The Spotted Devil

I was away for 2 months last year and the dogs went completely nuts when I arrived home. Mr TSD picked me up from the airport (in my car) - Em was much quicker to twig that it was me I think. Zig barked his "who's there!!!" bark whereas Em flew up on the lounge (where she can see me coming up the stairs) so hard she smashed it into the wall. One of my cats was wrapped around my neck purring within seconds, another just could not stop trotting and squeaking at me in delight whilst Dizzy just sat and stared for about 5 mins in absolute astonishment before head butting me half to death. Same happened when I was away for nearly 7 weeks at the start of this year - except I think Em had even more training withdrawals than I did judging by her warp speed response when I took her out. When I unpack my suitcases I get a lot of help :D

I can tell you love retrieving. It sticks out a mile in your posts :-) When you say gundog, do you mean breed or one that's been trained under a gun? Are you retrieving actual game that's been shot in the retrieving trials? This dog sports business is a whole new world to me & I'm getting a bit fascinated by it all! :laugh: I am rather transparent! Yes, what everyone else said is spot on. We are lucky here that any dog from group 3 (gundogs) can compete in retrieving trials - not so in the US where it's only the official "retrievers". It does help if your gundog has a good amount of retrieving instinct but it is a complex sport. When we train we use "dummies" but when we trial we shoot over them (with blanks) at dead game. The latter sends my Springer through the roof in terms of motivation - it's amazing the difference it makes. I will get there with tracking one day Tassie!!! My goal is to focus on tracking when I retire Zig from agility - that won't be anytime soon though!

Tracking is something I'd love to do with Zig one day! Yes, FOO is brilliant - I went a few times with Ziggy and it gave me the confidence I needed to enter a trial. Where are you based BR? Maybe we can point you in the right direction...? Retrieving is awesome :D I was hooked the first time I ran a very generous DOLer's dog - first in training and then in a trial. You do need a gundog...and being slightly addicted to the sport helps too :laugh:

Whoa!!!! That's awesome Sway!!! Huge congratulations to all - what a mighty little dog

:laugh:

Ah! I feed Zig outside first and when he's done Em gets to go out and have hers. They are pretty respectful of each other but if I feed them together I will supervise. Zig can only have chicken or turkey anyway. Both dogs have really good teeth. Oh, and they are both gutses :D My Burmese cats have been eating chicken necks every 2nd day for years - at 8 and 9 years old I'm about to have their teeth cleaned for the first time....I've now started them on daily chicken necks.

I feed frozen chicken frames as the standard teeth clean. Em has lamb necks on occasion. If they need a little more meat I'll give them 1/4 raw chicken (wing quarter). Sometimes I can't get frames so will freeze a handful of wings together. Turkey wings are pretty awesome if you can get them.

I'm certainly happy with her progress but it's tough to get the balance just right in training...there's always something I've neglected...like memory marks today! It's been suggested to me that I should consider the National next year....once we've got some AA runs under our belt of course I've put my name down to steward at this year's Nats....not sure if I can manage the State trial too as that's the weekend before and the weekend before that is a trial so a lot of commitment in a short time. When Em's had a few days off, she will get up to more mischief around the house (hoarding cat toys, wallets, mobile phones, wrestling with Ziggy and Dizzy the cat), retrieve small gheckos and break into the back area to go hunting. Nightmare she is! Actually I got excited when Em started breaking on known blinds. Just went back to some steady feet games away from retrieves and give a NRM if she broke after that. She would pull herself up and race back into position which was pretty funny. With lining issues I would just go back to wagon wheels. Today, whilst I was waiting for Mr TSD to get in position I played with heeling on the spot as it has been a bit crappy in training - turns out I was giving her a slightly different physical cue than when we do obedience work and as soon as I fixed that she was a different dog Bloody snakes...clearly you get them pretty bad?

