Chudleigh is a GENIUS

All my dogs are smart, I have taught them many things that they have easily mastered, and sometimes they just plain surprise me with something.

Today surpasses all those surprises. 

Tuesday is garbage day for my neighborhood.  For us that means we have to have our wheeled recycle container and wheeled garbage bin out next to the curb first thing in the morning so the automated truck can empty them.

I let the dogs out for their first potty trip of the day and Chudleigh stopped at the foot of the steps and stared at the blue recycle bin.  They he looked back at me with a quizzical expression on his face, then deliberate turned his head slowly back at the recycle container and pointedly stared at it for a longer period of time before looking back at my face again.  I had to tell him that although Tuesday is our garbage day since it is Christmas tomorrow will be garbage day, and I thanked him for being such a good boy to remind me to put the trash out.

I was totally blown away.  I know my dogs can count, but I had no idea Chudleigh knew the days of the week.

Lightning Strikes Again!

Today was another super agility day, 5 entries and 3 Qs.  Rollo ran T2B first thing and although he didn’t qualify I was greatly encouraged that he was able to complete the course. The first time he did it the buzzer went off when he still had a few obstacles left to do.  The weaves slowed him down with 3 stops in the poles to hopefully check specks in case they were food.  He did complete the weaves without popping out though and everything else was spot on.

He ran open jumpers for his very first time today as I moved him up last night and darn if he didn’t qualify!  He was 5 seconds over time due to popping out of the weaves so his Q was an 85 point squeaker.  He was the only qualifier in his class and got a pretty blue rosette.

His open standard run was total chaos, he was distracted and acted like he had never even seen the contact equipment before as he wildly ran by everything.  I guess 2 long days of agility just overloaded his little doggie circuits so I carried him off the course.  He is happy enough, so it must have been sensory overload.

Chudleigh finished the day in grand style qualifying in 100% of his classes!  He finished his novice jumpers preferred title with a clean run and 14 seconds under course time.  Then he did open standard preferred and was so fast he sailed by the final jump so I had to circle it and redirect him.  Even with the side trip he was 17 seconds under course time.  I was very pleased that he stayed on the table, but I did use my big outdoor voice when I said STAY after softly commanding table. 

Chudleigh is a very VERY good boy.  As you can see by the tightly cropped picture he is rapidly graying.  He will turn 6 in May.  I am thinking I will keep him in preferred as jumping 20 makes more sense than having him do 24 with all his poor body has been though.

What a finish to the year.  Our next competition will be the Border Terrier trial the first weekend in January.

Best agility day EVER

It is a good thing I like agility because we left the house at 6:15 this morning and got home at 6:00 tonight!  We entered 6 classes and qualified in 4, and it really should have been all 6.

First class of the day starting at 8:00 was novice FAST which I entered both boys in.  They ran small to tall so Rollo was the 5th dog on the line.  He did great, nailed the send and we got a very respectable  score.  Unfortunately the timer messed up so we had to re-run for score.  The judge said not to worry about the send as he did it fine so when he backed out of the tunnel in the send I didn't re-do it and just went on.  Bad move, that was a huge misunderstanding on my part and the judge said she was sorry but couldn't qualify me for that.  I told her that since he had handily qualified the first time why couldn't I just take minimum score of 50 to keep the Q.  She said that would work so that is why his score was 50 points, which still gave him a 2nd place.

Poor Chudleigh was robbed.  The brainless steward that was the chute straightener did NOT straighten the chute and Chuds got all wadded up in it.  The poor guy was struggling to get through it and it wasn't letting him, I was amazed it didn't come off the barrel.  Anyway he had to give up and come back out the entrance.  Unfortunately that was the 2nd obstacle and was worth 9 points so there wasn't enough time to get the required 50 points and make it to the finish jump to stop the clock.  He got the send and even sailed through the weaves speedily for 10 points.  The judge at least let he put him through the chute after we were done so he wouldn't have a a problem and he went through it fine.  She was muttering that she had never seen a dog get tangled up like that in a short chute.  Well, if the stupid  chute fluffer doesn't do it correctly it will happen.  I hope her day job isn't packing parachutes.

Then we got to hang out for hours until Rollo had open standard.  He was flying along great, wonderful concentration, everything spot on UNTIL the weaves.  He got the entrance and was zipping though them when around the 7th pole he spotted a tiny brown pebble on the weave base that looked EXACTLY like a  piece of kibble!  He stopped to sniff and in his disappointment that it wasn't a yummy treat lost count and missed a pole.  Being open I redid the weaves as we are allowed one screw up and can still qualify.  He sailed thought them perfectly and finished the course, but the time killed us.  We lost 18 points in time faults plus the 5 for the table fault.

Everything else was rosy.  In novice jumpers they both qualified with perfect scores way under course time although Chuds was a 2nd place.  Rollo did a 42 second course in 33.47 to finish his novice jumpers title.  Chudleigh got his 2nd jumpers preferred leg doing a 45 second  course in 30.50 seconds.

Final class of the day was Chudleigh's novice standard.  He had one mess up.  Due to great speed he sailed off the table and had to hop back on.  Even with that he had a faster course time than the 1st place dog but 100 beats a 95.  He did a 74 second course in 53.05.  I am in awe, I have my Chudleigh back.  He feels good and looks wonderful.  Not too shabby for a dog that had a grim 30% survival chance intoned by the cancer department up at Davis.

Tomorrow we get to play again.  I hope we get home earlier.  Driving home from Santa Rosa in the darkness and rain was no fun.  Traffic was quite heavy and the oncoming headlights were brutal. Poor Charlie had white knuckles.