Training

Performance Puppies and Bringing Along Your Performance Dogs

By Jen Effler-Leveille, Powderhound Alaskan Malamutes

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Intro

To begin, I have to give credit to those who inspired me and played a major role in getting to where we are today. In 2008, I started my performance journey in two sports with my own Bred-By dogs after watching other dogs of my breeding in a home where they were excelling in agility. I was so inspired with what they had done with Travis, Powderhound’s On The Other Hand WWPDS NA NAJ NF, and Layla, Powderhound’s Woo The Masses WWPDS RN OA NAJ NF. Both were primarily owned by Dustin Warner and Rachel Banks. I co-owned Layla. I put her Rally Novice title on her at the 2010 AMCA National. Because they had done such great work with her, I ran through some skills with her in my kitchen like an hour before we jumped in the car to go to the ‘Springs, hit a trial in Iowa on the way out to get her first leg, and then got legs 2 and 3 at the RS/NS. Her scores were good enough to qualify for the AKC Rally National Championship. A little off topic, I borrowed Layla a few times and went to weight pulls….and she won most of them. Dogs who will work at that level for people they don’t live with? Especially for the breeder they haven’t lived with for the last seven years? Is there really anything cooler than that?

Drawing inspiration from others

Dustin and Rachel had introduced me to their agility instructor who has competed on the World Team and I was privileged to take a couple private lessons with her. I started Ikey, Trav’s litter brother from my first litter, since I thought he would be pretty forgiving of my dreadful novice handling. I knew structurally he may not have been the best candidate given his straighter shoulder but he was an optimistic dog and I knew he’d try for me. My goal was Novice titles with him. I did some low level foundation work with Bumper as well since he was still a puppy. My hope was to pursue agility more seriously with him after I fumbled around with Ike for a while. At the same time, I had started their half sister Lucy in Rally obedience. She was gifted in rally and we were quickly hooked after a couple first place wins. I was invited to come watch classes from Mark and Kim Christiansen at Western Waukesha County Dog Training Club. They were working their two Malamutes, Mack and Blaze, in various classes and wow - here were more Malamutes doing WELL in sports most would say are not suited to this breed. I joined the club and have spent pretty well every Wednesday and Thursday night there since. Mack and Blaze were titled in AKC and UKC Agility, Obedience, and Rally Obedience.

I have put 47 Rally Obedience titles and 48 Agility titles on dogs I have bred, another 6 Rally titles and 7 agility titles on my UK import Ivy, and one Rally Obedience title on Nancy Russell’s Task. Some of those dogs did not live with me and I feel that’s notable because it’s a matter of 1) their foundation they got as puppies and 2) while this may not be in a working context, I feel it’s a tribute to the breed in that it proves that they are still not a ‘one man’ dog. Eight more of the dogs I have bred have gone on to compete in at least one area of performance and so far have completed 26 titles in obedience, rally, and agility. Several have others in progress.

The point of all of this is not a brag but to illustrate that this breed has earned an unfair reputation for being “stubborn” or unwilling to behave in performance venues. While certainly some people are more gifted when it comes to training a dog to do things that aren’t totally natural, I feel that the bulk of our dogs can be successful in these sports, at least in the more basic levels. And obviously there are more sports than these three but these are my focus beyond show dogs and working dogs.

Selecting for performance…it’s probably not what you think.

I want to preface this section with this: I do not breed for performance dogs. We don’t need to, a well bred Malamute has a lot of the traits that make a good performance dog. I still try to breed to the standard and I do not breed, at all, to soften temperaments. I actually like my dogs on the grittier side.

What I find important in selecting puppies for performance is choosing the best front and rear angles and I do like the puppy who is into everything, who doesn’t have a whole lot of fear. The puppy who falls over and simply passes away (or sits and screams)’ when met with a challenge? That puppy is going to a home where it can hold down the couch and enjoy a family with low expectations. The others though? Your middle and higher drive puppies are a fine choice to work with.

Where We Start

We probably aren’t doing anything all that revolutionary. We start putting small inflatable exercise discs (13”) in the whelping box at about a week of age. Regular toys are great too but I like the discs because you can control how squishy they are and they disinfect well. Puppies learn to balance on an unstable surface early and it desensitizes them to that which moves beneath their feet. A lot of them also like to sleep on them as well and this remains a fixture in the whelping area throughout their stay here.

Around 2 weeks we introduce the JPaws 22” inflatable disc when they are having play time outside the whelping box. It’s just a continuation of the work done on the small inflatable. I don’t necessarily encourage them to get up on it but some do.

At about 4 weeks I add a FitPaws FitBone to the whelping area. It’s a lot taller than the inflatable discs and because it’s narrower, it behaves differently than the stable discs. I also start introducing food rewards for their bravery in climbing up on it. This isn’t just good for your performance prospects, you can also start teaching them to free bait on it. We also have a puppy tunnel that they play in outside.

Around 5 weeks, when they’re hanging out outside of the whelping area, I let them start climbing around on a Bosu ball and I have a balance board that mimics the action of a teeter. I offer support to the tipping action of the board at this point and I make sure it’s not tipping on a hard surface because it will sometimes slide when they exit. I don’t want them to get scared or to get injured.

Around 6 weeks, I start taking them to my training club. It’s a risk for disease, yes, but the dogs there are vaccinated appropriately and working in an ER I’m a bigger risk coming home from work. Do what is comfortable for you. I put them in an x-pen or pair them up in small crates to let them watch classes. They are often fascinated by what’s going on, especially with agility.

