Agility equipment

[Ritz459]

I want to start walking Chloe through some agility equipment. No major anythings right now as she is only five months, but just to get her used to the different obstacles (going through a tunnel, walking on a teeter, etc.)

The problem is trying to find the things I need at an affordable price. I can't shell out 75$ for each item.

Does anyone know of any good places to either buy cheap agility equipment from, or where you can get do-it-yourself kits? I don't mind making my own equipment, and my dad does woodworking as a hobby, so having certain tools and know-how wouldn't be a problem.

I'm not looking for anything "fancy", just something that I can keep in the backyard and store in our garage or little shed-shack.

[GreyhoundGirl]

I have 6 home made weaves and 2 home made jumps. I also bought 2 store bought 6 foot tunnels from a friend. I don't have any pics of my stuff, but I can take some... Secondly, if you can find good quality equiptment for 75$, you're very very lucky.

For jumps I'd advise for making our own you make wood. Many people like metal, because a) they're lighter. b) they're one-piece and c) you can carry them without taking the bar off, (you don't have to adjust bars constantly.) However, I don't like them because especially if you have a rambuctious dog, they can easily knock them over, which then falls the dog and can hurt the dog if it falls on them. Also, you will have a very hard time balencing them on un-even ground, they won't stay up even on the slightest slope. (not recommending that you should be doing agility on uneven ground, but it happens) Jumps require two piceces of wood , two bars, and extra wood to surround the posts so they balence easily. Hint about jumps, make sure your pole is to regulation, so the jump is to standard. (I'm not sure about USA agility standard, but in canada it is an even 4 feet). Also, you put little notches that stick out of the main bars (to rest the pole on), make sure you put those at the correct heights. You don't need to put a notch for every jump height, but put one at your dogs regulation jump height (when she's fully grown, that is), one the height under your dogs jump height, and one just a few inches from the ground. Also,, for training you can rest the bar on the ground.

Weaves are a handy thing to have your own of. They're very difficult to train (probably the hardest equiptment for most dogs) and take lots of practise. They are harder to make then jumps, and require a piece of metal and 6 tubes. However, you don't need weaves soon, in any case. You mentioned she's only 5 months, you shouldn't do weaves until she's at least a year if you want to start training straight. If you begin training off set that is fine, but I still wouldn't do off-set until she's 8 months. MINIMUM.

Some hints about weaves, make sure you space the bars correctly, if you put the bars closer then regulation, or further apart then regulation, the dog could get very confused if you ever enter her in trials where they will be spaced differently. One of my students made some weaves and put the bars too far apart, she trained the dog for months on these, the dog was amazing at weaves, she went to a trial pretty confident and the dog didn't even recognise the weave poles. For weaves, you will probably also want to make wires, they make training a whole lot easier. I'll make a little pic to explain wires, I can no way explain them with words. lol!

Tunnels I don't say you really need as far as training. Most dogs don't need to be training the tunnel, and I've never met a puppy who didn't love open tunnels. Tunnels are fun to play with (especially when you have multiple tunnels because can put each one facing the other in a semi-circle and have your dog race through...) but don't require much training. The only reason I have tunnels because I got a deal buy one get one free, which I couldn't pass up.

I don't have a teeter, because they're probably one of the most difficult ones to make. You'd ned the little flippy thing in the middle, which I reckon would be difficult to make. Teeters sometimes pose a problem if your dog is easily scared or very shy. To start training teeter, just socialise your dog a lot, in many different situations. Dogs often get scared on the teeter the first time because it feels like the ground if falling out from them. That change in elevation is pretty scary, so make sure when you begin training it you take it very slowly, so you don't scare her, because it will take a lot more work to get her over a fear then to just train slowly.

You don't really need do it yourself kits, there are plenty of instructions on the internet, and jumps are quite simple...I could probably write you up some, worst comes to worst.

EDIT: btw: I did not make my equipment, my dad did.

[GreyhoundGirl]

Weave pole wires: The black are the weaves, the red are the wires. The wires sort of make like a barrier, to guide your dog in the correct direction. Handy if you start off training straight weaves. Wires are simple to make, just take a piece of thick, plastic coated flat wire and put a bull clip on each end. Clip it on every other weave on both sides. (but on a different side each)

(It's a really bad drawing, I know...)


Again, please, PLEASE do not train Chloe on weaves just yet. It could stunt her growth, throw her shoulders off, I've heard some horror stories at trials from people training young dogs on weaves. Especially future large dogs.

[britishbandit]

Sweetpea showed me a ton of stuff she made for Emma, and some sites that show you exactly how to make a lot of the stuff yourself. I don't recall what the sites were, but I'm sure she'll see this thread and post some for ya.

