Even though she isn't really doing anything that would much resemble agility to most people yet. Being a very small girl, I am already thinking towards teeter. Early on she and Vettel were both put on a variety of surfaces to get used to different things under their feet. Then I gave them a balance disc to play on. I followed that up with putting a board on the balance disc that tipped and wobbled when they walked on it.
After Vettel left, I kept up with Daz moving things. At a suggestion from another small breed owner, I taught her to use a paw to close cabinet doors, so she got to know she could use her feet to move things and control them.
Separate from moving things, we also started working on a contact behavior. While she will eventually not do a stop on the end of contacts most likely, I do want to teach her the process and to respect the bottom, so we began work on Rear Toe style contact behavior, based on Linda Mecklenburg's 1RTO article that appeared in Clean Run many years go. (the photos in the article are my sweet little Neat, btw.)
Two weeks ago we got to where she walks along the plank lengthwise and offers the behavior, then moved on to me propping it off my deck steps to make it a slope for her, since I have no actual contact obstacles in my back yard. Actually, I DO own a very old teeter, but after many years of use and sitting outside the board has disintegrated and needs replaced. I hope to get that done before too much longer.
Last week I took it a step further and had Daz down at the BRAG building to work. I set the teeter with both ends on tables and enough padding so that it didn't move at all. She trotted happily back and forth along it, so we took some pads out one at a time to introduce movement on the board. She got a "click/treat" each time it moved. She had a blast, going back and forth!
I am anxious to move on in her contact training!
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