Lesson: Setting yourself up for the Tight Narrows

Lesson: Setting yourself up for the Tight Narrows

Really tight narrows can be challenging. With a dog that can perform the side-step, and this video shows an easy way to navigate your dog through very narrows.

Lesson: The Back Up In Cart

Lesson: The Back Up In Cart

Many draft tests will require your dog to back out of cart and to back in cart. The length of the back can vary from 1 foot to 5 feet, but just to be safe, teach your dog to back 20 feet. Teaching your dog to back is an unnatural behavior, and there are countless ways to teach a dog to back. I only explained a couple in this video, and I may be updating it with other methods over time.

Lesson: Turns, Side Stepping, 360s, and 90 degree turns

Lessons: Turns, Spirals, Side Step, 360s, and Navigating a 90 degree turn Teaching a dog to turn in cart is a long process, and I urge you take your time with this.  Pushing a dog further than it is comfortable may cause the dog to lose confidence or spook in cart.  I start teaching turns by making large spirals in the cart.  Sometimes the radius of such spirals begin at 50 yards.  Once the dog is comfortable doing smaller circles (~20 ft in radius), I will start to teach a dog to turn and to perform side steps.  Once a dog can side step, I teach the dog how to do 360 turns.  Here's two videos demonstrating how to teach a turn and how to navigate a 90 degree turn. Teaching a dog to turn and perform 360s Navigating a 90 degree turn

Lesson: Harnesses, Harnessing, and Hitching

Lesson: Harnesses, Harnessing, and Hitching
Here's a video on harnesses and harnessing.  I may make other videos  with more details, but here's the basics to get you started.



Here's a video on hitching your dog from a sit position.  It works the  same way from a stand position.  Mouse just happened to be sitting. 

Balancing this Front Heavy Cart

This cart showed up at a training session, and the owners had a problem.  The judge at the previous test deemed this cart unbalanced.  How could an empty cart be unbalanced?  Upon further inspection, it was noted that the shafts on this cart were particularly heavy, and thus, it put a substantial amount of weight in the front of the cart (in front of the axle).   To balance this cart, we added a counter weight.  That might seem odd, but we added the counter weight BEHIND the axle, thus, balancing the cart on both sides of the axle.  The best way to do it would have been to measure the weight of the shafts, and then to add that exact weight to the back section of the cart.  This was a quick way to solve the issue for now.

What's Wrong with these Rigs?

Over the years, as a participant, judge, or steward, I've seen a variety of mistakes that have caused people to fail out of a draft test.  The following are photos of what might be overlooked during harnessing.  Now, I haven't made all these mistakes, but I've made some.  The others were stories from other judges.  Sometimes when people get nervous, flustered, or frustrated, they tend to forget to check over the entire done before indicating to the judge that harnessing is complete.  Always double check!