Hi,

My 16 month old male Border Collie is 4 months into his agility training. He is well behaved, quite obedient and has a wonderful nature but he turns into a wild animal at agility! I know it's exciting for him but it's getting to the stage where we can't let anyone go near him whilst he's waiting his turn as he barks incessantly and pulls at the lead and if you put your hand near his mouth he will snap at you. When it's his turn to go and he's off the lead he's great, all the bad behaviour stops and he's actually brilliant doing the agility and has already won 1st place in our club's fun day.
He completely ignores anything you do or say to him unless you attract his attention with a ball, but then we feel as though we're rewarding the bad behaviour.
I have tried a halti (made him worse) and am thinking of trying an anti bark collar along with Valerian.
Can anyone offer any advice on this?

Thank you,

Julie.

Sounds like normal behaviour for a collie at agility :-)

Does he like footballs too? Mine has an old flat football that she bites while other dogs are running. She watches the other dogs while biting her ball! Failing that a ball on a rope when standing in the queue. Don't think of it as rewarding bad behaviour - it's distracting him with a toy which is perfectly fine.

edited to say Collies are obsessive characters. It's better he becomes obsessed about his ball than other dogs running

Have to agree with Tigger2. My collie behaves badly whils watching unless I give her a toy to chew on. Everytime she gets too excited or frustrated she bites down on her toy instead of going at the other dogs.

Hi, have the same problem with my springer x gsd at Flyball, he is the noisiest there and there is one certain collie he gets really wound up with which had esculated into fights.  I have found the best way is to distract him with a ball, walk away from the rest of the people and dogs and play with him there or do a bit of obedience. This seems to be helping, I too thought I must'nt reward him but was advised the ball/toy thing and it is certainly better.

Sounds very familiar :-o  It is too do with the adrenaline rush the collie gets - there was a good article I read that Lindsay put on here.  I have a collie that has a very strong chase instinct too and the minute she hears someone else urging their dog on or the claws scratching on the a-frame she is beside herself.  Having just been to an indoor competition yesterday I was impressed with the queuing along a boarded gate. Meg couldn't see what was going on until it was our turn next.  She ran beautifully but didn't want to be caught at the end because she wanted to go back round again.  She is an agility junkie!!! Will search for that link again - it might be useful.

I am sure Lindsay won't mind if I post her link.  It really does sum up how my collie reacts - though as I say stopping her is another thing - only blocking the view and getting her to do things for me can stop her blanking me out completely - and as you say if you put your hand down on the dog you get a snap - collie nip reflex!  http://www.dog-secrets.co.uk/behaviour--training/how-do-i-stop-my-dog-chasing.html

He is well behaved, quite obedient and has a wonderful nature but he turns into a wild animal at agility!

Do you mean as in pulling the lead and stuff?
I love it when I see the collies waiting for their run at flyball and their going absolutly daft and so loopy lol :-D !!
Tugging on their leads dying to get to that ball and when their let go WHOOSH!!! Their dust trail is the only thing left lol

I know Im not a help but just had to say how impressive they are at flyball :-D !

Thanks to everyone who responded, it's good to know I'm not alone!

Cheers Guys,

Julie x

Hi, it's great that your collie is showing success at agility, it's a great sport and very enjoyable for both dog and handler.  Having competed in agility for a number of years, I have now retired from it ... partly because I couldn't stand the manic behaviour of handlers and their dogs at competition.  It is the worst thing ever if you have an eager, but calm dog, to stand in the agility queue waiting your turn and someone behind you is winding up their dog, or not calming it.  It totally stressed me out and my dog.
Fortunately, my club did not condone barking dogs from the sidelines. I think if agility dogs were docked points for the barking they did in the ring, as in obedience, it would be a lot calmer with far fewer confrontations between dogs outside the ring.  From my point of view, my dog was calm prior to going in the ring, but once she was 'on' she just got on with the job - each obstacle is a reward in itself, she didn't need to get manic in order to achieve success and have a good time.
A lot of agility dogs turn into 'wild animals' ringside, but they do because they're allowed to. I know it's hard to calm a 'keen' collie, but introducing a settle command would help, and if his behaviour gets wild, then just pop him back in the car. He'll soon learn that poor behaviour results in no fun.
This isn't meant to come across as critical, but I do believe that if you condone the behaviour (by allowing him to do the obstacles) then you are going to encourage the behaviour you obviously (thankfully) want to remove.
Personally I wouldn't use an anti-bark collar - it could be set off by other dogs and could then make your dog a nervous wreck.  Good luck and continued success, look forward to competing next season!

