We're not actually doing any team training at the moment, just Trish and I getting together to do some work with the youngsters once a week. Haze, Squirrel and Kitten are doing some really nice chute work...we now have the chute up to a 45 deg angle with the ball on the lower station and all 3 are still doing a nice clean '4 footed' turn (although 'heffalump haze' does take a bit of persuasion...she's SO like her mother!! lol). We'll 'proof' this stage more and then the next step will be to move outdoors and add a hurdle to drive them off the chute faster and get them chasing away. There's no hurry with any of these dogs so it's just small bits at a time, just keeping it fun and always leaving them wanting to do more. I must confess I haven't really done much with either of the boys yet though (don't know why!?).
We've also been doing some chute work with the cockers, Drake already has a nice turn but he seems to have lost some of his enthusiasm for flyball since he first started training, I think it's a combination of a few things that happened to him in his first few months of competing (...being kicked in the face on a training day by a particularly clumsy individual...being 'gone at' by other dogs at training and in competition, other dogs on the same team fighting with each other and having a really bad day running in the slippery mud at Mottram back in May) that have slowly chipped away at his confidence so it's all about building that back up. Since we formed the new team he is only running with dogs he knows very well and there's no animosity between any of them. For all his bounce and madness he's actually quite a sensitive little soul (bless) but the instances where he would just lose the plot and refuse to run have thankfully stopped, he seems much happier and is back running consistently. The chute training for him is all about it being fast and fun and no pressure to help him regain his manic drive and enthusiasm he had when he first started out, it seems to be working so fingers crossed we'll have him back up to full speed again soon! Teal is a funny one (this is something I'm starting to learn about these cockers!), when she first started training (must be 18 months or so ago) she wouldn't touch the box, she really wasn't sure about it at all, so I trained her on the chute at home to get her confident enough to trigger the box and it didn't take too long before she did but the recent chute training we've been doing with her has revealed that she is still not very confident on the box. Her technique and speed between the chute and the box is vastly different (the chute is MUCH better) so it's now a case of proofing her chute technique over winter to try and get her to transfer that to the box by the start of next season. Teal is already proving to be a valuable asset to the team being a relatively quick but small height dog but hasn't yet really fulfilled her potential, if we can get her running at her optimum who knows what she'll do next season?!
As the season is winding down and we're doing much less competing, we are going to have to find a decent outdoor training venue to keep our competition dogs fit and be ready to move the youngsters onto the next stage of training.
Monday, 22 September 2008
Sunday, 14 September 2008
The show must go on!
Well, a late night getting dogs prepped (thankfully only 4 entered) and an early start for Alison and I to get over to Newby Hall in North Yorkshire in good time for the start of judging and what did we find?? An absolute mudbath!! (see the pic on Vicki’s Post although I'm not sure it quite capture's the full scale of it!). My van got stuck getting IN and a very kind lady that was at the show stewarding on a ring pulled us out with her little Citreon Berlingo (one reason why I ALWAYS carry a tow rope! lol); there was no way the trolley was going to move on that ground so we carried all our gear in then went back and carried all the dogs in (I hadn't spent all that time bathing and blowdrying to get them plastered in mud before they even got to their benches!) but my arms were absolutely killing me after all that! lol We carried them to the ring and sat them on a picnic blanket waiting to go in but their feet got muddy as soon as they hit the floor in the ring, at least everyone was in the same boat! The ground was treacherous for running on with people and dogs slipping all over the place and an awful lot of dogs 'flying tails' just to maintain their balance! The sun did come out in the afternoon and dry the ground a little but not much!
Anyway, Spark won his class (junior dog) so was really pleased with that, especially as this judge doesn't particularly like merles, she spoke a lovely glowing critique into her dictaphone about him and I had lots of nice comments about him when we left the ring too (he is a lovely, lovely boy!)...Dylan didn't get placed in the next class and was a bit giddy (the mud and spongy ground seemed to have that affect on some dogs). I had Eabha in minor puppy bitch, she was just 6 months and 2 days old and is still a real baby but no hiding she is beautifully constructed, well muscled and well balanced already so can move exactly how a BC should. Sue giggled at her, very much the baby in the line up, and said 'shall we move the tiddler to the back before we move them?' but she moved beautifully, stood beautifully to be gone over and came 2nd! Behind the puppy that went on to win Best Puppy. I was SO pleased with her, she's a natural . Kitten came 3rd in Junior bitch which qualifies her for Crufts too (finally!), she's had nothing but reserves and VHC's in the puppy classes and I was thinking there wouldn't be much point putting her in junior (her being so diddy still) but this was her first junior class and she got her qualifier. She may be small but she is well proportioned and she moves like you wouldn't believe (but especially when she's not trying to pull me across the ring...bad Kitten!). Faith then came 4th (reserve) in a good strong Yearling class despite the fact she's blowing her coat (we had VERY strong words about her tail beforehand after her brother's earlier performance! lol) so we came away with a 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th...in that order! And 2 more Crufts qualifiers (Spark and Fi are already qualified) so I was glad we made the effort and braved the mud! Three Cheers for the judge (Sue Large - Wizaland) too for doing such a great job under such very difficult conditions!
