Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone!  

 

 

Fed Ex delivery

Who doesn't love a delivery from Fed Ex?! If that big brown truck is showing up at my house it's because something fun was ordered and is now arriving on my doorstep.  Today's little cardboard box contained three bottles of liquid.  Specifically the three scents you need for Canine Nosework. It wasn't supposed to arrive until after Christmas, so I was pretty ecstatic when I saw the truck pull up today.  I have wanted to do Canine Nosework for a while now, ever since I heard about the fun new sport taking over the U.S.  The problem was always that I couldn't get the scents up here in Canada.  Well last week I looked into it again and this time they had a Canadian dealer listed, so I went ahead and placed my order.

What prompted my recent Fed Ex delivery was the news that Denise Fenzi is offering a Canine NoseWork course through Agility University starting in January.  And unlike other training schools that start your dog finding food first, her plan is to teach the dog how to find and indicate to the three scents right from the very beginning.  That makes much more sense to me and I had to sign up!  I would love to offer NoseWork classes in the new year, so I'm pretty excited to get started with my own dogs.  And I'm happy to have something new to teach Strider.  It will challenge his mind to learn a new skill and keep him young without adding physical stress to his body. It is a great sport for young and old dogs alike!  Now the only problem is I have to wait until January to get started :(

I have also been doing a lot of obedience work with Spryte lately.  I find it gives us a nice break from agility.  I really need to work multiple sports with my dogs or I get burnt out.  And since the ground is covered in snow, it's time to move inside and work on Open and Utility.  Both are going well and we have mini breakthroughs each week.  I know we are improving because I have started adding distractions into our training. Things like heeling while I am swinging a rope toy around and throwing stuff , or fronts while I am squeaking a toy, or toys laid out with the utility articles and other similar types of distractions.  Generally when I add the distraction for the first time Spryte will struggle a bit and make a mistake. I always let her work through it and then we reach success and she is more confident in the exercise and what her job is.   I need to consciously remember to keep adding new challenges and distractions to each session, and not fall into the trap of being lazy and doing the same old routine. It is the only way she will improve and learn to work through anything that I set up for her.  Seeing her overcome a new challenge is one of the best parts of training in any sport.  It keeps it fun and exciting for both of us.

Here is a recent picture of Quinn (HyperHounds the Mighty Quinn) that was taken last week at a Christmas photo shoot. I had to share, he looks so handsome. Puppies are now 4 months old.  The other puppies are all doing really well too, I just don't have any recent pictures of them to share.

Dumbbell work

So I didn't end up entering the Cal K9 obedience trial. I really really wanted to, but the more I practised, the more I realised I need to work on Spryte's dumbbell mouthing first.  When holding a dumbbell she tosses her head back, rolls the dumbbell to her molars and chews and throws her head around at the same time.  Sometimes she just flat out drops in on the floor. It's ugly and I want to fix it.

So it's back to the drawing board for our dumbbell work.  I have started tying a string to it and teaching her to keep holding the dumbbell or I'll pull it out of her mouth.  And she knows that the only way you get a cookie is to have the dumbbell between her teeth when I say "yes".  When I first started this exercise any little bit of pressure with the string and the dumbbell would come rocketing out of her mouth. Basically she wasn't really holding it at all.  Once she realised that if she didn't hold it, the dumbbell would leave and all chances of getting  a cookie left too, she began to hold tighter and resist my pressure forward.  Now I can pull really hard and she clamps down on the dumbbell and doesn't let go.  I am excited about this progress, if she is holding it tight she can't roll it back in her mouth or drop it on the floor.

Next step is getting her moving with it and still maintaining the same hold.  I started this yesterday and it's going pretty well.  First I put her in a sit a few feet away from me. Then gave her the dumbbell with the string attached.  I backed up a few steps, start applying pressure and then called her to front.  Just as I expected the first few times I did this the dumbbell came hurling towards me as she relaxed her mouth while moving into front position.  She didn't know how to keep holding tight while in motion.  Again several repetitions later she realised what she needed to do and was able to move towards me and not drop the dumbbell.  Lots of cookies for Spryte!

It will probably take us a long time before her dumbbell holding is improved to a point that I can show her.  But at least we are making progress.  I wish I had of done more foundation skills initially with the dumbbell and holding tight.   But my last two obedience dogs understood quickly how to hold a dumbbell without any special training, and I assumed Spryte would be the same.  It has been a good reminder to me not to skip steps along the way and that every dog is an individual. I'll do it different with the next dog. <grin>  how many times have we all muttered those words!.

All the pictures in this post are from todays walk (Spryte is still very naked after having puppies!).

 

 

 

 

 

A Great Success!

