Saturday, July 14, 2012

Bratty Corgi, and some Border Collies

Pixel NQ'd both trials this morning! What a brat!

The first trial was really great- lots of pep and she was working pretty well. A little laggy on the figure 8, but not too bad. I was stoked- she never has trouble with the stays. Until today. She SAT UP on her long down. First time ever. When I left her I did think to myself that she didn't look as settled as normal but by the time I realised- it was too late to do anything about it.

And then of course the second trial was bumped up to before the break and we were up in less than ten minutes. Not so good for a Pixel. In hindsight I should have just cut my losses and went home. We struggled the whole way to stay connected and keep her up. We NQ'd our heeling. lol. Which is usually her best thing. So after that I helped her as much as she needed. The judge didn't say anything except that'll cost you. But we'd already failed so whatever. lol.  Oh, and I should mention she did stay for that trial- her usual rock solid little self. Brat.

So now we will wait until Fall- Reddeer or Lethbridge. Probably Lethbridge- no travel, or hotel. I'm all about saving money these days!

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In other news we are having a great time at Phantomridge. When I got home at noon the dogs and I had a nice long walk, and then a nap in the airconditioning! I spent some time playing with Louanne's dogs. And of course took some photos!!!

Remember Gus? Well he's almost all grown up and has turned out to be a great little dog. He is happy, fun, and sweet.

Isla is the Queen of the place, and is a super cool dog. She is all serious when it comes to work, but bring out a sheepie tug toy and she turns into a lunatic. LOVE HER!

Mack. AKA Crackers. He is a dog that is just training at Louannes. He is super cute, and a little crazy. ;)

Random Lamb. <3

and one more of Isla all crazy like. What a neat dog!
 Oh, and I didn't get any photos of Meg, who is a SUPERSTAR (she just won Reserve Champion at the Stampede Stockdogs).  Although she is Super Star she apparently hates the camera and wouldn't cooperate at all. I will try again tomorrow.

Of course I worked Brit today. ;)
 Brit hasn't seen sheep in a few weeks now and she was pretty pumped. We had three small training sessions today- about 15 minutes each and spread between 2 and 8pm. We worked on outruns mostly. She is really starting to bend out on her own now- which is nice to see. I'm anxious to get some lessons started again though as I really have no idea what I'm doing. lol. It's mostly guess work and I don't think that's very good. Our last session we did some work on our flanks- me behind her and I tried to get her to drive the sheep straight away and just gave her the flanks if needed to keep them straight. Surprisingly it wasn't a catastrophe! She did pretty well until the sheep started running and she couldn't resist bringing them back to me. She is quite confident these days.

Tomorrow I will head home in the afternoon. I'm going to squeeze in a nice long walk with the dogs and one more bit of work with the sheep. Then back to real life!


4 comments:

Jen said...

It is so very hard to return to real life, isn't it?

It's funny, there's a corgi across the street from us right now (not sure if it's temporary tenants or not). She and Elka yodel at each other across the street, and the girl we see most often with the corgi told my fiance that she (the corgi) is a brat. Maybe it's a breed trait? ;)

The Wh0le Story said...

Sounds like an eventful weekend for you! I love the pictures of your friend's dogs.

Unknown said...

lovely pictures :)

onecollie said...

I really am sorry about Pixel's NQ, sucks to be so close, but I admire your attitude, still working on mine :)