Do you remember when we got to play agility outside? I remember it like it was yesterday. Oh! That's because it WAS yesterday. Seriously, Mother Nature is an evil bitch this year. Granted, I have to admit that I don't have it nearly as bad as my friends in MN (they got like a foot dumped on them this past week), but this is still some sort of cruel joke. It's like the winter that will never end.
There is a NADAC trial in Lindstrom, MN this weekend. Yesterday morning it was something like 14 degrees in the unheated horse barn where the trial is located. Not only that but there is a foot of snow to deal with outside. Yeah... Can't say I'm missing attending that trial this year!
There is a USDAA trial in Duluth, MN in two weeks. Do you seriously think this winter will let go in time for that? I have my doubts. Duluth is too far for me to consider going anyhow, but I'd be pretty hesitant to enter an outdoor trial before JUNE this year. lol
Yesterday (you know, before all that white crap hit us) I set Secret up to take the photos required to be submitted with the AKC PAL registration. This is something I've kind of been sitting on for the last two years but I never actually did anything with it. Now that Secret has her NATCH and is on her way to her PDCH, I've kind of been exploring our options with other organizations. Since CPE doesn't really appeal to me in the least, I figured AKC is probably the next most likely thing to try. I'd love to try ASCA eventually, but there just aren't a lot of opportunities and they always seem to conflict with something else I'm doing.
I've always been pretty ho-hum about AKC in general. Let's face it, when I first started agility it wasn't even an option for me because they didn't accept mixed breeds at the time. Then there was that whole fiasco of how they went about bringing in mixed breeds (thank god the whole business of "separate but equal" never panned out). Kaiser was just starting to compete around that time and he was an intact male of an unrecognized breed, so AKC still wasn't even on my radar because I wasn't going to show one dog and not the other.
Fast forward to today... Luke still won't show AKC because they don't have a Veteran height option and the lowest he could jump would be 20". Kaiser, however, technically COULD show in AKC now that he is altered... But standing at 14" tall he is *right* on the edge of being able to jump 8" Preferred and I don't know how badly I want to go through the stress of measuring again. I suppose we could try and I'd just run him FEO if he measured up. Ugh. I so hated going through that with him because it was stressful for both of us. Granted, he's come a long way in his sociability, so maybe he'd be more relaxed now and make it easier to get that 14" measurement. We've gotten it in two organizations so far; fingers crossed for a third?
As for Secret, I've always thought that AKC courses would appeal to her. I also think that having only two runs per day (or three if they are actually offering T2B -- nobody plays FAST around here anymore) would be just her thing.
I am undecided about running her at 24" in the standard division or having her jump 20" Preferred. When you think of it, it would just be 2" higher than her USDAA height... But there would be spreads to contend with, which we've never actually had before. I suppose since we take the height drop in NADAC and USDAA it would make sense to take it in AKC. If winter ever leaves us I'd like to play around with this at home some.
Of course, though, I've completely procrastinated and put this off for far too long -- seeing as there is an AKC trial here in La Crosse that closes on the 27th (and surprisingly, AKC trials here don't fill -- the trials in the Cities get like four times the number of entries they can accept and always have to do a draw!). The odds of me actually getting Secret's PAL registration through on time are pretty much slim to none at this point. I do have an e-mail into them to see if they have any options other than mailing. You can do the Canine Partners registration online which is handy, but the PAL registration is stuck in the 80s with the whole mailed in registration and pictures requirement... Sheesh, to do that I'd first have to get these photos printed at Walgreens or something and then send everything in! Yeah, get digital, AKC...
So that's where my thinking is at these days. Just a rambling post while the satellite was knocked out for the last hour thanks to the snow..
Hooray! I finally broke down and set the first agility course of 2013 today. The yard is probably a couple more dry days away from ideal, but the clock is ticking for our trial next weekend and I decided that the yard be damned, we were going to play today! It got a little ripped up in spots (mostly because I let Luke come out and play), but it held up okay. We might not end up with grass in a few spots, but it will just match all of the other areas that don't grow grass anymore...
I've been following Ann Croft's "Agility Coach" page on Facebook pretty much since its creation this winter, so I've been eagerly waiting for the opportunity to finally try one of her Happy Hurdle courses out for myself! I just picked the most recent course that was posted this last Wednesday. It was the "Americanized" version of an International-flavored drill she posted last week. Honestly, Secret probably doesn't need to be doing too much crazy stuff at the moment when the goal of the day is to increase speed & motivation. This course was just right.
I should backtrack slightly -- On Wednesday we had a little accident at home. It was raining (it rained/snowed/sleeted most days this past week) and we were stuck inside the house, so I was playing tug with Secret on the floor with her woolie ring. Luke was jealous and going nuts from inactivity and was laying nearby. I started tossing the tuggy in the air for Secret to catch between tugs and after a few of those Luke just couldn't take it any more. I again tossed the ring into the air for Secret and...
CRACK.
That's pretty much the sound of two skulls colliding. Or it could have been teeth, I'm still not entirely sure. Either way they hit each other HARD and Secret more or less thought she was going to die at that exact moment. I managed to confirm that everyone's teeth were still intact and that there didn't appear to be blood anywhere, but Secret spent the better part of the evening flicking her tongue out and licking her nose, so I know she was hurting somewhere.
She didn't trust me and she didn't trust Luke. Secret already has issues playing around Luke because he has the bad habit of barging into pretty much anyone in his way when toys are involved. I spent the rest of the week locking Luke in the house while I attempted to get Secret to play with me. Fun times, having a dog who doesn't really care about agility nor wants to play with toys. The good news is that it did start to get better and I happily sacrificed my yard so that she could chase after frisbees and other fun stuff.
So, back to today. It's still hovering in the low 40's, but the sun is shining and it's not raining so I decided that today was the day! I started out by just doing a few short sequences with Secret and playing in between. She started out at what I'll call "trial speed" and it did take a bit for her to click on and start running with a bit more gusto.
I was completely dieing at the end of Secret's first session, but she was still running nicely for me. I ran the boys and then brought her out again to play. Nothing has changed with regard to her fussy rules regarding not using the same toy two sessions in a row... We'll deal with that issue later, but today I pandered to her because I needed happiness and motivation. We got in one nice run (on the video) and then she went kind of flat on me. When she came trotting out of the yellow tunnel I called it quits and put her back in the house so that she could watch me play with the boys and give them attention while she sat and did nothing. My hope is that we can build some sort of connection to, "You give me effort or you go back in the house and sit by yourself."
After a while I put the boys back in the house and brought Secret out for one more try. I grabbed her beloved Jolly Ball that time for the ultimate in motivation -- no excuse for her to be a bum this time. It worked. It wasn't the "prettiest" run (mostly because seriously, I am so out of shape and was dead on my feet by this time), but she was trying and she was moving. Good girl! We quit on that note.
I thought everyone did great! I'm super impressed that ALL dogs responded very well to the Ketschker turn up in the top half! It just worked better than a front cross, even with the boys. Everyone had nice wraps, too, and really surprised me with how well they all got the send to the backside entry of the tunnel. Sweet! I'm definitely feeling rusty after not being able to practice for nearly SIX MONTHS, but it will come back (hopefully quickly).
