It would have been a magic 189.5

Cooper would have earned his third-in-a-row score of 189.5 in his third UKC Novice B Obedience trial yesterday. Would have, except for a small matter of handler error.

Cooper is consistent. Just like the last two times, he lagged behind in the On-leash Heeling and Figure 8, went wide on the right turns and about turns, came in slightly crooked on the Recall, etc., etc. He did well with the off-leash heeling, did a solid Stand for Exam, and stayed steady until I called over the jump.

But we lost two points (for a total of 187.5) because, the judge said, my overly mechanical-looking way of using my head to follow Cooper’s movement toward me in the Recall exercise looked to her like an extra command.

Handler error could easily have lost us a few more points, but the judge did not take off any points for my stopping for one of the Halts before she’d actually told me to Halt.

But in any case, 187.5 is a passing score, so with his three UKC Novie B passes, Cooper can now add a UCD title to his name, a ribbon to the ribbon board, and a stuffed squeaky toy to his collection.

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It’s official: March was wonderful

The AKC website confirms that March was truly wonderful. I still smile whenever I think about it.

First Cooper got his Rally Excellent (RE) title:

And then Tooey got her Junior Hunter (JH) title:

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Rally boy does Excellent enough

Well, we pulled today’s Rally Excellent run out of the hat.

The course was difficult and crowded. Difficulty started right away at station 2 (exercise #107). At station 2, the dog ends up in a sitting position, and then for station 3, has to do a Send to Jump (exercise #210) almost immediately, within just 6 feet of station 2. That was particularly difficult for Cooper.

The two little French bulldogs who took 1st and 2nd place did fine, but a big dog like Cooper really needs the whole 10 feet called for in the regulations to execute that maneuver. Cooper seemed sort of befuddled, just standing there in front of the jump, and I had to tell him at least 4 times to jump. Finally he just hopped over. Hence all the points taken off for “slow, delay, or resistance to respond,” as you can see in the score sheet below the course map.

But the judge rightly took the whole 10 points off for Cooper’s not doing the “Back Up 3 Steps.” He didn’t even try to stay with me — he just stood there and watched me idly while I backed up the three steps without him. I could have retried it and possibly not lost all 10 points, but after yesterday’s iffy performance of the same exercise, that was a risk I decided  not to take.

Cooper got back with me on the next station, and he did fine on everything after that. And that was a relief because, like I said, the course was crowded. Probably it was more suited for a square ring instead of the narrow rectangular ring we had, and sometimes the teams had to step around or away from signs that were directly in the natural path of movement.

But you know, a qualifying score is a qualifying score, and we were right in the middle. 100 is perfect, 70 is qualifying, and we finished the run with an 84. Not bad, and not the worst.

So now, with his pass at Rose City and yesterday’s pass, Cooper has his third Rally Excellent leg. That gives him his Rally Excellent title. I’m very proud of my boy. We’ve had a good time together.

After I got home, Russ asked me, “What’s next?”

Hmmm. I don’t know. I’ll have to think about it.

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Thank goodness for rules

The AKC regulations for Rally Obedience say that the judging begins when the judge says, “Forward!” Unless you abuse your dog, all that stuff you do to get ready to move forward at the Start sign is not supposed to be part of the judge’s evaluation.

Thank God.

As Cooper and I entered our ring, over in the ring next to us, handlers were throwing dumbbells, and dogs were jumping over a jump and retrieving those dumbbells. I walked toward the middle of our ring, where the Start sign was located, got Cooper to sit, and removed his leash. At that point, Cooper couldn’t resist anymore — he hooked a left over to the ring gate to get a closer look at what was happening on the other side. His ears and nose were extended forward, almost as if he were a puppet with a string tied to his nose, pulling him over there.

All the time, I’m trying to get his attention and call him back into Heel position without actually abusing him. Finally, after many long centuries (probably really only 15 seconds), he came back to me and sat. But not in Heel — no, he was sitting directly behind me facing the other ring.

Sigh. The judge asked me, as directed in the regulations, “Are you ready?”

