fetchindawgs Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 W.A. trials were pretty heavy going weatherwise. Still too hot over here, and only a drizzle of rain on Sunday afternoon. Really happy with my kids. Three are in All Age and my youngest Lab. came =5th on Saturday, and my old boy finished. The All Age on Sunday had 23 dogs in it and my Golden girl came 1st, so absolutely thrilled with her, then on Monday, my baby managed to topscore his 2nd run in restricted, but didn't finish his trial. The AA in the afternoon had 18 dogs in it & went well into the evening with my two labs being the final competitors. (Very difficult to see a black dog in the dark !!!!!). The Golden and my old boy both finished, but the young Lab. went out on her last run (I couldn't see her go the wrong way). Ended up with the old boy getting 2nd place (he turned 11 yrs old today), and the Golden came 5th. Pretty happy with those results. RS enjoyed herself with Ruby, by the looks of it, even firing the gun over her for some practice retrieves. It was a great weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rubyroo Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 Congrats FHRP, Im so excited for you!! :D the drive was definately worth it. and FD, what a weekend you had, fantastic results. I have never seen that many entries in AA over here in NSW, no wonder you finished in the dark! We had a great weekend, lots of improvements with my boy, which was great and some nice comments made about his work. We managed to finish all 3 runs in restricted on Sat, but unfortunately were DQ'd after the end of the 3rd run. Chomping a bird in the middle of the creek wasnt a highlight! And the weekend didnt improve from there, nice work but birds, well?? I still had a ball and am learning a heck of alot. It was great catching up with everyone and Im so pleased so many of you in Novice finished your trial, I was really pleased for you all, great work!! Looking forward to the next trial. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted April 26, 2011 Author Share Posted April 26, 2011 W.A. trials were pretty heavy going weatherwise. Still too hot over here, and only a drizzle of rain on Sunday afternoon. Really happy with my kids. Three are in All Age and my youngest Lab. came =5th on Saturday, and my old boy finished.The All Age on Sunday had 23 dogs in it and my Golden girl came 1st, so absolutely thrilled with her, then on Monday, my baby managed to topscore his 2nd run in restricted, but didn't finish his trial. The AA in the afternoon had 18 dogs in it & went well into the evening with my two labs being the final competitors. (Very difficult to see a black dog in the dark !!!!!). The Golden and my old boy both finished, but the young Lab. went out on her last run (I couldn't see her go the wrong way). Ended up with the old boy getting 2nd place (he turned 11 yrs old today), and the Golden came 5th. Pretty happy with those results. RS enjoyed herself with Ruby, by the looks of it, even firing the gun over her for some practice retrieves. It was a great weekend. Well done on your 1st and your other placings!! I saw some very lovely work on the weekend, quite inspiring stuff Ruby and I had fun. They were awfully long days for her in the car all day with only a few toilet breaks in between, but she was such a good girl and didn't make a fuss of being "neglected". To make it up to her, we did some practice retrieves this morning with the thrower and gun, but used dummies as I haven't done enough birdy work with her yet to let her loose on a pigeon without me being within reach. She thoroughly enjoyed it (and I did too!!!!) She is such a good girl, she allows me to worry about getting the gun thing right by being steady and only going when told, so one less thing to worry about while I fumble! Hope the steadiness doesn't disappear once we start trialling I'm really looking forward to giving this retrieving trialling thing a crack at some stage. It is too much fun to keep sitting on the sidelines Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 W.A. trials were pretty heavy going weatherwise. Still too hot over here, and only a drizzle of rain on Sunday afternoon. Really happy with my kids. Three are in All Age and my youngest Lab. came =5th on Saturday, and my old boy finished.The All Age on Sunday had 23 dogs in it and my Golden girl came 1st, so absolutely thrilled with her, then on Monday, my baby managed to topscore his 2nd run in restricted, but didn't finish his trial. The AA in the afternoon had 18 dogs in it & went well into the evening with my two labs being the final competitors. (Very difficult to see a black dog in the dark !!!!!). The Golden and my old boy both finished, but the young Lab. went out on her last run (I couldn't see her go the wrong way). Ended up with the old boy getting 2nd place (he turned 11 yrs old today), and the Golden came 5th. Pretty happy with those results. RS enjoyed herself with Ruby, by the looks of it, even firing the gun over her for some practice retrieves. It was a great weekend. Congratulations What a wonderful weekend of retrieving - you must be over the moon Geez you've had an endless Summer!!! Thanks for the run down on the trial....just so everyone knows I always enjoy hearing all the details of individual retrieves so if you feel like posting them please do! Glad you had a good time too, RS :D Congrats FHRP, Im so excited for you!! the drive was definately worth it. and FD, what a weekend you had, fantastic