We stayed 'til the end of judging, some lovely well deserved winners and a good day for BC's in the group judging as the Best Veteran (Angela's Gillespie's Detania Jillian) went on to take Veteran Group 4. We ended up helping several people get their vans off the field before we finally left. Fortunately, with a little push to get going, I managed to reverse mine straight off the field onto the roadway. We came home along the A59 and stopped to take the dogs for a run up Pendle Hill. It was a lovely warm, sunny evening...for a change! The dogs actually came off the hill cleaner than they'd come off the showground!! lol I also managed to get the camera out for the first time that day (only AFTER we'd put the dogs away, doh!)...
Pendle Hill approaching sunset...
Views from the Hill...
Anyway, Spark won his class (junior dog) so was really pleased with that, especially as this judge doesn't particularly like merles, she spoke a lovely glowing critique into her dictaphone about him and I had lots of nice comments about him when we left the ring too (he is a lovely, lovely boy!)...Dylan didn't get placed in the next class and was a bit giddy (the mud and spongy ground seemed to have that affect on some dogs). I had Eabha in minor puppy bitch, she was just 6 months and 2 days old and is still a real baby but no hiding she is beautifully constructed, well muscled and well balanced already so can move exactly how a BC should. Sue giggled at her, very much the baby in the line up, and said 'shall we move the tiddler to the back before we move them?' but she moved beautifully, stood beautifully to be gone over and came 2nd! Behind the puppy that went on to win Best Puppy. I was SO pleased with her, she's a natural . Kitten came 3rd in Junior bitch which qualifies her for Crufts too (finally!), she's had nothing but reserves and VHC's in the puppy classes and I was thinking there wouldn't be much point putting her in junior (her being so diddy still) but this was her first junior class and she got her qualifier. She may be small but she is well proportioned and she moves like you wouldn't believe (but especially when she's not trying to pull me across the ring...bad Kitten!). Faith then came 4th (reserve) in a good strong Yearling class despite the fact she's blowing her coat (we had VERY strong words about her tail beforehand after her brother's earlier performance! lol) so we came away with a 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th...in that order! And 2 more Crufts qualifiers (Spark and Fi are already qualified) so I was glad we made the effort and braved the mud! Three Cheers for the judge (Sue Large - Wizaland) too for doing such a great job under such very difficult conditions!
We stayed 'til the end of judging, some lovely well deserved winners and a good day for BC's in the group judging as the Best Veteran (Angela's Gillespie's Detania Jillian) went on to take Veteran Group 4. We ended up helping several people get their vans off the field before we finally left. Fortunately, with a little push to get going, I managed to reverse mine straight off the field onto the roadway. We came home along the A59 and stopped to take the dogs for a run up Pendle Hill. It was a lovely warm, sunny evening...for a change! The dogs actually came off the hill cleaner than they'd come off the showground!! lol I also managed to get the camera out for the first time that day (only AFTER we'd put the dogs away, doh!)...
Pendle Hill approaching sunset...
Views from the Hill...
Friday, 12 September 2008
A fairly uneventful week
Not much to report this week to be honest, have been busy at work and it's been raining LOADS (again!!) so activities with the dogs have been limited. Trish and I did a little training with the youngsters on Weds evening despite the fact that the 3 young pups (11 weeks old and due to leave over the next few weeks) had decided to pull the rubber off the training chute...little monkies!! (serve me right for leaving it in the kitchen! lol) I actually think it's the velcro they like, they seem to be obsessed with it...weird! This is the second time the rubber has had to be replaced and the umpteenth time I've had to replace the velcro! Not sure it's worth going to too much trouble refurbishing it again since we should be getting the new one soon. This is however, definitely not the weather to be accomodating the very playful, and sometimes destructive, nature of three 11 week old pups! lol
Was really nice to see Lucy and Jeff last night as they came over with Oz, someone had brought a bitch up to him (Oz has quite a busy schedule over the next few weeks, not that he's complaining lol) so we're keeping every crossed that all goes well with that. We had a good old natter about everything and anything, once Lucy and I get going no-one else gets a word in (oops) but it was great just to catch up. So no Thurs night agility training for Fi again. Next Thurs is the last evening session before training switches back to Sunday mornings which will be loads better for me (except when we're away competing or showing of course!)