Hell no. I didn’t say that, of course. I just smiled at her, said, “Not yet,” and called Cooper to heel again.

Finally, I got him into position, and the judge, said again, “Are you ready?”

“Ready,” I said, and the the judge said, “Forward!”, not giving Cooper any time to get distracted again.

We actually had quite a nice run. Cooper did almost everything I asked him to, and I think he even enjoyed it. Here’s the course:

He even tried the “Back Up 3 Steps.” He moved backwards with me, but he didn’t exactly stay in position. Instead he moved at kind of a 90 degree angle rather than staying parallel with me. But he did the jumps nicely, and he even gave me a very nice down in place, without moving forward, in the Stand-Leave Dog-Down Dog-Call Front Finish exercise.

I was pleased, and onlookers told us that we did a smooth, natural-looking job. Then I was happily shocked when I saw our generous score of 99. I had watched two other dogs in the ring who did a much better job than Cooper, staying in heel, keeping their attention on their handlers, and even moving backwards three steps exactly in heel position.

So why did those teams get lower scores? It was all handler error. One handler added an extra trip around the cones in the Figure 8 exercise, and another added a sit to the Stand-Leave Dog-Down Dog-Call Front Finish exercise.

So that put Team Cooper in 1st place for his 2nd qualifying score in Rally Excellent B. The Mt. Hood Keeshond Club is putting on a second show tomorrow, and we’ll be back to try to qualify in Rally Excellent again.

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No bird Rally

There she was, doing a quick heel around the cones in Rally class, when suddenly, a duck started quacking. Tooey stopped in her tracks, her attention totally off me, looking toward the area where the quacking was coming from.

The quacking stopped. After a few beats, I got her attention back, and we started heeling again. Then the quacking started up again: “Q-u-a-c-k, q-u-a-c-k, quack, quack, quack, quack.” Just like the mechanincal quacks that are used on wingers during hunt tests.

Tooey stopped again, focussed on the area where the quacking was coming from.

I could not get her attention. That quacking had her rivetted.

Finally, the right command came to me. “No bird,” I said. “No bird.” She turned and looked at me, as if to say, “Oh… No bird. Are you sure?”

The quacking stopped just then. Why? Because the owner answered her phone. She’d had it set to quack when that particular caller called, and being an obedient phone, that’s exactly what it did.

And Tooey and I got back to heeling.

Who knew we’d have to proof against quacking in the Rally ring?

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The dog days of March

Yesterday had to turn out well, no matter what happened. How could it not with a sunny, warm and dry day in March out with the dogs?

We started out at one of our favorite training grounds with a picnic hunt test put on by the Greater Pacific NW Retriever Trial Club. This is the same site where the club will put on a real hunt test later this month, and we want to help Tooey get comfortable in those surroundings should we decide to enter her in the test.

As the morning progressed, she got better with her marking. Russ had to handle her to the area of the fall on her first bird, but by the afternoon, she successfully trotted through the the area of her third bird to get to her fifth bird, which landed in line with the third, but 25 yards further out.

Tooey is not a naturally confident performer, so we were happy to see that she didn’t let the fact that there were a bunch of strangers hiding out in the field faze her. (Strangers being out in the field has been a problem in the past.)

I ran Cooper in the field. Or at least, I tried to. I had resolved that if he broke at the line, I’d march him back to the car. Sigh… I gave him several chances, but Cooper spent most of the morning in the car.

After field practice, we drove about 30 minutes to the building where Cooper’s next Rally trial will be held. Fortunately, yesterday the owner was sponsoring “tickers” — short bursts of time when you can take your dog into the ring and do whatever you want within the provided setup. We arrived in time to run Tooey twice through a Rally Advanced setup and Cooper twice through a Rally Excellent setup.

Tooey did okay with a lot of enthusiastic encouragement, and Cooper did great. In fact, except for the fact that he didn’t jump the high jump the first time I asked him to, all of the mistakes were my mis-reading or forgetting the signs.

