As a bit of fun earlier this year I signed Finn up for Sylvia Trkman's online puppy/tricks class. I'm truly amazed at some of the tricks we've been able to learn & master. Its pretty cool to see everything start to fall together. Anyway, to 'graduate' we had to put together a video, and having never done much video editing beyond the basics I decided to use this as an opportunity to teach myself. So here is our video if anyone cares to watch, although it is quite long:
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Wednesday, June 6, 2012
What a way to start!
Wow wow wow. Im still a little in shock.
At the moment there is large week long UKA agility show on fairly locally, so I decided to head down yesterday to get Finn officially measured and to do some training getting her to settle around the rings. I had said to Hilary who was also taking her cattle dogs, that I would consider putting Finn in a steeplechase class and run NFC (not for competition) if and only if she was settled & there was a course appropriate, but fully expecting to chicken out.
So first I get her measured - 483mm which puts her in standard height in UKA, of which there was never any question - but then find out they have to be 2yrs for their final measure & Finn is one week short. Bummer.
Hanging around the rings Finn was fairly relaxed, at least by her standards. Happy to tug, focused on me, no barking, and only the occasional lunge at the rings when we got very close. And then more than happy to play with Tully, her new cattle dog boyfriend, ringside without worrying about what was going on around her.
So with Hilary as our support squad I bit the bullet and entered a steeplechase class.. for real, not just NFC. The run was a blur, my little girl flew around the ring as if she owned it and had a near flawless run except for a bobble at the last jump when I was out of position & panicked and nearly pulled her off. What a superstar she was! She ended up getting 1st in 18.9 secs, more than 3 seconds faster than 2nd place!
Still in shock & on a high I decided to put her in the other steeplechase course. That one didnt go quite so smoothly - she took the first 2 jumps, and then instead of turning right to a tunnel she continued straight ahead to take an arc of 5 jumps & a tunnel around the outside of the ring while I was left standing in the centre of the ring! But she is only a baby dog and still achieved all I wanted in that run - to be focused on the equipment, not to run out of the ring, and most importantly have fun!!
It will be some time before I do another show with her, we still have weaves and contacts to perfect, and I dont feel she is ready to cope with a KC show yet, but boy has my confidence in her shot up so much higher!
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Who needs relationship building!
What a glorious weekend in the south west.
I had booked Finn into a 'relationship day' workshop at DevonDogs today in preparation for agility summer camp in a few months. So yesterday with the sun shining we left the city to head south. Unfortunately I didnt get away quite as early as I wanted and found myself stuck in god-aweful motorway traffic (I think which may mark the start of school holidays??) in the hot sun and air conditioning broken. Fun. Eventually we made it to Devon though and made a bee-line to one of the dog friendly beaches. Brilliant plan, not so brilliant planning.. got there and started walking the coastal path but never actually found the entrance to the beach itself. Never mind, as looking down on the beach it looked quite busy & cramped and instead we had the fields above to ourselves.
We spent the night at a nice B&B that we had to ourselves , and in the morning headed to he equestrian centre where the workshop was held. We started the day with a 121 lesson focussing on Control unleashed stuff and then the workshop itself which focused on a range of foundation work that complemented what I have been doing with Finn nicely. Im thrilled with how well Finn worked & how she coped with the new environment. For the most part she was totally focussed on me and only once felt the need to pull at another dog. I can't say how much of a confidence boost it is to know that Im on the right track with our training and to work with people who are experienced in the training programs/exercises that I'm trying to base my training on. I'm lucky to have great agility trainers that I love, but what I would give to be closer to Devon to have access to group classes like this on a regular basis! So totally worth the 3hr drive back home in the piercing heat to get back to work tomorrow..
I had booked Finn into a 'relationship day' workshop at DevonDogs today in preparation for agility summer camp in a few months. So yesterday with the sun shining we left the city to head south. Unfortunately I didnt get away quite as early as I wanted and found myself stuck in god-aweful motorway traffic (I think which may mark the start of school holidays??) in the hot sun and air conditioning broken. Fun. Eventually we made it to Devon though and made a bee-line to one of the dog friendly beaches. Brilliant plan, not so brilliant planning.. got there and started walking the coastal path but never actually found the entrance to the beach itself. Never mind, as looking down on the beach it looked quite busy & cramped and instead we had the fields above to ourselves.
We spent the night at a nice B&B that we had to ourselves , and in the morning headed to he equestrian centre where the workshop was held. We started the day with a 121 lesson focussing on Control unleashed stuff and then the workshop itself which focused on a range of foundation work that complemented what I have been doing with Finn nicely. Im thrilled with how well Finn worked & how she coped with the new environment. For the most part she was totally focussed on me and only once felt the need to pull at another dog. I can't say how much of a confidence boost it is to know that Im on the right track with our training and to work with people who are experienced in the training programs/exercises that I'm trying to base my training on. I'm lucky to have great agility trainers that I love, but what I would give to be closer to Devon to have access to group classes like this on a regular basis! So totally worth the 3hr drive back home in the piercing heat to get back to work tomorrow..
Friday, April 27, 2012
... And the dogs
Meanwhile the dogs are still doing well.
