All Dogs trial

Three runs today:

Advanced Team: Signed her up for this back when I was feeling more optimistic :-D Fortunately, our draw partner who has a nice little Pyr Shep was totally easygoing and both our dogs totally screwed up so no one let anyone down. They took the first part which meant that Lucy didn't have to do the frame and that I wouldn't have to deal with getting a hold of her in the box. Well, Lucy had her sights set on the nearby offcourse dogwalk on the opening line. We must have had a few other goofs but I didn't write it down and now the day's details are a fuzzy blur. Oh but I do remember that she held 2o2o on both dogwalks (the offcouse and the legit one) but she was sniffing the ground both times while in 2o2o. Good news is that she happily waited for me before exiting the ring.

Advanced Snooker: Just what I was hoping for: There was no frame on the course, yay! Our opening was the #7 teeter twice and the #2 tunnel. Lucy was slow and unpeppy but somehow we made it through to the end of the closing even though she *walked* through the weaves. So a Q for Lucy but not exactly our best ever performance.

Advanced Jumpers: This was at the end of a long day. If only my dogs would be able to sleep in their crates/xpens during their downtime. Anyway, let's just say man did my pom-poms get a workout. Halfway through the course, however, she went to the fence and started sniffing at the grass. Clearly she was not into this run so I put an end to the torture for all involved and signalled to the judge that we were done. Lucy's fence-sniffing was strange behaviour as usually when she's stressed or just not into a run she heads straight for the exit gate, but the fence she went to sniff at was at the opposite end of the ring and even when we went running to the exit I had to really cheerlead her to get her to break into a canter.

Later at home I looked at her feet out of curiosity and noticed a cut on her left rear pad which was definitely sensitive to the touch. No idea when or how she got it as it wasn't there a few days ago when I trimmed her nails, and she hadn't been limping. Surely to goodness this injury played a role in today's performance, my poor Lucy. She has gotten strange cuts like this before including once shortly before a trial from which I therefore scratched her, $45 down the drain but obviously the right thing to do. So, I vow from here on to inspect her feet before every single run to make sure there are no cuts.

As usual, she was a joy to hang out with, and she even got some compliments on her sweetie-pie good looks from a very nice woman who was taken with her. Lucy loves everyone so she was glad to soak up the lovin' and it was nice that for once it was her instead of Mr. Fancypants Walter who got the attention of a stranger. :-)

Practice - Discovery!

If I haven't been blogging much about Lucy's agility practices this year it's because, well, we haven't been doing very much of it. I've been really focusing on developing a number of skills with Walter this year so as usual Lucy's agility training has taken a back seat. Taking both dogs to practice at the same time involves digging out the heavy crate from the bottom of the trunk and setting it up and I've just been too lazy this summer. So I take her out with Walter from time to time when it's cool enough and shady enough that the dogs can wait in the car while it's the other dog's turn. We've done simple little sequences but that's about it, haven't worked on skills development at all. Sad but true. (But, she is my main focus in flyball, and I would love to get into rally with her at some point... so hopefully it all evens out in the end?)

Anyway, today I decided to see what would happen if at one of our usual practice fields (BF) I treated it like a trial run: We did our typical warmup exercises and I left our treat bag outside the ring, no treats inside the ring. Then we ran a simple standard course. Well, lo and behold, we had the same issues we have at trials! Where she seemingly tunes out now and then, running around aimlessly for a bit; where she sometimes locks onto obsacles in front of her instead of turning with me; where she runs toward the exit gate.

So, could it be that the issues we've been having simply come down to a lack of practice? Geez when I think about it she gets a heck of a lot more flyball practice time and flyball is the same darn thing again and again and again, none of the complexity and variety that's found in agility.

Looking at it that way, it all makes sense. Too bad it took me to the end of the season to figure it out. Oh and there is still the frame retraining issue which will need to be addressed.

Hopefully next year I'll get back on track with her as Walter has made good progress on his skills development this year (weaves aside, ahem!!) so he can take more of a backseat next green fee season.

Guides Canins trial

Our first time at the gorgeous Guides Canins facility in Saint Lazare. Lucy was entered in only two runs, one Saturday morning and one Sunday morning. No expectations, just wanted to give her some ring time and see how she'd do at a different venue.

Saturday morning: Advanced Jumpers

The opening straight line went well but after that we fell to pieces, both of us completely discombobulated. I got lost on course for the first time ever but didn't realize it until we were on the closing line when I thought hey, how come we never got to the chute? and the bunch of jumps before and after the chute? woops :-) From watching the video it looks like Lucy had a combination of excitement and stress, but at least she wasn't stressed to the point where the exit gate became an irresistable magnet. Oh and she had a strange stumble on the turn after one of the jumps towards the end. Here's the video:

Sunday morning: Advanced Gamblers

Wanted to enter her in just one run early in the morning. Since Jumpers wasn't until late in the day, our choice was between Snooker and Gamblers. While we would have stood a better chance at Qing in Snooker (since we never practice distance), I figured Gamblers would be the better choice for us as the Mean Yelling Snooker Handler in me would not get the chance to take over. Some good news is she did the 12-weaves, yay! However, I made the mistake of putting her over the frame since it provided a way of continuing a nice line. The frame faced the exit gate so then off she went to the exit... then she came back in the ring, and soon after the buzzer went, at which point she ran right back to the exit and visited the scribe and timer, BUT the good news is she eventually did come back so we tried the gamble. She took the wrong end of the tunnel (no surprise there) and then made no attempt whatsoever at 2o2o on the dogwalk (actually she jumped clear over the yellow) and left the ring. We would have had nowhere near enough opening points to Q even if she had done the gamble. This run didn't get caught on video so we are all spared from having to watch it again.

