Stomp The (Back)Yard

I'm a day late for Dog Agility Blog Action Day, but I still feel like writing about this topic, so here goes nothin' :P

Those of you who know me in real life, or that have been reading this blog for awhile, know that almost a year ago, I moved from my hometown to a town almost 300 miles away. The transition was difficult in many ways, but one of the most challenging--and depressing--issues had to do with agility. I went from having access to my instructor, a full agility field, and a big and supportive local agility community, to knowing no one, in an area where agility is not as big.

I went from this:

Photo taken from the Dogs A'Flying website

To this: 

I'm not looking for sympathy... I could have it a lot worse :P. But moving from being able to practice on a full set of agility equipment in an acre-sized yard, to a small backyard with very limited equipment and little support, has been difficult. I've had to get pretty creative in order to keep building our skill set in agility. Which brings me to the DABAD topic this month: Backyard Training. 

Obviously, a lot of the exercises in books, online, or in Clean Run won't fit into my very small suburban back yard. My yard can handle about four jumps, a set of weaves, and maybe a tunnel or table, with some creative maneuvering.  I don't own my own contact equipment, but I wouldn't have anywhere to put it even if I did! :P But I've still managed to get in some good training. The limited space means that I can practice and train tight/up close work, and the long narrowness of my yard makes training some distance and extension/collection fairly easy. 

I've even managed to modify quite a few of Nancy Gyes' Alphabet Drills to fit :P 

Generally, I set up some combination of jumps/weaves to practice on. Right now, I am working on training Ember's weave poles, so the exercises I set up mostly concern practicing entries and proofing distance and independence. Of course, Cedar can always use work on that stuff, too. The shape of my yard also lends itself will to practicing extension into collection, always a good skill for Border Collies to work on :P

I still haven't found a reliable, easily-accessible place to train contacts, unfortunately. But I work with what I've got.... and really, I can accomplish quite a bit of training in my little back yard!