Loki Update

As the weather has been so awful we've not done much training this week, so I decided to take a chance and go to an obedience club with him. The last time he went (to a different one) he freaked out!!! He was not happy at the beginning, but he worked and by the end he was relaxed. His left turns have gone to pot so I need to work on those if it stops raining long enough!!!!

Cefn Coed is on Saturday, and if it is chucking it down, we may well not go!!!! Yes, I am a wimp, but I'm not that committed to obedience - yet!!

Lokis' Obedience Training Progress cont.....

I am so pleased with his progress. He is not swinging his back end out on the about turns any more, which is great, he doesn't drift off my leg so often and his concentration is improving.

The running order for Cefn Coed came today and we are drawn to work 6th in Novice, which couldn't be better as this is how we worked at the West Of England show. I can use the novice round as a "training" round if I need to.

I have started to re-teach sendaway with a down at the end instead of a stand, which we used for working trials, and he is happy to down, so no problems there so far. I need a good reliable fast send before adding in any "markers" into the equation.

Lokis' Obedience Training Progress

After our amazing day at the West Of England Border Collie Club show, I have entered Loki in some obedience shows. We are doing Cefn Coed, CwmBran, Cheltenham and Taunton. We are also going to Golden Valley and Caerphilly agility shows. This will be a busy year as there are the flyball tournaments to fit in too!!
I took him out into the garden to train the other day and discovered that if I’m not feeling 100% and don’t put a lot of effort into working with him, he doesn’t bother either!
Today we went out in the garden and in the 20 minutes we were training, the want and attitude were there in bucket loads!!
We started with small left circles to get him in the correct position and to remind him that he has to be “on” my leg, then from left circles we added a short straight line – lovely, attention and constant contact with my leg.
We then tried small right circles and after a shaky start, he was much more consistent in his position.
His presents are much better – have to work on his wait though, he is enjoying the training too much lol.
I will have to remember to only do one, maybe two retrieve training bits at one time as he gets over excited and starts being silly!!!! I am pleased with his work so far. Let’s hope for some dry weather so we can consolidate our work so far.
It hasn’t been easy trying to remember how we taught turns years ago ( I haven’t trained a dog for competition obedience for 12+ years – it’s a long time to think back!! It’s coming though, once you get into the right frame of mind and in a training situation, it just sort of pops back into the memory again.

Video of our round

www.youtube.com/watch

This is Loki's obedience round.

The begionning is very ragged - my fault for not getting him focussed enough before going in! But once we got going, I thought he was very good, considering the little bit of training we have done!!!

Loki the obedience dog!

We couldn't have had better weather today at the West Of England Border Collie Club show. It was sunny but cool.

Grace got 4th out of 4 in veteran in the breed show, and came last in working bitch, so the judge didn't like her - so what, she behaved beautifully, did what I asked, when I asked. I think she enjoyed herself, which is the whole reason for showing her again.... Mission accomplished!!

Loki was his usual sniffy, wanting to say "hi" to everyone self and I thought he was not going to get his brain in gear and concentrate! Wouldnt blame him as I've not done much training at all!!

We worked the novice round first and what a surprise..... he went in the ring and as soon as he was set up, he became a different dog!!!! Apart from his retrieve, he did really well. I didn't bother doing stays with him.

Kim, my friend from flyball came to film his beginner round for me so that I could see what needed to be worked on. The first exercise was heel on lead and after a shakey start, he suddenly switched his brain on and worked like a little superstar! Recall was not bad - crooked present, but then he's never done a straight one yet!! Heel free was beautiful. Yes he drifted, but he was paying attention and worked really well. Retrieve was his downfall in novice, so I wasn't hoping for much.... He sat and waited whilst I threw the dumbell, I sent him and he picked it up and for some reason I said "in" which I don't normally..... he came in and sat in front with the dumbell in his mouth!!!!! I was so so pleased with him.

I went back after showing Grace to see where he'd ended up... only to be told that he was needed for a run off!!!

Run back to the van, chuck Grace in, get him out, do a warm up - badly, runback to the ring, do another warm up. He has no attention - oh well, he is at his first ever obedience show, what can I expect?

We have to do heel free again. I set him up and his on switch kicks in and off we go and he is working. I am so proud of him. And the icing on the cake is that Jenny his breeder is tere to watch him!!

Loki ends up winning his run off and coming in 4th place!!! I am over the moon with him. And I have the film to remind me!!!! I have no idea what he lost.

Obedience training for Loki

For a laugh - and because the show is about a mile from my house, and because I've put Grace in the breed show as she can't do flyball any more..... I've entered Loki in beginners and novice obedience!!!! I must be mad - he's not had any obedience training as such, but he takes after his dad and just does natural heelwork, that I thought..... why not. At least then I'll see what he is capable of and whether it's worth finding a good trainer to work with to get him up to proper show standard - or not!!!!

Agility Training

We all had agility training today. Lottie was a little superstar, not putting a paw wrong - not like her - even when I got my commands a bit late, she managed to correct!!!!

Loki on the other hand was a little monster!!! He hasn't beren this naughty since he was a pup!! I just hope there's a bitch in season locally!!!!

Grace was allowed to do a tunnel, a low dog walk the weaves and a pretend jump - you'd have thought she'd done a full course, she enjoyed herself so much!!!! It was lovely to watch.

GRACES' REHAB Parts 1 & 2

PART 1

On November 16th 2008 Grace got up in the morning looking very very stiff with a very hunched back and in a lot of pain. She made it out to the garden and back in again, then collapsed and didn't even try to walk again for 36 hours!!!
Obviously as soon as the vet was open, we were there. The vet admitted Grace straight away.
Poor Grace spent her 11th birthday in the vets.
There were 2 possibilities for Graces collapse:
A spinal stroke or
A prolapsed disc.
X-rays didn’t show anything, so it was decided she would have an MRI scan.
The scan was booked for 2 weeks later and by the time that came round, Grace was walking almost normally and if you didn’t know what had happened, you wouldn’t have thought anything was wrong.
Two days after the MRI, Grace collapsed again.

PART 2

The vet decided not to keep her in this time, thinking she might make more effort to walk if she were at home, which she did.
She was on 6 weeks cage rest, which meant that she was allowed out to the garden for essentials only then back in the cage, 4 times a day!
Grace was surprisingly good throughout her prison term!! Normally if she is caged she barks – constantly! Providing I didn’t go out with the other two, she was as good as gold.
As she approached her 5th week of cage rest, I began letting her have 5 minutes potter in the garden so that when her rest finished she would be more able to cope with little walks. She had lost a lot of weight which was all muscle. I also started letting her stay out for short periods in the house, making sure that she was unable to get on the furniture – yes I do allow the dogs on the chairs!!
On January 1st 2009, Grace was allowed to start physio and hydrotherapy to try and get her back to some semblance of normality.

Agility show

This morning I was supposed to be going off bright and early to Taunton for an agility show.

Instead I'm home, very disappointed and typing this. Why?

Yesterday coming home from Westonbirt the brakes started grinding every time I used them! They still work fine, but not knowing the first thing about cars or vans..... I decided at 5am not to take any chances.

Hopefully it's nothing serious.........

This Blog Is....

.... going to be about my dogs, our hobbies and stuff like that!