The contrast between Cooper’s field work with me and his Rally work was striking. Out in the field, he was completely not aware that I even existed. In the Rally ring, he gave me lots of really impressive (for him) attention and had a lot of fun.

I feel pretty good about our chances of qualifying in Rally Excellent next weekend. I’ll have to study the signs again and bring my cheat sheet with me, but at least Cooper will be familiar with the venue when we get there.

But the dog day didn’t end there. We finished up with a bath. Never Cooper’s favorite, but necessary. He was so dirty that the shampoo turned brown.

After all that, I was tired. Tooey lay down in that sweet spot where she could keep an eye on both me in the dining room and Russ in the kitchen. But not Cooper. No. When I finally got to sit down with some scotch and my book, what did I find at my feet? A tennis ball and a hopeful Cooper smiling up at me.

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Same team, same score

Team Cooper qualified in his 2nd UKC Novice Obedience trial with 189.5 points. The judge took off exactly the same number of points today for almost exactly the same reasons as yesterday.

Cooper’s performance did improve in some respects today. He didn’t sniff the ground, for one. Actually, today Cooper stayed with me a lot better than yesterday — no tight leash, no sniffing the ground, no going wide.

Instead, today, he decided to get creative. On the Halts, he danced forward several steps, and then leap backward to land in a sit by my side. A little more dramatic than preferred, but at least he sat at every Halt.

And he also invented some variations on the Figure 8. Instead of staying by my left side, he decided to see what it would be like to heel on my right side for several steps before going around in back of me to sit in the proper heel position at the ending Halt.

I thought his Recall was lovely. His butt stayed solid on the ground, and then he made a beautifully athletic leap over the jump. True, he arrived into a sit that was a little crooked, but then his finish was square and solid in the heel position.

He still doesn’t like the Honor down or the Long Sit, but he did them a little more calmly than yesterday, not quite so much rubbernecking. Perhaps he found the regular pounding of my heart to be calming. That he succeeded in the Honor was especially gratifying, since the working handler was using a walker for her run. That’s very unusual, but Cooper handled it well.

All that aside, with that 189.5, we qualified. One more Novice leg to go, and then he’ll earn his “UCD” title from the UKC.

One of my friends pointed out, after reading yesterday’s blog post, that she distinctly remembers my promising Cooper that after earning his AKC CD title, he wouldn’t have to do Obedience anymore. I remember that, too. But you know, this morning, when I put my Obedience vest on, Cooper started dancing in circles, running to the door. I love working with that dog. He’s so enthusiastic, so happy to go for it, so willing to be happy. That’s why we’re doing it again, so I can share that happiness. Cooper doesn’t seem to mind.

Oh, and by the way, you might notice that while we got a qualifying score ribbon, there was no placement ribbon for Team Cooper today. Placing is such a matter of luck as well as performance. Today, four dogs (I am pleased to say that three of them are hunting retrievers!), did a more beautiful job than Cooper. One of my favorites, Taura the Standard Poodle, who is one of our field training buddies, earned first place today, and it was beautifully well earned, too.

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Cooper takes 1st at his 1st UKC Obedience

Cooper is not a dog for precision. He’s the dog you want when you’re looking for enthusiasm, a willingness to give it a shot, the confidence to try something even when he’s not completely sure exactly what he should be doing.

I’ve been working with Cooper in Rally, which I think is made for dogs like Cooper. I haven’t been working so much with him in competition Obedience, which rewards exactness and precision. But lately in practice, he’s actually been heeling next to me, even on the Figure 8 exercise.

So just for the heck of it, I entered Cooper in his first UKC Novice Obedience trial today. He did great, especially considering that this is Cooper: a 189.5 point score (170 out of 200 is a qualifying score).

And to top it off, he got first place in his class, Novice B.

AKC Novice Obedience and UKC Novice Obedience look an awful lot alike — they both have On Leash Heeling and a Figure 8 exercise, a Stand For Exam exercise, and an Off Leash Heeling exercise. But there are some significant differences, too.