[Sweetpea]

There are a some good places on the net to get instructions on how to make agility equipment. I've made a teeter and tire jump. You may be able to pick up a kids tunnel at Target cheap. If you check out some of my pictures you will see the equipment I have. Here are a few web pages I really found helpful. It would be cool if everyone would post pictures of equipment they have made. I'd like to make a dog walk & a-frame and pause table. I picked up weave poles and a jump at petsmart but they were a little on the pricey side. The best part they came with a travel bag to store the equipment in.
http://www.peak.org/~helix/Agility/
http://www.k9sportsdogz.com/agility-home.html
http://www.dogbegood.com/equipment.html
http://members.cox.net/jw791/baxagility2.htm
http://www.bogartsdaddy.com/bouvier/...base_plans.htm
http://dogplay.com/Activities/Agility/equipment.html
http://www.dogplay.com./Activities/A.../agilitye.html

[Ritz459]

Don't worry Grey, I am most definitally NOT going to start doing any sort of intense training with Chloe until she is at least a year. That includes jumping over the 12'' (or whatever size she'd need) jumps, weave poles, etc.

But setting the jumps just a couple of inches off the ground (she jumps over my legs when I'm playing tug with her and she loves it LOL) and teaching her to jump on command, getting her used to the different equiptment...that is something I can start now. And even if I don't buy any equipment right away, at least I know what I'll need to get and how much it will cost so I can start saving up.

Thanks Sweetpea.

That was another question I was going to ask...what equipment should I get? Just looking at all of the different types of stuff you can get has made my head spin. lol

Oh, and from browsing, I found this site:
http://www.affordableagility.com/

Any thoughts on the qualitly of the stuff they are selling?

[briarlow]

The tunnel is what most of my dogs don't like and won't do, surprised to see that most dogs like it!

[GreyhoundGirl]

Affordableagility is an okay store, but I wouldn't buy equipment from it, it's very cheap stuff, and a friend of mine had a few hundred dollars worth of stuff blow away. Also I said I prefer the wooden jumps, their jumps are all lightwieght plastic.

Their tunnels look okay, I have no personal experience with them. I notice they have a few things that are "competition ___ " those are more likely to be of better quality (not neccesairily though, because just because they're competition size doesn't mean they'd be good enough to actually use in a competition). But more expansive. I think as far as buying you'd be best of to make your own, if you join an agility club, the director will *probably* buy agility equipment in mass and sell it to students. This saves you some really expensive shipping costs.

BTW; I wouldn't trust a fabric pause table, especially with big dogs. not likely it will break, but the feel is soooo different from the wooden ones that your dog will probably not recognise a wooden table (which is what will be used in trials)

I also don't recommend stick-in-the-ground weaves. It's unlikely you'll always place these the same distance apart, and if you have a way of doing that they're fine probably, but it's still easiler to get a full set and not measure carefully everytime as to not throw your dog off. Unless she's fast or rambunctious on the course, their cheap regular weaves should be fine, if she''s fast, crazy of hyper, she'll just knock them over. Adding wieghts to the bottom of them seem to fix that pretty quickly.

[Rivsky]

Definitely go to kids stores to get a tunnel - it's where I got River's from and I'm so glad I did - he HATED the tunnel the first couple of times he had to go through it - even when it was all squashed up together but leaving it out at home for a week really got him used to it.

Apart from that I only have some home made weaves and a children's hoop at home (which you can use to get her used to the tyre jump if you want - just hold it yourself to make sure it doesn't move and get her to walk through it to start with then slowly lift it off the ground as she gets used to it.

[Sweetpea]

I talked to my trainer about weave guides. She didn't recomend them. Because you may need to train the dog all over without them. She has weave poles that can lean. I found them very helpful training Emma to go faster. I worked on Emma running down the middle of them. Each pole was leaned outward. We still have a long way to go. It's so much fun. When Emma was a pup I picked up some orange cones from the dollar store to weave around. It was great to play with in the house. I also love hula hoops. You can do so many cool things with them. Double jump, use as contacts, crawling under them, hold one out on each side and have your dog walk around jumping them. Emma loves to show off to friends. You can pick them up at dollar stores too. Emma and I are taking a break from agility for a month or so. It's just been so hot here. Contacts are great to work on with a young dog. Even if you lay a 2 by 12 on the ground and paint it like a teeter. Just to get your dog to walk across the board. It will help later on when you work on the teeter and dog walk. Also a Buja Board is pretty cool for young dogs. http://www.mfrye.com/agilityeq/buja.html
If you need any help just message me. Keep us posted on how you are doing. Looking forward to seeing some pictures.

