First Excellent A Q!!! And more stuff...

We Q'd in JWW, and it was brilliant :) Zoe was a little spacey, but not nearly as much as she had been the weekend prior. And...it was our fastest course by YPS ever! I think that we would have done even better in Standard had I not made one teensy little mistake and pulled her off of a jump, and had she actually seen the tunnel at the end of the course. It was at a really wierd angle and dog after dog missed it and just ran straight past. Oh well, we'll try again in January :)

At some point next week I'll post some pics of Zoe and Boomer doing some obedience. Zoe is trained through Open and half of Utility, we just need to polish some stuff and fix our go outs, directed retrieve, and articles and then we'll be trial ready! Earlier this week I "broke" her recall by doing too many drops in one direction to the point where she determined that the crease in the matting was where she needed to down every time I called her. I think that we fixed it, but her creeping is back, so I'm going to have to go back to the drawing board. We've been neglecting broad jump and figure eight training, but the rest of our Novice and Open excersises are lookin good. Moving stand and signals are OK, she can do discrimination with two articles at a time, and she will do directed jumping if she is placed behind the jumps. Go Outs are steadily improving, and I don't think that they'll be a problem.

Directed retrieve, on the other hand, is a nightmare. Zoe just grabs the glove and throws it at me. I'm going to have to build some serious value for keeping hold of the glove, and then I might practice the directed part with dumbells at first. I have some time, we won't start in Novice until the spring. Our first of many scheduled run throughs is in a few weeks, and I'm thinking that I'll enter her in both Novice and Open just to see how it goes. It's in a building that she is really happy and comfortable working in so I'm predicting good results!

Boomer is coming along slowly, we work best together when our sessions are REALLY short, so we've been perfecting heeling, learning finishes, and reinforcing his glorious fronts. This weekend I'm going to resume his 2X2's and his teeter re-training in the hopes that he can start accompanying Zoe and I when we go trialing. Hopefully he and I can bond a little bit in December when we spend the weekend at the Crown Classic, my absolute favorite show. I'm a little bummed that I won't be trialing there this year, but it was the right descision not to enter Zoe, she would have been too stressy. Instead, Boomer and I will hang out, bar set for agility, study some obedience competitors (and judges), and hang out around the breed rings to pick up some pointers for 4-H next year. It'd also be really nice if I could find a handler that needs an assistant or kennel help, i could really use an enjoyable job. And the shopping is always a plus :) I'd like to find some articles, a dumbell for Boomer, and some books to add to my growing collection.

I've also been spending lots of time with Banner, the lovely mini horse that I'm trianing/leasing for the 4-H year. He hasn't always been treated well and it's going to be tons of work, but he will be really nice when I'm done with him. He just spent three weeks with an Amish trainer, and later today we're going to put him in the cart for the first time since he came home. Fingers crossed!

Soo...pictures of Banner and the dogs to be posted later this week!

Updates

It turned out that the paw pad wasn't the problem, Zoe dislocated her toe and had to be on crate rest for a week. We took things a little slow coming back, and we are ready for our next Discdogathon next week :) I'm also super happy with how her obedience trainin gis coming along. Heeling is slowly improving, and her retrieves are looking really nice, both on the flat and over the high jump. Our biggest challenge has been making it through a front for 10+ seconds before I actually take the dumbell. We're probably going to attempt a run through or two in the next few months, and I'll probably start her trialing in Novice in the spring. Boomer has been on the back burner for the past few months, but he has resumed his agility and obedience training and is making huge strides. His chronic bar knocking dissapeared with some conditioning and a vacation from actual agility. Now we just have to work on our contacts and weaves and he can start trialing :) Zoe is entered for a few agility trials this winter and I'd really like to pick up our AX and AXJ by the end of 2012. My goals for her next year are: fun obedience, MACh, Discdogathon Worlds, and the Junior Invitational (agility, obedience, or both.) We are resuming our Utility training and I'm planning on picking up my scent articles at the IX Classic this year. I think I'm going to incorporate her previous scent detection work into the discrimination training before I try anything more "traditional".

Happy tails!

First Discdogathon!!

