Starting the new "work season"

We still need to work A LOT on Wi's self-control while working with water & cold game. At the beginning she was as over-the-top as she could be but towards the end she calmed down a lot and she was able to work without losing her head completly. She doesn't have the same problems while working with game on land so we'll work from there and then start to work near the water and then in the water when she'll have more control over herself.

Oh and yesterday she managed to open the door of my room while I was away and eat the whole family lunch. So when I got home I was greeted by a sight of one red stuffed pig on the doormat. She could barely move for 2 hours but she's OK now. You can still see she's a little "fuller" but other than that she's the same (still acts like she hasn't eaten in ages...). :)

Brushing off the dust

Finally time for some updates!

There's not much going on here. I'm pretty busy at the university and the weather has been really bad. As soon as the mud dried up the rain came again and everything turned into mud. So last week we finally had one agility training after the whole winter.

I mostly placed jumps on 65 cm to see how she would jump over them. We warmed up with a bit of running and some low (35-45 cm) jumps and then did some sequences of 3-5 jumps with tunnels. I was surprised at how good her jumping looked. She also pulled ahead and looked really comfortable with the height. She did knock one bar but that was my fault (bad handling!). Her teeter performance was also better than I expected after such a long brak and how it looked a few months ago. Not as fast and confident as on last trainings but still enough speed and independance.

The contacts on A-frame were good but her dogwalk was terrible. If I was ahead of her she did it but if I wasn't she was jumping off like crazy. Hopefully this will go away when we start training more often.

We also got new balance pods and we are learning 101 ways to use them. :) The most popular with Wi is standing on 2 domes (1 with moth left and 1 with both right feet on) and stepping from one object to another by stepping on the pods inbetween (still not done with this one, she needs a little more balance). And then there's a whole variety of standing on the dome on 1-4 feet though 3 feet (left in the air) is her favourite. Or standing on 3 pods with the free leg in the air (working on balancing with front left in the air, other 3 are ok but with this one she loses balance really fast).

We're also doing dummy trainings again. Doing lots of doubles and more difficult singles and every now and then we do some easy blinds and some free search. Also working on her whistle commands. She's still having difficulties with stopping and turning towards me sometimes. She always stops but sometimes that's all she does and it's a bit hard to give her a directional command when she's facing away from me at 60m.

We're going to an agility trial next Sunday. I think this will be our last trial in A1. :)

Also it seems we'll be going to a Canine Freestyle comeptition in Germany in June. Still looking for "the song"...

November update

I've been really busy with university the last 2 months and I couldn't find enough time to update here.

Not much has happned since last update, except that I'm now really busy with university. Wi's alergies are now gone and the only reminder are some hairless spots on her legs, thighs and stomach.

We're mostly doing our homework for our Targets & Shaping virtual class at LAD.

And we go hiking, whenever we get the chance.

Slovenian agility 2009

Today was the last trial for Slovenian agility cup.
We didn't have our best day. The lack of training showed quite a bit and in jumping I was so tired I actually forgot the course while running...and Wi's alergie is getting worse so before jumping I didn't even know if she'll manage to run the course without stopping to scratch. So after the run we went home where she got her sattelite back on and managed to calm down.

Even tough we didn't have a good run today we still finished 2nd overall in A1 large category!

Tired Toller with her cup :)

This is our last trial for this season. Our next trial will be in December (Winter cup) in A2 category. Hopefully we'll get over with her alergies by then...

So hot...

...too hot to do much outside, except in the early morning and late afternoon.

We had a frisbee photoshooting in the beggining of August and it was a lot of fun. But I also found out that I'm really going to have to buy a new camera body since my 350D's shutter is getting slower and slower and sometimes shuts down completly.
We also had this fun little Irish terrier girl joining us for a week. She and Wi got along really well and even tough I couldn't work with them as much as I wanted (studying) they didn't caouse any problems and behaved really well. I did some shaping games with her, some playing on the balance disc, nose targeting, 2on 2off position...

Wi's bald patches no her back and chest are almost all overgrown with fur now. She managed to chew her front foot tough so I guess one bald patch goes and a new one should appear? She's not chewing any new spots now so hopefully that's over with.
We're working on a canine freestyle choreography. So far I'm still looking for a song but I already have a few picked out. We're also doing more on distance work and we try to do some elements in various environments if we get the chance. And we started on side movements since that's our weakest spot.

