What our students are saying about us:
While I am busy listing the accomplishments of Breeze, I need to take a moment to thank you for helping me train this special dog. We started with foundations. Foundations have proven to be just that. We may have done a little tweaking along the way, but we have never had to re-train any part of her foundations. As I see people re-training contacts, or weaves, or jumping skills, I realize how lucky we are to have a solid foundation. Breeze really blossomed under this training. She has become a steady, confident dog.
Thank you.
--- Linda Heaton
ATCH-II C-ATCH-2 NATCH-4 Vers-NATCH-2 Fourwinds Magic BREEZE JS-E-SP, GS-E-SP, RV-E-SP, S-HP-O, XCC-N, PD1-IP, AD, AJ, AS, RA, NF, OAJ, AX, CGC, TDI
ASCA Certificate of Merit #3 Gamblers Elite Agility Dog 2010/2011
ASCA Agility Finals Qualifier (10th) 2010/2011
ASCA Agility Finals Qualifier (44th) 2009/2010
ASCA Certificate of Merit #5 Regular Novice Agility Dog 2008/2009
ASCA Certificate of Merit #9 Gamblers Novice Agility Dog 2008/2009
NADAC Triple Triple Superior Award NADAC All Around Award Open
NADAC Triple Superior Versatility Award NADAC Lifetime Points 5000
The Agile Canines community is unique and wondrous and I appreciate it more every day. Each time I spend a day or a weekend with my dogs and my ACTS friends, when I see the depth of relationship we have developed with our canine partners thanks to Annelise and the wonderful group of people that have grown up around her, I am touched and amazed at what I have been so blessed to become a part of. The caring, the concern, the joy and respect we have for each other makes so many other organizations look flat and one-dimensional in comparison. I am excited to spend another year with all of you, learning and growing and enjoying my favorite past time with my favorite friends and canine teammates!!
Elizabeth Penning and Gina and Boomer
I drive about an hour and a half to train at Agile Canines. There is no other training school the area that has the Foundation Agility Classes like Agile Canines. I have trained with Annelise for more than 8 years and I feel confident when I step on the agility course that my dog and I will be successful. I am now on to my 3rd agility dog and the training has changed so much since the first dog. New excercises have been added to the foundation program to better prepare our young dogs for a long career in Agility and great excersices to fine tune our competition dogs. The skills that you learn at Agile Canines will help you excel on the agility course, in the obedience ring or whatever dog sports you compete in.
Thank You Annelise for all the hard work over the years! My dogs and I appreciate it.
Thank You Annelise for all the hard work over the years! My dogs and I appreciate it.
Jen, Rodeo, Harlot and Lil Ky
I think the best part of the weekend, though, is that I was not terrified. It felt so good going into the ring confident and with faith in my dog. So, thank you so much for this!!!
It felt so good to see progress. I think it can be hard to tell in class, but it was good to get into a trial situation, and not have everything fall apart.
It felt so good to see progress. I think it can be hard to tell in class, but it was good to get into a trial situation, and not have everything fall apart.
—Julie Sharbo and Ruby
Thank you so much for the award! Wow, I'm honored.
Anything that Shep & I accomplish is truly thanks to you!
We were a complete disaster when we found you a year ago - it was not fun doing agility and I knew it should be.
You have made it fun and we love it. You are so amazingly patient with us.
THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!
-Marya Lydeen & Shep
After I started training with Annelise in 2001, my success with Maggie increased dramatically. Annelise helped me find the way to really motivate my canine partner and we’ve gone on to earn Championships in NADAC, CPE and TDAA.
When I got my puppy Winn, my goal was to train a versatile dog, one who could be competitive in all the different agility organizations, and in herding and obedience. I can’t say enough about the foundation training that Annelise provides. The time spent in building handling skills makes the obstacle part of agility so easy! And the same foundation has meant greater success in herding and obedience too. Winn is now seven, in his prime, and has earned Championships in FIVE agility organizations. He’s got titles in obedience, rally and herding and really enjoys life.
Now I have another corgi puppy, DDare. He’s 18 months and a delight. We’ve been through Jane Fallander’s foundation class, Annelise’s agility foundation class, and we’re now in Beginning Agility. When we need more time to perfect something, Annelise is there to support that perfection. There’s no “hurry” to get on equipment and no point to it until your dog understands how to follow your cues. We have thoroughly enjoyed every moment of class, and revel in the progress of these young dogs.
Our class has bonded in an atmosphere of encouragement and support, and we look forward to the coming years of fun.