I'm hoping for at least a couple more opportunities to play with Secret before the trial next weekend, but we'll probably stick to smaller drills just to work on speed & motivation. I did call and make an appointment to take her in to see Dr. Marta for an adjustment, so we'll be doing that on Tuesday (which means no agility then or Wednesday, most likely).
Today I finally broke down and walked up to the vet clinic to buy some Frontline. I haven't been able to get it from the shelter since I'm not working there this month and I keep procrastinating on ordering it, so I just got it from the clinic. I'm so tired of pulling ticks off the dogs -- and we haven't even been walking the trails this week! Hopefully this helps with that little problem. Secret still gets all scabby where they bite her. Poor thing. We all hate ticks.
Today Kaiser and I drove back up to Minneapolis for the second time in just over a week. Target specially requested that he return to fill a few more shots that they needed, so who was I to say no to that?
Apparently this was a continuation of the job from last week, but they were moving on to winter jackets. The shoot producer apparently had a couple of jackets specifically in mind for Kaiser -- Does that mean that he's for sure going to show up on the packaging? I guess we'll wait and see!
This week is a lot more low key than last week, I guess. They were down to only one set, but it was the same one we shot on last time so Kaiser was familiar with everything. And everyone, as the crew was the same, too.
Our time slot was at 11:00 a.m. today, which was nice because we got to sleep in and left home at 7:45 a.m. We arrived to the studio at 10:30 and Kaiser was the only dog in the waiting area this time. They were just wrapping up the dog before us and were actually ahead of schedule, so I had just enough time to fluff Kaiser up and wipe the goobers out of his eyes before we got called back.
Kaiser modeled the small jackets, but we didn't really have a lot of choice in the matter because he swam in the medium! I assured them that if I was the customer I'd buy the small because he needs his clothing to be short in the back because of his tail. It wasn't exactly the fit I would love on him, but it certainly worked. And of course it all looked completely darling on him.
They wanted Kaiser to model two blue jackets -- one with a solid stripe and one with a plaid stripe. He was, once again, amazing. They just kept getting perfect shot after perfect shot and it took no time at all. We took a brief break to wander outside and when we got back in they decided to throw him in a pink jacket as well (regardless of the fact that he is a boy, Kaiser looks fantastic in pink with his coloring!).
The surprise of the day was how well Kaiser worked with Barbara! She was the trainer on our set today and as we went on it became fairly obvious that Kaiser was responding better to Barbara than he was to me, so I just kind of stood behind her. He totally responded to her requests for repositioning and was very attentive to her! Who is this dog? It's like you put him on the table in front of the lights, camera and crew and he just turns it on. :o)
Once again they were all in love with him. I was happy that Kaiser performed so well in front of Barbara, too, since she's more or less in charge of his future as "the talent" and she was also impressed with his wonderful performance. So much so that she mentioned possibly using him for another shoot she has this Friday for Christmas wear. I really don't know if I should push for another day off work (three in two weeks?), but I told her she can put him out there for the client to see and if they choose him I'll worry about it then. I probably *shouldn't* drive to the cities for a third time in two weeks, but it's hard to say no to seeing your dog on stuff...
Since we were "in the area" (okay, it's about a 20-minute side trip), I stopped at Cake Walk in Northfield, MN again on the way home. Nom, nom, nom. I only got two cupcakes this time and I'm keeping them all for myself! lol I bought the turtle cupcake because I didn't get to try that from my last box. The one on the left is their signature red velvet cupcake, which I don't believe was offered last week. I can't wait to try them!
Kaiser and I got home at 3:00, which is just late enough that there's no way it paid for me to go into work today. So instead I took advantage of the sunshine and temperatures in the upper 40's and took the dogs for a walk. I'm really tired of pulling ticks of them right now, though, so we just did an hour-long leashed walk around the neighborhood. I really need to order/buy Frontline (or whatever) so that we can go on fun walks.
The yard continues to improve. Fingers crossed that we can play there again soon!
Secret is trying to garner sympathy for the boring weekend she just had to endure. Doesn't she look forlorn and pathetic? It's hard not being the center of attention all of the time.
Nope, no new titles earned this weekend for Secret. But we did finally get her very first NATCH bar! Family Dog Center was out at our March trial (and doesn't appear to be restocking, but that is another subject....) and I was pretty bummed that we wouldn't have a bar to commemorate Secret's very first NATCH.
Thankfully we have friends in high places -- in other words, we know the owner of Pebble Beach Designs who makes the most lovely Championship bars ever, complete with fun glittery ribbon stickers in practically any color you desire (PINK!). I talked to Kelly after the trial and asked her to make one for Secret.
Don't worry, Luke got one, too. :o)
We (myself and our friend, Karen, who also did the same thing) put them out on the tables for everyone to sign and they turned out just beautiful. Hooray for having a bar to remember the occasion! I already talked to Kelly about having a bar ready for Kaiser's V-NATCH, which will hopefully happen at our next NADAC trial in June. Sheesh, June??
Secret actually handled the weekend very well, but then again I didn't really anticipate any problems. She doesn't seem to mind spending time in her crate and without having to come out to run the pressure was completely off her. I took her out a couple of times on Saturday to see if I could get her to play outside with me. The first time I used her Wubba. It was a slow start and she wasn't really into fetching it at first, but she did tug! And not for food, either -- real honest to goodness playing tug. We went out the second time to play with her frisbee and again were successful, but only if I kept the tosses short. My big takeaway is that I don't think Secret generalizes "playing" in new places well. Maybe if I worked on this it would help agility, too?
Sunday was just god-awful outside. It was raining when we left home in the morning and it soon turned into sleet and morphed into these weird balls of slush falling from the sky. We ended up with TWO INCHES of slush on the ground that day, which kind of canceled any plan of playing outside. I did take Secret out between classes once, though, and played with her on the mats behind our crates. I just grabbed an old rope toy out of my bag and hoped for the best, but she was really into it! She was pouncing and bouncing and tugging!
It wasn't quite as hard as I thought it would be to not run Secret, which is kind of sad to admit. There were several times when I wished she was entered (she totally would have gotten Chances on Saturday for sure, and I think she would have really enjoyed the Jumpers courses), but in the end I knew I made the right decision because I would have just been disappointed if she came out and was "blah" again. I'm getting so tired of waiting for the ground to firm up so that we can train again. Time is ticking down to our USDAA trial at the end of the month!
The boys were AWESOME this weekend! Maybe that's why it wasn't that hard to not have Secret running -- we didn't need her to pull up the Q rate like we sometimes do. lol
Kaiser had a perfect night on Wednesday running 3/3 with Qs in Weavers, Tunnelers and Touch-n-Go. His Tunnelers run was just shy of 6 yps, which may or may not be enough for another 100+ DRI. I'll be waiting eagerly for the results to be posted to check many of his runs from this weekend.
On Saturday Kaiser was da' man. Both of his Regular rounds were absolutely smoking! Not only that, they were incredibly consistent with only 0.05 seconds difference between rounds. Kaiser's second round was the fastest of the whole class -- in Regular! He was just spot on the whole day -- except of course for Touch-n-Go, which was the last Q he needed in that class for his V-NATCH. Oh well, we'll get that next time. I was hoping to come out of this trial just needing that last Tunnelers Q, but I guess Kaiser thought it would be more fitting to finish on Touch-n-Go. I can't really disagree!
