MrsD

Well done Tracey, great work for a first go , I'd be proud & happy too :rolleyes: .

Good luck with it to both of you, Indi Girl, you will be fine with HT, just take so deep breaths & don't do what I did & be so nervous that my voice went al squeaky . Superminty, ahhhhhh the headache of almost every person who has a working dog - how to get them to stop ;) . We are facing up for our PT at the Cattle Dog & Kelpie club trial up here on the 25th & 26th Aug. Im pretty confident that we can pass, but you know how there is always that tiny bit of worry that something will go drastically wrong . I need to get his PT there otherwise I wont be able to enter the State Championships on the 8th & 9th of Sept as there are no test classes only trial classes on offer & I want to run him in A Course Started.

Yep that would be about right, maybe we could kidnap him & keep him up here when we have the next clinic, I wouldnt mind getting beaten at every trial if we had a chance to learn more off him . Anyway, lots of stuff to work on, Im looking forward to the next 6 months of hard slog cos I know it will be worth the wait .

Thanx Tracey for organising it & most especially thank you to Colin for such a fabulous weekend, I can't believe how much I learnt. And I know that Eddie had a great time too & learnt a lot. So much stuff, I was still dreaming about herding last night , as you said Tracey, now we just have to do the training & put in the effort. I'm so glad that Colin thought Jarrah had improved so much, as the saying goes, the proof of the pudding is in the eating & it's certainly proof that his methods work. As I said yesterday, it's hard to believe that Jarrah hadn't even seen sheep 4 months ago & now he's working so well :D . I am looking forward to the next clinic already . Mr. Webster is a god .

C&Z, yep, how to handle your dog (gaiting & stacking etc) (& yourself) in the show ring .

Well done CB, now you will be in class with Dagboy for the next month (if we ever turn up to class that is ).

Or Spacko Zaco as my old dog was nicknamed .

Be careful saying that - you will have all the one-eyed dry food nazis screeching at you that you cant feed a dog anything with "by products" in it or they will spontaniously combust .

I've already talked to you on the phone but just in case anyone thinks Im ignoring you ...... Yep that's fine, cya then :D ;)

You should be feeding him that low calorie Eukanuba you are bringing over to me for Cooper ;) . Who was the judge yesterday?

Mine was brown so I think it may have been a bush tick but only very small so wasn't engorged yet, I can tell what a paralysis tick looks like when its bigger, but how do you know the difference between them when they are small? Are they a different colour like they are when they are older?

Yep I found one on Jonty a couple of weeks ago, it's the first one I've seen since we moved in here 2.5 years ago & Im not sure if it was a paralysis tick or not but mine have all got Advantix or tick collars on again now :rolleyes: .

I usually use some sort of meat roll, windsor or devon, it's available in the cold section of the supermarket, the cheapo own brand version is about $2 for a KG roll, so it's very economical. Also sometimes cheese (but at almost $10/kg it works out alot more expensive ) or left over chopped cold meat etc. Luckily Jarrah will work for almost anything (havent tried mushrooms though :rolleyes: ), but Jonty used to be the fussiest little bugger, he would even turn his nose up at chopped roast chicken . We found he quite liked dried liver but luckily he is over his fussy stage now & is happy to gobble anything down just like Jarrah. As dogdude said, you want something soft so the dog doesnt have to chew & you'll find the best treat is the one your dog works best for . As for the ziwipeak treats, the dogs did like them but they are shockingly expensive & at almost 30% fat you have to be careful to monitor how much they get. I got some at a trial, if I got some more given to me I would use them again, but I wouldnt pay for them .

Paganman, just be aware that some posters on here have a vested interest in what they recommend & what brands they run down, despite what other people say if your dogs do well on it it's never the wrong thing . I fed Jonty on it for a while as a puppy & had no problems with it, I just wanted to get him eating a bit more as he was fussy at the time, so changed to something he seemed to like better.

I know what you mean, I have found the best thing for settling the dog is to get as much sheep time as you can, last week we worked sheep Mon, Wed, Thurs & Friday & it helped him no end, he sailed through his HT on the weekend & I got lots of nice comments on how well he worked. We were also lucky in that I started using him to move the sheep from paddock to yard & move them around in the yards during the week as well, it gave him alot of confidence & it was like he grew up in front of my eyes . I know it's not always easy to get sheep time, but you need to beg, borrow or steal some from someone .

I will reply - but it will just be a rehash of what jesomil & JulesP have said so I'll just make it bulletpoints living on acreage is no excuse for not having adequate fencing, I live on 2.5 acres & we have put up a separate yard around the house & had to put chickenwire on our farm wire fences & block under all the gates to keep our sheltie in. As jesomil has said, he needs more brain work & if he is losing interest in obedience training after such a short length of time he is bored, so teach him some new things & make them interesting And lastly, dont even consider sheep unless you can contain the dogs away from them & you get some lessons on how to work your dog on stock

Indi dog Im reading that one at the moment, mollasseslass let me borrow it from her . He's got lots of interesting stuff in there, I have really enjoyed reading about the "types", not sure that Jarrah fits into one though, possibly a cross between the keen dog & the talented (or maybe less talented ) dog. Congrats on your HIC .

Errr if he keeps wandering out of the gate & followed a car 3kms up the road wouldnt it be easier to make sure that your yard is dog proof so he can't get out? Also, if he's anything like my kelpie & most other working dog breeds that I know, a 2 hr "brisk walk" wont even come close to curbing his enthusiasm, he needs some good off-leash running time plus some serious training to tire him out mentally. Start taking him to obedience or get him involved in some sort of dog sport (there are heaps of them around now) & do lots of exercises to strengthen your position as leader of the pack because at the moment it sounds like you are asking him to do things & he's refusing & getting away with it. It may seem that on the surface if you desex him that will fix the problems, but Im not so sure. Good luck!

there are a couple more of her that you might like as well on the CD, glad you like them .

Greenslopes is near the city, not many obedience classes are that close to the city. The closest CCCQ affiliated clubs to you would be Redlands (at Birkdale) or Southside (at Runcorn). Or possibly Metro (at Chermside). If you want privately run obedience lessons/classes, someone else may have a recommendation.

One more of Abigail doing her run penning the ducks And one of Bell in her B course duck run

OK, here are a couple more Lad in his B course run on sheep What about this one of Abigail? ETA, Im just cutting bits out of bigger pics, the originals probably won't be as exciting .

BTW, somehow my qualie card missed having the trial secretary sign it, was that you?

I've got 256 pics, mostly of your dogs it seems , Abigail's B course duck run was hard, she was so quick it was almost over before you could even get it focused . For the rest some are good ones, some are pretty ordinary, I'll bring you the CD on Thursday. Here are a couple of Rebel

Here are a couple of the pics I took Lad on ducks And Abigail working during her HIT 99/100 run on ducks Hope they arent too big