Hollywood Dog Obedience Club Trial

Today was a good agility day. Dottie got her Open Jumpers title and I moved her up to Excellent A for tomorrow. She listened great, had amazing weaves and kept all the bars up. In Standard she was almost equally as good. Usually (so far) our second run is not nearly as focused as our first run. This time the focus was around 75% of our first run, so I am pleased with the improvement. The "almost equally as good" comes in because she did not stop on any of her contacts. She also almost went around the table and almost missed a jump, but when I called her she worked really hard to get it. Oh, and she also hit a bar really hard but it luckily stayed up! So even with all of our "almosts" she was clean and now has 2 open standard legs.

Pie was clean and 2nd place (to the same 20 inch dog jumping 24" we always come in 2nd place to) in Standard, then in Jumpers I did a bad blind cross and got a refusal on a jump, throwing away our chance for a QQ. Drat.

Fancy was clean in both of her novice runs, although we almost had an off course in standard. How does a Mach 4 dog almost have an off course in a novice run? She got her Novice Standard P title and I moved her up for tomorrow but she isn't entered. Why did I do that?

Tomorrow we are doing obedience and agility at the same show. Dottie is entered for her first novice trial, and Pie is in Open and Utility B, hoping, trying for another UDX leg. Those UDX legs are hard to come by, yet so tantalizingly close. What keeps me going is it is always 1 thing... it is not as if she fails multiple exercises. It is usually the groups, signals or articles. And when she fails, I think it is stress related, so I've been working on lowering stress. They set the rings up in the afternoon, so before going home I went and practiced signals next to them and she refused the first down signal. How can you be stressed outside a ring that isn't even set up and you are at an agility trial so you don't even expect it to be obedience? She rarely, if never, refuses a signal while practicing at the park or SchH. How can she tell we'll be doing ob tomorrow? At obedience shows when I practice before going in, she tends to refuse signals. Previously, I would correct, then play, and try to work through it (fix it) before going in the ring. At our last show I didn't practice outside the ring at all and just played before going in. I think that helped. Today when she refused the signal I gave it again, with a verbal, and she did it and I rewarded. Yes, that is rewarding a double command, but it is also showing her there is nothing to fear from being wrong. Let the stress go.... I'll be interested to see if this approach works. When we fail the articles, it is always leather. Why is leather harder? I started doing it first in case the metal smell messed her up, but she'll still miss the leather. She is likely to do this in practice also- occasionally- and I can tell she wants to get the right one... I'm a bit baffled on this one.

I will have very bad conflicts because there are 3 obedience rings and Pie and Dottie will conflict with each other in obedience, and obedience will conflict with agility. Why did I sign up for so much???

My goal with Dottie is attentive, ears up heeling. I've been working on cues to put her in the right frame of mind and I think it is working.

Sadly, no video or photos from the trial today.