I'm still alive and everything

[Jamiya]

Hi guys! I haven't been around much the last week or so. I've been swamped at work (as usual) and I took Nala to a 4-day AKC agility trial Thursday through Sunday last week. She did pretty well. She qualified in three jumpers legs so she got her Novice jumpers title. She never qualified at all in the standard course because she kept doing weird stuff! I think we are at the adolescent age where she is going to unlearn a bunch of stuff and I have to re-teach it and be consistent with her. The weave poles went up at home yesterday and I am going to make her weave correctly before she can have her dinner. You should see how fast she shoots through those things when dinner is in the balance! I really think she is just not that interested when she's in the ring - she'd rather sniff and explore the new place.

She does seem to like jumping, though, and in NADAC trials she also likes the tunnel courses.

I decided to NOT start Bonnie in the next session of classes. I am going to start working with her on other things, like loose leash walking and paying attention to me in general. Then we are going to work on things like being able to go where I tell her to, crossing in front of and behind me, etc. THEN once she knows to pay attention to me and understands some basic signals, I will take her to class and introduce her to the obstacles. I think I may even borrow a friend's freestyle videos and teach Bonnie some of that. I think Bonnie would be an excellent freestyle dog but I wish there were some local classes.

I got portraits taken of the dogs at the trial and I think they are going to turn out really nice! They will put them on the web in about 10 days and then I can choose what I want to buy. They shot some of Nala alone, some of Bonnie alone, and a couple of them together. It was quite an ordeal to get Bonnie to stand for the photos! Luckily we could leave the leash on and the woman will paint it out of the photo. Poor Bonnie startled every time the flash went off. They also took action shots on two of the days and got one of Nala jumping and a nice one of her in the weave poles. I also got videos taken of most of our runs.

[charmedagain]

Nice to have you back Jamiya and congrats on Nala doing so well . Have you notice alot of animals seem to do better when they know food is available lol.

I wish i could get my dogs to do things like that but they would much rather run around and play than actually do anything lol..
Mike

[Jamiya]

Funny you should mention that. I just took Nala out to the weave poles and I was holding treats in my hand. She FLEW through those things. She's much less motivated if the food is not on me. I guess I know that she KNOWS how to do them and is just being stubborn when she won't do it. Maybe I should start bringing really high value treats to trials, although we tried that on Saturday and it didn't help.

She refused to finish the teeter all weekend. She would tip it and it would hit the ground, which is the hard part. Then she'd stand there on it and then jump off the side instead of walking down it. I have no idea why. She has done the teeter correctly for months. In class tomorrow I will have to feed her down the whole length of it and that should take care of it, I hope.

[horse_child]

Good to hear from you! Congrats on Nala, that's great! Good luck with the teeter.

[HereinDecatur]

Go Nala! I am going to try and get CW involved in agility this spring when the ground dries up and gets a little warmer. He turns 5 months old Thursday so still very hyper and has a hard time concentrating for long periods of time! Did take him to the vet yesterday and had him neutered and the last set of puppy shots and deworming. so he is mad at me right now I think..lol