Zoe and I have taken a break from agility to pursue our disc dogging passion and this past Saturday we competed in our first Discdogathon!! We went down to the field the nighty before to ge the lay of the land and get in some last minute praactice. It went great and I was feeling good about our prospects on competition day. But...I woke up Saturday morning to the lovely sound of puring rain and 30 MPH+ wind. The first bad weather we've had in two weeks and it had to be on Discdogathon day. Thanfully the field was well drained and by the time we started the rain had stopped. The weather has kept most of the competitors away and there were only about 20 dogs competing, including both the Novice and Pro divisions. Our first event was Pairs D/A and Zoe and I were competing with our friend Jason. We were second in the running order and when we stepped out on the field there was no wind at all. We ended up scoring 10.5, and ended up placing second to Jason and his own dog, who scored 11 and earned a spot at the 2013 Worlds. Next was TimeTrial, where we scored about 36 sec. Spot Landing was a disaster, I forgot the order of the landing circles and the wind was wreaking havok on my throws. During Bullseye we were getting into a good rythym when I happened to glance across the field and saw my EZ-up rolling away. At the end of our round I headed striaght for the carnage that used to be my camp. The first time I use the EZ-up one of the legs bends completely in half :( Another competitor came over to help me and we were able to salvage the EZ-up. We then had a lunch break and by the time that we set up for freestyle the weather was beautiful. I got all suited up, warmed up Zoe, and then we hit the field. We got through about a minute of our routine and I cued Zoe for  leg vault. She jumped up, hit the leg, and slipped. She was just laying on the ground, and wouldn't get up. I got her standing adn she wouldn't put her right rear leg down. After streching the leg she started to bear weight on it, and I got her back to her crate to look it over and ice it. The problem seemed to be a burned, scraped up paw pad. (Later that day it swelled up pretty bad, but the swelling is now completely gone and her gait is completely back to normal.) So, no score for Freestyle, 2nd palce in Pairs, 4th in time trial, and unknown scores in Bullseye and Spot Landing. I feel that with some more practice that we can qualify for Worlds and put in a dang good showing in Tennesee come next September :)

New Plan

My original plan for this year was to get out of Open by June (Check!) and be collecting MACh points by the end of the year. Now I've decided to return Zoe to CPE until March/April of next year.

1. More runs per day means more time to improve speed and distance, which we will need in AKC excellent.
2. Games = FUN!!!
3. CPE Nationals are going to be in Ohio for 2013. We need to get 19 Q's to finish our level 2 title and then we qualify to go. I've always wanted to go to a netional level event as a junior and this will probably be my best chance.
4. Getting to see the wonderful CPE people that I haven't seen in almost two years.

Hopefully I'll get a job good enough to pay for the number of entry fees that I will need to get those 19 Q's. I'll send in my appliaction in mid-June because early June will be spent in Florida :) I'm also super happy that Zoe and I are going to be heading to Columbus in June to attend a seminar with Tori Self!!!!! I'm really looking forward to work with a very succesful trainer who is a former junior handler :D

May 13th Trial

Today was our first run in Excellent JWW. Zoe was a good girl and would have Q'd if it weren't for silly handler mistakes ;) Standard was fabulous and we ran clean for a 1st and our OA title. This will be our last trial for at least a month. We do have a seminar the second week of June and I'm hoping that a little tune up will both get us ready for some serious trialing in late summer/fall and will allow me to save up some funds for entry fees.

Boomer is coming along well and his birthday on last Saturday just reminds me how far he has come. Friday he did his first hard barrel shute and his first dogwalk. Teeter training is progressing nicely and weave training will start soon. If everything goes well he will be unleashed on the trial circuit in late fall :D

May 6th Trial

We had a great day at Countryside and met all of our goals for the day. Standard went fairly well, just a small zoomies episode and an off-course (Entirely my fault, I forgot the course). We still managed to Q with a 1st leaving just one leg needed for Zoe's OA title. Jumpers was one of the best runs we have had in a while and we again had a Q and 1st, meaning that we finally got our OAJ!! Its been a  long hard road to get to this point and now we're on a roll. Zoe is just happy that she won some new toys to play with :) I am sooo excited for next weekend when we'll have the chance to get our last OA leg and get to run in Excellent for the first time. I think that our chances are pretty good because the trial location is Zoe's absolute favorite place to do agility and she's usually really focused there. We are getting closer and closer to our goal of collecting MACh points by the end of the year. Yesterday (Tuesday) I let her blow off some steam at the beach and we'll run a backyard course tomarrow to get her prepped for Sunday. Friday will be Boomer's second agility class and hopefully a leisurley bike ride for Zoe.

Intro

Hi! My name is Sam Adams and my dog is Zoe, AKA Reality Check CGC NA OAJ CL1-R. I am a junior handler who trials in agility, obedience, rally, dock diving, and K9 disc. She is a 3 year old Border Collie X JRT X Beagle mix whose favorite things are playing disc, agility, swimming, and scent detection. Zoe came into my life two days before my 13th birthday when I rescued her. She was completely feral and was terrified of everything. We have overcome huge odds to become a succesful agility team and are currently racking up titles on our quest for a MACh. She is my heart dog, my best buddy, and the best agility partner I could hope for. My up and coming agility and obedience star is Boomer, also known as JKA Boomerang Houdini. He is a year old Shih Tzu that I rescued from a hoarder. Most likely his competition career will begin in late 2012 or early 2013. I live in NE Ohio with my dogs, my mom, my brother and two cats. 4-H is another hobby of mine and I show dogs, dairy cattle, and ducks. Rounding off my list of activities are Science Olympiad, cross country running, mountain biking, and horseback riding. This blog will largely consist of my adventures with my dogs as we partake in the wonderful sport of agility.