The team learns some new tricks...

Kipper relaxes while the intros are done. He is not worried, he's a superstar and can sleep during the instructions.
The team is fortunate to be able to attend seminars with some really cool, knowledgeable, and interesting folks. Last night we attended day one of the tricks seminar. I was amazed at how many tricks and how far some individuals were able to get on their tricks in only 2.5 hours. As it was after my usual bedtime, I found the dogs had more energy than me, but I'm glad I went and will attend day 2 on Thurs.

As we head into Winter and the world of agility slows down a little due to weather and holiday festivities, this is a great time to work on some tricks. I believe what Silvia says, "tricks build a bond" and I'm going to work on some tricks over the vacation.

The first trick sorta resembles a pole dance.

Techniques for teaching were different, but the idea is to grab the pole and hold it. Some had their dogs standing on two feet, and some just had the dogs grabbing the pole with the pole at an angle.

Yep, definitely pole dancing for dogs.

Next trick was the penguin walk. Starts with a sit up and legs extending and flapping. After a while the flapping gets crazy and the lower legs start to wiggle. The the dog starts to walk. Another variation is to have the dog stand up from the sit up and then sit back down...EXCELLENT strength training and very hard to do.

This is Silvia's dog La doing the penguin.

And demonstrating the handstand.

All of the tricks demonstrated can be found on her website, click here. She has tons of video demonstrations.

Christmas challenge: Teach your dog a new trick or more and send me a YouTube link and I'll post all the holiday tricks we are teaching our dogs.