2x2 weaves - where am I going wrong?

seashel said:
.I have noticed how well he seems to do things during our lessons, even if he's not tried it before. I have a feeling he might be trying to impress Gypsy, his tricolour sheltie training partner!! :lol:

(If he is, it isn't working because she thinks he's a brash young whippersnapper!!)
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:lol:Sounds like Birch trying to impress his bi blue training friend Haley and his sister Willow. With the same results I might add.:smile2:
 
seashel said:
I tried doing without the clicker today and relying solely on the reward but found it made him frustrated as he was not getting enough information about what he should be doing. Once I got the clicker out again he immediatly became more confident. :smile2:
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question- is clicker now helpful tool or a crutch?
I looked into Shaping Success and SG was doing like 48" initially. She does say something about 12? feet on DVD/ have to rewatch/ but my take on it is depends on the dog. If you have awfully speedy long strided BC 15' probably is good idea as they need enough space that second set looks like separate entry. With smaller/ slower dogs it should be 6-10 feet IMHO
 
SheltieChe said:
question- is clicker now helpful tool or a crutch?
I looked into Shaping Success and SG was doing like 48" initially. She does say something about 12? feet on DVD/ have to rewatch/ but my take on it is depends on the dog. If you have awfully speedy long strided BC 15' probably is good idea as they need enough space that second set looks like separate entry. With smaller/ slower dogs it should be 6-10 feet IMHO
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I agree
I think I did around 8 feet? Definitely NOT more with Toffee
 
I have a couple more videos but have ben too busy to get them uploaded yet but Epic is doing 4 poles almost in a straight line now!:biggrin2:
Today's discovery relates to SheltieChe's question quite nicely. I had been clicking on completion of the excersise, i.e. once Epic was exiting the last pole. However he was struggling to make the entry from the right of the arc (level with pole 2) and kept running through the gap between 2 and 3. He was improving gradually with practice and no reward for wrong entries but I started clicking for a correct entry and then rewarding once he was passing the last pole and this made a difference quite quickly and sped up his entry again too. After doing this he went from about a 50% sucess rate to about 70% sucess rate+. Interestingly he was always getting the second part right whatever the first part was like. I find he is very responsive to what the clicker marks and this is teaching me to be a lot more precise. I must try very hard not to mark the barking though!
Today's environmental issue is that a dusting of snow makes the white weave poles harder to see!:rolleyes2:

It's interesting to know about the distance between the two sets of poles and I supose this is one aspect where the type and size of dog will have a bearing on the training.

One more question if I may:wink2: So far I have been doing all my entries from the 'front' (right hand) of the poles and not going more than 180 degrees from the first pole, if that makes sense as I'm not sure how to explain it. Should we also be practicing entries from behind (left) of the first pole? I don't think I've seen anyone doing this on videos but was wondering what happens if you approach from that direction - or are weaves always approached from the right?
I'm hoping that the more Epic can do independantly of me the less I'll have to think about!:lol:
 
Working tough entries seems what SG recommends doing the most. Saying that, I have my sessions tailored to my dogs response. Tougher entries require greater collection at speed. I recently went to practicing more 4 feet in the bowl as I noticed when I have S shaped approach, it is difficult for boys to collect at speed.
 
it is difficult for boys to collect at speed.[/QUOTE]

Not really.My dogs have no problems and every person I know who does agility and compete with have no problems.
 
Sharon said:
Not really.My dogs have no problems and every person I know who does agility and compete with have no problems.
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I tend to agree. Lexi would prefer to go fast than to get it right a lot of the time. It has taken lots and lots of training to get her to slow down enough for tough weave entries. She is still behind the majority of dogs her age (she's 3--not a baby anymore!) because though she knows the drill, she doesn't like having to slow down. It's something we're always working on.

(The same is true when I ask her to collect at speed over a jump...but weaves I think are easier to drill because it's a more static exercise).
 
corbinam said:
I tend to agree. Lexi would prefer to go fast than to get it right a lot of the time. It has taken lots and lots of training to get her to slow down enough for tough weave entries. She is still behind the majority of dogs her age (she's 3--not a baby anymore!) because though she knows the drill, she doesn't like having to slow down. It's something we're always working on.

(The same is true when I ask her to collect at speed over a jump...but weaves I think are easier to drill because it's a more static exercise).
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mmm, not sure I follow. So you do have problems with Lexi collecting to get right entry into weaves as she is as many dogs does not like to slow down and seems have spent significant chunk of the time working on this.
You bringing an excellent point though- is the collection over the jump is the same and which one is easier? I have not paid any attention to that.
 
This is a video I made a couple of weeks before Christmas of our progress. Sorry it isn't great quality and the angle is rubbish but hopefully it gives some idea of where we were at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1n8R8Bk4x8

I don't have an up to date video yet but we have been good and continued practising over Christmas (well we did actually have a few days off for the sake of the neighbours! ) and Epic is now more or less reliably on 4 poles in a straight line.
We did go back to 2 for a while as I wanted him to really focus on the entries, now we both have a better idea of what we are doing, and this seemed to help a lot.

Then I reverted back to 4 gradually, but bringing the two sets together more quickly this time. He is getting all the entries in a semi-circle and whizzing through so I am very pleased with his progress as we are only doing 5-10 minutes a day.

A couple of things I have noticed is that he is more comfortable sending from my left, I don't really know why as he is always trained on both sides so I will have to do some seperate work sending from the right to a target or something I think. The other issue I had was that when doing four poles, if I used the clicker to mark a correct entry he would sometimes miss out one of the later poles but I had to reward as I had clicked so I have just started marking the entry with "Yes" and clicking when he has done all four poles correctly. He knows "yes" as I use it for HTM as a marker when I have no hands free for the clicker, but I was astonished at what a difference this made. After making a couple of mistakes he had been approaching the poles more cautiously and only speeding up on exiting but once I started saying "yes" I found he was much more confident with both entry and exit.

I have also noticed that he seems to realise when he hasn't got it right as he will stop before he goes in and come back to me and go again - without me saying or doing anything. Not sure whether this is a good thing or not but at least it means he appears to be thinking about what he is doing rather than just rushing in headlong and hoping for the best! Interestingly because he is thinking more he is barking less which is a massive benefit.

I'm learning there are a lot of different elements involved in teaching weaves other than simply getting him to go in and out - which was the easy bit!

I have also got Susan Garrett's 'Shaping Sucess' book for Christmas which I can't wait to start reading :biggrin2:
 
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