results. I have never seen that many entries in AA over here in NSW, no wonder you finished in the dark!We had a great weekend, lots of improvements with my boy, which was great and some nice comments made about his work. We managed to finish all 3 runs in restricted on Sat, but unfortunately were DQ'd after the end of the 3rd run. Chomping a bird in the middle of the creek wasnt a highlight! And the weekend didnt improve from there, nice work but birds, well?? I still had a ball and am learning a heck of alot. It was great catching up with everyone and Im so pleased so many of you in Novice finished your trial, I was really pleased for you all, great work!! Looking forward to the next trial. All you can ask for is improvement Sounds like he is going great guns (pardon the pun!) Bugger about the chomping but I'm sure you'll come up with something. In a retrieving trial free Victoria we had a great day at agility on Sunday! However, LL suggested I get Mr TSD to do some more walking singles with the pigeons last night and Em went completely bug-eyed She lost every ounce of self-control and broke on every mark - not that it worried me at all as her enthusiasm was awesome and that's all that matters at the moment. She was seriously unimpressed when Mr TSD tossed her a dummy in the second set but we ignored her until she finally decided to pick it up and bring it back. I immediately lined her up for a bird as a reward so she didn't think it was TOO bad. Today, LL and I met up again.....3 walking singles (pigeons) for Em in very low cover and she was too smart for her own good - ran really hard and was parading her bird to LL before she brought it back to me. Gave her a rest whilst the other dogs worked on blinds then LL decided to see how she went in some cover - Em ran hard out to the birds - had to hunt around quite a bit for the first one but she was much quicker to pick up the next two. She enjoyed herself immensely and we decided to leave it at that. Lots of zoomies in lovely, sticky mud so I now have a very tired liver and grey (:D) Springer asleep on my feet! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mollipop Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 Also had a great weekend. My girl got 3 birds on each day and improved over the weekend. We were so lucky with the weather. Apparently it was wet all weekend in Sydney but we were spared - just some very light drizzle. Glad you survived Charlie, FHRP. What great experience for you. Loved watching WO driving your little red car. Great to see you again, Rubyroo. Didn't get to see your boy work most days but sounds like he's making great progress. Your weekend sounded full on, Fetchin. I trialled with your Dascha over the weekend. She is looking good and working really well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 26, 2011 Share Posted April 26, 2011 Sounds like you had a great weekend too mollipop Well done! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted April 26, 2011 Author Share Posted April 26, 2011 Just wanted to share a photo that someone took of me and Ruby this morning doing a few practice retrieves. Hope she doesn't mind me sharing the photo, I think her name is fetchitup on here Thanks for taking some photos for me I love this photo because Ruby looks so happy and pleased with herself after a successful retrieve, and I look quite happy with her, too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fetchindawgs Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 As requested here are some details of the runs from our Easter trials. All Age on Saturday. Run one: Blind, Mark and doublefall (Lost five dogs on this run, mostly picking up the wrong bird). Run two: Triple mark, with the second mark being a wounded pigeon and dragged back and angled away from the fall. Total span between all three marks was 90 degrees with a strong wind blowing across from right to left & pickup being left bird, middle bird, wounded game. (three dogs lost here). Run three: Mark and blind both requiring long swims. No dogs were lost on this run. Day two, Sunday, All Age: Run one: Mark and blind with nono bird. Blind was straight ahead & longer than the mark. Mark was to left of blind line, and nono bird was to the right of the blind line. Total span between all three birds was about 45 degrees. (five dogs lost) Run two: Triple mark with a walkup on the first mark which landed across the river; second mark thrown immediately on fall of first bird & landed in the river about 30 to 40 metres from first bird. Third mark was long and dogs had to negotiate fallen timber then go out into open ground to retrieve. One dog lost here. Run three: Mark, doublefall and two bird, all requiring swimming. Span between all three was less than 90 degrees. For this run you fired at a mark & sent the dog. As it was about halfway across the river a doublefall was thrown from the same position as the mark thrower, but this bird landed in the water at the banks edge and slightly to the dogs left. After getting the mark and swimming back to handler, a two bird was thrown to fall at the edge of the same bank as the d/fall, amongst branches, and about 30 metres from the d/fall bird. Dogs had to get the d/fall then the 2 bird. (8 dogs went out here). Day three, Monday. Novice. obviously three single marks, but we had some fog and sighting of the first mark may have been difficult for some. It wasn't terribly easy but most got it. I judged the second run, being the water run. This had