You are very lucky to have a dog that can be kept calm while queuing and watching other dogs do agility koolcad.  However my dog has a strong chase drive and once she has seen the movement and noise in the ring she switches off entirely and becomes fixated - this happens almost instantly - I don't do anything to wind her up - a settle command falls on deaf ears - I have had all sorts of things said to me about how to control my dog - and made to feel pretty stressed about it too - my dog is a good agility dog - it would be a shame if we were pushed out because of her behaviour - many folks with difficult dogs get someone else to queue for them!   How am I dealing with it?  Blocking the view, getting her to focus on me before another dog starts running - lots of praise and treats when she sits and looks at me, when I need a break get her to lie down and put my foot firmly on the lead to keep her there, walking right away and doing some training to calm down and get the focus back on me - anything to stop the obsessive behaviour.  If I put my dog in the car everytime she barked then we would never take part at all.  What would that teach her?  She is unable to reason out that she is there because she got excited.

Koolcad I think you were right to give up agility if you were getting so stressed out! Personally I love to watch the dogs ringside having such a great time.

As CJ has said if most people put their hyper collies back in the car everytime they barked or got excited there'd not be many left to compete :-)

Yes and I am sorry that the agility shows you attended had people who behaved badly by winding their dogs up.  In my limited experience I have never seen this thank goodness.  The only one amazing behaviour I saw was someone trying to quieten their barking dog by shouting quiet at it at the top of their voice - which was quite funny really.  Couldn't tell who was barking the loudest :-)  Everyone gets stressed out at sometime - but it is no way to compete with a sensitive dog.  If I don't try to keep Meg calm she will make off around the ring so fast she won't perform well.  I have to be calm myself.

Sounds pretty normal BC behaviour whenever i go to anything where they have agility the collies are all barking raring to have there turn. I think its just extreme excitement and he is only a baby, you should be proud of him for doing so well at agility i know id be a very happy mummy. He may calm down with age but i think its just collie nature hes like a coiled spring.

Only thing i can suggest to calm him down is when he gets wound up take him outside (keeping tabs on when its your turn, maybe your other half can come and get you) when he has calmed down outside, it may take a while for him to do tht if at all on the first try but persevere. When hes calmed down bring him back in and get him into a sit with a treat. if he starts again take him out and so on repeat this over and over again and he should eventually get it, remember lots of praise when hes calm. I know hes a collie and its unlikely hes just guna sit there and lol on the floor but get him to a stage that your happy with. Dogs learn by assosciation and he will understand that to behave in such a way is wrong. even if you go sit in other classes and not take part it will teach him to wait nicely until it is his turn. patience and structure is what you need. He will need all his get up and go to win the rest of his agility runs.

Louise

My sprollie is a barker in the queue and no amount of telling him to settle will make him quieten down despite knowing the command well.  When I go to queue I step away and tell the people what I am doing and why I am doing it, most people appreciate that you are thinking of other people by not sitting in the queue with a manic dog.  My boy will also hold a toy in his mouth and tends to tug on that which also stops the majority of the noise.

Thanks Louise, I'll give that a go.
We are really proud of him & he's the youngest in the class as well. It,s funny I don't think he acted this way until about his 3rd week at training!

Julie.

Ah he has probably learnt alot of it by copying the other manic BC lol, yeh but give it a try and remember not to give up and persevere.

Louise

Hi Julie
My Border Collie is 3yrs next week
People told me to play ball or tug in between to reward, to distract & so he doesnt get bored!
NO WAY!
he would just get more hyped up & uncontrollable !
so instead i found calm training (reinforcing the "wait", walking to heel, right& left turns, etc & tricks work perfectly for us
HOWEVER now when the others play ball or tug mine is too busy & focused on me to even bat a eyelid (LOL)
Helen
x

Hiya
sad to hear how other dogs are hyped up at competitions
this is one of the reasons why i haven't yet competed !
bad enough at training when others waiting hype up / clicker train /play with their dog near you !
i get tottally stressed out just by the practice runs (LOL)
i totally agree its hard to calm a 'keen' collie
However when i saw them running and barking i thought to myself no way - i wanted that kind of behaviour from mine
so i taught him not to bark whilst training HOWEVER we have been also working on the no barking whilst waiting
still prevailing (i'm determine not to have a loud barker)
Helen

He is well behaved, quite obedient and has a wonderful nature but he turns into a wild animal at agility! I know it's exciting for him but it's getting to the stage where we can't let anyone go near him whilst he's waiting his turn as he barks incessantly and pulls at the lead and if you put your hand near his mouth he will snap at you. When it's his turn to go and he's off the lead he's great, all the bad behaviour stops and he's actually brilliant doing the agility and has already won 1st place in our club's fun day.
ummm... maybe these dogs get pushed to far too soon. Ideally I really would advise desensitising the dog to the excitement. You want the dog to run smooth and calm and so you don't want hype.  Maybe make being quiet in the line the focus for reward. So no reward for any other aspect of agility but just for the being calm in the line. Ideally this should be the emphasis from day 1 rather then let bad habbits develop. 

Yes many of our dogs start if like this but most are taught not to, and although you do see a lot of collies acting like this in some classes this is not normally so within the ones in Large grade 7 or with more advanced handlers in general. So yes it is normal but handlers need to wind thgese dogs down and not up. Let him know he must be quiet while he waits, just as anyone would if they had a dog walking down the street who was reactive/excitable to dogs or to strangers.