The most fun difference is the Recall exercise. In the AKC version, you sit your dog on one side of the ring, walk to the opposite side of the ring, and call your dog. The dog is supposed to come directly, and sit squarely in front of you. The UKC version is just like that, except that there’s a jump between you and the dog. Cooper loves jumping, so jumping over a high jump to get to me is just plain fun.

So fun that we almost blew it. You don’t call your dog until the judge says, “Call your dog.” Then you give your command, and only then should the dog come. Today, when the judge said, “Call your dog,” I saw just a sliver of sunlight appear under Cooper’s butt. That lasted just for just a moment, and then he thought better of it and sat back down. I waited a beat and then called him. He ran, jumped over the jump, and then came right to me, just hair off square (hence the loss of 1/2 a point). If he’d actually gotten up and come to me before I called him, he’d have failed the exercise and we’d have been out.

Then there is the Long Down. In the AKC version, the Long Down is done as part of the group exercise, with the Novice dogs lined up along one edge of the ring, all in the down position for 3 minutes. The UKC does it a bit differently, and it’s called the “Honor.”

In this exercise, the “honor dog” team enters the ring first, and walks to a spot indicated by the judge. The handler downs the dog, walks to a spot about 25 feet away, and then turns and faces her dog. While this is all going on, the “working dog” team has also entered the ring, and they are waiting for the honor dog and handler to get all situated before they start their On Leash Heeling exercise. The honor dog must stay in the down position in the ring while the working dog is in the ring, too, doing the On Leash Heeling and the Figure 8 exercise.

What I didn’t anticipate was the impact of the waiting when it was our turn to be Working Dog. We walked into the ring and got into heel position, ready to go… and then waited. For several long seconds. In the AKC version, the judge would quickly get you started with the On Leash Heeling as soon as you were in position. But with this UKC version, the working team has to wait for the honor team to get settled, and those extra seconds is plenty for Cooper’s attention to go elsewhere. When the judge finally turned to us and said, “Are you ready?”, I had to say, “Just a moment” so I could get Cooper’s attention again. When he looked at me, I said, “Ready” and just then, Cooper looked away again. Argh! The judge kindly waited a few beats more and luckily Cooper looked up at me again just as the judge said “Forward!”

As you can see from the score sheet, Cooper’s heeling is still not beautiful. He lags behind me on the outside turns of the Figure 8. He sniffs the floor sometimes instead of keeping his attention on me. He forgot to sit once at a Halt. But he didn’t go running out of the ring; he didn’t get so engrossed in his sniffing that I completely lost him; and he totally stayed with me on the About Turn. All huge improvements over his qualifying performances in AKC Novice Obedience.

So we left the ring, Cooper got a quick roast pork tidbit, and then we walked back into the ring to do the Honor exercise. Cooper is actually pretty good at this. He doesn’t ignore the working dog, but he stays down, sometimes looking at me and sometimes looking at something else. Ideally, he would keep his attention on me, but this is Cooper we’re talking about. I am just happy he stayed down.

So then we left the ring again, and waited for the Long Sit, a 1 minute sit-stay done with a group of dogs. Cooper was a bit distracted, as usual, stretching his neck out first to the left to get a whiff of the dog to his left, and then turning to do the same on his right. He looked at me a couple of times, yawned once, and swiveled his head toward some noise only he heard. But his butt stayed on the floor and his front feet didn’t move, and that’s what we needed.

All in all, it was a great day. I got some ribbons to hang on my bulletin board and Cooper got a blue stuffed toy to rip up. I think we’re both pleased.

We’ll try it again tomorrow. I love that UKC allows a person to sign up on the day of the show, so that’s what I’ll do tomorrow morning. We’ll just see how it goes.

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Happy, delighted, ecstatic is now official

That Saturday, Sunday, and Monday in Puyallup weren’t just dreams. It’s real. We did it! Cooper has his Rally Advanced (RA) title now. As of today, the AKC says so.

