Proper Flyball

Posted on March 1, 2009 by Paul

Beanie’s been doing quite well at our own cut-down “DIY” version of flyball. Intrigued by the idea of seeing whether she can handle the real thing, Susan started Googling to see if there’s a flyball club nearby. There is – the Lomond Flyball Club – and we got an invitation to their beginner’s class this morning.

The club is run by Sarah. Her day job is working with police horses, so it’s no surprise that her class was extremely well paced and structured. It started much like a typical obedience class, with the dogs on lead walking to heel round the hall. After a couple of minutes, a single small jump was placed on the circuit. Once the dogs got used to hopping over this another jump was added, then another, until by the end of the warmup the dogs were ready for action and had already got used to the jumps. Now it was time to familiarize them with the other essential piece of flyball equipment – the ball release box. Here’s a clip of Beanie and some of the other beginners getting to grips with this strange new device!

There are apparently two styles of flyball. One style employs a box that launches the ball into the air when the dog hits a pressure sensitive board, while the other uses a kind of curved springboard that simply releases the ball as the dog makes contact and helps the dog to turn on his/her way back to the handler. As you can see the Lomond club uses the springboard style box, and this is apparently better for the dog as injuries can occur if the dog has to jump and twist to catch a ball in flight.

The next stage involved one-way recalls over the jumps. This was old-hat to Beanie, so she did pretty well.

Once the dogs had the hang of that, the difficulty level was raised a couple of notches. Now they had to run over the jumps, pick up a ball lying on the floor and return over the jumps to their handler.

Given that the ball in question was just a common tennis ball (i.e. it didn’t have half a cocktail sausage stuffed inside it), Beanie didn’t feel any particular need to hurry back with it to Susan, but she did come back after a bit of nosing around.

Now it was time to put it all together: over just two jumps, hit the springboard, grab the ball and return via the jumps. Here’s how it should be done, courtesy of one of the more experienced class members:

And here’s Beanie’s attempt:

OK, if you’re eagle-eyed you might spot some minor technical differences between Beanie’s run and that of the Poodle. Like the way she was more interested in the hole the ball came out of than the ball itself. That, and the fact that she dodged the jumps on the way back and didn’t actually return with the ball. But hey, everybody’s got to start somewhere.

The class finished with a couple of circuits through the full set up – four jumps instead of two. Again, Beanie didn’t do it perfectly, but she showed improvement. She was watching the other dogs very intently between rounds – you could almost hear the cogs turning in her head as she tried to work out what it was all about. I’m hopeful that she’ll do a lot better next week.

Attempt #1

Attempt #2

Afterward we got a cuppa and a chat with the other class members, and hung around just long enough to see dogs from the later advanced class in action. Admittedly they were nearly all Collies, but that doesn’t mean there couldn’t be a little Beagle in there later in the year! Susan was invited to handle one of Sarah’s advanced dogs which was great fun for her and a good learning opportunity.

The ball pickup in slow motion

One full run, as it should be done

Once we got back home, we unleashed a very bored little Biggles from his crate and took him for a walk in the park. It was now almost a full week since his op and he was desperate for a run around, so when we bumped into a friendly little Spaniel boy I let him off lead. He had a fantastic time and led the chases from beginning to end. OK, his play pal wasn’t exactly a speed demon, but still it was a nice little confidence builder for our boy!

Beagle Bagels

Posted on March 1, 2009 by Paul

Biggles post-neutering scar is healing very well, and it won’t be long before he’s back to full fitness. Until then, we must continue with the constant struggle to keep him and Beanie sufficiently occupied so that there’s no illegal licking of wounds and no rough and tumble. To that end, here’s our latest find – two huge, bagel-like chews from our local pet shop.

An initial display of excitement from Beanie is quickly followed by suspicion. Is this giant bagel kosher?

But a couple of exploratory nibbles later, and it’s chew time!

As for Biggles, he got straight down to business the second he got his paws on it!

Biggles is now almost a match for Beanie when it comes to chewing. When he was younger we had the problem that she’d finish a treat in five minutes while he’d still be soldiering on a quarter of an hour later – a sure recipe for trouble. It’s no good when one Beagle is left with a full tummy and nothing to chew while the other one is still gnawing away!

