Stacking advice and critique

[remy]

I am brand new to conformation, so any advice and critique is welcomed! Remy just turned 4 months old yesterday. I have been working on stacking him more often recently, and I always take videos of our session then screenshot the better stacks.

I like the first one, but I think it would be better if his back legs and hocks were like the second photo. Would you agree? Also how is his head/neck positioning in the first photo? I haven’t focused too much on that as I’ve been trying to work on his legs more. If there is anything else that can be improved please let me know!

 

[Rits]

He looks perfect in the first picture. His legs are a bit too far back in the second. He could be a hair back in the rear in the first pic if you wanted to really nitpick to make his hocks perfectly perpendicular to the ground. Remember, you want his hocks straight up and down, perpendicular to the ground. Typically this means they are standing up on their toes. If you look in the second picture too, because his legs are too far back it creates a dip in his top line right before his hip junction. A perfect top line should have no waves or dips so you'll want to do your best to not create issues where there are none.

His neck looks beautiful in the first too. For neck position you can play around with it and see what helps make any neck/shoulder wrinkles disappear. You want there to be a smooth flow from head to tail. He's a puppy so he is going to have some wrinkles but you can still practice with it now because some always do have some wrinkles even if it isn't correct and it can be distracting. If you see in the second picture his neck is stretched up a little higher and so the neck to shoulder transition looks smoother. So I would play around with it and see if you can get his neck up and head bent while smoothing out his shoulder the best you can! The beautiful head bent at the poll is for when the judge is looking at side profile. When the judge comes from the front, you will want the neck up and to keep the head planes level with the ground.

I would have your camera a little higher so its not looking under him so much.

If you don't want to always bait with your hand, you can practice standing beside him and tossing or spitting bait out ahead of him, tell him to "watch" and you watch for a slight weight shift forward. Release him soon as he shifts or leans forward with "get it!" or "break!" or whatever release word you want. Do this enough he'll start leaning into that stack and makes them look really impressive while your hands are free to fiddle with cleaning up the face, lips, skin around the neckline, tickling the tail etc.

Y'all are doing amazing! He looks really really good and you're doing such a great job with him. I think you guys are going to go far and have a ton of fun!

 

[remy]

He looks perfect in the first picture. His legs are a bit too far back in the second. He could be a hair back in the rear in the first pic if you wanted to really nitpick to make his hocks perfectly perpendicular to the ground. Remember, you want his hocks straight up and down, perpendicular to the ground. Typically this means they are standing up on their toes. If you look in the second picture too, because his legs are too far back it creates a dip in his top line right before his hip junction. A perfect top line should have no waves or dips so you'll want to do your best to not create issues where there are none.

His neck looks beautiful in the first too. For neck position you can play around with it and see what helps make any neck/shoulder wrinkles disappear. You want there to be a smooth flow from head to tail. He's a puppy so he is going to have some wrinkles but you can still practice with it now because some always do have some wrinkles even if it isn't correct and it can be distracting. If you see in the second picture his neck is stretched up a little higher and so the neck to shoulder transition looks smoother. So I would play around with it and see if you can get his neck up and head bent while smoothing out his shoulder the best you can! The beautiful head bent at the poll is for when the judge is looking at side profile. When the judge comes from the front, you will want the neck up and to keep the head planes level with the ground.

I would have your camera a little higher so its not looking under him so much.

If you don't want to always bait with your hand, you can practice standing beside him and tossing or spitting bait out ahead of him, tell him to "watch" and you watch for a slight weight shift forward. Release him soon as he shifts or leans forward with "get it!" or "break!" or whatever release word you want. Do this enough he'll start leaning into that stack and makes them look really impressive while your hands are free to fiddle with cleaning up the face, lips, skin around the neckline, tickling the tail etc.

Y'all are doing amazing! He looks really really good and you're doing such a great job with him. I think you guys are going to go far and have a ton of fun!

Thank you so much for all of the great tips and advice! I always tend to overextend his back legs, so I think that’s why I thought the legs were better in the second photo.

I have noticed that sometimes the wrinkle near the neck/shoulder area is more visible, but I couldn’t pin point why. Now I know to play around with neck positioning to help with that! I’m hoping that it will also smooth out as he ages.

I need to work on taking the bait away from him, so I will try what you said today. Right now I pretty much hold it the whole time while I mess when his legs and stand up to get out of the way for a photo. Trying to get him to stay while I get up (when he doesn’t have the bait) has been a challenge, but I know with time and practice we’ll get it!

I’ll look for my phone tripod and use that too! I can never find something that’s the right height, always too high or low. In those pictures my phone was set against my barbecue lol.

 

[remy]

He looks perfect in the first picture. His legs are a bit too far back in the second. He could be a hair back in the rear in the first pic if you wanted to really nitpick to make his hocks perfectly perpendicular to the ground. Remember, you want his hocks straight up and down, perpendicular to the ground. Typically this means they are standing up on their toes. If you look in the second picture too, because his legs are too far back it creates a dip in his top line right before his hip junction. A perfect top line should have no waves or dips so you'll want to do your best to not create issues where there are none.

His neck looks beautiful in the first too. For neck position you can play around with it and see what helps make any neck/shoulder wrinkles disappear. You want there to be a smooth flow from head to tail. He's a puppy so he is going to have some wrinkles but you can still practice with it now because some always do have some wrinkles even if it isn't correct and it can be distracting. If you see in the second picture his neck is stretched up a little higher and so the neck to shoulder transition looks smoother. So I would play around with it and see if you can get his neck up and head bent while smoothing out his shoulder the best you can! The beautiful head bent at the poll is for when the judge is looking at side profile. When the judge comes from the front, you will want the neck up and to keep the head planes level with the ground.

I would have your camera a little higher so its not looking under him so much.

If you don't want to always bait with your hand, you can practice standing beside him and tossing or spitting bait out ahead of him, tell him to "watch" and you watch for a slight weight shift forward. Release him soon as he shifts or leans forward with "get it!" or "break!" or whatever release word you want. Do this enough he'll start leaning into that stack and makes them look really impressive while your hands are free to fiddle with cleaning up the face, lips, skin around the neckline, tickling the tail etc.

Y'all are doing amazing! He looks really really good and you're doing such a great job with him. I think you guys are going to go far and have a ton of fun!

I just watched the video again and took this screenshot, it was right before the first photo. Would this be a better head/neck angle for when the judge comes to the front? Or should his neck be more up and down with no bend?

I wish he wasn’t licking the kong so his head looked better

 

[Rits]

Right now I pretty much hold it the whole time while I mess when his legs and stand up to get out of the way for a photo.

That's honestly perfectly fine so he associates stacking with great things.

Trying to get him to stay while I get up (when he doesn’t have the bait) has been a challenge, but I know with time and practice we’ll get it!

You will! You can practice teaching stillness without touching him. Have a treat get him all excited for it then hold the treat in the air out in front of him. He might jump up or move about. As soon as he stands still, mark yes, and reward. A cheap clicker helps get the mark out there quickly. Keep working on this, just mark and reward the moment he stands still and looks at the bait hand. Once he gets that he is supposed to be still, you can add duration to it by not clicking immediately but only after 1 second of stillness...2 seconds and so on. Once you are up to 15-20 seconds of stillness you can start either asking him to step his front feet into position or you can touch a leg and put it in position while he watches the food. Then reward. Baby steps! Hope this helps!

Would this be a better head/neck angle for when the judge comes to the front?

Yes. That looks good! If you can, watch doberman pinscher judging on YouTube for Westminster or DPCA nationals and that helps a lot to see what the handlers are doing. It's an art for sure and takes many years to master all the nuances so watching the pros helps.

 

[Ravenbird]

@Rits you make an excellent instructor - so precise in how you explain things! I was trying to get feet in position then ask for stillness. Shoulda mastered stillness first, then foot placement?

 

[Rits]

Shoulda mastered stillness first, then foot placement?

I think teaching stillness without the pressure on you for getting things perfect, or pressure on the dog to accept all this manipulation, makes it so much easier to ask for it when you do add that pressure! Then stillness can be used to your advantage for when hand stacking or for free stacking. The dog will already understand what they have to do when they see your bait hand out or the piece of bait on the floor.

I did like you with Ripley, stacking her and asking her to stay. Then with Revel I taught stillness first, then asked him to place correct feet with baiting him into position, then hand stacking + stillness. I had to handstack him anyways weekly for pics for his breeder so it's not like I didn't handstack him before he mastered stillness! But I kept it to once or twice a week until he got the stillness part. I was constantly feeding him when handstacking. I don't think either way is necessarily wrong or right. I do believe it helped him get the picture better of staying still a little easier at a much younger age. He definitely learned how to free stack so much sooner than Ripley and he offers it constantly throughout the day for any treats lol. But definitely takes longer than jumping right in and skipping some steps. Of course after lots of practice with hands on Ripley and some UKC shows later she caught on eventually too. When she hit close to a year she knew she needed to stay still. She definitely went through phases of too excited to see people, to hitting her first heat and not wanting her rear being touched. Now she doesn't care and stands like a she knows her mission in life is to do that for the treat. Revel was standing still too but also going through a phase of wiggles. Just a matter of working on stillness but with the added distraction of stranger hands!

 

[remy]

That's honestly perfectly fine so he associates stacking with great things.