-Chris Mosley
I’m just home from Echo’s fourth AKC trial weekend. In eight trial days she has Q’d 7 times to earn her Novice, Open, and first leg towards her Excellent Jumpers titles and earned her Novice and Open Standard titles. Yes, I have a very, VERY big grin and am thrilled with how well the Echo-Bunny is performing.
I’m a bit blown away, because all of this has been so much easier than getting to the same point with Piper, my first agility dog. Piper & I started her first agility class elsewhere and following their advice, she was four months old for the class. That night she was on her first A-Frame and dog walk and started her first jump sequences. I asked what I should do for her contact criteria and received three different answers. For the rest of her career, I know without a doubt that I will never trust her contacts. We have come up with a lovely running dog walk, but I will continue to manage it instead of letting her do her job. She is young enough that the term “flying Corgi” was definitely not penned for her A-Frames, but it sure could have been. You don’t want to start me on her bar knocking adventures. Piper was so into the other dogs that she had a drag line on her in class and a couple of people helped to manage her. I love running and training Piper. She is a fabulous team mate and lifts my spirits every time she grins at me when we are starting a new adventure. She has taught me SO much about training and these new games that I’ve started playing since I decided to get into Corgis. She has been mostly patient with me while I figured out where we needed to go to find help and Annelise has done a lot to help me patch up some glaring holes in Piper’s foundation. It will never be as strong as if she started that way, but she is so much more reliable now.
Echo is Piper’s niece and came home at 11 weeks when Piper was 4.5 years old. They are very much alike, yet so very, very different. I started Echo in foundations (note, NOT an “agility” class) right away – three days after she came home. Our first lessons were working on focus, recalls, and loose leash walking with some other foundation skills quietly introduced. We quickly were able to proceed to focus around distractions and we moved classes all over the place. One fun class was held at an agility trial while the trailer was being loaded, another right outside of Como Park’s amusement park. You know, having your puppy hold a stay while a roller coaster fires up behind her is absolutely priceless! I don’t think Echo was on her first dog walk until she was at least 10 months old. I’m glad we took it that slowly as she has beautiful contacts and while I know they will fall apart as we continue to trial and I push her for more speed, we have a sound basis to start with to clean up the behavior.
So this weekend Echo Q’d in 3 of her 4 runs. She popped out of the weaves in her Ex JWW debut; because of the work we have put in I knew it wasn’t a confidence or training issue and took her for a massage after I cooled her down - she was sore across the shoulders. Today her JWW run was absolutely phenomenal – had she been in the Excellent B class with “the big kids”, she would have placed (she took 1st in Ex A). A half hour later she had her standard run and noticed people walking by the door in the middle of the wall at SoccerBlast and had a baby brain melt down while we were on the start line. I have been waiting for this for the last two months. I was able to use her focus cues to get her back with me each time she decided to be goofy about the door. Her A-Frame was flawless, the weaves were beautiful, the teeter was slow, but she reconnected with me. Another small panic after getting on the table and she gave me a perfect dog walk to a strong finish. Yes, she actually managed to Q and finished her OA title. I am more proud of her flawed standard run than her almost picture perfect JWW run, because it verified what Annelise & I knew about my girl – she has the skills she needs to do her job under stressful situations and she trusts me enough to recover, perform, and wind up having fun when she didn’t really think it was a good idea to start with. I’m proud of myself for anticipating this event and being ready for it. I didn’t worry, I just asked the person standing at the door to look away and called Echo to focus back on me and our game. She is such a very good Baby Dog and I know that I am beyond fortunate to share my life with her. Now those fast little Papillons in Ex B had better watch out! The Bunny is moving up quickly.
To all of you with your brand new puppies – I wish you many, many years of joy. Enjoy your time with the babies now and don’t push them too quickly; when you do start to trial, you will both have more fun!
Oh and Annelise – thank you SO much for all of the target and especially the ignoring non-cued target work you had us do. Echo’s favorite obedience exercise is the go out and she loves charging 45-50 feet across a ring to sit on cue. However, I haven’t had an issue with her stopping to check out the big white circles at SoccerBlast! We have found the perfect balance.
Patty Fulton
Nancy Haley, Julie Heller and Cathy Whitney at an agility demo for Agile Canines!
Thank you so much for helping Quetzal and me get to this level! We double Q'd yesterday and got both AX and AXJ titles and today got our first Excellent B double Q with first places each time. We now have our first double Q and 54 Ch. Points towards that MACH goal.I know its just a beginning but I truly do not think we would have made it this far this fast without your wise and patient tutelage. A big thank you from Team Buttercup!
-Michelle Ritt