Luke is still running as great as ever. We had a super nice first round of Regular on Saturday to win his class (and it's a surprisingly competitive group at 12" Veteran Skilled!). In round 2 he was kind of naughty and took the tunnel under the a-frame -- likely because he had too much speed coming around the back stretch and just didn't feel like collecting in time. It's probably a good thing that he didn't have a clean run, though, considering as soon as he crossed the finish line he squatted and started to poop in the arena. Ummm... No idea what that was about, but I'm thinking the pumpkin supplement I gave him that morning (more for Kaiser, but Luke got some, too) may have just run right through him. Everything was firm, so I was just baffled at why that would happen. Oh well, shit happens. Literally.
Chances was one of those courses that Luke can do in his sleep. He sailed through it easily for his first Q towards NATCH 5. :o) Jumpers was, well, not clean. In watching the video I think the blunder started with a slip on the turf, which caused him to cut in on the line. It was all downhill from there, but we had fun and the run ended well.
After Kaiser started Sunday 3/3 with Q's in Jumpers, Weavers & Chances, I thought just maybe we had a shot at a perfect day and a 12/13 weekend (holy crap, wouldn't that be awesome!). It wasn't meant to be, though, as in the first round of Regular he was a bit squirrely and took several extra obstacles. In the second round I was really pushing to get into place for a front cross using a lot of lateral distance. I'm not in frame on the video, but I'll just guess that I was doing something to cause him to keep running straight to take the off course jump.
But still, I'll take a 10/13 weekend for the little guy -- and both Chances Qs in one weekend, how awesome is that? Seven more until NATCH 2, but who's counting? I'm totally stoked to take the wee man to Champs this year. I tell you, if we can hold it together he has a really good shot. I'm getting excited already!
Luke was the main man yesterday with a perfect day! Not only were his runs clean, but they were FAST! Luke's Jumpers round was THREE SECONDS faster than Kaiser's, and Kaiser didn't exactly have a pokey run. I threw in a blind cross at the end (a tricky one) that Luke read perfectly and Kaiser didn't, which was the main difference -- but overall the run was just awesome. Chances wasn't a given for Luke yesterday, but he was a good boy and didn't fly over the a-frame at a distance, so he also picked up both Chances Qs for the weekend!
Thankfully the weather stopped and things warmed up a little before everyone had to head home from the trial (oh, by the way, I won the worker raffle again!!). The yard is, however, still a mess and several warm/dry days from being usable (and we really don't have any of those in the forecast). Gah, I am so tired of this. Secret and I seriously need to get some bonding time in here soon because we're driving each other nuts.
Kaiser continues to be the Golden Child and is getting all of the attention. As if his claim to fame from last week wasn't enough, the excitement continues -- I was contacted over the weekend and told that Target wants him back AGAIN to do another shoot. Jackets? So we are going back up to the Cities for another shoot tomorrow. I know very few details, so I guess I'll have to report back when I get home!
Poor Kaiser, though. He may be getting all of the attention, but he's also getting all of the baths! lol
If you ever wanted to know what a super awesome dog looks like after over an hour of modeling, here you go. ;o)
Kaiser and I hit the road around 6:20 a.m. today for his gig with Target up in Minneapolis. Our time slot wasn't until 9:45, but I didn't know if there was any paperwork to fill out or if we'd run into any other things that would slow us down. As it turned out, we ran into a detour AGAIN that my trusty Garmin got us out of with only about a 10-minute delay.
The studio was in a large warehouse that really wasn't marked in the least. I wandered a bit and by sheer luck managed to find the right door. It was probably around 9:20 by this point and there was one other dog in the waiting area (a cute little Yorkie). Apparently they were getting started late, as that dog was supposed to have a 9:00 a.m. time slot.
Long story short, we waited. There were two sets going, but we were following the Yorkie on the side doing costumes -- Apparently the other side was doing side/silhouette shots that will be used to show breed recommendations and sizing on the packaging. Those shots were going fairly quickly, but the costume side not so much. They were having some sizing issues and they ended up using four costumes on the Yorkie.
It was probably close to 11:00 a.m. by the time they were ready for Kaiser. We experienced the same sizing issues as the Yorkie before us -- apparently the manufacturer was a little off or something. We used a mixture of sizes on Kaiser. He was supposed to be a "small" model, but we did end up using medium on him for a couple of things.
The first thing they put on Kaiser for a size reference was a T-Rex costume. It was too small and they moved on to something else without bothering with that one; not sure why we didn't try the next size up for that.
The first thing we shot him in was a hotdog costume. He ended up wearing the medium for that one because the bun didn't come far enough down on his back in the small. It was super cute. The hardest part was simply that Kaiser had to sit with his back to the camera and then I had to get him to turn his head and look back at me without moving his body. We worked just a little on this "skill," so considering how little practice he had he was pretty awesome. The only thing was that he would get up every time I'd reward him so he'd need to be repositioned. It didn't seem like a big deal, though, as it gave them more options to choose from.
The next costume was a skunk. This one was a little more complicated because it had to be positioned just so and it had a head piece. It was obvious that Kaiser would need the medium body for full coverage, but we shot it with both the small and medium head pieces. For this one we did body shots and head shots -- I believe the idea behind this is that they'd photoshop the better head shot onto the better body shot, as it was hard to get him to turn his head quite as much as he'd need to for them to be able to see the detail in the head. Who knows, we'll see what gets used.
His third costume was probably my favorite. It was a knight with a sword and shield riding atop Kaiser on his saddle. lol It was so super cute. We did squeeze Kaiser into the small for this one because the medium was too big. Kaiser preferred this pose because he got to stand in a more natural position without having to turn his head at odd angles. Once they got all of the costume shots they needed we set Kaiser up to get a few shots with his tail up. He never holds his tail up when he's standing still unless he's high as a kite or interested in something, but they wanted the option of having it up so the trainer on set held it up and then the photographer snapped several frames while it was still over his back. Seriously, the stuff they can do with editing is amazing...
Costume four was a bumblebee with light-up/flashing wings and yes, another headdress. The antenna didn't seem to bug Kaiser as much as the skunk head, though, so they probably got some cute shots where he didn't look too sullen. lol He was a super good boy, but he definitely didn't look as "happy" in the shots where he had stuff on his head. But you have to give him this, he stayed put with every costume and didn't mess with anything. He was SO GOOD.
By this time we surely must have been going for about an hour or so. When we wrapped up the bumblebee costume they asked if I thought Kaiser had one more in him. We'd struggled a bit at the end of the bee shot with all of the head turning and I knew he needed a break, so we just took five and went outside for a few minutes. I couldn't get him to potty for the life of me, so I just let him run around and sniff stuff. He was much happier and more relaxed, so we went in for the last one.
Initially they wanted Kaiser to wear the hula/surfer girl costume (lol), but that ended up going on another dog model while we were outside. One of the assistants brought out a pink cowgirl instead. Ha! I just love these costumes where someone/something is "riding" the dog, I get such a hoot out of them. Again the small was actually the better fit and it looked super cute on Kaiser. This was one of the most "involved" shoots of the day as an assistant was holding/operating a fish line attached to the cowgirl's hat in order to maneuver it into the best position. Seriously, Kaiser stood like a rock through all of this, even when the photographer moved forward to reposition the cowgirl on top of him.
