How Often to Train? For agility.

My partner and I made our own agility equipment last year ready for Skye to start when she hit a year. We did quite a lot of training with her when she was just a year - showing her the equipment so she didn't spook at the seesaw and A-frame etc but have only just recently come back to getting the equipment out and doing proper training.

How often do people usually train with equipment and what do they work on in between to aid with the agility?

Skye has her distance commands pretty good, Shiloh tries very hard but doesn't always listen to the command, he does what he thinks, bless him, and Ruby is very steady and responsive and is improving on distance so we work on those out on walks.

In the sessions, we do a bit of everything, but then focus an extra 5 mins or so on an obstacle in particular to try and get it right.

When my dogs are young (between 1-3 years of age) I go to 2 training classes a week with them, when they're older (supposedly know what they are doing) I go to 1 training class a week with them. I have equipment at home, I only train at home if there is something specific I want to train, this year I've only used my equipment at home once, but then I have 3 older dogs retired, 1 competing dog, 4 years old, so pretty consistant (qualified for Crufts) and a pup (just 5 months old) who I will be doing alot of training with next year.

Sadly as we don't have any equipment at home its once a week for us.

The things we were able to practice at home were weaves, directional commands and wait.

I am also currently teaching Max to touch target to help with his contacts something which has been so hit and miss a new approach required. Being a setter though he thought touching a target a nonsense! And without the equipment he still thinks its darn stupid even with the clicker!

We have just started going once a week. We have borrowed a tunnel for the garden and have two tesco boxes with a stick balanced across as a jump! That is the garden full! When we move onto weaves I will probably fit a set of those in but no room for anything else. We practice 'over' 'through' and 'wait' mostly, maybe 5 minutes once or twice a day? Depends if he wants to do it