Our first weekend back at agility competitions and it was a great success! I guess I had nothing to worry about, Spryte is back to her old self again.  Well actually I think she is even more wound up at a trial than before.  Standing at the start line I always have my dogs sit in heal position before leading out.  Well Spryte would bounce and bark at me 4 or 5 times in a row before finally placing her bum on the ground.  She was just so excited to be back in the game.  From the way her line up behaviours started, I figured her rounds would be wild and out of control.  But the training stuck and every round she was attentive, her handling was bang on and she didn't blow a contact all weekend.  I was so thrilled.  Both Shelties Q'd 6/8 runs.  Spryte had a masters jumpers run that was 6.17 yards per second.  She was smokin!  The courses were really nice and they all flowed well.  Strider also earned his expert jumpers bronze and expert snooker bronze titles.

I have no videos to post. I have gotten a little superstitious about videoing my rounds. It seems when I video they don't go as planned, but when I don't video we Q more than we NQ.  So for now I will probably have no videos to post for a while, until I get over my little superstitious behaviour.

Something new for us

I am going to try Novice Intermediate (CDI) with Spryte.  I have never done it before, always going straight from Novice into Open. Problem was with Alaska and Strider it took two to three years before I was ready for Open after completing Novice.  That is a long time to be away from the obedience ring!

This time with Spryte I did it a little different.  From day one we have been working on all the exercises in obedience from novice through to utility.  They are all in various stages of completion.  With some exercises (directed jumping) looking very good and some that leave a lot to be desired (drop on recall!).  My plan with teaching everything from the beginning was to avoid big breaks between competition. It is working well, but we still have many months ahead of us before we are ready for Open.

I was a little disappointed looking at the upcoming trials, especially the Cal-K9 trial, thinking we are not ready for Open and I don't see the point in entering Novice again.  There was nothing for us to do.  Then it hit me, Novice Intermediate!  What a great idea to have a transitional class that works on Open exercises in smaller parts.  Things like a moving down in heal position, and a recall on the flat and over a jump with the dumbbell.  Looking at the rules I realised Spryte was ready for most of the exercises.  So I thought "what the hell, lets give it a try!".  So I have entered her in both the cal-K9's trials and the CKOC trials.  I'm excited to try something new, and happy we can come out and play while continuing to train for Open!

I had to share  this recent picture of Snap, she looks like she is really loving all this snow! 

wow it's cold out!

My thermometer says its only -1 outside.  So I bundled up to take the dogs for a run. Wow how wrong the thermometer was! It is way colder with the wind chill, so our run was a little shorter than planned. But I did get some pics of the dogs having fun in the snow.

So now what...

Puppies are all gone now.  They all left on Friday and have settled well into their new homes.  I have been sent lots of happy updates and photos from their new families.  The puppies are all sleeping through the night, all of them love their kennels and have no problem going in for nap time.  All the puppies are making friends with their new canine siblings, and of course they all love their new humans immensely.  The puppies have successfully settled in and are beginning their new lives.

How am I doing?  I'm ok.  I miss my puppies, I think about them often. I remember all their silly puppy antics and I can't get over how quiet the house is now.  I have tons of free time again, and I find I don't have anything to fill it with.  I worry about my puppies.  I know they are not actually mine anymore, but it's funny how hard of a concept that is to accept. I know without a doubt that the new families are absolutely perfect and are the best possible homes I could have found for them.  But I still feel like their mother and I worry about their well being.  I know this will pass, it has only been a few days.  I take comfort in all the happy stories and photos the new owners share with me, it reaffirms that I did the right thing.

So now it is time to get serious about Spryte's training again.  Saturday we went to our first flyball practise since July.  She was rusty and we had to take several steps back.  Catching the ball out of the loaded box was tricky and took a lot of work for her to get her coordination back.  I know with some consistent practise she will improve quickly and be back to the level we were in the summer.  My goal is to take her to the february tournament.

I have also started our obedience training again.  I would like to get her CDX title this year.  Holding the dumbbell without rolling it around continues to be a big issue, so we will need lots of consistent work on that.  The other skills are decent (especially the jumps, that is always her favourite thing to do), but again a bit rusty because it has been a while since we have practised. It is time to start really proofing and adding distractions, and taking the show on the road. So we will focus on our training and meeting these goals.

We are also entered in our first agility trial this coming weekend.  Regionals was the last competition we entered.  Our agility practises have been going well, but I admit I am a bit nervous for this weekend.  I just hope the teamwork is there like it was in the summer and we don't have an awkward adjustment period.

here are pics of the puppies in their new homes:

snap enjoying the sun

Quinn hoarding his toys (something his mom did all the time as a puppy)

Quinn playing with his new toy

Cricket playing with her new sibling, Jerry.

Cricket playing with new toys

Izzy loving the outdoors

Izzy with her new princess bed, lucky girl!

Here is a video from flyball practise on Saturday. the two puppies on the team, Radio and Snap are playing tug and doing recalls