They were so impressed with him -- and so was I! Everyone kept commenting how "calm and docile" he was. hahahahahaha I don't think I've ever heard those words used with Kaiser, but I can't deny that he was acting like he's done this a million times. He hung out on the floor off leash on breaks between costumes and even visited some of the crew. The whole time he was just like, "I've totally got this."
I'm glad he made such a good impression on the whole crew, as apparently Target is in the habit of requesting dogs they like. Who knows, maybe we can do more stuff in the future! I still have no idea what these things pay, but I don't really care -- I just want to see my dog on stuff! That said, apparently Kaiser is getting paid "extra" because they kept him so long. Sweet. Guess I'll find out what that means in the next 60 days or so. Unfortunately I have to wait a lot longer than that to find out what they end up using in their costume line this year! The wait will kill me!!
I'm not sure how Secret would have handled this shoot. I know without a doubt she could not have done as much as Kaiser; I have a feeling she'd have been done after about two costumes. The pop of the flash didn't seem as loud on this set, but there were a lot of people and hands involved and I think that would have wigged her out -- but then again, I thought the same of Kaiser and he had hands all over him the entire time and did fine. Who knows -- But I do think they would have appreciated Secret for her "head posing" that she's so good at. For example, they're big on the open mouth panting look which Kaiser will simply NOT do unless it's a million degrees outside. That's pretty easy to get out of Secret, although they would have probably all gone deaf from the barking. lol
On the way home I made a detour through Northfield, MN to stop at a cupcake shop I've seen a Facebook friend post about numerous times. Everything she's ever posted has looked amazing, so I knew I had to check it out for myself. Totally worth it. Totally. :o)
In other news, the yard is getting there! I was home Sunday and decided to test it out with a little speed circle using hoops. The right side of the yard was still a little spongy, though, so I kept it to the left side and made it more angled than I would generally prefer in order to keep within the confines of the "dry" portion of the yard. It worked, as the only area that got ripped up was by the first hoop to the left and the spot where they had to turn the hardest on the arc.
I took Secret out first and had her beloved Jolly Ball. Her first time around was about what I expected after our winter of no agility practice -- blah. But then the light bulb went on and she went, "wheee!" She had some super excellent speed and was really hauling ass. All of the dogs thought it was great, so we'll be sure to spend plenty of time on the speed arc in the coming weeks.
I did entries yesterday for our NADAC trial this coming weekend. As I posted previously, Secret is sitting out. It was hard. Very hard. I almost waffled and put her in some runs. In the end, though, I know it's more beneficial to keep her out until we have some solid, fun training time under our belt. Plus there was no way I'd get her to the chiropractor this week with everything going on, so we'll shoot for getting that done before her USDAA trial at Think Pawsitive at the end of the month.
The trail we walk on is almost completely snow free now -- but unfortunately that means one thing -- ticks. I stopped counting after pulling the first 20 off the dogs tonight when we got back from our hike. Sadly, no more trail hikes until I get everyone back on Frontline. And since I'm pretty sure we don't have any sitting in the drawer, that means I'd better buy some!
Oh my goodness, how exciting is this?!?! I was sitting at home Monday night when my phone rang. Like usual (because I am completely antisocial and hate talking on the phone) I let it go to voicemail because I didn't recognize the number. A message popped in before I even finished Googling the number to see if anything came up. The number traced to Barbara O'Brien! (For those to whom this means nothing, Barbara is the animal actor photographer we auditioned for again a couple of weeks ago when we were in Minneapolis for the USDAA trial.)
In her message Barbara shared that Target had chosen Kaiser for their upcoming Halloween costume shoot! Um, what?! I called her back immediately and got the details. I was totally surprised because they've never shown interest in him before (not knowing what he was), but Barbara said they loved his size and look.
The shoot is this coming Monday up in Minneapolis, so I'm taking the day off work to drive up for it. I don't expect it takes that long. I'm pretty sure I'll take Kaiser by himself; he doesn't seem to have any problem traveling solo.
I'm so excited and looking forward to the experience. It will be awesome to have an Alaskan Klee Kai represented on products sold nationwide (worldwide?). I have no idea what the gig pays, but I've always said just the experience of seeing my dogs on "stuff" is more than enough for me! And who knows, perhaps this experience could lead to other jobs if everything goes well. Kaiser is a super-duper poser, after all, and I'm sure Barbara was impressed by the fact that he doesn't even blink at the flashbulbs and other stuff going on around him.
Barbara actually did put Secret in the gallery of dogs that she made available for Target to choose from for the shoot (she was in the "Large" dog gallery -- the pictures here today were downloaded from Barbara's client gallery). I was surprised (about both of them) because I didn't get any sort of feeling that she planned on possibly using either of them for the Halloween shoot since she didn't ask either of them to wear an outfit. Maybe she's seen enough of my Facebook pictures with the dogs wearing crap? lol
I thought Secret's photo was super duper cute! Barbara even got her with her mouth open, looking all smiley and happy. It looks like they chose a different Border Collie for the large size; one with a very classic and traditional look about him. Oh well, maybe Secret will get another opportunity in the future. I still think she needs to be a head model. :o) Because just look at how adorable her face shoots!
I've heard nothing but good things from my friends who have been lucky enough to participate in photo shoots, so I'm hoping for an equally good experience. I'll be sure to report back after it's all said and done!
In other news, there is a light at the end of the dark tunnel of the winter that never ends. The temperatures have remained well below normal lately, but it has been warm enough to keep melting the ice out of the backyard. As of this morning about 80% of the yard is visible and it was cold enough that the patch furthest to the left was solid enough for us to play a quick game of fetch before I left for work (I had a dinner function and knew we wouldn't be able to play when I got home tonight).
I've been covering the muddy spots with hay and it's preventing the worst of the mess from being brought into the house. We've been hiking a lot out on the trail recently, but I'm really looking forward to being able to play in our own yard again! Hopefully very soon!
Entries went in the mail today for the USDAA trial at the end of the month. I'm confident that we'll have been able to get in some agility play by then, so hopefully Secret goes into that trial with a bit more oomph. She'll need it; she's signed up for all five core classes... Time to give P3 Pairs a try. It's the third run of the day, though, so she shouldn't be too run down by that point. Luke is entered in three runs that day! It will be his first time in Veterans Jumpers!
The last post was slightly depressing in nature, so I thought we needed something more cheery and uplifting.
The never-ending winter from hell is still upon us as you can see from all of the snow in these pictures, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel. The last few days have actually given us sunshine and above-freezing temperatures! Yesterday it reached 41 degrees and today the thermometer on my car read 47 degrees! Above zero!
I took the dogs walking yesterday on the trail we discovered last fall whilst out looking for Lucy the lost Klee Kai (who was never found, by the way; sad). I chose that trail because I figured it had a better chance of not being muddy like the bike trail, which gets soft and squishy every spring.