At 6-8 weeks I start introducing some super basic skills. Since I back-chain agility obstacles, I bring them to the bottom of the dog walk and while kneeling next to it, I encourage the puppies to step on at a “normal’ climbing height and then reward them as they step down to the bottom. Once they are confident doing that, I prop the teeter so that it is about an inch off the ground and when they step on it, it moves. They get rewards for getting up on it and we cheer when it hits the floor so they get the idea that this is fine. I slowly increase the height it falls as their size and confidence say I can. I also start doing more controlled balance work on the tipping board so they learn to balance their front on something that will move in a predictable manner. I have a Cato board that I teach them to sit on and work on being patient while sitting. This will lay the foundation for a start line sit in agility later. I also use it to teach the “concertina down” for use in rally later.

I also start some basic heeling at this point. I also teach the precursor to a loose show ring movement…but off lead. By teaching them to run alongside me and take their cues from me, the current yearling puppies are coming along MUCH faster in their show ring training as it pertains to a nice loose lead go around. I work on speeding up and deceleration too as a precursor to how I will cue them in agility and rally. It’s cool to be able to train for all four sports at once.

From there it’s about building on the base as it becomes appropriate. I keep training sessions REALLY short. More on this later but the biggest, most important thing I have learned about working this breed over the years is this: As soon as they have demonstrated that they understand what you are trying to teach them, you MUST move on. Repetition for most of them is counterproductive. As such, training really isn’t much of a time burden.

10 weeks and beyond

10 weeks and beyond: I slowly introduce equipment as is appropriate. Puppies should NOT be jumping. I keep jumps at the point where they can step over until they are a solid 7-8 months and even then, we keep things very low and on absorbent surfaces. My club has the ¾” closed cell foam flooring to absorb landings well. My 12 month puppies are currently jumping 12” and we only went up to that from 8” in the last month. There is absolutely no reason to rush faster than that. I start teaching the vaguest idea about wide open channel weaves around 6-8 months of age and don’t start moving them in at all until about 10 months of age. They will get it, there is no reason to rush.

A word about fear periods: I back off on what I expect of them during fear periods. If they’re not really working at their normal level of confidence, that’s fine. Do what they’re comfortable doing. If that means skipping some of the harder stuff that’s fine, they’ll recover soon and you can continue as normal. Trying to force something during that period will only set you back.

My dog is an adult and I want to play in the performance sports

Awesome!! I have a few tips to help, especially with agility. As I mentioned above in the puppy section, our dogs generally do not appreciate repetition.

Story time: Nellie single-handedly changed everything about my perspective on training this breed, especially in agility. She was the fourth dog I had trained in the sport. At class her first run would be perfect. Her second run, she would do what most people expect out of the breed - she would run off like we’d never met at all and like she had never strung together two obstacles in her whole life. It was so frustrating because she had clearly shown she could do it and do it well on the first run. She isn’t the first dog of mine to do something like that but the others had done it with less predictability. I eventually learned that if she had done it correctly the first time, we had to move on. We could run something else but we couldn’t do the same thing again. This made for some realllllllly short classes sometimes but I have learned that’s ok, I can just train more dogs in that time period then.

Before I knew it, we were Qing right and left and quickly found ourselves working toward her Preferred Agility Championship (PACH). I have trained her daughters from the beginning with this tip in mind and the one I have focused on is into Excellent for both agility and rally at much younger age than her mother. Her grandsons are coming along even faster. It has even very much benefitted all of my other dogs in other sports. As soon as they demonstrate they understand, we move on.

There are still a lot of old school drill-drill-drill instructors out there and it can be tough to find someone open to another perspective. I recommend before classes start that you have a chat with your instructor about being flexible about the one-and-done type training. I let them know I’m happy to work on other things once we’ve successfully performed whatever skill they’re asking for but that if I drill-drill-drill my dog is going to leave me for someone less stupid or more interesting OR they’re going to shut down OR they’re going to start to be disruptive. Or all of the above. I’ve found most are pretty accepting of that once they know you’re not just blowing off their instruction.

For agility in particular, the dogs seem to struggle most with the contact obstacles and the teeter in particular. We’ve tried a number of methods, most of which had marginal results. Years ago, Bumper was coming along well but got distracted on the teeter mid-tip and got bounced off. For like 3 years after that he was 2 steps forward, 1 step back. We tried anything. He just couldn’t commit to tipping it forward and I persisted because he was RIGHT there. Had he been bailing and running off we would have just accepted that we were done with Standard.

A friend taught me about back chaining. As I do with the puppies now, you prop the teeter with a chair so that it tips only 1 inch and you work them getting on at the bottom. Big praise for banging it and staying on even though at first they’re banging it and THEN hopping on. I always reward ON the teeter, not at the end of the teeter, because I want them to understand what I’m rewarding is their bravery for tipping it. As the dog becomes more and more confident, you back the chair up so that it allows the teeter to bang from higher and higher up. Eventually they’re hopping on where it’s level and then banging it down. From there they usually graduate to the full teeter pretty quickly. I teach the dog walk and the a-frame in somewhat similar fashion by starting with the down side first. Speed comes later. Be sure to work both sides. If you need a visual, I have a video on my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/@jene-l4309

Conclusion

Work forward slowly and with the dog’s physical and mental safety in mind. If ever you have questions or is running into a struggle somewhere, please feel free to contact me at powderhoundmals@gmail.com or via Facebook Messenger as Jen Effler. I might not be able to help but I’m happy to help find someone who can. I would LOVE to see more Malamutes out there in the various sports.

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