Loki and I went to the Duke Power Engergy Explorium trails today and he pulled his cart totally off lead through the woods.  He did awesome!  He seems to know that he is to stay right by me while in the cart….usually we go here and the dogs run free.  There were not too many distractions, other than a squirrel that ran across our path!  Fortunatley Loki just stopped, and was ready to continue on. 

Just finished week 4 of Jan Demello’s Around the  Clock method of scent discrimination.  It went very well!   I think Loki is ready for the challenge of the next few weeks.  He certainly loves this game because of all the squeeze cheese involved!

Loki got his UKC CD today!  We had our first trial yesterday…..it was fine, could have done better.  Our score was 190.5.  Today was much much better!   We scored a 196 1/2 and got second place!  He far exceeded my expectations today.  Our goal was 194. 

So next weekend it is Grad Novice in Simpsonville, SC.  This will be a little bit more of a challenge.  There are 4 recalls:  one over the broad jump, one over the high jump, a drop on recall, and a recall while holding a dumbbell.  I do not anticipate any problems with the two jumping ones.  The other two could potentially be a problem though.  We shall see! 

The best things out of these trials:  huge improvement on figure 8’s, no bumps on the front, and no squishing up on me on the finish.  About turns were an issue yesterday, but not so much today.  Today the big thing (as well as yesterday) were sit-at halts out of heel position.  We had these worked out for the trials prior to this one…so not sure what happened.

We switched our Scent Discrimination method to  Janice DeMello’s Around The Clock Method.  She has some crazy insane overachieving  Border Collies, as you can see at her site: 

http://www.jandemellobordercollie.com/

Since I am doing this on my own, I needed a visual, so I bought her video of the same name as her method.  Quite the interesting video….We are in week 3, and things are going very well.  Hard not to, as there is an abundance of squeeze cheese used.  I think around week 5 the cheese is eliminated.

This episode of a British show called Keeping Up Appearances is funny, featuring a Newf!

Love the “oppostional reflex” when they are trying to pull the Newf out of a sit!

First of all, Blue is still in training!   He is learning the cart.  He seems to enjoy this, so now we work on commands and maneuvering. 

Loki, however, has a busy schedule.  We have two UKC trials coming up in Fountain Inn, SC.  He has one leg of his U-CD.   He also will be heading to Simpsonville, SC for an AKC trial, for Grad Novice.   Grad Novice is stepping stone between Novice and Open.  We will hopefully be read for Open in December…depends on how he does with the Grad Novice.  We also have a draft trial, see below.  And will hopefully finish out Grad Novice in November in Asheville and Concord. 

We entered two UKC trials 2 weeks ago in Hickory, NC.  Me, myself and I NQ’ed us the first day…I set up Loki for the recall over the jump, went over the other side, promptly called him over.  Problem was, I did not wait for the judge to tell me to call him!  So that was an automatic NQ.  Why it was not just a handler error is beyond me.  We would have otherwise had a 190 and 3rd place.  The second day we placed with a 3rd place and a score of 191.5.  Loki’s ears were bothering him, and he shook his head alot.  I also did not set him up straight for the jump as I should have. 

Blue is in a Novice class, and hopefully we can get him ready to show in January.  He is a challenge!!!  He is not terribly food motivated, and does not take corrections very well…..but we will ge there.  Loki is so easy.

For the Chatahoochee Valley Bernese Mountain Dog Club draft test that is.  We have been practicing.  We have been to a run-through.  I have the entry sent in.  I have the hotel reservation made.   The test is back to back  on Halloween and the day after.  It will be outside of Atlanta.  Hopefully I make it home in time for trick or treating.  Hopefully we pass the first day!  Loki is very confident in his cart, and is doing well with tight turns and commands.  Of course all that changes when in “the ring”.  I did have some videos taken of us at our run-through…..I made some mistakes….I guided him with the leash a few times, and did not take advantage of being able to talk, heck sing if I wanted to, to keep his attention.  It was also blazing hot and sunny, and he tends to not work in that sort of weather!  I have been taking him outside in the bright sun to have him heel, so that he knows that he does indeed have to work in the sun and heat.  Hopefully it will not be sunny and hot on draft test day.  I would prefer freezing temps!  He will work in that.

