[ SHOWGSD-L ] handling
- From: Sandra Kozub <skozub@xxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: showgsd-l@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 12 Jan 2010 18:36:36 -0600
Actually, I believe, as others have posted that a truely correct dog can &
will stack perfectly by themselves. In fact, I do
not think that any "forced" stack can make them look as good as the natural
stack. Of course, if the dog has some
(even minor) structure problems, then it should be hand stacked to look
it's best. Over the years, I have watched some
of my GSDs playing out side come to a stop in the most beautiful stance -
IMO nothing quite as impressive.
Years ago I showed my own Norwegian Elkhounds & seldom hand stacked them -
without any intensive training. (move
in front of them with bait & they would look impressive). Also, years
ago I helped a few club members show their dogs
occasionally. A friend had one of the best Belgium Sheepdogs I've seen &
she was near perfect in structure. My
friend had been showing her & not doing too well. She asked me to come
watch & see if I could offer any reasons
that the dog was not winning very much.
After watching her in the ring, one could see that the dog hated being
over-handled & simply would not show herself. I did
explain this to my friend. She asked me to show the bitch the next
day. We practiced outside the ring for about 10
minutes or so. In the ring, I praised the girl as we gaited with a happy
voice. When it was time to stack, I just swung
out in front of her & stopped with bait in my hand. Most of the time she
stopped in a perfect stack - when she did not
do so, all I had to do was back up just a tiny bit to get her to move
forward. She did so beautifully & appeared to enjoy
herself. Some dogs just hate being manipulated (as in to a forced stack)
- she was one of them. BTW we took
a five point major & BOS that day. We did the same the next day (it was a
3 day show). I showed her again for my
friend a month or so later & finished the little beauty.
Anyway, I am sure that many of us has had experience with free-stacking as
well as hand-stacking.
Sandy
At 12:32 PM 1/12/2010 -0800, you wrote:
>Repetition, Repetition, Repetition is the only way in my opinion. The
>younger the better, my male was free stacking at 4 months old. I usually
>start out by using bait (if the dog likes bait) and have them walk into a
>stack. Start out slowly, I usually start by giving the command stand and
>getting the dog to stack the front straight by walking the dog into it.
>Then I would say "fix it" and move the outside rear leg back (if it
>already isn't stacked). Then I move onto getting him to place his inside
>rear leg in the right place by saying fix it. I also use squeaky toys when
>I train my dogs instead of bait sometimes, cause I use those to double on
>my dogs most times. Whenever I feed my dogs or take them outside, I
>usually will make them free stack. Once the dog has got that you can learn
>to have them fix certain legs that are out of place. For example, if one
>front leg is to far front, you can say fix it and slowly move your hand
>back over their head. It
> doesn't take me to long to train a dog to free stack, some other breeds
> use something called Happy Feet I believe, but all that does is make the
> muscles memorize the position the dog is in. Which if you work with the
> dog enough they'll learn to do it anyways. I would say if you have a
> hyper dog to try and calm it down a little before you start training, and
> I would obviously recommend bait (since handlers can use that), but I'm
> sure whatever your dog would respond to would work just the same cause
> it's mostly muscle memorization. I think free stacking is really
> beneficial for a lot of reasons. 1.) not many people do it, you and your
> dog stand out 2.) makes the dog look more well trained 3.) doesn't stress
> the dog out by being stacked so many times and 4.) easier way to
> excentuate good qualities about your dog. For example, my dog has a great
> head piece, by getting him to free stack I have more time to work on
> getting him to show expression to the
> judge. I hope this helps everyone and if their are any more questions
> please ask. I'm considering doing a video and putting it on youtube at
> this point.
>Lastly, I just found out today that I got accepted to my number one choice
>for college at DeSales University as a Biology major. I'm really excited
>and can't wait to start my freshman year at college. One of the reasons
>why I did pick this school is location, so I can still continue to train
>and show dogs
>
>-Lauren Gerloff
Sandra Kozub
KcK Kennels
http://iweb.tntech.edu/rkozub/kennel.htm
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