Alison and I are heading over to Darlington Champ show tomorrow so a mammoth bathing and grooming session this evening although I only have 4 entered, none of which have much coat atm so not 'too' bad. I also need to give the van a bit of a clean out as at the moment it just smells very strongly of very damp dog (hmmm, I wonder why?? lol)
Thought I'd leave you with these pics of Faith's brother Bryn (Bryning Truly Special) that his owner Brenda kindly sent me earlier in the week. I know I'm biased but I just think he's totally lush! lol
Was really nice to see Lucy and Jeff last night as they came over with Oz, someone had brought a bitch up to him (Oz has quite a busy schedule over the next few weeks, not that he's complaining lol) so we're keeping every crossed that all goes well with that. We had a good old natter about everything and anything, once Lucy and I get going no-one else gets a word in (oops) but it was great just to catch up. So no Thurs night agility training for Fi again. Next Thurs is the last evening session before training switches back to Sunday mornings which will be loads better for me (except when we're away competing or showing of course!)
Alison and I are heading over to Darlington Champ show tomorrow so a mammoth bathing and grooming session this evening although I only have 4 entered, none of which have much coat atm so not 'too' bad. I also need to give the van a bit of a clean out as at the moment it just smells very strongly of very damp dog (hmmm, I wonder why?? lol)
Thought I'd leave you with these pics of Faith's brother Bryn (Bryning Truly Special) that his owner Brenda kindly sent me earlier in the week. I know I'm biased but I just think he's totally lush! lol
Thursday, 11 September 2008
The puppy formerly known as 'Bryn'...
This litte man was returned to me this week as his new owners just felt that their elderly dog was not coping with having a new pup around. He's a very confident and outgoing little chap...inquisitive, noisy, bouncy and playful...just as an 11 week old pup should be! lol
His registered name is Bryning Goshawk so I've been calling him 'Hawkeye' ;)
I guess these things happen, it's just a shame he's had to settle somewhere else and then come back (not that he seems in the least bit bothered! lol) so he's now here waiting for the perfect new home to come along. Somewhere he can be loved and adored and have lots of time spent with him learning new things and playing games. Hopefully he won't be waiting too long.
Sunday, 7 September 2008
Wash Out Weekend
Well, the rains came down and the floods came up and the flyball tournament at Penny Farm was cancelled (boo hoo hoo!)
This is absolutely typical, the one tournament on home turf, less than 10 mins away and it gets called off! I have to say, a weekend at home to tidy up and have a bit of a break is quite welcome at the end of what has been a very busy summer.
Saturday was busy since Tom and Kate had been planning to run a PET passport clinic at Penny Farm for all the people wanting to take teams to the European Champs in Belgium next year. Since most of the teams were from this area they came over here on Saturday morning and we held the ‘clinic’ in our kitchen! I think we rabies vaccinated 29 dogs in total, 18 of which were ours! lol Blood draw will be in a few weeks time then we just have to wait for the titre test results.
We had originally been planning to have a team night out after racing so the whole team (and my mum) went to the local pub for lunch instead which was very nice.
Since it was too wet to do any team training in the afternoon we decided to make the most of the time off and introduce some of the youngsters to the training chute. The training chute is an adjustable device used to teach the dogs to get all four feet on the box and push off for a faster, safer ‘swimmers’ turn. It’s something we really don’t utilise enough but the one we have here was made by a friend a few years ago and although perfectly effective is a large, heavy cumbersome device that takes up a lot of room to store, is a nightmare to transport and is a pain to put up and take down. Mike is currently in the process of building us a much smaller, light weight version that will be much more useful for us (thanks Mike!)
The chute is adjustable to 4 different angles, we started them all on the second setting so it’s on an angle of approx 30°, we will gradually make this steeper as the training progresses.
With the bigger dogs (i.e. the collies) the first stage is teaching them to get on and off the chute using all 4 feet so it’s the movement you’re teaching more than anything. Here’s Trish with Haze and Gemma with Kitten, just teaching them the movement we’re looking for initially. As their training progresses we will work on tightening up the turn.