These bagels have given us a different problem. It’s fine to let our pups chew away on them for a while, but eventually they have to be taken up and shelved for another day. Given Beanie’s recent reaction to attempts to take something off her in the park (i.e. speed-swallow the whole thing) we don’t really want to take things off her in the house without replacing them with something of equal or higher value. Equally, Biggles often gets a bit growly when asked to give something up and all the advice we’ve been given warns against confronting him. Again, bartering is the way to go. Up to now a Pedigree Dentastick has usually been a good enough trade for most things, including teatowels and semi-clean socks (smelly socks are on a whole different level, but that’s a story for another day). Unfortunately these bagel chews appear to be painfully close in value to Dentastix.

When I went out to the kitchen to raid the Dentastix box, Biggles started to follow, got as far as the kitchen entrance, then had to dart back into the living room to answer the bagel’s siren call. A couple of seconds later he was back.. almost.. then again he sprinted away. This sequence looked like it might carry on for some time. Every time I crinkled the sticks’ foil wrapper there’d be a mad scramble of paws and claws as he ran up the hall, then a split-second of indecision, and he’d be off again. It was such an effective form of exercise I began to wonder if it might be a viable alternative to the park on bad weather days.

Eventually the cycle was broken by Susan, who came to my aid by making a big enough fuss over the dental chews to tear both Beanie and Biggles away from their bagels for a couple of minutes. When our two duped Beagles returned to the living room, the bagel fairies had whisked them away.

Big Less

Posted on February 23, 2009 by Paul

Biggles was at the vet having “the snip” this morning while we took Beanie to the park. She didn’t seem to miss Biggles on the walk, but she was decidedly mopey when we got back home and she realized her brother was still AWOL. By 3pm though Biggles was back home with us – albeit without his two favorite non-squeaky balls. Beanie was very happy to see him but she immediately picked up on his delicate state and was very gentle with him.

Biggles isn’t the only one saddened by the loss of his pocket billiards set

As you might expect, Biggles spent most of the afternoon sleeping, but by teatime he was almost doing somersaults in anticipation of food. He was so excited by the time his bowl arrived that I actually had to pick him up and restrain him to prevent him from straining his stitches. The next week or so is going to be a challenge, that’s for sure.

The next 10 days of convalescence may be pretty dull for him, but at least he had a great park session yesterday thanks mainly to Beanie’s sister Bella. Here are some of the photos:

Of course the Beagles weren’t the only ones having fun!

And one last shot – the last ever to feature Biggles’ little conkers!

Finally, we got an unwanted chance to test the new “emergency recall” command we’ve been working on for the last three days. Right at the start of the walk, Beanie again did her pickpocket act and grabbed a polythene bag from someone’s pocket. She started tearing it up as though preparing to eat it. I fought back the urge to rush in and try to get it off her (which would probably have made her swallow it), and instead composed myself and tried the recall. It worked brilliantly! While I was following up the recall with a loads of highest quality treats and an exciting game, Kirby’s Mum Sheila quickly secured the bag, and Beanie didn’t even notice it was gone. It’s extremely encouraging to see such a simple training method working well after only three days. If we keep this up daily it should be almost hard-wired after a while. Just for reference, here’s the method we’re using for our emergency recall:

1) Choose the cue you’re going to use. Go for something that’s not likely to be heard outdoors, and preferably something that either puts you in a happy frame of mind (and so gives your voice a happy tone) or is incapable of changing due to the stress in an emergency situation (e.g. a whistle)

2) Use the cue to introduce a really, really fun session to your dog. It should involve their most favorite food(s) and games and be as exciting and over the top as possible. The dog doesn’t have to do anything to get this fantastic reward except thoroughly enjoy his/her self. Keep repeating the word during the session to build the association.

3) Never, ever abuse the cue. It is strictly for emergencies only.

4) If/when you have to use it for real, follow it up immediately with treats, praise and games just as you would during training so that you don’t weaken it.