Funny Stories About Trialling Or Training.

[pawsaroundoz]

Ok here are two funny stories...

In Utility with my 1st Obediance dog Wellington (way way back) - the Utility ring was set up almost next door to the bbq, Wellington went off on his seek back lost article, working very nicely when he got the scent of the bbq, trotted out the ring managing to give good impression of still working, dashed up to back of bbq and pinched a sausage, ate it on the move, found the seek back article and bought it to me.....

In a novice trial a few years later with Rocky....on way in to ring Roacky spied a lovely big fat vanilla slice someone had dropped or forgotten, I didn't see it at that time though, it was outside the ring and sort of behind the centre line of the ring.

Rocky is sitting on a pass, we get to recall, I leave him at other end of ring, walk back down, turn and on judges direction call my dog, who flies in straight as an arrow until about 2 steps from me he ducks past, scoops up said vannilla slice and comes back to sit in front of me with vanilla slice all over his face....

My dogs do know how to make me turn a lovely shade of red !

Annie and her boyz

[whatevah]

I had Moses in his first CCD trial, it was restricted to gundogs. They are doing a group sit stay and suddenly all the dogs turn their heads to the left. There was a retrieve of a dumbell in the next ring. They all stayed though. I have made lots of handler mistakes such as exiting the ring by jumping over the rope. On the recall exercise I forget there was a lead up and left my dog behind, but they told me to bring the dog with me. Once I called my dog by his name in a recall instead of calling "come" but they knew it was me making a silly mistake and it was okay. I also forgot to take my dumbell into the ring but was allowed to go and get it. Whilst heeling Moses saw discs on the ground and was looking at them. During CCD at Geelong the first dog in the ring dropped the heavy artillery right next to the figure of 8, it was cleaned up, and we were last dog in. Moses being the sensitive dog that he is flared right out and refused to walk in the particular area.

[Lablover]

This is a horrible thread.......disclosing OUR (mere human) mistakes. I am a firm believer, with a good dog, it is more often than not, our training mistakes. Teach teach teach teach!!!!!!

All the same, one of my long lasting memories was my first dedicated retriever "game" labradors. Cracker, now 13 years of age.........where did all the years go????????

There was a blind (hidden retrieve) across a vast water channel. As the normal sequence goes...we leave the dog at a designated spot (at a stay or wait or sit, whatever cue has been taught). The handler proceeds to the starting pegs, fires a blank, and when steadiness is shown, calls the dog to heel.

Cracker races to my side, glances up to the direction I am facing, and takes off swimming without a direction. Goodness she was a great trialling dog. Never got full control of that one. LOL.

[whatevah]

Josh at his first retrieving trial. He hears the gun and waits for my signal, he does a fantastic water entry with lots of enthusiam he sees the pidgeon but keeps on swimming looking for his toy.

[Guest Clover]

Reading all these stories is one of the reasons i love training with dogs, you just never know what they are going to do .

At a 2 day Flyball comp in Qland last year Elvis had a 'dumb' moment. The dog running before him had a rubber ball put in the box for some reason..she spat it out strait away and it was right next to the box on the ground.

Elvis ran after her, got his rubber ball and then saw the other rubber ball on the ground so stopped to pick it up. It took him a good minute of scrambling around on the ground (In the mud) trying to pick up this second ball, when he eventually got both balls in his mouth he came flying back, but forgot to come back over the jumps. If he had of come back over the jumps it would have been a clean run. I was too busy laughing to care though, and the boy got a judges prize for it .

[Delaforce]

This is a great thread.

Well my OH use to trial a border collie that came off the farm. Ben was a bit of a boy, well he thought he was anyway.

At one particular trial in Open, Ian threw the dumbell over the high jump at about this same time a competitor was walking past the top of the ring with her female GSD. On the command fetch, Ben took off with great enthusiam, over the jump past the dumbell, out of the ring, said "hi" to Inca the GSD the way all male dogs do nose under tail.

At the direction of the judge Ian called Ben, he immediately turned around came back picking up the dumbell on the way, over the jump and a perfect sit in front. He then completed the finish and scored a bit fat 0. 2 weeks later Inca the GSD came into season!

Then there was a utility trial, located in a semi rural area. The trials grounds were a large beautiful oval with no fence, across the road was a paddock with sheep (remember Ben is a farm bred BC)

When we arived the sheep were directly opposite the Utility ring so heres hoping Ben is on after lunch & the sheep move. As the day wore on the sheep slowly moved down the paddock out of sight and everything looked good.