Later on when I was discussing Lucy's issues with someone, she suggested that Gamblers is not necessarily a good event for a dog with stress issues because often the obstacles are not laid out in a way that you can design a nice, flowing course. I hadn't thought about it that way but totally see her point.

Lucy had a nice massage by the on-site dog masseuse afterwards which she quite enjoyed.

I have to say, while I'm not sure what the future holds for Lucy's agility "career", she is such a wonderful dog to just hang around the show site with. Easygoing, quiet, and knows how to kick back and relax in the sun. The only thing I need to keep an eye on her about is to make sure she hasn't, isn't, or isn't about to stick her snout in someone's unmonitored treat pouch or lunch bag :-D

August K9 Kup

Mixed results on this one. Standard wasn't too bad; I think her lapses were more excited in nature rather than stress because she was quick to come back to me; however, her fabulous go line (which I didn't ask for) at the end seemed stressy and she ran out of the ring by herself. Snooker was going well until she took back to back reds, but she seemed happy enough so I don't mind. Gamblers was ok, except I accidentally put her through Walter's opening instead of hers which called for the teeter instead of the frame. She didn't seem happy on the frame and paused at the top. Again, a stressy line at the end where she ran out of the ring by herself, missing the last jump of the gamble, too bad!

In retrospect, it actually looks better (i.e. Lucy looks happier) on the video than it felt while we were running.

A-frame box practice

Re-read the first steps of the Clean Run article and realized I've been missing the step of throwing the treat into the box before throwing a treat outside of the box. So we gave that a try at the field today (box on ground, now with additional sponge at corners for slightly better visibility in grass). She was having fun, but when I back up from the box she tends to come to me, then upon getting no reinforcement she turns around and goes into the box but it's from the side rather than the "top". Hmmm. Might just be worthwhile to buy the DVD they're putting together on this training method.

A-frame box update

We gave it another go with the pvc box on the ground at the agility field today. The problem last time we tried this was that the box disappeared in the grass. So, I attached a little sponge at each corner thinking that would help raise it and make it more visible. Well, while the piddly little sponges make it perfectly visible on the living room carpet, they do next to nothing in the grass. So, back to the drawing board; I'll have to put a few sponges on each corner I guess. Oh and the other problem that we don't have at home on the living room carpet is I can't throw our usual treats in the grass because they disappear and it takes Lucy forever to find them. Ok, so our action plan is to (1) find a way to raise the frame a bit higher off the ground so it doesn't get swallowed up in the grass, and (2) find some large, light-coloured treats for throwing.

As the days get shorter and the end of green fee season starts to approach, I concede that Lucy's frame retraining will not be finished this year. Heck we've barely started it! So, my plan is to really get the groundwork part of it down pat over the fall and winter and next spring be ready to put it to the equipment. Trialing-wise, I'm encouraged by following the current thread on the Clean Run mailing list about Rachel Sanders' pvc box method: it's ok to keep trialing as long as you're still on the groundwork part of it. It's once you start putting the box on the frame that it's a good idea to take some time out from doing frames in trials.

Check out Emily Snider's You Tube videos for some neat footage of her border collie's progress with the pvc box method. Here's her most recent frame training video:

Dogz Advanced trial... in which Lucy has a 100% Q rate!

Ok, so she was entered in only one class. ;-P She ran the Advanced Jumpers course. Didn't put her in the other games because of the frame retraining and not wanting to overdo it with her at trials.

She ran very attentively and stayed with me the whole time, yay! But, her happiness level wasn't at full-on 100% Happy Girl. I'd give her a 3.5 or 4 out of 5 on the Happy scale.

Couple of things I noticed from the video... I rely way too much on the off arm, such as to bring her in after a turn to avoid her running past the next jump... and, holy moly I can't cue a tight turn to save my life. Actually that kind of thing (efficient turns) is the last thing on my mind both when walking a course and running it. But jeez maybe it's time to start eh!

Practice

Quick practice to work on rear crosses in anticipation of possibly wanting to use one or two at tomorrow's Jumpers run. She doesn't really "get" rear crosses because, well, I haven't worked on them much with her. Poor Lucy, always the neglected one. She spun at first but after a bit of work she was picking it up better.

Also, put her through the 12-weaves at the field with the good weaves and she was looking great: excited and happy!

Krazy Kanines fun match

Today was the Krazy Kanines (our agility club)'s first ever fun match. Lucy ran a starters and advanced standard and the starters gamble. I ran her at 16" instead of 22" because, well, just because. It was fun and the bonus is that some photographers took a bunch of photos of everyone and their photos are free to use as we please. So, here are a bunch of Lucy.

Club practice

Tonight for the first time I asked someone to run Lucy for a bit, just to see how she'd do with that. Sure enough, all it took was a bit of pre-run bonding involving a cheese string or two, and she subsequently followed her new handler around like magic. It was neat to have an observer`s perspective on her for a change. She's such a funny dog, so bouncy and happy when she's having fun.