Yes, definitely a few minutes here and there every day is more effective than big blocks. I tend to think that the more experienced you get as a handler, the higher your expectations (especially thinking beyond the first few titles) and the older your dog when they first hit the ring! That said, it's hard to know when to hit the ring, particularly if you're a new handler. Take video of your training, review it critically, keep a training diary, enlist the help of experienced competitors (on this forum too - post videos on You Tube for us!) and get along to trials to watch and steward when you can. Keep an eye out for smooth handlers who are calm when things go wrong - watch and learn! When you do take the plunge remember that the relationship between you and your dog is THE most important thing. And it's perfectly acceptable to make at least 100 mistakes with your first trialling dog...you won't make the same mistakes with your 2nd and 3rd dogs but you will probably make different ones :laugh: I mostly do agility with both dogs and retrieving with Em. Zig does obedience when I have time and Em will return to it when retrieving is less of a focus.

It's pretty nice rubyroo - our camping holidays revolve around finding good places for the dogs to train/run and great places for us to eat :D I don't have acres at home on which to train either so I'm constantly on the look out for a pond or bit of cover or a hill to work on a concept. Known blinds sound like they are going well - it's so nice to see that penny drop! We arrived home Friday night so didn't do anything with the dogs on Saturday except to give them a good sprint up the back. Mr TSD helped me out today....Em was off her nut after 2 days off. Started with a double mark across very heavy cover (landing in clear ground). Go to mark (right) was great, memory mark was ok. Had Mr TSD move so the memory mark was to the left through heavy cover and the go to mark was through a pond. Great line on the over water mark and memory mark was better although not brilliant. Moved again to 2 ponds for a single cheaty mark - thrown into the middle of the 2nd pond it drifted right to the far edge. The only time I had to remind Em to take the line was when she hit the land between the 2 ponds - very pleased with her effort. I decided that was plenty so just finished with a double mark on land to warm her up as it was a bit of a hike back to the car. Ran it with memory to the right this time - go to mark was great with a nice angled line down the slope. There were lots of distractions with white rubbish lying around for the memory (I should have tidied them up) but she pushed past them to find the dummy.

In other species, there have been studies that looked at the bond between siblings... it involved cross-fostering at birth and then reintroduction. There were effects of both relatedness and familiarity on aggressive encounters. Introductions on one dog's territory would complicate matters. I have had siblings in puppy games class and all they want to do is play together....there is also the aspect of similar playing styles. It makes for great distraction training anyway :D

Drove back to Wenworth today, had a delicious brunch then headed out to the sand hills again. Mr TSD threw multiple single marks in moderate but dense cover and we had her crossing a small tributary and a track. It took some work to get her mind off bunnies and on the dummies but then she marked everything really well, and at supersonic speed :laugh: Little devil has an insatiable appetite for running - we let her do that for a good 40 min up and down the sand hills and she only slowed down when I put a leash on her!

Another trip to the pond yesterday before an afternoon of wine tasting and lunch! Set up 3 cold blinds and threw an easy mark first....first blind was up the middle of the pond with a decent run to entry and a small run to exit. I wanted her to really see the choices and be tempted to cheat. 3 handles to get her there (a tempting sand bar pulled her off line) and 1 to keep her in the water coming back. Next two were fairly simple land retrieves....second blind I lined her poorly so it took a long right to pick it up. Third blind was better from me but the contours dragged her right so it took a couple of casts to get her to the dummy. I put a video on YouTube but it doesn't look half as good as it did on the iPad. Dogs lazed in the sun (actually Em spent the entire time bird watching) and gave them a good gallop at a local park later on.

I use these collapsible bowls in wire crates - not great for puppies but perfect for the adult dogs: http://www.cleanrun.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=product.display&Product_ID=3197&ParentCat=545 Zig won a Cruiser bowl - it's fantastic for the car.

2o/2o for Zig for everything - I worked hard to get him super confident on the full height see saw (poor equipment at trials spooked him badly) and then it was the wee saw. He still respects it - and, as he is very body sensitive and has reasonable rear end awareness, I've let him do what feels most comfortable. Em does a drop 2o/2o - I taught it as a nose touch stand but this seems to suit her and she's developed her own style. She has a different body shape which might explain it....concentrating on jumping rather than agility at the moment so not much contact training.

Yeh, good luck with that

Went back to the pond this morning....well it felt like morning but I suspect it was after midday Had Mr TSD throwing marks about 2/3 the length in the same place each time and I progressively increased the entry distance. First one was easy, second one was good in terms of not cheating but quite dreadful in terms of being distracted by the ducks landing right in front of her (little turd :laugh: ) and the third one was excellent. The wind picked up on the third one so it drifted just about to the shore line - she needed one handle to keep her in the water coming back. Let her run around to dry off and she was straight back in the water so had Mr TSD throw some single land marks using some very small hills...really mixed up distance, angle, direction etc. First 3 were spot on. Final one was a bit crappy....suspect the ducks took her attention for a split second and she didn't mark it properly. Hunted a bit short, then went wide but realised it was where she thought it was and hunted it up. After lunch and coffee we dove towards Red Cliffs for wine tasting and gave the dogs a huge swim and run at Karadoc Sand Bar, right on the Murray. Beautiful.

We drove to Wentworth today and it was straight to the tourist info centre to find out where we could exercise the dogs :laugh: Gave them a huge run at the Perry Sandunes and then combined some sight seeing with a few drills at the Murray-Darling junction - left/right backs, a couple of two birds and half a wagon wheel. Lots of selection practice! Em was red dirt from head to tail so finished off with a double mark in the river....pretty much the only way to keep her mind off the beautiful local birdlife!

Not if MUP has anything to do with it. Lol Rozzie. Your family legacy is a canned fruit factory which you now manage because your parents are ill and you also dabble in scrap booking. Ain't that the truth Rozzie! How does one "dabble" in scrapbooking? :laugh: Priceless MUP :D

Jane Kingsbury. I'm thinking Lady Jane Kingsbury :D

Playing tug so the dog is using its hindquarters is also effective as is balancing on hind legs, begging, perch work etc. I do those with Zig in particular as he is very much a "front wheel drive dog" - not something I want in agility as it makes them more prone to injury. Also swimming with a life jacket on encourages him to use his hind legs.

Em had energy to burn and there's nowhere safe to let her run free without risking the local bird life so we took her to an open park on the way back to our campsite to run T-drills. Started with left and right back to a pile - decent distance me to Em to pile. Dropped another dummy and set Em up between that and the pile. Threw a dummy just over her head and asked her to take a long right cast instead. She wanted to go back very badly so just stopped, 'leave' and cast right again. Repeat to the left. Then sent her for the dummy straight in front (the one she had to leave) and again for the double rise. One dummy left on the original pile at quite a distance so sent her for that. She picked it up and flew back - about half way I stopped her and treated it as a land version of a swim by. She thought I was NUTS :laugh: but pulled it off without too much trouble. Hopefully she will sleep well tonight!

If my first day away on holiday is spent scouting around for training grounds for Em, does that mean I'm obsessed? Found a super pond - longish, not to wide and perfect to practice longer cheaty swims. Mr TSD threw progressively longer marks until she was swimming the full length and back again. Only one stop and right cast back needed when she thought about taking an easy way but she did well. Did a couple of double falls on land to warm her up. 7 retrieves all up and it barely took the edge off her! At least Mr TSD's throwing arm is working well.....despite having to juggle holding Zig at the same time. That's quite a handicap :D

Congratulations Tassie The old girl's got a bit left in her alright! Yeh, Kirra

Little rascal! Once they throw it up I tend not to worry. One of my cats ate a cupcake pan (it had nice bits of muffin attached) the other day and I just popped her in the outdoor enclosure to eat some grass. About 30 min before dinner she started licking her lips...gave me heaps of warning! Threw it up and then ate dinner no problem. Her Mama ate some string unbeknownst to me some years back and, whilst she threw it up, had a very raw and sensitive tummy for a few days. On vet advice I starved her for 24 hours then started her on steamed chicken and rice. My Dally ate a plastic bag (fishy flavoured!) at the beach when he was younger - whipped him straight to the vet for an emetic. Threw up everything and was immediately fine. Did the same thing a week later but apparently a second trip to the vet taught him a lesson and he never did it again.