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Julie I've never been asked for one. Its just I keep mine in the car because I'm supposed to show it everytime we start a new block at training and I always forget it.

Rotten luck - so much work to organise a trial, let alone a quadruple and all down the drain

To be honest I've never been asked for any paperwork, however I have Darcy's folder with me whenever I trial and it has all her paperwork/certificates/height card (agility)/ trial receipts and trial details (times/classes & judges etc). But I'm a trial newbie who is always far too organised VCA membership card is always in my wallet, vaccination card is always in the glovebox of the car because I ALWAYS forget it! Good luck for the trial

She's such a cutie, and I'd love a blonde kelpie, but I'm not ready for another dog for at least another 18 months as mines not much more than a pup herself

As far as I was aware, it would be a NQ (scoring under the 50% required to pass that section). There is a big difference between, as I found out when stewarding a CCD ring and I copied the results over as DQ thinking they were both the same Always worth reading over the rule book I've found, one of our members got DQ'd for something in a games trial a few weeks ago and he shouldn't have been.

Shoey - I would too if I could afford the house prices where I train ;) How bout getting up at 6.20 am on a Sunday morning to drive 45 mins to training.... does that count??? Used to drive an 1 hour 20 mins but found a closer club.... have considered travelling the two hours to Melbourne to go to a highly recommended club but I dunno if I have the stamina for that every week

Welcome to the world of trialling ;) Congrats on your excellent heeling results Pity about the recall but thats trialling for you - you did well!

Ah... what about the extremes you go to get to training? I.e distance travelled? Or is that really starting to reveal addictions?

Can't say that I am - I love agility/jumping and thats always my first priority, but I also did obedience with Darcy til she was old enough to compete in agility. I'll probably enter her in novice obedience a bit later on in the year as she's doing ok with it. Toying with the idea of doing what MrsD is doing, at the moment I only have Darcy, so would let her continue with agility/jumping and get a pup to start with on obedience. But we'll see Don't have a lot of interest in doing anything else at this stage. Wouldn't have minded doing herding earlier on but I find it rather ironic that I have to travel to Melbourne to do that.

I didn't realise it was that basic - I knew it was below CCD standard but I wasn't sure. You'd want it to be basic though - imagine doing all the training required, doing the 2 hours on the day only to have your dog fail the obedience bit at the end

Occasionally in heel work he also does a quick step to the side aswell and then jumps back in close to me as if there is something he is stepping around ?? Darcy does the same thing, mostly in off-lead heeling but also on-lead. In our case I know whats causing it though - our training ground is quite often left too long and then mowed, creating big wind rows of grass. She's not a fan - I think sometimes the grass flicks around your feet and if its windy I'd say she occasionally cops a face-full of grass

And I thought the VCA was strict with only allowing two associate registered dogs

Good luck for your first trial!! Don't forgot to breathe.... at my first trial I reckon I got to the end of the fast pace before I remembered to take a breath Is anyone from your club going? I've been very lucky to have the support of a few competing club members at my first 3 trials - I admire your bravery! I'm too much of a chicken to go by myself Edited to add: I'm not going to Gawler either I'm afraid - Mt Gambier is as far as we wander over the border ;)

Well done Cosmolo, especially to do well in both agility and obedience in one day I find the same thing sometimes Jules. Sundays class was like this, received very minimal feedback except for a silly thing on the sidelines preventing something that my dog doesn't even do and never has Lucky for me one of the people I compete with is always very encouraging, otherwise I'd start to wonder why I was going... Sad how such goings on can put a dampener on an activity that we do for the fun of it ;) BTW Sway - its not called a "blue moon" because of its colour so I don't know what you think you're going to see

Fantastic pictures - captured the essence of a working cattle dog beautifully Without a doubt my favourite breed of dog, would have one in a heartbeat if I was still on the farm.

TO - I had a similar problem with Darcy, she would drop the dumbell and then sit. I taught her a "pick it up" command so that she would pick the dumbell up and offer it to me, so when she dropped it I would ask her to "pick it up" and she would then give it to me, only then would she get rewarded. Took her a few goes but she soon figured out that it was easier to sit and give it to me than drop it and have to pick it up again before her reward

I wouldn't worry about it - funny some of the stuff that you can apparently get in trouble for I would've thought it would've been a disadvantage to the dog if anything, I know a few people are a bit funny about people the dogs know standing close in case they get distracted Pity no-one in authority said anything to the person at Warringal standing near the ring with a squeaky toy

My dog was a bit the same as a youngster, she'd retreive the toy once or twice and then lose interest. I started off just using an ordinary toy, and my only condition was that she retreived it and brought it back, and enjoyed it!. Wasn't worried about the sit or how it looked. I stopped at one retreive and made it a high reward exercise for her. As she enjoyed it more, I added a few more repetitions but always quit while she was still very interested. It is only when she was about 12 months old that I started to shape a trial level retreive with a special toy, and when she got pretty good at that I introduced the dumbell, so she knows the difference between a fun retreive (with a ball) and a trial retreive (with the dumbell).

Darcy is the same - the hackles come up when she's running around with other dogs. Right from her neck down to her rump and even the ring around her tail Amazing how many people get stressed out about it though, thinking she's aggressive, til I explain that its purely an excitement thing for her!

Nice to see I'm not the only one with a dud barker.... only get the occasional low, barely audible warning "wuff" when someone walks across our training grounds at agility.... how dare they!! Does a nice "singing growl" when she's excited though!!

Best thing would be to speak to someone at the club... they will recommend the best class for your pup. One club I went to ran a puppy preschool which is absolute basics and mostly socialisation, that was for 4 weeks then you did puppy class to 6 months or the dog was deemed mature enough to go up into mainstream classes. The club I currently attend has 1 class for puppies til they are 6 months, or 5 months for an advanced pup, and then they go to class 1 which is beginners. Have fun on Sunday

Sorry to butt in... if by chance you were going to recommend someone in Vic LL, I'd love to know who they were cos I reckon I could do with a lesson or two

Links...... Do a search for it, it will come up under drive.... Edited to add Seita beat me to it!

I have a food processor but it was a bit of a slow process given I do about a months raw at a time and freeze it, so I bought a breville 1200W juicer instead. Highly recommend it - so much quicker and easier Used to take me most of the afternoon with the food processor, my first lot of raw through the juicer took 90 mins from start to finish!

Never tried it, and if its that high in fat I won't be. But I find their doggy cool treats really good, and Darcy loves them, but it appears Safeway is no longer stocking them Or if they are, not down here in Western Vic