Lunch break and still everything looks good, Bens time to go in the ring and yep you guessed it the sheep were back in sight. I decided to slowly move in a direction where I thought I might be needed.

Ian is going through the exercises, seek back, speak on command, scent discrimination, then the send away and away he went, sheep in sight past the marker, out the ring and headed full bore to the sheep.

To get to the sheep he had to cross a road where the speed limit was 80kph so that is why I had decided to move to a spot where I might be needed. As he had now left the ring I called him and he came to me hitting my legs in the process.

Ian then called him and yeah back he went, on the command sit he sat and was directed over the jump which he did and yes another big fat 0.

Unfortuanely our dear BEN is no longer with us but boy has he left us with some wonderful stories and the best laughs

Ben went on to be an Australian Obedience Champion and back in those days is was made up of Obedience and Tracking titles

[Astro Boy 2]

Thanks guys for your funny stories, and us mere humans are not to blame for all our friends silly behaviours. Some of them are just plain naughty

Another training session gone wrong, i was training Sadie on some land near the Ballarat Airport with some friends. We were doing a recall, when i called, she came running in to me, then veered out to the right, put her nose on the ground and she was off! The thing with Sadie is once her nose goes on the ground, she turns DEAF! There i was calling her, then running after her (again), everyone came to help. By that stage the grass was so long, all we could see was the stern of her tail every now and then as she leapt through the grass. Planes were landing and taking off everywhere. Well, what seemed like hours we finally got her back, but i could see myself carrying my much beloved friend into the vets yelling HELP! MY DOGS JUST BEEN HIT BY A PLANE! (Glad i can laugh about it now because i wasn't laughing then)

[FHRP]

Love all the stories, so glad to know we aren't alone

At a retrieving trial on the last run in a Novice stake my boy struggled to find the bird that was across the river. After lots of hunting along the bank he finally picked up the 'bird' and the judge commented that it took him a while, but he got it. I was thinking to myself that I didn't mark that very well because it wasn't where I thought it was!! When my dog entered the river to return I could make out that his 'bird' was in fact an empty plastic water bottle He delivered it beautifully to hand without a mark

At a breed specialty obedience trial I threw the dumbell which managed to roll out of the ring and the judge told me to send the dog before it even stopped! I sent Flynn who went over the solid, under the ring rope and continued on to the stewards tabe which had the food for food refusal sitting on it ;) Thankfully he didn't eat the food, but returned, back over the jump, without the dumbbell

I've also gone to set my dog up in front of the last jump instead of the first jump at an agility trial

Enough embarassment for one thread

[mollipop]

My old girl (now 14 years) set a record for the shortest time ever in the Obedience ring. She went straight from the starting peg to the barbeque at the other end of ring! Never seen her move so fast.

[Astro Boy 2]

I LOVE these dog stories!

[Tangwyn]

Hi there,

This is way too embarrassing but here goes anyway...

My last Golden Retriever was a crazy, mad retriever. At his first retrieving trial I heeled him up to the peg, removed his collar and lead and watched him immediately speed off into the paddock in search of the bird which had yet to be thrown. When I finally got him back and to the actual firing point, he broke as soon as the bird went up, sped out like a steam train, picked up the bird and took it to the bloke sitting on the bird throwing machine

I loved that dog... :D

ETA C-J I love the black stump story!!!

and

Lablover - how would the judge score Cracker's inspired blind?

Edited May 11, 2007 by Tangwyn

[pawsaroundoz]

I have already shared a couple of my funny (as in what colour is red?) stories from way back in the obediance ring, but there are a few from more recent times at Retrieving trials....

Like the time I was running Crash in a Restricted, the second run was one of those great runs with a 2nd bird going up whilst dog is on way back with 1st bird. It all needs really good co-ordination between judge and stewards....various problems arose and after Crash crossing a creek and successfully finding the 1st bird 3 times only to have the 2nd bird not go up he was getting just a tad bored with this 'game' and starting to wonder what he was doing wrong.

Finally everything went right, Crash got the first bird, saw the 2nd one go up, bought the first bird back to me, returned to get bird 2, when out of the blue one of the all age dogs coming racing along to 'pinch' Crash's 2nd bird.....it was like watching a race as to who was going to get there first.....if I had laughing fit to have an 'accident' I would have taken bets as to which dog would get there 1st!

