Eric does a great job capturing the agility moment.  His videos are a fantastic training tool that incorporate both the handler and the dog into a piece of video art. Thanx for what you do!

Today I watched a spider wrap a fly up in it's web.  The fly continued to buzz and squirm even though it's wings were tied together with silk.  It fought for a good 5 minutes.  I saw the spider bite it a couple of times and eventually the fly stopped moving.  Then the spider cut the web and dragged the package off, under the counter and I could spy no more.  I was sad because I wanted to watch it suck out the juice and leave an empty fly hull.

Don't you wish you had a superhero costume? E does. Saving the world from bad video and making an awesome agility blog. Go Super E!

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Pickle is a pirate because at 1.5 years he had to have his left eye removed due to a fungal growth.

The vet wasn’t sure he would be able to do agility again. I asked around and there are a few dogs who do agility with one eye or with the vision mostly gone in one eye. So after his surgery I tried to be positive and just started re-training him from the beginning.

We had already been competing but after the surgery he couldn’t find weave pole entries, he popped out of weave poles, dropped jump bars, fell off the dog walk, etc. The re-training went well and although Pickle doesn’t run the same as he did with two eyes he is an awesome dog. I love him and he inspires me to be the best team mate I can be for him.

PICKLEPOWER

This weekend Pickle rocked it up at the Purina Incredible Dog Challenge 2006 Western Regionals. What a boy (not to be confused with what a burger....). He was SOOOO good! I released him late 2 out of 3 times and he managed to catch and pass the other dogs each time. He had so much drive and focus. I was happy to be with him, doing what we love to do. I cried after he won. For a dog who might not ever do agility again he has come back to be an awesome agility dog.

This past weekend I learned two very important life lessons at the West Valley trial, Feb 25 & 26

#1 Do NOT go anywhere without a poop bag. If you do, your dog will decide he has to poop two minutes before your gamblers run. Which is no biggie except some of the poop gets stuck in his butt ‘cause he ate grass and it is hanging off. So the choice:

The reason for the cancellation of the 60 weave pole challenge wasn't just a storm... it was a blizzard (remember I'm from Tucson so any snow to me is crazy)!

No 60 Weaves Today!

A continuation of the investigation of shaping a dogs path. Here is an example from Sunday’s Excellent Standard course at Van Nuys January 22, 06. The course map, shown below shows the course (it set up differently than on paper).

These videos show how shaping a dogs line in between obstacles can determine where they go next. It is crazy how 6 inches of movement into the dogs path can make the line for the next obstacles different.

The following is from the Stacy Peardot-Goudy Seminar, 1.17 - 1.19 in Happy Valley, AZ. Bold info for clarification added 1.26

Ever wonder what the time difference is between a double front cross (in this case could be called an RFP) at the weave poles and a front cross before and after? Here is the answer: