It’s coming up to Christmas time and have been busy with parties so always good for a few dancing moves with twists & turns. Actually Dances with Dogs is one of the many dog activities where the twists and turns get used. Even with our limited knowledge of the huge amount of dog sports and activities that are about, we use the twist and turn in so many places. In Rally we use them for the 90 and 180 pivots. For agility we use them for turning me away from mum towards a jump or obstacle. We use them as stretches and just for fun playing around the house.
So what is a twist or turn. Well simply just doing a circle beside mum. We just call it “twist” on the left hand side turning away from mum and “turn” on the right hand side turning away from mum as they are the terms mum started using in Rally O training. Others that we train with use “back” for both.
How mum taught it to me was simply using food to lure me around. She put the food down at my nose height or just below (so I don’t jump up) and just to the outside. Then it was simply a matter of luring me around. Our “yes” word at the end and very importantly a treat.
Here is some video of me doing the “Twist” and me doing the “Turn“. Really need to talk someone else into helping us with videos rather than mum trying to video and do the trick at the same time but hopefully it gives you an idea. A trick that has practical uses but also just a fun easy trick. As you get better at it the human can just use the word or a hand sign (or both) rather than luring around… it is a great party trick. Oh yeah that is right…. Christmas Party time!
1st World Dog 
That’s really cool ^___^ love the videos! Now we gotta go try that.
An easy one to practice in the flat or out on a walk.
Just had a Homer Simpson “Doh!” moment. I taught Eko to spin like that, but I have the same command for both directions. He spins in the direction I point, but it makes so much more sense to have separate commands.
Most of the good agility dogs and their handlers we know just use the one command ‘back’ and then point. They actually think we confuse it but it’s just we came to the move through Rally O. Whatever works for you.