Collection

One of the Daisy Peel seminars this past week (not one I went to) talked a lot about collection.  Our instructor learned a lot from that seminar and brought it to our class last night.  Collection is where your dog pauses (a very very short pause when they're good at it) and looks to you for their next instruction.  Cuing this pause is very useful to get tighter turns and avoid off course obstacles.  The first course we practiced this on involved collection before the first jump in a 180 to avoid an off course jump straight ahead of that first jump.  Our dogs were on our right so we cued collection with our left hands, putting our left hand in the dogs path to stop them and give them a treat.  Then we cued the jump and continued on.  Stopping the dog forces them to pay more attention so that they take the shortest path to the next correct jump.  We did the same thing with a tunnel-jump-jump where there was a sharp left turn between the jumps, but this time we added a front cross as we cued the jump after collecting.  The last little course we did had three jumps set up in a row with a fourth jump next to the third jump in the line.  The jump to the side was the next jump in the course so we collected after the second jump at a spot that was good for a front cross and then pivoted (front crossed) to the jump to the side and continued on.  It was an interesting lesson, and one I look forward to learning more about.  Apparently the obvious cue can be faded out, or at least made less obvious as the dog learns how to collect.  Hopefully I'll have more to post on this topic soon!  Happy agility!