Today was probably one of the roughest days at an agility trial I have had in a long time. Here is the recap:
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Such a
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Today was probably one of the roughest days at an agility trial I have had in a long time. Here is the recap:
★
★
★
Such a
Well, after a day of complete rest and doing nothing yesterday, we were back at the agility trial today. It was a bit of up-and-down today, with good moments and ugly/disappointing moments. Here is the recap:
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In watching my videos at home, I see so much brilliance in Pizza. She is by far my most talented dog, but I can't get her past this visiting of the barsetters, which I KNOW is caused by stress. I think I will take some time off with her, and work at home and in classes and see if I can get her more confident in herself and in me. She is entered with Dolphin in a trial in Florida next month while we are on vacation, but other than that I think I will take a break with her. Time to regroup.
It was a typical crazy busy Wednesday, but a darn successful one! Dolphin was awesome in his agility training group. Pizza did great in her class. At one point I had someone sit in the corner, and she did blast out of the tunnel straight to the person...I had the person scold her "No!", and interestingly she came back and finished without another visit. I wonder if this is the key - having the people in the ring tell her NO rather than just trying to ignore her. It's a thought...
After class I took Pizza field training with a friend of mine. She was on
Dolphin's scent work class in the evening went well. I am looking forward to running him in his second ever scent work trial in a week and a half. He is half in novice, and half in advanced.
Dolphin and I went to the Cincinnati Weimaraner Specialty show in Xenia, OH today. He was the only male special entered, so his Best of Opposite award was pretty much a given. He showed decently, although he was a little low-energy (it was hot, crowded, and he sensed my lack of enthusiasm!). He is such a good boy, even when he would rather be somewhere else, he still behaves and keeps up a good attitude. I love that about him.
I got a chance to do some field training in the evening with my regular field trainer. It was a great session!
I worked on a blind retrieve with Noodle. I have a
Pizza and I worked on having her honor through a long retrieve, which she did well. There was a rainstorm rolling in, and the scenting conditions were weird, so she struggled pinpointing the location of the bird she pointed (at one point she was actually pointing and facing the wrong direction!).
We had two birds out for Dolphin. The first one he pointed, then hopped a few inches, which I corrected and he then held beautifully. The second bird was solid, he had the most gorgeous point I have seen and as I was handing my phone off to have someone take a photo, he broke...I corrected and put him back on point, and then he held well...and handled the correction like a big boy. He is growing up! Great session for him, as I feel he is slowly becoming more and more solid. OK, maybe solid is too generous of a word just yet, but I see glimpses of him thinking and holding off his impulse to jump. We will get there!
Today was Pizza's turn to show. She showed "ok", but got nothing other than owner handled best of breed. Standing still and focusing is still an issue for her...sounds familiar doesn't it? Focus is a big problem in agility also. Strange that she can be so focused in the field, and nowhere else. I think this will be a priority for me to work on with her for the next 3 months.
Dolphin and I did some HD (Handler Discrimination) Scent Work training tonight at a friend's place. He struggled a bit in Novice with the distraction odor (someone else's sock). We practiced some Advanced in hopes that we get our last novice HD Q this weekend...Advanced uses a cotton ball of my scent and it is hidden in an interior room. That one was tough! Especially tough since Dolphin constantly tries to eat the cotton ball (he ate TWO tonight!). We have a scent work trial this weekend, so I am hoping to finish up his last remaining novice titles...but it might be more difficult than I had thought.
It was an abnormally cool morning - it was in the 50's when I left the house around 9am to go field training. Nice wind, perfect conditions for the field! All the dogs struggled with something and it was a great opportunity to train through the issues, which is what I was hoping for.
Today I took just Noodle and Dolphin to an agility trial in a new place, one about a half hour from my house. We only had Jumpers and Standard today. Jumpers was awesome, but we had a few mistakes. Dolphin was super fast and running realy great until towards the end he got overly excited and jumped up at my arm instead of the jump, so we had a refusal, and then a bar down. This is something he tends to do a lot when he is excited, but I love the enthusiasm so I will take it!
Noodle had a WONDERFUL jumpers run going, possibly the fastest I have seen her run in years, and I had to throw in a last-minute rear cross because she was ahead of me...and I timed it wrong and pulled her off the jump for a refusal. SO mad at myself!
Master Standard went a lot better. Dolphin laid down a nice, clean, controlled run for a Q (although his weaves were pretty slow for some reason). Noodle also laid down a nice controlled Q, and Dolphin beat her time by about a half a second. This makes Dolphin's 6th Master Standard Q and Noodle's 22nd. Overall a good day!
I was suspicious all day, and when I got home later that evening I confirmed it - Noodle is coming in season. Normally I would be annoyed, but I am so happy because this means she will be all done for the hunt tests in October...YAY!