I have competed at a small few shows over these past 2 wet summers and have two G2 hyped up beginner dogs and if I were starting over again I would train some place where hype was not accepted and where the dogs were trained at a slow pace they could cope with without developing this type of hyped up stress reaction.

Just been reading all the posts on agility and thought you could all advise me.
I have two young Shelties and I'd love to try agility with them, I've got other dogs and I have to confess I've never really done any classes for training of any type. This is about to change and I'm going to take the younger ones to puppy school, to learn good manners etc, then I want to have a go at agility. Do they need to be a certain age before you start, mine are 6 and 7 months is that too young?

Hi Nicola, you need quite a good level of obedience to enable to train to do agility. If your dog has no recall, he will be useless in the agility ring. I would suggest puppy school is a good idea for basic obedience. I would also make enquiries in your area regarding agility classes. It is quite normal for clubs to have waiting lists, so get searching & get your name down. There are quite a few shelties competing at the shows & they make fantastic agility dogs. You can't enter an agility show with a dog under 18 momths of age, but there are certainly many things that you can do before that age. Get yourself a good club & you will be hooked!

Hi Beardy,
I thought this may be the case which is why I'm going to puppy school, my girls are quite good at recall but there's always room for improvement. The puppy school I have chosen also does 'fun agility' courses of 4 weeks so I thought this may be a good starter for 10.

you need quite a good level of obedience to enable to train to do agility. If your dog has no recall, he will be useless in the agility ring.

even if they have a very high level of obedience they can still be useless in the agility ring! zooooooom! Weeeeee! 'What obedience?' wag wag, wag!

Yep shelties are good for agiliity and because they are small or medium they will compete in small class sizes so have a chance to really do well and progress through the levels. Because of the smaller numbers of entries for non large dogs not all open shows will run suitable classes and tend to combine beginners with higher level clasases so frequently when you start at grade 1 you may find you are competing with grade 1 to 5's. So you will need to hunt around to find the best shows to enter when you get to the point of being ready to compete.   

Fun agility classes can be good if they are taught by trainers who do compete at a KC level, but otherwise they can be fun but set you back with training and handling if you choose to continue into competition - which with small or medium dogs really isn't a bad idea because as I mentioned the small class sizes do make it much more possible to do well and progress. Somethims you compete against 5 sometimes 30 but not frequently much more then that. But for large dogs you would compete against 100 to 300+ dogs in your class, including the fast border collies so it is much harder. But no matter which size dog you run the better the training you recieve the better you will perform in competitions. The agility shows are friendly and fun social events and there are always a huge amount of new folk at the shows and people are helpful so it is a good interest to take up.  And end of the day the dogs love it and it is a really good laugh too.

The competive classes start from 12 months old but some do run puppy agility classes which would be ideal for you right now.  And some specialise in mixed breeds and smaller breeds  rather then mostly just Large or Border collies so go look at some clubs and see which would suit you the best.

So skip the fun pet agility classes and look out for puppy agility foundation courses instead. 

>zooooooom! Weeeeee! 'What obedience?' wag wag, wag!

I didnt know you had setters too

Hi Nicola

(You have my daugher's name!).  Interesting that  you have two shelties and you probably know that I have one, Isla, who is almost 5 months.  Apart from being interested in showing I thought I would find  out about agility, although they all (yours and mine) will have to be a little older!  I watched some agility at Crufts this year and was so impressed by the shelties - so fast.  Isla who is quite small is incredibly fast when playing ball and if she doesn't want me to catch her well ......

But at the end of November she is starting a basic obedience course so that should be helpful.  I have been teaching her sit and down and stand a bit at home but it is more fun to do it with others on a course - I did it with my other two dogs, terriers(both hopeless!)

Snowflake

Apart from stay and recall (which are essential) there are other really useful things you can start teaching before you can join an agility club, or maybe while you're on a waiting list...

Left and right. That's the dogs left and right, train it with a favourite toy or treat - move the toy round in a circle so the dog follows it and say the command. Do right one day and left the next - not at the same time.

Heel and side - heel at your left and side at your right - or whatever words you want to use.

GO - teach your dog to go on ahead of you - throw their toy and be really excited telling them to go go go

:-)

one of the most important things is to teach a release word otherwise your dog will just sit at the start line.  I use 'go', so the dog doesnt release from his wait until I say go - or at least thats the theory.

> or at least thats the theory

:-D

Hi Snowflake

Only just back to this thread, there's so much going on and I'm such a gas bag!!!
Talk about spooky, you have an Isla, so do I. Three Shelties actually, Bonnie, Isla and Skye. I'm in the middle of TRYING to teach some of the things mentioned on this thread like the left and right stuff and the release word, it's quite hard work with 2 of them, it's the pups I'm concentrating on at the moment.  I'll have to drag the OH of his backside a bit more. We're going to classes at the end of November for some pro guidance on the obedience stuff, so we'll see how it goes.