Trish with Haze…
This is absolutely typical, the one tournament on home turf, less than 10 mins away and it gets called off! I have to say, a weekend at home to tidy up and have a bit of a break is quite welcome at the end of what has been a very busy summer.
Saturday was busy since Tom and Kate had been planning to run a PET passport clinic at Penny Farm for all the people wanting to take teams to the European Champs in Belgium next year. Since most of the teams were from this area they came over here on Saturday morning and we held the ‘clinic’ in our kitchen! I think we rabies vaccinated 29 dogs in total, 18 of which were ours! lol Blood draw will be in a few weeks time then we just have to wait for the titre test results.
We had originally been planning to have a team night out after racing so the whole team (and my mum) went to the local pub for lunch instead which was very nice.
Since it was too wet to do any team training in the afternoon we decided to make the most of the time off and introduce some of the youngsters to the training chute. The training chute is an adjustable device used to teach the dogs to get all four feet on the box and push off for a faster, safer ‘swimmers’ turn. It’s something we really don’t utilise enough but the one we have here was made by a friend a few years ago and although perfectly effective is a large, heavy cumbersome device that takes up a lot of room to store, is a nightmare to transport and is a pain to put up and take down. Mike is currently in the process of building us a much smaller, light weight version that will be much more useful for us (thanks Mike!)
The chute is adjustable to 4 different angles, we started them all on the second setting so it’s on an angle of approx 30°, we will gradually make this steeper as the training progresses.
With the bigger dogs (i.e. the collies) the first stage is teaching them to get on and off the chute using all 4 feet so it’s the movement you’re teaching more than anything. Here’s Trish with Haze and Gemma with Kitten, just teaching them the movement we’re looking for initially. As their training progresses we will work on tightening up the turn.
Trish with Haze…
Monday, 1 September 2008
Ryecroft Farm
Well, what a FANTASTIC weekend we had at Ryecroft Farm. It's only an hour from home and all our teams were running on Sunday but we decided to take the caravans down Saturday afternoon and have a bit of time to chill out which was very nice. We had only booked 2 camping spaces so I stayed with Trish (thanks Trish!). The weather was as good as it's been in ages so it was all very civilised, sitting out enjoying the late afternoon sunshine with a glass of wine. After several more bottles of wine, on account of the fact it was Bridget's birthday (Happy Birthday B!), Gemma finally joined us about 12.30am (she had been working the late shift) and we stayed up and chatted into the early hours and eventually fell into bed...knowing we were running in Div 1 at 8.30 in the morning!!
The alarm went of at 7.00 as usual but it was 7.30 before we woke up properly and then jumped out of bed and dashed around getting dogs walked and fed before racing started. Most tournament organisers run the fastest divisions on the Sunday as they were doing this weekend; the thinking being that they'll get through the racing quicker and have an earlier finish for people having a long way to travel home. However, most tournaments run the days' divisions in reverse order...starting with the lowest and finishing with the highest. I don't know why but this weekend they did it the other way round starting with Div 1 and going down to Div 5 . I actually think this is a good idea, it often happens that Div 1 is the last division to go into the ring after a whole weekends racing and you end up running on the worst ground, especially if it's been wet and the runs and box areas start to get cut up, this sort of churned up/slippy ground obviously affects the faster dogs more.
Anyway, our schedule for the day was...Div 1 with the Speed Demonz (Dylan, Bailey, Lexie, Mist)...Div 2 with the Demon Racers (Mac, Frost, Faith, Teal)...Div 3 ring party, Div 4 off and finishing in Div 5 with the Demon Pawz (Pip, Drake, Dottie, Ethan, Spud) so quite a busy one!
