Thursday 30 July 2009

Brodie the parrot and the dogs.

Wish being brave!

Brodie saying hello to Cruz and Inca


Wish getting out of his way and taking her tennis ball with her. LOL

Wednesday 29 July 2009

Lodgers on my weaves!

Mrs Blackbird has decided that my channel weaves in the storage stable look like a very safe place to raise her second brood. She is very watchful of us putting the equipment in and out.





Monday 27 July 2009

Tala update.




Hi, attached are a couple of pictures of Tala that I took today (the other dog is my Laekenois, Solli). She is rather wet and completely out of coat. I saw one of her half brothers at an agility show a couple of weeks ago, they are quite alike. I think she is finally beginning to grow up but still forgets herself from time to time and chews things! Chris

Sunday 26 July 2009

Wonder boy Wilf


Wilf had his first show competing in his new grade 4, Di said he did a fab run in KC Olympia combined 3-5 they finished in 3rd place taking home a nice trophy. Keep up the good work xx

Fab training morning.

I had the morning free today, I arranged training with Wish's breeder Heidi and her son Aaron they brought Wish's brother Klaus and sister Lola to training. All the pups were brilliant and are showing alot of promise for the future. We did small little puppy course's, jump into open channel weaves, dog walk, A frame and flat tunnel. The weather stayed brilliant, the pups really enjoyed themselves as did we, they had a final reward, a great game of chase and bundle lol.
Playing rough after training!!


Wish with her perfect 2 on 2 off position on the dog walk, then released on to the jump with her toy at the end.





Monday 20 July 2009

Wish passed her Bronze good citizen.


For the test
You had the dogs ID disc checked, all the details where correct, then we were ask to show we had suitable bags to clear up after our dog, then we showed the examiner how we groomed our dogs and how we checked their ears, eyes and paws. Then we where asked to walk them around the ring in a controlled manner, then we where ask to all have our dogs relaxed next to us on the lead while another student walk in and out of us in a controlled manner, till it was your turn to do the same. We then did a stay in any chosen position for a minute, a naughty pap went to say hello at this point but all the others where happy to stay, we then returned to them with lots of praise before releasing into a game of tuggy.
We then set them up one at a time to do a recall, Wish nailed a perfect recall and happily waited for her lead to be put on. We then showed the examiner a controlled sit before going through a gateway and a lovely sit while we closed the gate. I then had to answer a few questions from the examiner. Then a little wait while the others finished and ask the paps owner to do another stay exercise before he announcing the results.
What a brilliant puppy.



Brilliant weekend

Wilf handled by Di Griffin had a very successful weekend not only did they get 2nd in grade 3 jumping he won his last ever grade 3 agility and then went onto WIN the KC ABC 1-7 qualifier.
Huge congratulations to you both from a very, very proud breeder.

What a lovely way to end a fab weekend, a few of us stayed on an extra day in a massive almost empty field, the dogs all had a mad play and run around together. Then while they were chilling out, we all had a mega big breakfast feast, outside in the glorious sunshine with blue sky, chatting and sipping Tea/coffee before packing up to go home.
I love camping when it like this. :-)





I went to the Empingham show for the first time, I have entered the show before but it was the year it got cancelled due to flooding. I met Caroline at the Dartford toll to convoy up to the venue. We were told not to go by the sat nav postcode as it took you to the wrong address, whoops!! guess what....... short term memory loss LOL , up this single unmade track we turned that seemed to be getting smaller, hehe (not funny when towing)!! I stopped and tried my first ever effort at reversing the thing into this narrow drive that had dry stone wall lining the way. Ermmmm not doing brilliant as now seemed to be jack knifing it..... thank fully a nice local chap was doing his beautiful garden and called across are you looking for the Rugby club, YES we replied, you don't need to turn around just stay on this track and do right, right and right and you can't miss it, we have a lot turn in here he said with a smile.
It took us a while to set up at the venue as we had to wait for the heavy rain and thunder storm to pass before we could erect the trailer tent, it was all done quickly when the sun was once again shinning.
Saturday the sun was shinning a few little light showers in the morning I seemed not to be able to go clear with my dogs, I blame it on a very painful swollen Achilles tendon which was worse after rubbing in the prescribed doctors cream, any way Meme was the first to break up my bad luck by putting in a fab clear and gaining a 5th in grade 3 agility, then Inca pulled out all the stops to finish a very credible 4th in 1-7 open jumping.


On Sunday I was pleased I meet up with Cruz's sister Taya Pauline is not far from this venue, its always nice to catch up with all the pups from Dollar and Kane.


Sunday my results were Cruz 4th in grade 4 agility, 6th in grade 4 jumping, Inca 9th in grade 6 agility, sadly none of my dogs qualified the ABC but all put in brilliant rounds, Cruz sadly miss timed his exit from the DW, Kane got marked his See-saw???, Inca got marked his up on the See-saw :-( and naughty Meme broke her wait so sadly so I put her between number 1 and 2 and ask her to wait again, which she did perfectly this time we then practiced held contacts while I ran past before allowing her to go, I was very pleased with how she did but ended up with 15 time faults LOL :-)














Friday 10 July 2009

Whats the chances?

Older brother Cruz (grade 4) and sister Meme (grade 3) ran in a combined 3-4 agility class at the weekend,
Cruz ran first clear in a time of 29.602








Meme clear in the time of 29.609


Its a good job it was five figures on the timer as I would have had a run off against myself LOL
Thanks Grace Leach for the great pictures.

Thursday 9 July 2009

Ok, Ok stop nagging.....a blog update :-)


I know it has been a while but its that time of year, if your not working your training, if your not working or training, your competing and if your not working, training or competing, your catching up on some much needed ZZzzz ZZZzzzz.

Any way here are some highlights of what the dogs and myself have been up to:
Little Wish has had her first Birthday, she celebrated in style with her Mum, brothers and one of her sisters at the Thames show, Sophie who owns her brother "Trouble" made a lovely cake in the shape of a sheltie head for the humans, Grandma Heidi (breeder) brought them a toy each. Thanks for making the day as special as my little girl.
The dogs and I had a fantastic time at the agility boot camp hosted by Nancy Hudson and Leah Gardner.
The pictures below are of Wish taking part in the puppy foundation, balance and co-ordination session, I was so pleased with her, she took every thing in her stride. I do use a wobble board at home which I think helped with the gym balls.