As it happened Crash made it !

However the icing on the cake was when the judge told me seriously that I should take it all 'far more seriously', now that really cracked me up! :p

Annie and her boyz

[Keshwar]

I have been doing CCD for the last 12 or so months with my Afghan hound Faxon - you read that right obedience trialling with my Afghan Hound.

Now as you can probably imagine all has not been plain sailing when we are in the ring.

I'll start with one of the more positive stories. We were at a trial in Burra in the poring down rain - there was a small stream running across the ring. Now as I'm sure most of you are aware there has been a bit of a drought happening so chances to practice in the rain have been far and few between. I have to say our heeling wasn't too bad if you consider Faxon was no way going to drop onto that wet grass. Until you have had the look from an Afghan hound saying "you have to be kidding!" you don't know what being put in your place is. :D Anyway we soldiered on and got to the stays. Out we all went lining up for the sit stay. We had a loverly Corgi next to us. Now Faxon had been trying to play with this Corgi all day with no luck, so I wasn't all that confident he would stay. Anyway off we went, I left him in a sit walked out did my about turn and there is this Corgi standing right in front of Faxon. He didn't move a muscle. The Corgi did a perfect 1 min stand stay standing right under Faxon's nose and Faxon didn't move a muscle. ;)

Now to a slightly more embarrassing story. Trial at the end of last year on a Friday evening. I raced home from work picked up Faxon and went to trial. I have to say I wasn't feeling at all confident but I wasn't prepared at all for what was about to happen. The scene was set when the competitor before me said "you can't do any worse than that!" Well Faxon took that as a challenge. It all started to go wrong from the heeling. Some time since our last training session Faxon seemed to have forgotten what an automatic sit was. The perfect drop position was suddenly at right angles to me across my feet. Fast pace heeling suddenly included dropping your face to the ground and rubbing it along the ground at fast pace. This performance got a lot of laughs from the Judge and from me but no points. Back to the start peg we went. Judge asks "Are you ready?" My response "Why not?" 10 out of 10 for stand for exam! On to the recall. Heels nicely out from start peg. Stays nicely while I walk out and about turn - by now I'm a nervous wreck cos I've no idea what he is going to do - I call, And off he goes heading for the next ring! I got his attention before he got there so he does this big loop comes to my feet and drops beautifully at my feet looking up at me grinning! We didn't stay for the stays.

A more recent incident. We are on a pass all is going well until we got to the stays. Sit stay we had to have a big scratch and then a bit of a lay down. Down stay, It seems it was a bit hot to be doing a down stay out in the sun so 45 secs in up he hops and goes and puts himself in a down in the shade. Looked very satisfied with himself too!

Well no-one ever said it was going to be easy.

Bear.

[pembroke lover]

These are great!!! Thankyou for sharing these guys. ;)

[helen]

The funniest thing Bella has done in training was when we did some retrieving training.

We were doing water retrieves, the trainer threw the dumbell, Bella retrieved it and came out of the water, the instructor took the dumbell from her and had it out of site.

Bella realised she no longer had the dumbell, went running back in the water looking for it and wouldn't come out without it, the instructor had to throw it back so she could get it in order for her to get out of the water ;)

The amount of people Bella visited in her early days of agility is not funny. If someone was near the end of jumps etc they were obviously only there to greet her.

[whatevah]

Today at the herding instinct test, I had been watching the guys do the herding test. I am first one up to do the herding instinct test, so I go to ring where the herding test was done, I get into the ring I tell Tia to drop and she actually does it, I think I am already to go and the sheep are in the next ring. LOL I then go into the next ring and when I let Tia off she scared one of the sheep and it pole vaulted into the air.

When Tia got vet checked in the morning, she puts her hind leg up in the air for the check. Here she is doing it at home.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrNrbZRGOVo

Edited May 12, 2007 by CrashTestDummy

[J...]

I have a training one - last week we started a new block for training, so the class 3/4 dogs do a short obedience demo for everyone at the start. I've started using a bumbag for training/reward, its generally got her toy and food inside. Normally I give her the release word and she will retreive the bag for me and bring it back for her treat. I threw it about 10 metres behind us it so it was out of the way.

Did the demo nicely, we were asked to do a recall. Left Darcy with her back to the group and walked away. Gave her the recall command, she ran towards me for several metres, changed directions and collected the bumbag on the way past and did a lovely sit in front, bag in mouth for me to take it and give her her treat!

