where-ever I could.

 

I would break a course into sections, so first 4 jumps, lots of verbal praise, next few obstacles praise again, she needed that reassurance as we went along.

 

Start line routine, as we got to one dog infront we would play tug and then she did a routine of tricks again lots of praise so all very positive.

 

Very little training, I worked more on target training and obedience which could then be transferred to the equipment which meant we then had to only do a few repetitions of something new

 

I also found she was much better once we were out of starters and there were more twists and turns in a course so when in starters she was better in open classes or ABC ones.

 

Good luck!

 

Lynda

[lucyandmeg]

I have discovered the problem, well sort of. She seems terrified of contact equipment. I thought it was the jumps, but at the show the other day she was flying over the jumps and tunnels and then as soon as we got to the dog walk she panicked and ran over to the As it was only nursery we carried on with permission from the judge and she did a load of jumps and then as soon as we got to the a frame the same thing happened. So its jumping courses in competition from now on to get her more interested, and then lots of work on contacts involving masses of treats. I'm not sure what triggered it, but she was never 100% happy with them. She fell off the dog walk the session before the last show, but was fine at the show, but then my trainer asked us to go over the seesaw at the session after the show and she hasn't done anything since, so i guess it was the seesaw that did it! Its just going to be difficult to convince her contact equipment is fun though! Shes such a worrier.

[Lindsay]

I have discovered the problem, well sort of. She seems terrified of contact equipment. I thought it was the jumps, but at the show the other day she was flying over the jumps and tunnels and then as soon as we got to the dog walk she panicked and ran over to the As it was only nursery we carried on with permission from the judge and she did a load of jumps and then as soon as we got to the a frame the same thing happened. So its jumping courses in competition from now on to get her more interested, and then lots of work on contacts involving masses of treats. I'm not sure what triggered it, but she was never 100% happy with them. She fell off the dog walk the session before the last show, but was fine at the show, but then my trainer asked us to go over the seesaw at the session after the show and she hasn't done anything since, so i guess it was the seesaw that did it! Its just going to be difficult to convince her contact equipment is fun though! Shes such a worrier.

 

 

Banya also had a problem with the see saw, she was not "back chained" over it - was this with Sally?

I think Sally's a fab trainer but looking back I'd have done things very differently as after talking to BSD peeps they were not happy Banya was supposed to walk over the see saw to learn it. Not good for learning contact stuff.

 

My friend's Jake a golden was the same with the see saw (same place!) and I bet a lot of dogs are. Banya was OK with the contacts until the see saw then she tried to avoid them, then fell off the dog walk (this last was my fault).

 

She then got to breaking her watis and trying to do weaves instead of contacts...a real mess and I didn't feel any real help was offered that was constructive. Banya's obedience was going up the shoot but i understood why, she was not happy, so I gave it up and started working trials!!!!!

 

She loves the dog walk at home and will do WTs scale at a good height, we got over our problems, but the see saw started it all really. In fact I'd go so far as to say it messed up our relationshiip as Banya learnt she could bog off and run off etc and even just the once and she'd learnt it too much - it took months of training to get her right again poor girlie

 

Shame as her litter brother Hocus Pocus (Jazz) is doing sowell and is amazing at it.

Edited May 1, 2006 by Lindsay