We were all suprisingly spritely considering the late night and the teams all ran brilliantly, better than we could have hoped for with all 3 teams achieving new fastest times!! The Speed Demonz WON divsion 1 (woo hoo!!) and did it with some style, unbeaten all day and a fastest time of 17.48...we finally broke the 17.50 barrier!! This was also the fastest time of the weekend. The Demon Racers came 4th in Division 2, their first time up in Div 2 and they ran a fastest time of 19.01 (oh so close to the sub 19.00 I'm sure they're capable of!! lol)...not bad for a team fielding the mad midget cocker!! I was most pleased with Tealey this weekend because she actually ran for Gemma in the afternoon as I took over running Mac start dog (for some reason Gemma seemed to be asleep on the start this weekend!! lol). Although I did commit the cardinal start dog sin with Mac (getting two consecutive false starts)....TWICE!!! (oh the shame!). This is however, the first time Teal has run for someone else and she ran brilliantly all day (clever cocker!!). The Demon Pawz were top seed in Div 5 and didn't disappoint as they also won the division (yay!!) totally smashing their seed time by running 19.82!! This now gives us 3 sub 20.00 sec teams...fantastic!! I must also mention the help that we had from Steve and Bridget on the line for us, first class assistance as usual, and also Manda who was quickly volunteered to run Dottie in the afternoon, when Gemma had to leave for work, and did a brilliant job with a dog that isn't the easiest in the world to run that's for sure!!
The day was made complete by the phone call I received from Joy in the afternoon to say that Teal had won combined Grade 6/7 agility down at Trent Park so had got her last agilty win needed to go Grade 7 (Advanced)...absolutely chuffed to bits for Joy, Becca and Tealey...grade 7 before she's 3 years old...now that's not bad going is it? Well done girls!
It was a long and busy day but a very enjoyable one and we all left for home tired but very very happy and looking forward to next weekend with great anticipation. Keeping fingers crossed for a few dry days so that the Penny farm venue will be able to dry out in time for next weekend's tournament.
The alarm went of at 7.00 as usual but it was 7.30 before we woke up properly and then jumped out of bed and dashed around getting dogs walked and fed before racing started. Most tournament organisers run the fastest divisions on the Sunday as they were doing this weekend; the thinking being that they'll get through the racing quicker and have an earlier finish for people having a long way to travel home. However, most tournaments run the days' divisions in reverse order...starting with the lowest and finishing with the highest. I don't know why but this weekend they did it the other way round starting with Div 1 and going down to Div 5 . I actually think this is a good idea, it often happens that Div 1 is the last division to go into the ring after a whole weekends racing and you end up running on the worst ground, especially if it's been wet and the runs and box areas start to get cut up, this sort of churned up/slippy ground obviously affects the faster dogs more.
Anyway, our schedule for the day was...Div 1 with the Speed Demonz (Dylan, Bailey, Lexie, Mist)...Div 2 with the Demon Racers (Mac, Frost, Faith, Teal)...Div 3 ring party, Div 4 off and finishing in Div 5 with the Demon Pawz (Pip, Drake, Dottie, Ethan, Spud) so quite a busy one!
We were all suprisingly spritely considering the late night and the teams all ran brilliantly, better than we could have hoped for with all 3 teams achieving new fastest times!! The Speed Demonz WON divsion 1 (woo hoo!!) and did it with some style, unbeaten all day and a fastest time of 17.48...we finally broke the 17.50 barrier!! This was also the fastest time of the weekend. The Demon Racers came 4th in Division 2, their first time up in Div 2 and they ran a fastest time of 19.01 (oh so close to the sub 19.00 I'm sure they're capable of!! lol)...not bad for a team fielding the mad midget cocker!! I was most pleased with Tealey this weekend because she actually ran for Gemma in the afternoon as I took over running Mac start dog (for some reason Gemma seemed to be asleep on the start this weekend!! lol). Although I did commit the cardinal start dog sin with Mac (getting two consecutive false starts)....TWICE!!! (oh the shame!). This is however, the first time Teal has run for someone else and she ran brilliantly all day (clever cocker!!). The Demon Pawz were top seed in Div 5 and didn't disappoint as they also won the division (yay!!) totally smashing their seed time by running 19.82!! This now gives us 3 sub 20.00 sec teams...fantastic!! I must also mention the help that we had from Steve and Bridget on the line for us, first class assistance as usual, and also Manda who was quickly volunteered to run Dottie in the afternoon, when Gemma had to leave for work, and did a brilliant job with a dog that isn't the easiest in the world to run that's for sure!!
The day was made complete by the phone call I received from Joy in the afternoon to say that Teal had won combined Grade 6/7 agility down at Trent Park so had got her last agilty win needed to go Grade 7 (Advanced)...absolutely chuffed to bits for Joy, Becca and Tealey...grade 7 before she's 3 years old...now that's not bad going is it? Well done girls!
It was a long and busy day but a very enjoyable one and we all left for home tired but very very happy and looking forward to next weekend with great anticipation. Keeping fingers crossed for a few dry days so that the Penny farm venue will be able to dry out in time for next weekend's tournament.
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