[GreyhoundGirl]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I talked to my trainer about weave guides. She didn't recomend them. Because you may need to train the dog all over without them. She has weave poles that can lean. I found them very helpful training Emma to go faster. I worked on Emma running down the middle of them. Each pole was leaned outward. We still have a long way to go. It's so much fun. When Emma was a pup I picked up some orange cones from the dollar store to weave around. It was great to play with in the house. I also love hula hoops. You can do so many cool things with them. Double jump, use as contacts, crawling under them, hold one out on each side and have your dog walk around jumping them. Emma loves to show off to friends. You can pick them up at dollar stores too. Emma and I are taking a break from agility for a month or so. It's just been so hot here. Contacts are great to work on with a young dog. Even if you lay a 2 by 12 on the ground and paint it like a teeter. Just to get your dog to walk across the board. It will help later on when you work on the teeter and dog walk. Also a Buja Board is pretty cool for young dogs. http://www.mfrye.com/agilityeq/buja.html
If you need any help just message me. Keep us posted on how you are doing. Looking forward to seeing some pictures.

Weave guides work well if you do not have adjustable weaves (weaves that can adjust from off-set to straight). For just starting out you can also have the wires on off set. I find they work better then just offset, especially for entrances. I train my classes with them and it works great , with the larger dogs especially.

For single weaves and turns, I find useful are toilet plundgers (if your dog is too big for cones, also toilet plundgers are more like actual weaves then cones are, so it's more realistic training) . They are non-stick so you can train inside. They're most useful fort training left and right... Handy for if you want your dog to turn around after a jump. (if the dog turns around and takes the jumps it will be 10 faults, so you want to train the dog to go around a jump when you call them back)

[Ritz459]

I'm starting school next week, so training with Chloe will probably just be in bits and peices, but what a better way to get her energy out after being kenneled while I'm at school than to teach her some agility basics!

Thank you for all for the ideas and critiques. I'm going to start shopping around soon and will hopefully have some stuff by next week.

And don't worry, I will most definitally keep the questions coming. lol And any more tips and info on home making stuff is greatly appriciated!

[GreyhoundGirl]

LOL and for the record... uh... I'm not trying to be negative... I'm just trying to point out some of the cons of commonly used tactics and equipment. Hundreds of people use these techniques and equipment and it works just fine for them, it's just not something I would personaly recommend.

And another thing to point out, you'll need some sort of wieghts to hold down the tunnel if you get a child's tunnel or a lightwieght tunnel. Lightwieght tunnels are very nice in about 90 % of the ways... the other 10% is that with medium-big dogs you will need something to hold down the tunnel because if they go in with any speed they'll push the tunnel over and it could be very scary if it starts rolling with them in it... (again, has happened to multiple people I know where the dog is now terrified of the rolling tunnel... Didn't help that one of these people had a lightwieght tunnel at the top of a hill with a large, rambunctious lab who ran in there full speed and rolled the tunnel down the hill! luckily, the dog was okay, even if a little shaken up. ) So wieghts (I usually use sand bags or a squard piece of wood that goes around the tunnel) are important to lightwieght tunnels.

And I'd appreciate you keeping the questions coming, there's nothing I love more then babbling about agility.

[Ritz459]

So here are the things I'm going to focus on aquiring first:
A Buja Board to get her used to the sensation of a teeter. I think that we actually have the materials for it around here.
Something to use as a pause table.
A ladder (to help teach the back feet awarness...besides that I think it would be fun for her to run over. LOL) I think we have one of those laying around somewhere as well from our old fort that the wind blew over.
A jump (or two) that I can vary the height of so I can start it out just high enough that she has to hop over it and it won't hurt her joints. (So something like this: http://www.peak.org/~helix/Agility/cheapjump.html set. I'll set it high enough that she just can't walk over it, but low enough that it only requires a hop.)
A plank set off the ground by bricks so I can teach the contacts. Again, my dad has a stack of these in the garage...I'll just need paint.
A kiddy play tunnel (complete with sand bags so it won't roll.

Does that list sound good?\

Should I go ahead and purchase/make weaves and just walk her through them, or should I hold off on that until she is older? I realize that going full speed through them would be very BAD, but I didn't know if walking would...and if I taught her to walk through them now if that would cause issues later.

Now that I have an idea of what I need, do you know of any good books on agility training? And for future reference, any good agility clubs?

[SpringerLover]

Skip the weaves for now... it takes mental and physical maturity to master them...

Otherwise it sounds good. Just play with her safely, and don't let her practice 'bad' manners on the stuff... a jump, buja board, table, and tunnel will be plenty to play with. There are a MILLION things you can do with a jump, literally.