Up's and Downs

Tigg has now joined a class at Tenterden as upto now he had only been trained up my field on his own. The first week he was excellent and I was really pleased with all he did. I didn't do the full hour and put him away on a good note. Last week was a different story, he would not concentrate on anything, he kept sniffing the floor and eating the smallest piece of horse crap he could find and had forgotten how to weave. Anyway I put him back in the van as I really didn't want to continue with that sort of training. This week, I got him out and was obviously abit dubious about how he would behave, well he was great. I had set up the course that Nancy had posted, which meant we could do lots of little bits. We did a circuit on the contacts going twice round and his contact were the best they've ever been. Then we did a few jumping exercises, which involved scooping him inside me (which I haven't done alot of) and he was a star. Then we worked on wrong end of tunnels, this proved a little more difficult and I will need to go up the field and work on this. Then I put him through the weaves a couple of times on the lead, took him off and he was fine. I then put him away as I was very chuffed will all he had done. I did have a lesson booked with Nancy tomorrow, but now that we've got rain, unfortunately it will be too wet at Nancy's. I'm hoping I will be able to go sometime next week.
Anyway I've got a Toni Dawkins training day on Saturday and I'm working Chip, then I've got C-side on Sunday and I'm looking forward to that and so is Buzz as he's got veteran "AGILITY", yes he loves his contacts. Took Buzz into training last nite, just to remind him about his contacts, it just goes to show, you still have to put the work in even if they have semi retired. He broke his wait about 3 times and this is my dog that I would have said was 100% solid on his waits, but the fact that I have done no training with him (not even waits) shows. He then ran his dogwalk even though I had asked him to wait. He was very funny and was soooo pleased to be doing a little bit of agility. Anyway he's still sound this morning, so thats a good thing.

Training & Ribble

Well it's been a while since I last posted, but not much has happened. A couple of weeks ago while training at Mac's I tore the Plantar Faciia tendon in the bottom of my foot. I had only just got to training (after driving for an hour) and managed to do about 6 obstacles with Chip, when it felt like an elastic band snapping under the bottom of my foot. Well that was that and I limped out to the van and drove back home, I then spent the next week resting it totally and putting ice on it every 3hrs or so. I could hardly walk let alone run a dog and was quite disappointed as I was due to start working Tigg at club on the Wednesday. Anyway i didn't want anyone else to work Tigg as he is still a baby, so he didn't get to train, but I did manage to get Catherine to run Chip. He was a good boy for her, but did take the p..s abit on his contacts.
Foot is now alot better and I managed to work Tigg and Chip last week, I'm glad I worked Chip as this was his last training before going up to Ribble. Chip obviously knew I was not up to full fitness and he was soooo bad, I was not looking forward to Ribble with this wild merle.
Needless to say, he was still wild at Ribble and I got 3E's in the classes I ran, and Leah got 20th in the pairs running him with Eve's Dash, even though Chip had 2 poles and Dash had a refusal.
Tigg is going well at the moment and I have a got a training day lined up with him with Toni Dawkins and another with Natasha Wise. Must also make the time to go over to Nancy for some 1 on 1 as I do enjoy that and Nancy gives me ideas to go away with. Tigg is due out at the end of April and think his first show will be Lewes.

Chip doing abit of Training

A while ago I went to Nancy's to do some training and Leah kindly videoed it for me, so here is a little of what we got upto.

http://www.youtube.com/v/Jeb-UcEpfNY

Happy New Year

Yes I know, I haven't written anything for quite a while, so here goes.

Well Olympia came and went and in fairness to Chip he worked really well, he just responded instantly to my commands which were too early, therefore he got E'd. Had a good day though, spent lots of money and Chip got to say hello to lots of kids.


With regards to Tigg's training, he is now weaving on the upright weaves. Although it is slow, he is thinking about it. I am still running him through the V weaves to encourage speed. He will be starting at Tenterden next Wednesday, this should benefit him as he has only been trained at home in the field alone.

On News Year Day I went to Camber Sands with Elaine and Catherine. Between us we had 5 collies and 3 Aussies, they were all very well behaved and it was even commented on by a couple of horse riders how good they were when we put them all into a down while they rode past us. Anyway we walked for over 2 hours and the dogs had a great time.

Buzz loves going anywhere that there is water, so he was in heaven.

Heres a few of the dogs, Pi and Tigg were not in the picture as they were too busy stalking the group.

Pi (Chips little brother)












Tigg