a mark on the opposite river bank and required a pretty good swim. The last run was a land run and had some obstacles. Restricted: Run one: Double mark. one long and one short mark, with almost 90 degrees between. Run two: Mark, doublerise. Quite a long run with a high mark falling into light cover with d/rise placed just behind. Run three: Blind and mark. Both across water with the mark as first pickup. All Age: Run one: Triple mark. First into water with fallen timber all around it. Next two pickups, dog was out of sight of handler. Again, less than 90 degrees between the three marks. Run two: Blind, doublerise and mark and nono bird. Mark was landing in the river about 40 degrees off the line to the blind, with a nono bird placed about 20 metres right of the line to the blind. Run three: Blind and walkup mark. Mark thrown high to land in the river but totally out of sight of the handler. This was first pickup. Blind was left of the mark. Hope this gives an idea, I'll see if I can upload some photos later on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted April 27, 2011 Author Share Posted April 27, 2011 Thanks for the descriptions, fetchindawgs. It's nice to hear them described because it starts to make more sense for me reading about it after having watched most of those runs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 Thanks for the write up fetchindawgs - much appreciated. Some really tight angles and conditions there! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 Very nice pic RS - made me think of the book title: "Don't shoot the dog!" While we are posting pics a couple that LL just pulled off her camera from aaaaages ago. Slacker And one from the other day. All 3 of LL's camera batteries were flat (we tried one after the other ) so I took this on my mobile phone. Little Em's first birdy... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted April 27, 2011 Author Share Posted April 27, 2011 Nawwww she's so cute with her first birdy I love seeing photos of the retrieving dogs! Here's another couple of photos of Ruby from the weekend. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FHRP Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 Great photos!!! RubyStar, you're looking very professional The only photo's I managed on the weekend at the retrieving trial was of this cute little guy. OMG I got so puppy clucky!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 27, 2011 Share Posted April 27, 2011 What's one more..... Very cute indeed ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RubyStar Posted April 27, 2011 Author Share Posted April 27, 2011 Gosh he's a cutie! I'm always puppy clucky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fetchindawgs Posted April 28, 2011 Share Posted April 28, 2011 Thanks for the write up fetchindawgs - much appreciated. Some really tight angles and conditions there! Wasn't too bad actually. The dogs handled it really well. Two of the runs from Sunday's AA were pretty tight (the first and third), & one on the Monday was, too. But you get used to it in All Age. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fetchindawgs Posted April 28, 2011 Share Posted April 28, 2011 This is my young Lab. bitch in action on Monday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fetchindawgs Posted April 28, 2011 Share Posted April 28, 2011 And my 11 yr old boy in the first run on Monday. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted April 29, 2011 Share Posted April 29, 2011 Lovely pics - your older lad is in great condition! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Spotted Devil Posted May 1, 2011 Share Posted May 1, 2011 Another training update.... LL and I went out to a farm yesterday. Set up a triple mark for her dogs with the bumper boys and Em and I worked off each one for some (shorter) single marks. It was relatively light cover for an advanced dog but harder work for Little Em who is used to seeing the dummies land on the oval. I sent her for a second dummy from the same bumper boy but she wasn't keen on hunting in the same ground - just shows how much emphasis we've placed on retrieving on fresh ground. No dramas at all but just gives us something else to work on (found a good drill for that!) We had one of the dummies landing between 2 of the bumper boys and she wasn't very keen on picking that up at first so I made it simpler by spending some time around the bumper boys whilst I re-loaded them and then sending her at a better angle - she was much happier and it was an opportunity to work through the novelty of the situation. Em had a rest and then I worked her at 4 positions "around the clock" on one of the bumper boys. That went really, really well - she was super focussed and full of confidence - was nice and steady, marked the fall, straight out, persistent hunting and straight back. Another rest and then we pulled out the pigeons to work on Em's latest trick of parading the birds to LL instead of bringing them straight back. Started with some restrained recalls (LL restraining, me running and calling like a crazy woman and the reward was a bird thrown behind me), then restrained by LL -> fetching up a bird thrown by LL -> me running and calling like a crazy woman and throwing another bird behind me. Played the '2 food game' with a pair of pigeons (those poor birds have had an absolute pounding ) but I could see she was getting tired so called it a day. An excellent day Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now