Also, I just received in the mail a picture to prove it. An extravagance, given my employment situation. But a very happy one.

photo by Elaine Rushton

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Rally boy squeaks by

Cooper being Cooper, I entered him in Rally Advanced in today’s Rose City Classic dog show in Portland. When I was considering in December which shows I was going to enter him in, I figured that there was every likelihood that Cooper would not qualify in least one of the three Rally trials at the Western Washington Cluster of dog shows in Puyallup. And a dog needs three qualifying runs to earn a Rally title.

So, for a back-up, I decided to enter him in Rally Advanced in one Rose City Classic show. I picked today, Thursday, because Thursday is the least crowded, least trafficked of the 4 days of shows.

Why?

The Obedience and Rally rings are right next to all the vendors, where show people come to buy dog shampoos, try out new scissors or other grooming tools, find that special toy, or try samples of various dog foods. The general public comes, too. And all of them, many of them with dogs, travel the walkway between the vendors and the Obedience and Rally rings. Lots of traffic and lots of dogs mean lots of distractions for Mr. Distractible Cooper.

Thursday has the fewest people, which means the least traffic, which means fewer distractions. But that doesn’t mean no distractions. Nope, not at all.

To see why, look at the arrangement of the four rings. In the picture below, and you’ll see that all four rings are set up in a large square.

Obedience and Rally rings at the Rose City Classic dog shows

That means that while one dog is competing in Rally in one ring, other dogs would be in the other three rings, competing in various levels of Obedience right next to him. They would be retrieving dumbbells that have just flown through the air, jumping over jumps, running out away from their handlers and toward the opposite end of their ring, which just happens to be just over the white barrier from where the Rally dog is trying to work.

So Rose City is tough. And we didn’t really need to go to Rose City because Cooper passed Rally Advanced trials on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday in Puyallup. He’d earned his Rally Advanced title. But, what the heck — I’d paid for it already, so I might as well go.

Fortunately, the AKC allows “transfers.” That means I could bump Cooper up from Rally Advanced to Rally Excellent instead. So that’s what we did. Here’s a map of the Excellent course we ran today.

Map of today’s Rally Excellent course

It was not easy. I was very happy that it didn’t include a Figure 8 with distractions, a jump using a broad jump, or walking backwards for 3 steps while the dog stays in heel position, but it still had its challenges.

The first was station #2. That station was just three feet away from the entrance — which is also the exit. Cooper had to turn toward the exit to turn around me, and he noticed the exit. I could see that he was thinking about simply leaving the ring. I called his attention back, though, and we went on.

Then there was station 5. In that one, Cooper was supposed to lie down while I keep moving. On our first try, he got very distracted by the dog running toward him in the adjacent ring and didn’t lie down. I took a few steps back, called him to me, and we tried it again. This time, he lay down very s-l-o-w-l-y, and he did so facing the adjacent ring instead of the the direction of travel. But he was down, so I walked around him, and we continued on.

We did well, including his usual favorite, the jump, until we got to station 12. This is a moving stand, and he’d never done one of those successfully until once last night in our living room. In a moving stand, he’s supposed to stop moving forward and stay in the standing position while I keep moving. He sat instead of staying in the stand position, so we went back to try that again, too. He got it on the 2nd try.

But then, in station 13, he was supposed to make the jump again, this time in the opposite direction from before. That completely confused him. I gave him the command to jump and he trotted right up to it, and then just stood there looking around. I asked him three times to jump, and finally he levitated himself over it cleanly.

After finishing the other stations and passing the Finish sign, we had one more exercise. At station 17, he’s supposed to sit and stay there until I go get his leash from across the ring, return to him, and then clip his leash to his collar when the judge says “exercise finished.” We’ve done this one so many times just perfectly that I let down my guard and didn’t notice when he started to get up.

Consequently, he got all the way up and walked several steps toward me before I got back to him. I took him back to the station, got into heel position, and waited for the judge before clipping on Cooper’s leash and walking out of the ring. The rules say there is no retry on the Sit-Stay, so I’m pretty sure the judge took off the maximum number of points for Cooper’s getting up.