Currently Max is still on holidays with me. No photos of him yet...but soon.

Getting better

...and better and enjoying beauty of Slovenia.

No time to be serious...

Wi's first hike above 2000m

Yesterday Wi conquered her first mountain top above 2000m.

We went hiking on Debela Peč (2014m, Julian Alps) with my friend and her aussie Ginny yesterday.
Both dogs behaved nicely (except for the time when Wi stole yet another sandwich from a poor unsespected victim, but I blame the victim, she shouldn't gave her that piece of cheese in the first place...).
The weather was really nice and we had a lot of fun.

No luck with health

Sadly Wi got another bug bite reaction, but this time it wasn't local as with her eye.
She's on Synolux and Plivasept baths for at least 2 weeks. She's itching horribly so she has to wear the plastic cone to prevent and licking the wounds.
She's shaved on her back and chest:

Fun in the woods

The Current Pack

Our curent pack consists of 4 dogs right now. One week ago there were 5.

Along with Wi and Dora there is also Olivia (aka Oli aka Girly Whirly aka Little Lady) , the aussie girl:

And BammBamm (aka BB aka The Other Red Dog), mix, "border collie":


And former pack member Lyra, BC x aussie mix:


Both red dogs get along really well. Oli is in heat right now and a little moody so Wi is keeping her distance with her.
Dora loves to tug with BammBamm. She finally has someone who can go on and on and on. And I'm sure BammBamm likes this too (sometimes he even brings her the stick).
And I'm really starting to think that crashing into trees is a red dog's thing...first Wi and then BammBamm...

We're swimming a lot (I try to go every other day down to the river to our little spot by the shore) and there's also a lot of walking and running in the woods.
I'm also training a bit with Oli and BB. It's mostly just shaping games, to get them to start thinking. We also do ex. on the ball and balance disc, we even did some ladder work a few times, TTouch, balance tricks and a lot of playing.


And on to some Wi updates...

Agility
We had one agility trial on the 11th. It was held at the Slovenian coast and unlike other trials this one started in the afternoon and finished around midnight. I took all the dogs with me and the red dogs got to have fun and swim in the sea for almost an hour.
The courses were pretty simple, short and fast. In agility we lost a lot of time on the teeter (scary!) but we got a clean run. Except for the last jump where she barely made it over (I gave her a verryyy late signal) her jumping looked better then I expected (we haven't trained in ages!).
In jumping she ran nicely, no mistakes again but she's still holding herself back a little. But she was not all that slow either. Her average speed in jumping was 4,6 m/s and I think her usual speed in jumping last year was around 4,1 m/s so she's definetly getting faster.
Overall we finished 2nd in A1L.
Also she surprised me with her tugging intensity before the jumping. She was swimming a lot so I was worried she would be a bit tired and wouldn't want to tug as much so I took food with me instead. But when we were waiting she grabbed the leash and started to tug really hard and even made some noises while doing it! My crazy little red dog.

We also managed to have one training last week (yay!) and it went really well. She once again flew off the teeter. And the next time she almost did it again so I think we're finally getting over that whole "teeter = scary, have to go slowww" thing and she stays in the position no matter where I am or what I'm doing. She also had a couple of really nice dogwalks. Hopefully the weather will be fine this week and we'll be able to go training again soon.

The red dogs relaxing at home after the trial...in the red bed.

Frisbee
Wi had her first frisbee competition just a few days ago. My friend Gaja was competing with her and they did well. They need a few more trainings (they only had one really short tranining before the competition) but the important thing is that Wi liked it and had fun.

Almost got it!

Tricks
Here's another good generalisation of the "bounce" trick:
I tried to see if she would try to climb a tree at an agility trial in Domžale but she offered me a bounce off the tree instead (untill then she only bounced off me). We repeated it a couple of times and at home I tried with a wall and she bounced right off it. Now I can send her from a distance to some object and she will bounce off it and run back to me. Sometimes it looks like a swimmers turn (flyball) if she does it really low (she can do it from just a few cm off the ground to 1m).
And I have some new trick ideas so we're really busy learning them. :)