Dolphin and I have something different sceduled this weekend - a scent work trial! I haven't done one of these since last April, but we have been consistently training every Wednesday night. Dolphin was wonderful! Here are his results for today:
• Novice Handler Discrimination: One Q out of 2, to finish his SDHN title!
• Novice Containers: Two for two Q's, to finish his SCN title!
• Novice Exterior: One Q out of 2...stull struggling with the distractions outside. We need one more Q to finish up the rest of his Novice titles
• Advanced Buried: 2 for 2 Q's! Our first Advanced Q!
• Advanced Interior: One Q out of 2...it was a tough one!
Today was the second day of the scent work trial. Dolphin went 9 out of 10 in his searches today, and earned 4 new titles!
• Handler Discrimination Advanced: 2 for 2 (and he didn't eat the cotton ball...yay!)
• Containers Advanced: 2 for 2 again!
• Buried Advanced: 1 for 2 (it was our only mistake of the day) and this finished his title (SBA)
• Interior Advanced: 2 for 2 to finish our SIA title!
• Exteriors Novice: We only needed one more Q to finish out our Novice titles, and he got 2 for 2, finishing his SEN title and his overall novice SWN title
Pizza and I did some field training in the morning, she was a little scattered, and although she honored really well she got a bit lazy about staying put. Just goes to show - never take things for granted! Her retrieve went to pot again, and this is frustrating because I thought I had the issue licked this summer. Once again...never assume. My mantra should be "never think positively".
In the evening, Dolphin and I went to train scent work with some friends outside of the local school nearby. He did really well, he searched with intensity and was pretty accurate in his finds. That was nice to see, and a confidence-booster before our next scent work trial in a week and a half. oops, there I go thinking positive again!
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I took Dolphin and Pizza to do some field training with a friend at her trainer's place. Pizza did a great job - nice solid point and good honor (after her first honor where she wanted to duck out and leave after a bit...ugh!). Even Dolphin got to train - we had birds in launchers and he went on point and actually held fairly nicely with just a little hop forward. The best thing was that he actually did an honor all on his own, and that was
My training partner and I took our dogs to Dayton for an agility trial. It was such a fun day! Dolphin ran wonderfully. Master Jumpers was a bit messy - he missed a jump and then back jumped it, and then knocked down a jump and a wing on a sharp turn after the weaves. BUTTTT....he ran
Master Standard went great - although he did walk off his stopped contact on the A-frame, I was able to save my botched front cross and we finished with a nice Q and a good amount of MACH points. I was really happy with his run, he stayed focused and fast...perfect combination. I can't seem to get a jumpers Q to save my life, but we now have 7 Master Standard Q's.
I took the whole crew to Dayton today for our Weimaraner club's field fun/training day. It was a great opportunity for the girls as we had a club member gun for us, and although Noodle was in season she was still able to come train.
Noodle did great, but we had a few weird things happen that we had to train through (and that is PERFECT for a training day!). Lots of wild flushes (she stopped on every one), several missed birds she had to heel away from, and a wild flush on the way to a retrieve - she stopped, and I had to walk up to heel her off and go away from the flushed bird and the retrieve...great training moment. The bestest thing was she did a
Pizza did well - had a nice honor and stayed put, had an OK retrieve...not great, but much better than earlier this week (probably because the temperatures were about 20 degrees cooler). I opted to not let Dolphin run, because by the time it was his turn there were tons of loose birds out in the field, and the last thing I want him to do is grab one and undo all the training I have been working so hard at all year. I need a very controlled environment for him still, we are taking it slow and steady. But man...what a fun day!
Today changes everything. Today, we sat in Ohio and helplessly watched the Weather Channel as category 4 Hurricane Ian hit Florida, and hit Goodland pretty hard. In the blink of an eye (get it? Eye of the hurricane...) our Florida trip was cancelled. We were supposed to leave this Sunday. Now the future of our house and property is uncertain.
Aside from watching the hurricane on the news, I did have a pretty good agility training session with Dolphin in the morning. In the afternoon I took Pizza and Dolphin to do some field work. Pizza was outstanding, had a great retrieve, and some beautiful honors. I put one bird in a launcher for Dolphin, he went on point, and after a few seconds as I was approaching he broke. We launched the bird, and he was put away. One and done, sir! He will learn from this as we repeat this lesson over and over.
In Scent Work class this evening, a tennis ball was set in the search area as a distraction. Dolphin lost his MIND! He loves those darn things. He would not search, just kept going back to the tennis ball. We put the tennis ball away in another room and he still obsessed over it. This boy has some serious
Today was the first day of my Weimaraner club's scent work trial. Dolphin was on