Fortunately, I avoided some common handler errors. At the Excellent level, the handler is not supposed to pat their leg, clap their hands, or lure the dog with an “air cookie,” and I managed to not to do any of those. And I think I made some good choices about which stations to retry and which ones to just accept and keep going.

Today’s score sheet

So even with all the mistakes, do-overs, and lack of precision, Cooper still qualified. Irish Water Spaniel #R53 got the lowest score in Rally Excellent B, but anything over 70 qualifies.

I took the ribbon and smiled all the way home. We have some work to do before we go into the Rally Excellent ring again, but it’ll be fun.

Except tonight, I think I’ll give him a break from Rally class. He can stay home with Russ, eat some dinner, and play with his favorite rubber duck. He’s earned it.

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Happy delighted ecstatic Rally Advanced

I am ecstatic. If you’ve read Saturday’s post and Sunday’s post, you know why. Here’s a hint:

We did it! Team Cooper, with this third qualifying score in Rally Advanced, earned Coop’s Rally Advanced title. Now, instead of the Rally Novice (“RN”) title he’s got after his name, he’ll have that very sweet “RA” instead.

We had a good time. There was the always-fun jump at station 11 and the finish right at station 5. (For some reason known only to Cooper, he likes finishing right much more than finishing left.) Plus there’s that nice little dance-like move at station 9.

But it was also a bit more difficult for Team Cooper. The pivot at station 6 and turn at station 1 require some precision from both dog and handler. Precision is not Cooper’s strong suit (he goes more for exuberant enthusiasm), but today we did well enough. The only real hiccup was station 7, where we were to do the Call Front — 1, 2, 3 Steps Backward. In this one, the dog moves from heel position to around in front, squarely facing the handler, and then, when the handler takes first one, then two, and then three steps backwards, the dog is supposed to follow, all the time squarely facing the handler, sitting each time the handler stops. Coop does that part just fine.

What almost caught us up today was that at the very end of that exercise, the handler moves forward and the dog is supposed to move smoothly out of the front position and into heel position without interfering with the handler’s forward motion. But Coop didn’t get himself out of the way, and I tripped on him. Fortunately, I didn’t fall, but I did stumble. And as I stumbled, just out of the corner of my eye, I could see the judge’s clipboard rise up. That meant she was writing on it. And the only reason for the judge to write on her clipboard is to take off points.

But even so, we got a very nice 94 and a 4th place ribbon. I was happily, delightedly ecstatic. And I’m sure the feeling will last for quite a while. Good boy Cooper!

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Today I am delighted

On Friday, I said I’d be happy if Cooper and I qualified in one (out of three) Rally Advanced B trials this weekend. Cooper qualified yesterday, so I went into today’s trial feeling happy.

If we qualified twice, I said I’d be delighted. And tonight, I am not only delighted, I am really, r-e-a-l-l-y delighted.

In today’s trial, Irish Water Spaniel #2418 got 99 out of 100 points.

And that 99 put Team Cooper in 1st place. I am not only delighted, I am amazed at how well it all went. The judge took only one point off for Cooper’s being slightly out of position on a Pivot Right Forward.

One of my fellow exhibitors commented to me that our run looked very smooth and easy. And you know, it felt smooth. Cooper’s brain stayed with me, his body mostly stayed in heel position, he got to do some fun things like leap over the bar jump, and I didn’t lose our place with all the curves and turns we had. It was fun, we both enjoyed ourselves, and I think it showed.

Of course, feeling like we’d done well didn’t stop me from exclaiming, “Oh my God!” when I saw the score and realized there weren’t any other higher scores on the board. I had to look at it several times. I even asked the steward if that little green “99″ went with the blue “2418″. She smiled at me for a few moments before she said “Yes.” All I could say in response was “Oh my God!”

Here’s the course, if you’re interested:

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I said I’d be happy

That’s what I said as I left home last night for the Puyallup dog shows. If Cooper and I got one qualifying score in Rally Advanced, I’d be happy. If we got two, I’d be delighted. And if we got three, I’d be ecstatic.