Silly me. There was still over 4" of snow pack on the trail yesterday, and that was following several days of gradual thawing. We went back today since I figured it would still be fine and I was right (the pictures are from today). There is still a lot of melting that needs to happen. Our back yard looks about the same. We are pretty much down to the solid ice layer that needs to melt now, though, which means we pretty much can't do anything back there.
The dogs have LOVED getting back out on the trail to romp and run. We've been leash-walking around town the last week or two and I tell you, it blows. None of us are fans of the constrictions of a leash. Well, Kaiser has no choice... But at least on the trail he gets all 23' of his Flexi. :o)
Everyone came back to the car panting both days and we were only out 30-40 minutes at a time. They just never stopped running. Today they were a bit naughty.... We walked in the opposite direction and apparently entered the land of squirrels. Surprisingly, it was Luke who ran off on us. Likely the only reason Secret didn't follow is because she had already tree'd a squirrel of her own.
Tomorrow they say it might get up to FIFTY degrees! Too much more of this and I suppose we'll be stuck to walking the streets again, but hopefully it's only a short time before our trails are snow- (and mud-) free. And the yard of course -- who can forget the yard? I really want to get back to training the dogs again! In general, though, I'm just looking forward to being back outside. It's been a long winter...
In agility news, I've decided to keep Secret out of the NADAC trial in April. She's already past her NATCH 2 points in Regular and Jumpers -- lord knows we don't need any more of them at the moment -- and if I entered her only in Chances that's about the least motivating option on the planet for her. So, that said, she'll sit this one out. I am going to go ahead and enter Secret (and Luke) in the USDAA trial over at New Berlin the last weekend of the month. Hopefully by then we'll have actually had a chance to train again and maybe Secret will remember that agility is supposed to be fun. Like our walk today.
Yesterday was a long day! Once again we got up well before the break of day (3:45 a.m.) to travel to an agility trial. We were up in Ham Lake, MN this weekend, running under judge Peggy Hammond. I chose to go on Sunday this time because the class list was definitely to our advantage. We weren't able to run Gamblers, but we did get in four runs total. I could have signed Secret up for P3 Pairs, but I decided I'd rather go for a short day and end with P3 Standard.
Originally my plan was for Secret and I to take this trip alone to test the waters and see if she's gotten any better about traveling solo since our last try in June when she was super weird (could have been because my dad was along, too, who knows). Things changed, though, when photographer Barbara O'Brien announced another open casting call that just happened to be on this weekend. And well, since my plan was to scoot out of the trial at a decent time, I thought just maybe we could swing doing both. Kaiser, being so dang stinking cute, deserves at least as much of a shot at "fame" as Secret, so he got packed along just for that.
Poor Luke stayed at home by himself for this one. I didn't think it paid to bring him along for one class and he isn't considered a very desirable dog for photo work. I planned for the boys to keep each other company while Secret and I were off playing, so I felt bad for leaving Luke alone. He got to go spend a few hours at my parent's house, though, so I don't think he suffered too terribly.
I was on the road by 4:15 a.m. and pulled into On the Run right about 7:15 a.m. I made good time and didn't quite know what to do with myself I had so much free time. ;o) I got the crates set up (Kaiser even got to come inside; I was planning on him staying in the car if I couldn't find room together), brought the dogs in and then joined the hover waiting for the course maps to be posted. Masters/P3 Snooker was the first run of the day and they were torturing us by not letting us sit and study the map. lol They finally gave them to us at about 7:40 and I had time to come up with a decent plan before we started walking.
I was a little torn about my choice because it involved doing two teeters in the open. It made the most sense, though, so I went for it. My handling choice was the first red on the bottom right, teeter (5), wrap back to the red below the teeter, then teeter again (5), pull through the jumps to the red on top, then the (6) serpentine, the red and then the jump/weave sequence before going into the close.
I knew that we had to complete through 5 in the closing to get a Q, so my heart fell a bit when Secret knocked a bar on the middle jump of the serpentine in the opening. I knew that meant we now had to get through six in the close and well, she wasn't being the most zippy she's ever been and her weaves were particularly slow. As it turned out, the buzzer sounded when she was going through the second standard of the serpentine, so we ended up with 35 points. It was good enough for 1st place in the 22" dogs, but even without the dropped bar she wouldn't have gotten one of the two Super Qs awarded to our combined class, as the lower-scoring P16 SQ still had 49 points. And the hunt continues...
The good news is that Secret had three really nice teeters in this class! She did trot from the first teeter to the second red, but the judge was standing right there and I think that had more of an effect on her than the teeter. I really didn't see any hesitation from her on the approach or about the tipping point all day. Hooray for getting past the teeter issues!
P3 Jumpers was up next. I hemmed and hawed a bit over how to handle the first sequence. Would I be better off running with and forcing a front cross or go for a bit of a lead-out to catch her over two and scoop her to three? I opted for a very short lead out, just enough to allow me to get ahead of her at the jump. For the rest of the course I used blind crosses -- between 4/5, 10/11, then the 15/16/17 sequence. That one wasn't planned, but I was so far ahead of Secret that I had to do something.
We ended up 7 seconds under STC, but this run (like all of them yesterday) just felt like I was pulling her through the entire thing. And this is Jumpers, what is supposed to be her favorite class.
Secret got a bit of a break while Advanced and Starters Jumpers ran, but then we were up again for Performance Grand Prix. We have not attempted Grand Prix since the first time we tried, which happens to have been that same trial in June where she was so weird traveling by herself. On that occasion Secret ran clean but ended up with time faults. I don't think it was much -- less than a second over time -- but it still was enough to keep me from entering her again. I figured once she hit P3 she would be experienced enough to tackle all of the equipment without me worrying if she would do it or not (i.e., teeter).
I really had my doubts as to whether or not we'd make time on this one, but we did end up 5 seconds under SCT. Thankfully Secret had her fastest weaves of the day in this run or else we probably would have been over. We lost a lot of time as she trotted out of the chute and she was pretty slow over the dog walk.
P3 Standard was up next (see, I'm telling you the class list this day was ideal for getting in and out in a hurry!). I wasn't really concerned about obstacle performance at this point, as Secret had been doing the contacts and tire without a problem earlier in the day. I couldn't help but recall the time we were so close to going over time with a refusal at the tire in P2, though -- This was our first time in P3 Standard and I didn't have anything to go on with regard to how much time we'd have.
We had another pretty lackluster ho-hum run, but it was steady and clean. Once again we came in 5 seconds under SCT. That means for the day we were 3/4, all Q's in P3 and Grand Prix. It's the sort of thing I should be like, "Holy cow, that's awesome!" But instead I'm just bummed.
Secret was just not feeling it yesterday. At all. I got her all jazzed up in the waiting area. She played. She tugged. She barked her fool head off. And then we went in the ring and she just went flat. I didn't feel like she had any oomph to her stride at all. I couldn't find anything to prompt her to really want to play with me. It felt more like she was just going through the motions and not really having any fun. Who wants to feel that way about their agility partner? Not me; it's depressing to feel like I'm making her be out there.
So what now? Confession: I know Secret needs a chiropractic adjustment. I didn't get her in before this trial for various reasons; namely taking off work. Regardless of that fact, however, she still goes completely apeshit flying through the air after her frisbee or chasing and tugging on her Jolly Ball, so her (minor) alignment issues are only a factor in her performance at trials.