It got quite a few giggles from the crowd watching and no she didn't get her treat, well not until she did it properly! ;) Was just too tempting for her!

[MissMonaro]

A couple of years ago I attemped a sweepstakes obed with my lab.

It was at my club, so I thought familiar grounds...yeh...okay....no probs. But of course when I got there I just felt physically ill - I was sooooooooo nervous - and it was made worse by everyone from training saying you'll be right, no probs - and they stood and watched me, which just made me even worse.

Well that was just disastrous. (and everyone said I was so stiff in the ring they thought I was going to pass out) I just absolutely choked out there, so not blaming the dog totally.

For the off lead heel......off we start. First sit....yep.......then that is where my dog stayed and watched whilst I walked around the ring. I was sooooooo embarassed. I got NIL for that exercise.

I decided to keep going anyway.....recall (which she was normally good at). Give the command to come......nope....I'll just sit here and watch you again. More red faces from me. Judge says call her again. Of course comes in doing a great recall...but already too late.

On to the group exercises. Thinking what the hell I might as well keep practising and if she aint gonna move all day, then this should be a breeze. Thankfully full marks for the stay exercises.

But I was sooooo

I have another really embarassing one from a trial. Judge decides to start with the figure of eight (something different alright). So off we go and at the first sit, she just looked at me as though to say I dont think so...so without even thinking I checked her and in a loud voice SIT. All I remember was the judge screaming NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Then me thinking OH SH*T cos I had realised what I had done. I got a severe reprimand and a lecture for that one and a 10 point deduction. (I realised I would of been better to of just lost points for not doing that sit, but then again me putting her in her place early meant she did behave during the rest).

I just didnt think - it happened so quick. At training if they dont do it the first time then they get us to put them in the position...lucky I didnt touch her as well. But OMG I was soooooo embarassed.

I did have ppl coming up to me afterwards and saying not to worry too much because if I let her get away with it in the lower classes then she'd still put it over me in the higher classes where a better standard is expected.

I managed to just scrape a qualify - of course when the judge presented the certificates she told everyone I was very very lucky to be getting a pass. :p ;) (as if I didnt want to shrivel up as it was)

Edited May 13, 2007 by MissMonaro

[Erny]

My old dog Cindy in a retrieving trial.

12 dogs had been up to the pegs before her without any trouble.

The run was a double mark.

She got the first bird without a problem.

I asked her were the second bird was and she indicated she knew where it was.

I said fetch and she took of hard left and dove into the bush we passed on the way to the line.

Pulled a sausage out of the bush that someone had disgarded at lunchtime, she ate the sausage and then ran out and got the bird as if nothing had happened.

I think we got third in the end with the judge mentioning that we didn't get higher because our entry included a free lunch.

She was a black lab.

In another trial She had gone out of sight after a bird. After a couple of minutes scanning the area I saw her in the bushes looking at me for direction and I blew the whistle and gave her a right over.

She didn't move, I blew the whistle harder and gave her a bigger over. She didn't move.

After four of these I said to the judge I will pull her out as she wasn't listening. He said ok and told me my dog was now 200 yards away and still taking commands as I had been trying to handle a black tree stump.

He still laughs about it when we meet.

Country Joe.

I just chanced upon this thread. I don't usually quote full posts, but this one deserves extra credit. Love it CJ - and love the good humour with which you have posted. These are classic.

[Silvawilow]

Okay time for me to share two of my most recent oops

My mad black girl Kira is nuts about agility but not so nuts about obedeince. Anyway, we were in the open obedeince ring at Bendigo last year and we had managed to get passing scores on heel free, recall, SFE and DRF. I'm thinking to myself, OMG we might actually do good. Then here we are lining up to do dumbell ova the high jump. I throw and just as I sent her these awful creatures (sometimes known as teenagers) start kicking a scoccer ball right on the edge of my ring. Now I know Kira should ignore distractions but she is ball mad. Anyway, she clears the jump pick her dumbell up and continues on2 the kids with the ball. Spits her dumbell out and steals their ball, trying to entice them in2 a game.

My yellow dog Narmi (who sick at the moment ) is a good little worker at obedience but is the opposite to Kiz, very laid back and calm. I have started doing basic agility training with her and when it comes to the tunnel she believes that it's better to run on top of it instead of through it