As it stands now, I’m happy.

In today’s Rally Advanced run, we got a score of 91 out of 100. Qualifying is 70 points, so 91 is quite respectable, right in the middle of the pack.

The run started out well. There was a jump (exercise 103) early on, and Cooper likes those. Then there was a Fast Pace exercise (exercise 18), which Coop also likes because it involves running.

But then we came to the serpentine. Coop is usually good at the serpentine. In class, anyway. But actual competition, well… that’s different.

Outside that edge of the ring, there were people sitting and chatting. Several of these people, this being a dog show, had dogs with them. Right in the middle of the run, Cooper decided that he wanted to go have a closer look at one of these dogs, so he left my side and walked over to the edge of the ring.

He forgot that we were working. He completely spaced out that I was there. The synapses between his ears and his brain temporarily shut down, and he obviously didn’t hear me calling him back to heel.

Finally, after many long moments, I did what I should have done earlier, put on my field voice, and said firmly, “Here!”

That got his attention. His head whipped around before he had a chance to think about it, and his body followed his head right back to my side.

We went back and started the serpentine again, which is allowed in Rally for a 3 point deduction. Much better than failing for performing the station improperly.

The rest of the run was uneventful.* Except that at the end I has to restart my breathing.

And we got the green ribbon for qualifying, along with a tug toy and a first aid kit from the Irish Water Spaniel Club of Puget Sound for competing and qualifying, respectively.

So I’m happy today. We’ll see if tomorrow brings delighted.

*Those of you who like to read Rally course maps will notice that station 14 isn’t correct. If we’d followed those directions, we’d end up facing away from the Finish sign instead of toward it. Fortunately, the steward noticed the problem before any exhibitors came into the ring and called it to the judge’s attention. The judge then changed station 14 to a Call Dog Front — Finish Left — Halt (exercise 16).

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Rally advanced

This evening, after today’s adventures, I looked back on the blog to just over 11 months ago, to the last video I have of Cooper working in the Rally Obedience ring. It was a big day. He’d just won his show championship at the Rose City Classic, and that same day, he qualified in his 2nd Rally Novice trial.

That old video is vintage Cooper: happy to go along, but really distractible. From moment to moment, he might be paying attention to what we’re doing in the Rally ring, but on the other hand, he might be more interested in something on the floor, something going on outside the ring, something that the judge is doing, some noise he’s hearing from across the room.

In that show, he earned a 86 out of 100 — a not-horrible qualifying score. We went into the Rally Novice ring one more time, the next month. We qualified with a 90, and that third pass earned Cooper his Rally Novice title.

At that point, I switched to competition Obedience. I wanted Cooper to earn a Companion Dog (CD) Obedience title so he could qualify for the AKC All-Around Irish Water Spaniel award. He earned that last March, and that was the last time I had Cooper in any kind of Obedience competition. I started working with Tooey instead.

Tooey is different from Cooper. When Cooper doesn’t understand what he’s supposed to do, he just tries something, anything — whatever seems most likely or most fun at that moment. Tooey, on the other hand, is serious and not totally self-confident. She wants to do it right, and when she doesn’t understand what she’s supposed to do, she gets a bit anxious.

I wanted to lighten up things for Tooey, so I started to take her to a Rally Obedience class. You can talk to and encourage your dog during a Rally trial, and there’s a lot of action and movement — I thought that might make it more fun and less anxiety-producing for Tooey. I took Cooper along to class just for the heck of it, and guess what? It turns out he loves Rally Advanced. Unlike Rally Novice, it’s off leash, you get to jump over things once in a while, and the moves are just a little more complicated.

He’s been doing so well in class that I took a deep breath and entered Cooper in his first Rally Advanced trial. It’s scheduled in just over two weeks, at the Western Washington Cluster of dog shows in Puyallup. We definitely need practice. The class we’ve been taking is run something like a real trial, but to get even closer to a real trial experience, I wanted to find a match — a practice trial that is run just like the real thing so that both dog and handler can have the experience at less cost and no risk.