Tooheys is starting to age a fair bit, but continues to be fit & healthy. As of the start of the year I have retired him 'officially' from agility as he now struggles with full height jumps, but he still gets to do some training over lower jumps. Now that he doesnt get to work as often some of his ratty behaviours that he hasnt done in years, like nipping me as he runs (grrrrr), have returned, but as long as he's enjoying himself the who cares!
Finn is a law unto herself, but I continue to be impressed with how quickly she picks up on anything we train. At the moment I am working through Sylvia Trkmans 'puppy'/tricks class with her - every fortnight we get new tricks to teach, and every fortnight I think this will be really difficult - but then Finn just 'gets it' and is doing tricks I never thought I'd be able to teach.
Her agility training is progressing well, she has sooo much drive and is happy to work at a distance (and fast!) but still very responsive to handling. So now I just have to learn to handle her properly!! We still have our weaves and contacts to polish before I consider competing with her, but her jumping isnt far off being ready. But she is so easily overarroused around other dogs running that I do really worry about how she will cope with doing agility in the show environment. I really must get her to some smaller shows where there are less distractions to give her ring experience. That said, we had a cattle dog agility day a few weekends ago, and despite having 20+ ACDS, rotties & malamutes standing right by the equipment she never even thought about leaving work or lost focus. She even won the most promising agility dog on the day - so proud of my little girl!
And her herding training - well she really knows how to push my buttons, and continues to be a pushy little sod at times, but again things are starting to come together nicely and she is definately starting to settle. She has by far the most natural talent & instincts of the ACDs I've trained, we just need to harness it!
Tooheys is starting to age a fair bit, but continues to be fit & healthy. As of the start of the year I have retired him 'officially' from agility as he now struggles with full height jumps, but he still gets to do some training over lower jumps. Now that he doesnt get to work as often some of his ratty behaviours that he hasnt done in years, like nipping me as he runs (grrrrr), have returned, but as long as he's enjoying himself the who cares!
Finn is a law unto herself, but I continue to be impressed with how quickly she picks up on anything we train. At the moment I am working through Sylvia Trkmans 'puppy'/tricks class with her - every fortnight we get new tricks to teach, and every fortnight I think this will be really difficult - but then Finn just 'gets it' and is doing tricks I never thought I'd be able to teach.
Her agility training is progressing well, she has sooo much drive and is happy to work at a distance (and fast!) but still very responsive to handling. So now I just have to learn to handle her properly!! We still have our weaves and contacts to polish before I consider competing with her, but her jumping isnt far off being ready. But she is so easily overarroused around other dogs running that I do really worry about how she will cope with doing agility in the show environment. I really must get her to some smaller shows where there are less distractions to give her ring experience. That said, we had a cattle dog agility day a few weekends ago, and despite having 20+ ACDS, rotties & malamutes standing right by the equipment she never even thought about leaving work or lost focus. She even won the most promising agility dog on the day - so proud of my little girl!
And her herding training - well she really knows how to push my buttons, and continues to be a pushy little sod at times, but again things are starting to come together nicely and she is definately starting to settle. She has by far the most natural talent & instincts of the ACDs I've trained, we just need to harness it!
Catching up.. on travel
It wasnt my intention to let myself slip so far behind with this blog, but I guess life has gotten a little in the way, and it is what it is. So to catch up quickly so I can set myself back on track..
On the travel front I have has some truly once in a lifetime experiences this past 6 months. Back in October I headed to southern Africa for a month. Wow and wow is all I can say. After spending a few days in Cape Town I joined an overland tour that headed up the west coat of South Africa, then across through Namibia and Botswana before finishing in Victoria Falls on the Zimbabwean/Zambian border. We had a great bunch of people which made the tour - can you imagine what it would be like being stuck on a truck for 3 weeks with people you didnt like... eek! We saw amazing scenery (canyons, dunes, national parks), lots of animals (after awhile the response was 'oh just another elephant, moooore zebras, where's something more exciting?!), and had some great adventures (most notably jumping into the 'devils pool' at the top of vic falls and lean over the edge of the falls..). Even leaving Africa was an adventure. The day after the tour finished a few of us were to fly from Livingstone to Cape Town before I left from Cape Town the next day. But we turned up at the airport only to find out our airline had lost its charter that morning and there would be no flights, and we wouldnt be able to get a flight with another airline for a few days. So in a massive panic (bearing in mind I had to get to Cape Town by the next night) we ran into a lovely man who gave us a lift to Lusaka (a 5hr drive away and where we could get a flight from), gave us a bed for the night, and drove us to the airport in the morning. The generosity of people never ceases to amaze me.
Not to be outdone, January saw me heading to Iceland for a week. Another truly unforgettable experience. While alot of the land was covered in snow at that time of year, enough of the country was still accessable and it actually wasnt tooo cold. Or at least no worse than Britain was at that time. So while there I got to do a few tours, went dogsledding, horseriding on the Icelandic horses, and Glacier hiking/Ice climbing. I was even lucky enough to get a good show of the Northern Lights while there! All again with a great group of people around.
January also saw a weekend in Malta. Last minute cheap flights and very cheap accomodation is always going to equal a good weekend, and I wasnt disappointed.
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