The boy can back up!!! 

This one he did not pay attention to my “slow” command, cause he was making a desperate attempt to find shade!  This caused us to just have to bust right through that figure 8….which was no problem!  I think I had a tight leash though.  He ignored the Great Pyr outside the ring….

That’s it….I was pretty pleased.  Since this, I have been making sure that I keep the leash in my right hand, and not use it at all.

I am going to start teaching Loki scent discrimination.  On my own.  I have had the scent articles for about 6 months, but have not done anything other than ask him to retrieve them.  I am using the dog trainer Connie Cleveland’s book as reference.  It is very detailed step by step directions.  The prerequistes are:  correction for failure to retrieve (yes), ability to do the retrieve on flat (yes), speed going out to and coming back with the dumbbell (yes).  So I guess it is time to begin.  I guess I will journal our progress here.

We started with Step 1 Friday, which was to first see if he will “take” the metal article.  Not a problem.   Loki has a nice retrieve, and knows the “take it” command just fine.  Then the next step was to put a dab of peanut butter on the bar of the metal dumbbell (article), and tell the dog to take it.  Loki was more than happy to do this!  Once he licked the peanut butter off, picked up the dumbbell and brought it to me, without another “take it” command, it was time to move on. 

We moved on to the next step, which was to tied down two metal articles to a pegboard, and “scent” one loose article, and put a dab of peanut butter on it, and place it on the board.  The command now is “find it”, which also means bring it to me.  Loki has a good understanding of what “find it” means, so this was not a problem.  We played games of placing pieces of food behind cones and told him to “find it”.  Easiest command to teach!  We also tried another fun game a few times, where you wet a bunch of paper towels and place them on the floor, then dip two paper towels in peppermint scented water, put one on the floor, let the dog sniff the other and tell him to “find it”.  He did great at that game to.  Even brought the correct one right to me!  

So this finding the metal article went well, with Loki bringing me the correct loose article each time.  Except he was not sniffing the two tied down ones.  The book says he should sniff those as well, and bring the loose one.  He did sniff them at some point, but the book said he should sniff the other two and bring the correct one 3 times in a row.  I paniced!  In my mind that is what he should do.  In Loki’s mind, he was bringing me the loose one with the dab of peanut butter on it.   He got frustrated, and plopped down and looked at me like what do you want from me! 

We stopped for the day.  I rinsed the articles and let them air dry.

On Sunday, I set everything up, and started where we left off.  Loki went to the pile, sniffed the two tied down articles, and picked up the correct one!  Yahoo!  Success….we can move on.   

This is a lengthy process…..months!

Blue tried out pulling the cart for the first time yesterday.  He was a bit skittish at first, trying to figure out what that thing was attached to his butt!  He had worn the harness a few times with no issue, he had dragged the traces around without issue.  So we hitched him up.  It did not take long for him to enjoy it….tail wagging high!  So this morning we brought him out again, and he did even better.  We walked up and down the cul-de-sac, and did a couple of big circles.  I got him to back about 6 inches.  He can back up pretty far without the cart, so hopefully he will be able to with the cart.  He is learning Drop On Recall, and one of the things we do is back up and then “drop”. 

Here are some videos of the big guy.  Andy was working with him, because he is better than me at dealing with any sort of skittish behavior, I tend to panic as soon as the dog does.  Though I could tell that Blue would have preferred to be handled by me! 

Andy pretty much refuses to give treats, but does give lots of praise, which works just as well.   I would have given him a few more treats if it was me handling him, especially making the turns to lure him into them more.  Hopefully next week Blue will feel comfortable enough for me to work with, with Andy assisting. 

I think Blue did great for his first time!  What a good boy!