Clean Run - September 2014 - 39

2

Staircase

Staircase

Correct
Correct
entry line
entry line

3

lem. It seemed that many dogs were
not looking at the actual weave poles to
make the entry. Either the different base
partially affected their decision-making,
or they were entering the weaves looking solely at the base rather than the
poles. We often don't know or realize
exactly what the dog has based his behavior on.

1

2

Same sequence, with tunnel
added to block staircase.

ment with the weaves. We were unsure
if this staircase could be the reason our
dogs were missing the entry. So to find
out if our dogs had interpreted the pillar as the first weave pole, we blocked its
view with a straight tunnel as shown in
Figure 2. After this neither dog had any
problem entering the weaves correctly
several times in a row.
You can only wonder how much confusion we would have caused our dogs,
and how they would have reacted, if we
had punished and corrected them for
doing-from their point of view-exactly what they have been taught to do.

The horizontal base at the beginning of the weaves
caused problems in entering.

We have also seen an increase in entry
mistakes when the dog can see the long
jump corner marker poles behind the
weave entry, the color of the first weave
pole matches the background, or the
first weave poles are in the shade and
the rest of the poles are in the sun.

the tunnel entry, you often see dogs
hitting their head on the side of the tunnel that is visible between the sandbag
and the actual tunnel entrance. Look at
this video: https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=wqNvms_S4Qc.

Evil Twins
Inexperienced dogs often struggle to
perceive and separate the teeter and
the dogwalk from each other. From the
dogs' perspective they can't see the middle plank of the dogwalk on a straight
approach, so they are often quite unsure
while approaching the contact obstacle.
We can only guess how the dogs eventually learn to distinguish between the
teeter and the dogwalk. Are they paying
attention to the base of the teeter? Do
they learn the dogwalk has crossbars
and the teeter doesn't? Do they learn to
pay attention to the color difference in
the end part of the teeter? Or do they
react to the movement of the teeter?
Sometimes in trials you can see the dogs
getting really cautious on the dogwalk if
the up ramp is wobbly, as if they think it
is a teeter because the plank moves under their feet.

Different Associations
Sometimes you can clearly see differences in how dogs visualize the weave
entry. Some dogs seek the gap between
the first two poles, some seek to get the
first pole close to their left cheek on entrance, and some try to get the second
pole close to their right cheek.
One time Janita was giving a seminar
to students from across Finland. Way
too many dogs missed the weave entry
by going around the first pole on the
wrong side. She wondered why they
had this unusually high percentage of
errors. Then Janita noticed there was an
extra horizontal support on the weave
pole base before the first pole, and she
wondered if that could be the reason.
The other end didn't have the extra
support, so she turned the weave poles
around, which solved the dogs' probSeptember 14

| Clean Run

The corner marker poles of the long jump can fool
the dog when the long jump is behind the weaves.

Let Me In
One of the most common situations
where you can see dogs are conditioned
on something other than the handler
intended, and seeing the situation differently from us, is the blind-side tunnel
entrance. Instead of seeking the actual
entrance of the tunnel, like we would
focus on from our point of view, many
dogs evaluate where the entrance is
based on sandbags or whatever supports hold the tunnel in place. When the
sandbags are not placed right beside

The dogwalk and teeter look a lot alike
from the dog's point of view.

Bars or Wings
Just as we are unable to always determine how dogs perceive to go correctly
into the weaves, we are sometimes taken
39
Clean Run - September 2014

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Clean Run - September 2014