So I was thrilled to find a match put on today by the Silver Falls Kennel Club in Rickreal, Oregon, just south of Salem. And I was lucky to find a bystander who was willing to video it for me.

We did OK — the judge even said that had it been a real trial, we would have qualified. As you can see from the video, there were 16 stations*. I was glad there was a “Send Over Jump” (#103) because that’s Cooper’s favorite. I was hoping that one station would be an “Offset Figure 8″ (#108), where the team has to go around traffic cones in a figure 8 pattern while ignoring bowls of food and toys, but no such luck. But there was a “Halt Stand Dog Walk Around” (#105), where the team stops, the dog sits, then stands, and then stays standing while the handler walks in a circle around the dog. That’s been a hard one for Cooper, and he didn’t do it perfectly today, either — but he didn’t fail it, either.

I was glad for the video because watching it, I can see that on the call “Dog Front — Finish Left” (#14) station, Cooper returned to my left side, but pretty much sat in the heel position. In that station, the dog is not supposed to sit before moving forward with the handler. I’m going to have to work on that one. And I encountered a station I’ve never done before, the “Halt About U Turn and Forward” (#102), so that was good practice for both of us.

Cooper is still my boy Cooper, though. In today’s video, you can see him paying much better attention to what we’re doing in the Rally ring, but sometimes he still gets distracted by something on the floor or the chair, something going on outside the ring, something that the judge is doing, or some noise from across the room.

* You can read a description of each Rally Obedience station by reading the AKC Rally Regulations, accessible from the AKC Rules and Regulations page.

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Titles on both ends

First, I want to congratulate the 6 Irish Water Spaniels who have been invited to pre-enter the prestigious Westminster Kennel Club show in 2013. As in the past, for 2013, the top dogs in each breed in breed point standings are invited to pre-enter.

In Irish Water Spaniels,  6 dogs were invited:

• GCH Cat N Pats Luck Of The Irish
• GCH Nawedshoe Dawns Early Lite O Freedom
• GCH Stanegate Slippery When Wet
• GCH Whistle Stop’s Wind On The Water
• GCH Whistlestop’s Fire & Ice
• GCH Whistlestop’s Riley On Fire

I’ve met several of these dogs, and they are lovely, beautiful dogs who present very well.

Even so, take a look at this list of Wirehaired Pointing Griffons (WPGs):

• CH Stonehenge Spontaneous Will-O’-The Wisp JH CA
• GCH Bear Hug Fire In The Hole JH
• GCH Fireside’s Riding High SH
• GCH Fireside’s Rio Grande JH
• GCH Flatbrook’s Heir About Him MH

I don’t know what you notice first, but the first thing I notice is that all 5 dogs have titles on both ends of their names. What this means is that not only do they have show championships (CH) or grand championships (GCH), they also have titles on the right sides of their names. The list of American Kennel Club titles on the right side of a dog’s name recognizes achievements in “performance” events — things like obedience, rally obedience, tracking, hunting tests, agility, and other events in which the dog works with his person to do some kind of work.

In other words (and being extremely simplistic about it), they have brains in addition to all that beauty.

But take another look at that list of WPGs. Notice that every single one has a hunting test title: 3 Junior Hunters (JH), 1 Senior Hunter (SH), and 1 Master Hunter (MH).

Sporting dogs, like IWS, WPGs, and others, were bred to hunt: to help the hunter bring game home to the table. These hunt test titles show that the aptitude and ability is still there in those dogs, whether they actually hunt for birds for the table or they do it in the hunting simulations that are hunting tests.

Many breeders of sporting dogs do their utmost to ensure that their breeds are not divided into “show” lines and “working” lines, and it looks like these WPG breeders have succeeded.

Many IWS breeders do the same, which is why you’ll find a high percentage of IWS with titles on both ends of their names. For just one example, go to the RealtaIWS website’s Achievements page, to see the list of IWS bred by Rosemary Sexton (Cooper’s breeder) who can show off their their beauty and structure in the show ring, as well as do the work in performance events.

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