Practice Jump Heights in Agility

[AgilityKrazii]

I was just curious to hear from all you agility people what height your dog jumps in competion and what you practice at home.
My dog jumps 20" in NADAC and 24" in AKC we do both venues regulary and I have my jumps set up at 24" and thats what we practice at. I just have one jump cup on my jumps so adjusting them isnt easy but I might add more on this summer. He has good form and is not a bar knocker, all tho they do happen he isnt known to knock them.

So what do you guys think of this topic, better to jump lower when your practicing and how low do you go? Or is jumping at 24" in practice not that big of a deal.

[SpringerLover]

I always jump my dog lower. As long as the dog is fit and you know the dog is capable of jumping that high, I see no reason to stress the body.

The exception to that is my old dog jumps 12" in competition (he's 20.5") and that's what he jumps when we practice too.

[Snip]

AAC jump heights, from memory, so may be off a bit, are 6, 10, 16, 22, and 26", so the jumps I weld have cups at those heights only. since our own dogs are mostly smaller, they often train at the same height as they compete though.

[Beanie]

Auggie jumps 12 when we're practicing, though right now he's jumping 10 in the jumping program we're working through. Hopefully we'll get his height card in and he'll be at 12 officially; if things don't go well, he's at 16, and we'll start practicing him at 16. Jumping him at 12, then switching to 16 during a trial, was too stressful on him mentally. He didn't know what jump height to expect so he had a really hard time with it and it screwed up his confidence.
But that's just Auggie - other dogs might not have a hard time adjusting. And, who knows, when we get through the jumping program and he becomes a smarter jumper, he might no longer have a problem with it.

[Dekka]

Dekka jumps 10 in competitions, and as 10 is so low that is what her practice height is. Kaiden jumps 16.. now he can easily jump a course set at 24, but I will jump him at 10 as well as 16. Bounce jumps 22, generally I practice at 16. Not sure what Sport's height will be, but right now he jumps mostly 16.

Now I also jump my dogs a little higher on occasion. I will have a jump in a course or sequence that is higher than their normal jump height. I do this so they actually look at the jumps and calculate vs just jumping by muscle memory.

[MafiaPrincess]

Cider jumps 16" in AAC. I was jumping her most of the time at 16". We have been practicing more often than we have been in past, so I have been jumping her 10". Smudge is the same size, but due to back issues I'm jumping him as a 10" special (under chiro care) and he is happy enough and it is low enough that he has been doing 10 in lessons too.

[BostonBanker]

Meg jumps 16" in both CPE and USDAA (performance). I generally practice over 16", unless I'm the only 16" dog in our group, at which point I'll do either 12" or 20".

It's weird - with horses, I would always be careful to keep the jumps lower in practice, but I hear a lot of agility people say that their dog has trouble adjusting to various heights, and that changing the heights can throw them off. I don't know if it's just habit and muscle memory like Dekka mentioned, but it was something that surprised me.

[adojrts]

I train dogs to jump whatever is in front of them no matter what the height is. Jumps are set at various jump heights during training, but only after a dog is no longer a novice, for a sequence or course.

But when training something new, the heights are always lower or if I am having to do a lot of reps.

[Bear Luv]

With Rush I always jump her 18" or above, she is nearly 20" tops and gets really lazy if I dont. Most times I jump 20"-22" but if I am working on something harder I will jump her 18", sometimes even I go way way lower if I am just trying to work on flatwork and I want her to understand its a jump (otherwise she gets weird and like starts going around jumps).

Bear is like 26" tall and she jumps whatever Rush jumps, since her jump height would be 26" in usdaa and we only do NADAC right now, she would jump 16" (in skilled), and so usually I am to lazy to reset all the jumps since 18-20" is like nothing for Bear, and it keeps her picking up her feet (when I had her jumping lower then 16 she started knocking bars in competition).

Diane

[k9krazee]

Originally Posted by adojrts

I train dogs to jump whatever is in front of them no matter what the height is.

This is what I do too.

We used to only train at 16" and at our first trial we were measured to 20". He didn't like it at all and was very unsure, so we started varying jump heights (from 12-20) at home. Then we got our permanent height card for 16" -phew-