I really believe that this LONG super crappy god-awful winter has taken its toll on her as well. I think she's sick of the limited activity we've been reduced to in recent months -- but instead of going hyper freaking crazy like some dogs, she's gotten mopey (except for when it's time to play; then she's crazy...). I also feel that the complete inability to reward/play with her during agility is starting to sour her in the ring. Think of it, though -- We haven't trained since what, October?? That's a long time to go without reinforcement around agility equipment for a dog like Secret.
The question is what can we do about this? Obviously I can get her adjusted. But then what? I'm tempted to give Secret a break from trialing to see if that does anything. At the very least, I don't know if there's any point in trialing her until after we've gotten some training time in -- and considering there's still a good foot of snow outside my door I have no idea of knowing when that will be. I can certainly keep her out of the NADAC trial next month, but I would be more torn about keeping her out of the USDAA trial at the end of the month. I especially want to go to that trial because I want to see if she has any better shot at a Super Q in New Berlin -- I never paid attention to the P3 class because we weren't in it. My hope is that they have enough dogs to make a class of their own and not get combined with the P16 dogs...
If the weather/ground is decent enough, I'd be curious to see if I could get Secret to PLAY at the NADAC trial if I'm not running her. I don't figure I would leave her at home by herself, so I'd have to do something to get her out. It wouldn't hurt to experiment, I guess. Lots to consider, but I think we can all agree that winter has GOT to go.
We left the trial right around 2:15, which worked well because I had signed us up for the 2-4 p.m. time slot with Barbara. I hit, no lie, three different detours on the way over there! Good gracious, thank goodness for the Garmin. It was 3:00 before we got there. We ended up waiting about 45 minutes for our turn -- sharing the very small/cramped waiting area with some very poorly trained dogs (there were two scuffles during our wait and two dogs were unable to actually wait in there with the other dogs present). That said, I'm very proud of Kaiser and Secret. Aside from Secret being a freakazoid about the dog nearest us (I do believe she actually liked him, but she was making the most pathetic flirty noises), they were exceptionally well-behaved.
Secret was a good girl for her photo shoot. She spooked slightly at the flash a couple of times. She would stay nicely but then get up from her sit when the bulb popped. She was also being a poop about her ears and kept moving them back and forth at first, but Barbara should have gotten several shots with them nicely forward. Secret did not get asked to try on clothes for an upcoming Target shoot. Surprise, surprise.
Kaiser was a freaking rock star. (So was Secret, while she held a down-stay during Kaiser's shoot!) The only issue Kaiser had was that he could not keep his poor little butt in one spot on the floor. I kept placing him on the marker and he would continue to go into a down shortly after I walked away. We quickly realized that he was trying to hold his sit, but you could see his butt sliding backwards. The floor was slippery for a fuzzy butt like his! He is and always will be an adorably photogenic dog, so I'm sure Barbara got some great shots. As always, though, nobody knows what Klee Kai are and I'm sure we'll never hear anything again. But it is what it is and we try. Maybe one day we'll be surprised!
Barbara said the photos would be posted in about a month because she has some other jobs coming up. I'll keep an eye out and pick them off her site when they arrive. I'm curious to compare them to the pictures she took over two years ago!
Do you remember that glorious winter we had last year? The one where we had practically no snow whatsoever? The year that we were still playing agility outside in January, February and March? Yeah, that one. We're apparently paying for that now.
With the additional 1.5" of snow that fell this morning, I think we are now something like 7" or more above average. Yay... And guess what, they just issued a new winter weather advisory for tomorrow.
Seriously, I am so tired of winter. I miss training my dogs! I am sick of planning our play schedule around how bad the footing is in the yard on any given day.
Last week I actually reached the point where I finally dragged a few jumps down into the basement. We've used the basement for playtime several times over this cruddy winter, but I never actually got around to taking any equipment down there. The recent blog action day on Internationalization (yeah, I totally failed at joining in on that one, even though I do have my fair share of opinions!) really made me want to get out and run the dogs -- so since I can't do that, I figured we could at least play with backsides, threadles & ketschkers with a couple of jumps in the basement. I haven't been torturing everyone with that -- Just Secret, but we've been having fun!
This weekend we are all home again. A sweet, blessed weekend at home. I hope that the weather cooperates enough that we can do something. Anything. Anything at all outdoors. Did I mention that last year it was 78 degrees on this day? Yup. I remember that we went swimming in March last year!
Next weekend we are making the drive back up to Ham Lake. We are only going on Sunday, as that was the day that had the most advantageous run order for Secret. Sadly for Luke, they aren't running Gamblers that day, which means he'd only have Standard and it was the last class of the day. (Secret is running Snooker, Jumpers, Grand Prix [finally], and Standard.) I decided to make the day a little bit of a test run of sorts to see how Secret does if I take her by herself (leaving the boys at home). I haven't attempted this since Father's Day weekend when my dad accompanied us to New Berlin. Who's to say her weirdness that day wasn't due to my dad tagging along, though? That's why I wanted to test the waters again.
However, plans changed. Photographer Barbara O'Brien (whom we tried to get in with when Secret was less than a year old) is having another open casting call up in the Cities next weekend. I'm thinking we should be done with our runs in time to make it over there, so I decided to sign up for Sunday afternoon. And since I figure Kaiser deserves a shot as much as anyone (well, so does Luke, but he's black and, well...), that means he gets to trek along as well. So much for Secret's solo trip.
We'll see how the audition deal goes this time. Secret has matured a lot since the last time we tried this. She was certainly a very good girl in all of our interactions with Barbara (open audition, Target audition, Chuckle Pup collar shoot), but she was obviously nervous. Hopefully having a couple more years of maturity under her belt will help her show off her naturally gifted posing personality. :o) It will have been a very long day with a 4 a.m. start and the trial all day, though, so we'll see what happens.
She did it! Actually, they both did it! Both Secret & Luke got the final Chances run they needed for their respective NATCH titles today! Originally I wasn't so sure I wanted them to get it on the same day because I thought Secret deserved a "special" day of her own, but let's admit it -- Getting a NATCH on two different dogs on the same day is pretty dang awesome!
Honestly, I did not have high hopes. In fact, my heart sunk quite a bit when it occurred to me that the set of courses we were running today was the very same set of courses we ran at the Minnesota Mixed Breed Club trial over Labor Day weekend. The reason this particular course was ingrained into my brain is because Kaiser had his NATCH on the line when we ran it. None of my dogs managed to Q on this course. Actually, I'm pretty sure that only two or three dogs in the entire Elite class Q'd on this course that day. Yeah... I wasn't too thrilled to see it again.
This course stuck with me so much that I brought it home and set it up to practice. We STILL could not get it and it caused me a great deal of frustration (the dogs, too, I'm sure). Look, I even did an entire blog posting about it with video! Honestly, I went into this more or less thinking we didn't stand a shot. You know what they say, though, sometimes those are the best because you take the pressure off yourself!
Secret absolutely nailed the course! Not a single foot out of place and zero hesitation! Hooray for the baby dog!
