Well, this is a fun week!

As I mentioned in my previous post, on Thursday I brought the collapsible tunnel home from agility. This was actually primarily for Solei, but also to speed up things with Ria - and mean we could use the classes for more productive purposes.

Apologies if I'm repeating myself, but Solei as anyone who knows him well is the biggest wus ever...and thinks the whole world is out to get him :-P so you can imagine how well that goes down with having to run into blackness and push through fabric that also makes scary noises :-P He will (most of the time) run through it as long as it is being held right open, but if it was lowered at all that was that - and if you overstep the mark he then wouldn't go through it open either. Ria is mainly inexperienced - she had that fright when she first saw the collapsible tunnel age 6 months when the end was grabbed to open it just as she was in the entrance, and then wouldn't go near it again that day. Her next experience with it was at 8 months and she still wasn't very happy, though she did at least go through it once, held open (and then refused to have anything more to do with it!). Hasn't seen it since. Elton has never seen it before, he actually surprised me.

Given the way Solei's mind works, and also that they very rarely use it at Solei's agility club. I figured the only way he was ever going to make progress was to bring it home and have an intense crash course! Which also had the added benefit of being able to get Ria used to it, and overcome her uncertainty far quicker than we would be able to once a week at the club.

So, first session was Friday morning....started with it folded right back so it was just like a partial curtain at the entrance.

This was this (Monday) morning's session....(excuse pjs!)

I am stunned at how quickly Solei has progressed. He isn't terribly confident, but he is doing it - and please note we are training with a toy! For a dog that never used to play, this is equally incredible ;-) haha. As can be seen, although we have a long way to go and it is nowhere near full length, all three dogs are pushing through the fabric! Elton is going to have the hardest job - I wasn't at all sure if he'd be able to do it, he looks so tiny and lost in the entrance! He is quite a bit smaller than Solei, and is going to need to really blast to have a hope of not getting stuck - but I think he has the speed, so fingers crossed.

We'll see where we get to by Thursday!