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There is no excuse for putting down a litter of easily rehomable 4 week old Cavalier puppies - it is a waste of time, resources, and much more. I'm not for 'no kill' but surely this was just needless? A behavioural assessment failed at four weeks?? The worst part is not communicating with the foster carer or informing her what had happened to the puppies and bitch she had been caring for for weeks. Tha sooner the RSPCA has to answer to somebody, the better in my opinion.

The thing is if the lead gets caught and she gets frightened/pulls something onto herself she could end up more fearful/nervous than she began. When you are holding a lead your body isn't giving your dog the same picture it would usually be giving to take an obstacle because you are trying to hold a lead out of the way. Do you do clicker training? With Trixie I shaped each obstacle individually until it was reliable and then started sequencing them - this made a big difference compared to my older dog who was taught with repetition of sequences - I understand most classes make this hard but instructors are usually happy for you to at least bring a clicker in? If you had a clicker you could use it to build value in the equipment. Shaping success is a good book to read if you want more info/reasoning on shaping the obstacles first. Good luck with your girl and welcome to agility, it is a very fun, rewarding, and at times frustrating sport :D :laugh:

I have a tunnel loper now too, sigh - when she started trialing she was so enthusiastic about tunnels she would run up the sides and move them if they weren't stretched out properly - might try the restrained recall idea - good one

Thought so - thanks Kavik :)

Great video Tony - he looks very confident. Have you been training the SG Handling360 system? I watched her videos about it last night - found them quite good (and much higher budget / fancier than the agility videos of old - haha). Is she doing an online course or something? How are people learning it? (Apart from the ones who went to the SG seminars last year) How have you found it if you are learning it?

Not sure why there is such emphasis on a terrier being harder to contain - mine have never attempted to escape and they are left alone in a backyard a lot as we work full time. Did you want a dog to go into burrows? If so Tenties aren't really meant for that hence the longer legs - more for chasing. Maybe a shorter legged breed would suit that if that's what you were after. I'm not sure why people seem to be trying to talk you out of having a terrier on a rural property ratting/mousing? That's what they are designed for! My dogs would love that opportunity. Would you also advise people not to put a Border Collie on sheep?

Yeah another great breed which isn't around enough these days - love them.

A lot of the Tentie breeders I know here wouldn't have a problem with it to be honest.

I have a Tenterfield Terrier - he was shown a mouse once as a puppy and his switch flicked - he is never wrong and we always know when there are rodents nearby because he hunts them obsessively - he has disposed of rats that were probably 2-3 times the size of his head - he grabs them - crunches and shakes and spits them out and is instantly looking for the next - he is very efficient and fast! Tenterfields are a hardy sturdy dog that needs little maintenance other than a nail clip - they like to be with you but not on you - are independent and I know some who live outside - not my preference though. Some of them can be anxious and highly strung though so I'd select lines carefully and meet a lot of dogs. Chooks might be okay depending on the dog - but a major cause of death in Tenties is being bitten while attacking snakes. They were bred specifically for the purpose you require really. I have a truckie friend who is onto his second Tentie - the dog travels everywhere with him in his Semi doing runs all over the state. They lived on a station in the outback and both of their Tenties were fine with chooks and ducks, the issue they had was that the dogs wanted to get the Bungarras - probably not a problem for you! For temperament I'd probably go a JRT over a Tentie as a pet but I don't have one so can't speak of their ratting abilities - I do know my old neighbours had two of them and they said they would lay on the couch just watching mice run around the room - that definitely would not happen in my house :laugh: I also have a Manchester Terrier who was apparently bred for serious ratting but she's not the sharpest tool in the shed (prefers to run around with the rat the other dog has killed) and there is no way a Mannie could live outside - they are very attached to their people, and have very little coat.

Very sorry to hear about your beautiful girl Life isn't fair sometimes

What area are you in Birkat?

How horrific :(

Ah that's good!! Yep cost me an expensive specialist vet visit once after the referring vet thought he had a spinal injury - now I feed him some oil and give him a few hours to see if it makes him come good- always does haha Amazing how sooky they can get

Could be anything - my dog has those same symptoms when he has eaten something that is giving him a stomach ache or is constipated. Hope it is nothing bad and she is okay

2013 hasn't been a particularly good training year, I trained less, wagged a lot, didn't have a lot of motivation and was generally distracted by 'real life'! Still we scraped through it, feeling a lot better about 2014 though I will have a wedding to distract me I feel like it may be a better year dog training wise! No titles, but did gain some quallies - in Strategic Pairs (which was quite fun! Ran with Kyzer and my OH) got some lovely SDX passes and placed well, got a Gamblers pass, we have very few games trials in WA. She managed a few ADM passes which were on tricky courses I didn't think we could do - haha, and racked up a few JDM passes, our favourite class. I guess handling is getting better - need to work on it more though, but we are getting better at communicating. Kyzer was handed over to my OH halfway through this year to give him something to do at trials, and see if I was the cause of his ring stress. Unfortunately the stress is still there and he is still very up and down but we have some plans to combat it this year. They managed 2 JDM quallies including a 1st place, which is pretty good since the poor newbie handler was thrown straight into Masters haha

It's blind cross galore over here in wa! Some dogs love it, haven't seen many having significant issues but that's because it's mainly the more advanced confident handlers doing them anyway. People are blind crossing jumps, weavers, everything! Pretty much everyone here blind crosses tunnels but I don't think that counts because the dog essentially sees the same picture as they come out of the tunnel as they would if you front crossed.

Do you actually have fleas? If not, I wouldn't be putting chemicals on the dog if there is no need, my dogs haven't had flea treatments for years and haven't had a flea in that time despite always being at dog grounds etc.

There are some working line Cockers in Perth, they just bred a litter, I believe the owners brought the dogs with them when they moved from the UK or a similar place perhaps. They may even be the user who commented on the previous page from WA :laugh: They do retrieving and agility with them.

Mine don't care one bit about storms despite being a bit anxious in general life - when they were pups I made an effort to go outside and play with them / be silly / throw the ball when storms were coming - seems to have done the trick.

http://www.cdc.gov/animalimportation/rabies-free-countries.html http://www.cdc.gov/animalimportation/dogs.html You can import her into the US without the Rabies vac but you'll need to get it done there and confine her for 30 days from what this site says.

I think you'll find the darker fur is his new coat coming through and is his natural coat colour, the lighter fur has just been bleached from the sun. He's a very handsome boy :)

Hey that's awesome! My OH has just started running my older dog (who is in Masters - bit of a baptism of fire for the poor handler hahah) they got a JDM qually and first in height last weekend - you can probably relate to this - I find it terrifying to watch them! I get so nervous before they run, far more nervous than when I am running! :laugh: What's with that!

Yep I've had plenty of fur things from Clean Run and they have always made it through quarantine.

Take them both, if nothing else it's a great experience and good to get them used to things like the nationals :D

Yes the last day will be finals, you will have to qualify to win a place in them. Yes you could enter all of the open classes on the second day - so six runs, if you wanted to. Yep just the two classes for you on day 1.