I've been wondering for a while if I'd do a victory lap with Secret when she got her NATCH. If I'm honest with myself, I know it's totally not her thing. When we finished the run today I started to celebrate and she continued to head for the door. I did get her to come back to me, but I knew that making her run around the ring would be anything but rewarding for her. So I sucked up my ego and we went back to the crate where she got loads and loads of chicken.
It's amazing to think that Secret took just two years to earn her NATCH! It took me four years to get the first one with Luke. It took three years to get the first one with Kaiser. Maybe I'm on some sort of a roll here? Or maybe experience just helps. :o)
I was a little bummed that they were out of NATCH bars this weekend. I don't feel it's such a huge deal for Luke, but it would have been nice to have one for Secret's first big title. Oh well, the ribbon bling is pretty darn awesome!
Considering that Luke had also struggled greatly with this course when last we saw it, I certainly didn't think that this would be a slam dunk for him, either. He is and always will be, though, a very good boy. And Luke DOES enjoy victory laps, so we took one and had heaps of fun celebrating his fourth NATCH!
I'm so proud of the big guy! At nine years old and living with Addison's Disease he is still ROCKING IT every single day of his life! I think the best part of his day was when we came home and played frisbee, though.
In addition to their Chances runs, both Luke & Secret only ran in Jumpers today. Thankfully it was the first class of the day, so they got to get their ya-ya's out right away. Luke took down two bars, which is unusual for him (the first was from hitting the standard). Secret had a lovely run, although it certainly wasn't her speediest ever. She did still manage to come in 2nd behind the world's fastest Aussie, though, which is pretty great! And I had fun and stuck in two blind crosses, so wee for me!
Kaiser did not have quite the stellar day that he did yesterday, but he's still awesome. I need to get a better handle on how many treats I give the little guy over the course of three days, and/or I need to make sure I pump him full of pumpkin. His belly was not a happy camper today, which I know makes it hard for him to concentrate like he needs to in his runs. I think I was pretty lucky that we didn't end up with a giant mess in the first round of Regular, as he kind of exploded outside between runs. I knew he had to go -- I had him outside with Luke before that Regular run and I could tell something was up, but I gave him forever and he still didn't go. He was fine the rest of the day, though, and thankfully he only had Tunnelers to wrap up his day. Tunnelers is always fun!
With that Tunnelers Q, Kaiser is now two Touch-n-Go and two Tunnelers Q's from his V-NATCH. I don't know how I let them get quite that far behind. My original intention was to get his NATCH and then finish up the Versatility right away... Because, you know, I didn't want to finish them on the same day. :o) Oh well, we'll get there. With our current trial schedule, though, the earliest he can get it is June!
As if today wasn't already one of the funnest most amazing days ever, it got even better! I got to run THREE dogs in addition to my own! Seriously, I cannot tell you how much I enjoy running other people's dogs. It is such an amazing learning experience, as every dog you run will teach you something!
Colleen let me run baby dog Jet again today in Novice Regular. We NQ'd again, but it was heaps of fun! The start is a little unconventional since we figured he'd for sure take the tunnel -- Jet gets a little excited for tunnels. :o) Colleen was mostly interested to see how Jet weaves when someone else runs him, and the takeaway from this weekend was that he did great! Colleen was thinking about pulling him from Regular for a while, but now thinks it might be better to let him keep doing it for experience (he did finish his Novice Regular title with his mom this weekend!). He's going to be such an amazing dog!
My next awesome opportunity came when I got to run Spice! Spice is a Keeshond that belongs to my agility buddy, Cynthia. Cynthia is an amazing trainer and I have admired her (and her dogs) since I began competing in 2007. Spice has come so amazingly far since Cynthia adopted her a few years ago. She used to be a little whirling dervish who would just spin and bark at you constantly, but Cynthia has done an amazing job at teaching her "go on" skills.
Spice is a fast little stinker! She also has a running dog walk, and how much fun is that?! Unfortunately there was an off course obstacle straight off the dog walk and we NQ'd there, but it was still just ever so fun to have the opportunity to run the little fluff ball.
My last treat of the day was to run Nim. I'm sure everyone has dogs they see at trials and they think to themselves, "Man, I'd really love to run that dog one day." Nim has been one of those dogs for me ever since I saw her run. She is FAST. So super ungodly fast. She's a little twitchy, but she is amazing. Except for the whole being a girl thing and being the wrong color, Nim is pretty much everything I want in my next border collie -- She's small, she's built like a little coyote and she is crazy toy obsessed. Tug! Tug! Tug! She will play with anyone!
Renee gave me the opportunity to run Nim on the Elite Weavers course at the trial today. What a gift! It was so much fun, even if I did totally fail to support a hoop between tunnels and caused an off course before I could blink. Dang, you have to react quickly with these dogs! lol
I don't have it on video, unfortunately (I guess Renee does, so I'll post it if I get it), but I also got the completely unforgettable experience of running Nim in Tunnelers. It was the last class of the weekend and it was OH SO MUCH FUN. We put in a mind-numbing 7.9 yps run for a Q/1st! Holy buckets. Our time was 17.something and the average (good) time in the class was in the 20/22 range (Kaiser was 22). I never imagined I'd get to feel what it was like to have that kind of run. Completely exhilarating and totally addicting!
Renee is going to Champs and will be required to enter Nim in the 16" Veteran dog class (apparently all dogs 7 years and up MUST run as Vets at Champs now?). That would put her in the same class as Luke, which only makes me further think about not running him in the Regular rounds. lol Oh, we'll see... I'd love to see her run at Champs, though, that's for sure. I think she'll place quite well, if she keeps her head on straight!
I think that wraps up my super awesome day -- Oh, except that I also won the worker raffle! Sweet!!! We drove through Dairy Queen and I shared my ice cream with the crew on the drive home. Let's just say that some of them are neater than others when it comes to eating off utensils. Next time I should ask for two spoons....
In other news, we are supposed to get 10" of snow tomorrow.....
Obladi, oblada. Two days into the trial, two shots at Chances and still no NATCH. Bummer, eh? Good thing we have one more shot at it tomorrow!
Unfortunately neither attempt was really even what I could call close. As I mentioned previously, maybe this whole "can't train all winter" thing is not the most conducive to our distance handling.
Aside from that, Secret is running great! This morning she was entered in Round 2 of Regular (Luke was in Round 1). I couldn't help but groan to myself as I walked the course first thing and realized that Secret's round would have the weaves as obstacle two. Come on... Of all the luck.
That said, I thought she had some pretty slamming weaves considering they were the second obstacle on the course! Secret put in a very lovely Regular run today. She also had a great Jumpers run, even though I managed to get RIGHT in her way and probably knocked her neck out of alignment as she tried to keep from plowing into me. Stupid handler...
Luke also drew the short straw on the number of runs this weekend, but that is the price you pay for getting to play at USDAA trials now, buddy. He didn't suffer too much today, though -- he still got three runs (vs. the normal four). Tomorrow will be tougher, as both Secret and Luke only have two runs.
Luke is also running great -- and, just like Secret, is Qing in everything except Chances. Unlike Secret, however, Luke has been getting the challenges, but has knocked a bar both days. Boo. He WILL get it tomorrow!!