You will! You can practice teaching stillness without touching him. Have a treat get him all excited for it then hold the treat in the air out in front of him. He might jump up or move about. As soon as he stands still, mark yes, and reward. A cheap clicker helps get the mark out there quickly. Keep working on this, just mark and reward the moment he stands still and looks at the bait hand. Once he gets that he is supposed to be still, you can add duration to it by not clicking immediately but only after 1 second of stillness...2 seconds and so on. Once you are up to 15-20 seconds of stillness you can start either asking him to step his front feet into position or you can touch a leg and put it in position while he watches the food. Then reward. Baby steps! Hope this helps!


Yes. That looks good! If you can, watch doberman pinscher judging on YouTube for Westminster or DPCA nationals and that helps a lot to see what the handlers are doing. It's an art for sure and takes many years to master all the nuances so watching the pros helps.

Thank you again, as always you are super helpful! I will work on teaching stillness next time we practice. I’ll definitely watch some of the judging videos too. I can’t wait for Westminster this year, I’m always hoping for a Dobie win!

 

[remy]

Remy should be starting conformation class tomorrow! It gets cancelled a lot, so I’m hoping it will still be held.

I think I’ll start a new thread for pictures once we get to class and officially start learning! Here’s a stack from today while we were watching Westminster. I bought the Cato boards recently and they are really helpful for practicing in the house since the floors are hardwood.

 

[Rits]

Beautiful! We can't wait to watch Wicked... hoping she wins group and goes on to BIS! Looking forward to hearing how practice goes tomorrow!

 

[remy]

Beautiful! We can't wait to watch Wicked... hoping she wins group and goes on to BIS! Looking forward to hearing how practice goes tomorrow!

I would love for her to go BIS! I think she has a great chance if she is able to win the working group.

Thank you! There are usually a lot of dogs there, so I’m hoping he isn’t too crazy

 

[Ravenbird]

There are usually a lot of dogs there, so I’m hoping he isn’t too crazy

The best thing about group classes is getting all that spit-fire puppy crazy stuff over with before show time. Or some of it anyway. Mine grew up in first year of Covid, so our puppy get togethers in group classes were mostly cancelled, with just a few outdoor small events. I'd give anything to have had every week indoor training chaos during Ashas most formative years. Looking forward to your reports & pictures!

 

[Ravenbird]

We can't wait to watch Wicked.

I saw some of that yesterday - she actually looks better live than in her photos. SO animated! I was really impressed by all of those self-stacks in the Doberman BOB.

 

[Rits]

she actually looks better live than in her photos. SO animated!

Shes the #1 dog in the country of all-breeds for a reason! She's really beautiful and that ring presence of owning the ring is everything!

 

[remy]

So the conformation class was cancelled yet again… I feel like I’m never going to get him there! Hopefully next week

 

[Rits]

So the conformation class was cancelled yet again… I feel like I’m never going to get him there! Hopefully next week

Is this through a club or a business? I know how hard that can be on both sides. Usually if its through a club, its volunteer based with a small fee for the time. The amount of people that come to the previous drop ins can affect how often they happen. Any chance of any other clubs in the area? It sadly isn't uncommon to have to drive up to an hour away to get some practice in, but its definitely worth it. Conformation drop ins are few and far between!

 

[remy]

Is this through a club or a business? I know how hard that can be on both sides. Usually if its through a club, its volunteer based with a small fee for the time. The amount of people that come to the previous drop ins can affect how often they happen. Any chance of any other clubs in the area? It sadly isn't uncommon to have to drive up to an hour away to get some practice in, but its definitely worth it. Conformation drop ins are few and far between!

Sorry in advance for the long response!
There is actually 2 classes, but they are on the same night at almost the same time (6:30 and 7:30), and both cancelled tonight. One is through the local kennel club, the other is through a women who shows her own dog (sometimes they have a pro handler teach.)

The class taught by the kennel club is more popular with about 10 dogs each class. They cancelled a few hours before class was supposed to happen, so I’m guessing something came up with one of the instructions which is understandable! This one is outside so occasionally they need to cancel due to weather. Out of the two classes this one happens more often.

The other class has a hard time getting enough people to come. It’s only held if 3 people attend. The instruction lives about 45 minutes away, so I understand it’s not really worth the trip if not enough people plan to come. She posted that there wouldn’t be class today because she would be watching the dog show, but that’s already over…

I was hoping that if one cancelled the other would happen, but they both happened to cancel tonight lol.

The only other clubs I know of are about 2 hours away and another one 3.5 hours away. Luckily the classes near me are about 15-20 minutes away, so I won’t need to go far when we can go! I was surprised that they even have them here since there isn’t a big dog community, even though it’s a busy area.

 

[remy]

We are going to our first class tonight! I’m feeling excited and nervous! Hopefully I’ll be able to get some pictures and start a new thread.