One Day To Go...

Almost Nationals time!

The time has flown and here we are - tomorrow morning at a disgracefully early hour of the morning I am flying out to Perth. The camera batteries are charging, the online check-in has been done, the packing is... well... in progress... and the excitement level is climbing all the time. I am looking forward to catching up with friends, preparing to be amazed at the skills of both handlers and dogs, and generally have a great time.

I am just a *little* disappointed that I will not be running my own dogs, but I do know it was the right decision. Their time will come! I have heard a whisper also that the Trans-Tasman Challenge is well into its planning stages, and with Josh and Billie's breeder living just out of Auckland, I may be taking one or both of them back for a visit this time next year :) Something new to aim for - this time with a whole year to plan and train, I hope we can make it. It would be wonderful to represent Australia, and wonderful for my dear friends Lindy and Nancy to see the dogs they bred in action right in their own backyard.

Things have been quiet on the training front here - I have been very busy what with a recent trip to New Zealand (will have to do a blog entry on that at some point because, as always, I learnt a lot :>) Once I am home from the Nats and settling back into a routine I will try to get some more updates happening on the dogs' progress. My current goals include returning Billie to the showring, getting Fyre up to agility trialling standard and working with Josh to improve both our skills in herding.

On Saturday I was lucky enough to secure a spot in a sheep herding clinic with Tull Luttrell who was visiting from Tasmania and judged our two herding trials this weekend just gone. Josh has his HT title, and I believe will get his PT without too much trouble, but I really want us both to learn more skills and be able to do it really well, and be able to also proceed on to Started and potentially further. Josh was a wonderful natural instinct when it comes to herding - it is quite amazing to watch dogs that have had little to no exposure to stock just do what comes naturally when they see sheep or ducks for the first time. That was Josh - from the first time he saw sheep all he wanted to do was bring them to me. I can walk anywhere and he will bring the sheep after me. For a dog that is generally relaxed and happy, he gets quite intensely focussed around sheep, but is not over-enthusiastic as some Aussies can be. I am so proud of him - to me he is the perfect herding dog :)

Tull helped to point out several things I can practice with him to improve, I need to start teaching him directional cues (as to which way he circles the sheep), I need to work on him knowing to go on the outside of me rather than between me and the sheep (which I can do by walking in to the sheep if he heads in that direction) and I certainly want to work on a more solid stop. As always, he surprised me in that he actually was able to give a reasonable stop, another hint from Tull being that to practice stops I need to first wait until the sheep are still, i.e. to lead them into a corner and then cue to stop. Same as with the agility workshops I have attended, I came home quite enthusiastic from this day and determined to put some proper work into it.

One thing I have wanted to try for quite some time is using balloons to train some herding commands to Josh. The things Josh is second-most intense about (after sheep) is balloons and bubbles. Watching him play with balloons in the past, I noticed he exhibited the same circling/herding behaviour he does with sheep, and the same locked-on focus to their movements. Which is a big plus in itself, as trying to get him to perform e.g. a sit/stop whilst being so focussed on the sheep is hard to practice when you don't have sheep. The theory was that balloons would at the very least give me a chance to work with him in a higher than usual state of arousal, and thus allow us to practice the basics and make the most of the rare times we do get to see sheep. Here is a little video of oour first attempt at using balloons (just skip the first 30 seconds - it took me that long to set up my phone to record it and then to retrieve the dog!)




Things to work on - obviously we need to work on sits and downs with him at a high arousal level and gradually build up to distractions. As you can see, the handler at one point cues sit, the dog does not sit, so the handler decides to change to a drop, and then uses a cue that lasts about 20 sec!!! Obviously not the best training. So some work to do there. It does show you a little how focussed he really is on those balloons though, which is good because that's what I want from this exercise. You can also see him offering to circle around behind the balloons, and currently I am giving him big, obvious arm signals. I think I can also work on shaping this a bit better.

Lots to think on anyway! However with that I really need to go and get started on my packing now, as one does not want to miss one's new addiction 'Masterchef'. See you on the other side of the Nationals - good luck and have fun to everyone who is attending - I can't WAIT!!!!