I don't know if Kaiser thought USDAA was so awful that he's extremely happy to be running NADAC exclusively, or if he's so jealous about not running USDAA that he's trying extra hard in NADAC now... But either way, he is on a heck of a roll lately. With Q's in both rounds of Regular today that is at least six in a row that's he's gotten, if not more (records? you want me to look at records?). He hasn't gotten called on his dog walk in lord knows how long, but we still managed to NQ in Touch-n-Go today thanks to a wrap on a hoop (which he went back through -- monkey see, monkey do).
Kaiser was, of course, my only dog to actually Q in Chances today. And, of course, the course had a dog walk. Maybe he's changed his rules -- maybe now he will only Q on Chances courses with dog walks?
Hooray! I've been watching my order from K9gear.us, wondering with bated breath if our new tags for Secret's Julius K-9 Harness would arrive before our trial this weekend. They came in the mail tonight! My work day has been so crazy that I'd almost forgot about it until I saw the nondescript envelope in my mailbox when I got home.
Seriously, do you know how much angst goes into coming up with these things? lol Okay, maybe it's just me... You have to pick the COLOR in addition to what you want it to say. Oh the choices, the choices.
I went with purple glitter. I didn't know if pink glitter on the pink harness would have been overkill. Let's face it, any color glitter lettering is going to rock. And since purple and pink are kind of tied for favorite colors in my world, I figured I'd have Secret's harness rock both colors.
Secret's name was the obvious choice for one side (because I'm so not original and figured that would just be easy). Coming up with what to put on her tag for the other side was a bit harder. Knowing me, I'll probably end up deciding I don't like this one and ordering different ones -- but for now, I figured Sassypants fit Secret well, especially at trials where she's barking at me the whole time...
We all know that I'd love to get a label that says, "bitch" because that would be MOST fitting for Secret, but seeing as the intention is for her to wear her harness at trials I didn't know if that was the best impression to be making on judge. :o) Maybe "I Q a Lot" would be better? hahahaha
We don't need to Q a lot this weekend. Just once and we'll be good. Secret and Luke both have three shots to get the one Chances Q they both need, so hopefully we can knock that out of the way for each of them this weekend!
Neither are running in much else; both have just six runs total for three days thanks to me trying to save money towards running them in USDAA instead of NADAC. In addition to their Chances runs all three days, Luke & Secret are both entered in Jumpers on Saturday & Sunday and one round of Regular each on Saturday. I think Luke got round 1 and Secret got round 2.... Secret has so many stinking Jumpers Q's that I wanted to cut her back there, but I have a hard time keeping her out of the one class she enjoys the most. And since we don't really have the ability to create positive training experiences right now, we may as well try to achieve that at trials.
The little fart gets to run five runs a day on the weekend and twice on Friday. Poor Kaiser doesn't get to run USDAA, so this is his weekend to have fun! No big titles on the line for the little guy, but hopefully we can knock out a few games towards his V-NATCH.
Several weeks ago I was contacted and asked to review a new product from the dog bark collar store. The product in question is the ToughHound All Sports collar. This collar "is a personalized collar that lets you display your dog's name and address. The collar is made from highly-durable polycoated webbing which will allow you many years of rough and tumble play with your pup. The ToughHound's non-porous surface dries quickly, will never absorb offensive odors and makes mud easily removable. The collar also features an integrated stainless steel laser-engraved nameplate which won't jingle or fall from its ring."
Anyone who knows me knows how much I HATE jingling tags on collars! I cannot stand it and my dogs have not had tags on their collars for, well, years. Honestly, when it comes down to it, my dogs don't wear collars all that often, which is what took so long for me to write up this review. I figured I should at least wait for a few opportunities for Secret to wear the collar before I reviewed it.
I find many things about this collar highly appealing. The colors available are bright & fun, which also makes them highly visible. I'm always a fan of anything that is waterproof -- While it's a bit too cold to consider testing the water resistance of this collar, I imagine it will become Secret's go-to swimming collar this summer. I hate how the nylon collars retain odors and that is certainly one perk of this collar!
There are numerous font choices to choose from, so you can have fun personalizing your own collars! I settled on "Arial Round" for Secret's collar. Each tag can hold up to four lines of text with 14 characters each. I opted to limit Secret's to three lines so that the text would be more visible. Working at the shelter, the only thing worse than having no tag at all is a tag that is completely unreadable. The engraving appears to be very good quality and these tags should remain readable for a good long time.
The ring for clipping on your leash is good-sized, which is always helpful. Secret has a couple of collars with small, flimsy rings and it's very hard to clip on the leash one-handed. This one is nice and hefty and even with the spare end of the collar tucked through it there is ample room to easily clip on the leash. I didn't feel like I had to fish around for the ring like I do on some collars.
The metal plate is rather thin, which I'm not so sure I'm in love with. When the collar is being used with a leash, the name plate ends up on the bottom of the dog's throat. If you have a dog that pulls on the leash I could see this fairly thin metal plate digging into their neck. Maybe it would be an aversion to pulling; who knows, but I'm not a huge fan of this aspect of the collar. Kaiser and Luke both have Boomerang tags that operate under the same principle (no jingling), but those tags are attached to an actual collar so that the tags themselves aren't pressing against the skin. I showed the collar to several people at a couple of trials we attended and they seemed to have the same thought regarding the design. Most people said they preferred to have the collar material against the dog instead of the metal tag.
I thought the sizing was a little peculiar. I was instructed to measure one of Secret's current collars to get the correct size (measuring from the buckle to the tab). I admit that I didn't measure her again. I was pretty certain that I used 14" as the measurement for her custom sparkly collar a while back ago (the beads came unattached on that, did I ever mention?), so that was the measurement I used. The picture above is the collar on the smallest setting. For some reason they punched that many holes into the collar to make it adjust that small, but there is very little room for error on the larger end. The holes are also spaced quite far apart, so there isn't much room for fine-tuning. As a result, the collar is either too snug on Secret or slightly bigger than I would prefer (on the largest hole).
None of these things would necessarily prevent me from using the collar. I'm terrible about having identification on my dogs, so I can very much see myself using this as a traveling collar for Secret. As I stated earlier, I think I will definitely use it as our swimming collar for when we visit the river. I likely will not choose to use it as a "walking around the neighborhood" collar for the reasons I stated above regarding thickness and digging into the dog's throat. I'll be the first to admit that I fail at teaching my dogs to walk well on leash -- Secret is fine at trials, potty stops on the road and other every-day sorts of things, but she does get excited and pull for the first half of our leash walks around town (granted, we don't do them often...). Secret's collar is the 3/4" thickness. I would be curious to see the 5/8" collar, but I still think that this collar and the material would be a little overwhelming on a smaller dog like Kaiser. I think it would be a great collar for Luke in the 1" size, and I wouldn't worry so much about the plate digging into him because he has so much hair around his neck. After going to the link I included above and not being able to find the actual collar by navigating the web site, I figured I could include the direct link for you here: http://www.dogbarkcollar.com/toughhound The collars retail for $29.95. Boomerang tags cost around $11 and you have to provide the collar, so I would say they are pretty comparable in that regard. If you also hate jingling tags and would benefit from an easy-to-clean collar, don't hesitate to check out the ToughHound collar. As a disclaimer, for providing this review I did receive a ToughHound All Sports Collar of my choosing. I was not required to give a positive review and all comments and opinions stated above are my own.
