Uninspirational title, I know, but I'm feeling a bit drained. Eight hour shift at work tends to do that to me. I'm soft.
/nods
Apart from that, I have bits and pieces of exciting news.
First for Charlie. We're starting to retrain contacts- again, for what must be the sixty millionth time- for running using Silvia Trkman's method. So, hopefully, we'll make some progress on that. I'm debating about whether or not to work on Cik and Cap with him, too. Now the rain's let up, finally, we may be able to get into finishing off my jumps and starting on a dog walk which I'm very happy about. We also have our first '11 trials coming up at the end of January: 22nd is agility novice and excellent jumpers at Durack, 29th is agility novice and excellent jumpers at Birkdale. They'll also be Fletcher's first exposure to a trial environment, which'll be interesting- and gives me a segue! Handy.
Fletcher has been with me four and a half weeks, and what a four and a half weeks they've been. He's incredibly fun, but just insane at the same time. I've found that I'm getting less and less concerned with each dog in terms of manners and nit picky control things- as are my parents. Jack wasn't even allowed inside until he was about a year and a half, and that was only to try and keep him in from wandering off to the neighbours. He wasn't allowed to sleep inside until he was eight. Charlie was inside and sleeping inside from the first day I had him, but as a puppy wasn't allowed on the furniture off someone's lap. Fletcher's not only inside but he can launch onto the couches and sprint up and down them, jump all over the place and sneak in an occasional nom on a cushion without issue. Makes me wonder about what my next dog will turn out like.
I'm ordering a copy of The Focused Puppy, 'cause I need one: the book and the focused puppy. I wish I had of discovered it sooner because it looks awesome and has month by month plans for activities and training set out. But oh well. Shall be handy anyway. I've also got four more books I want to buy, but I have to wait for a few more pay checks to land in the account before I extract another one hundred bucks. I still owe Dad $600 for Fletcher- and next Tuesday both doggies are going to the vet for vaccinations so that'll be a big bill, too. And I need a fair few supplies for handraising my new baby sun conures as of next week, so I have to budget that in as well.
I'm patiently awaiting the arrival two tug toys for Fletcher- though Charlie can probably share the bigger one- from Air Dogs and just hope they come before next Tuesday when he starts puppy preschool. Eek, I'm so excited about that.
As far as training goes, we've done a lot of thinking and clicker work, not a lot of formal training. He's pretty good with "sit" and I'm now starting to put a name ("tic") to the right paw lift and wave I freeshaped. I'm going to focus on "drop" and freeshaping for the rest of this week, then get into some more structured tricks as of next week, while still keeping up the freetime sessions so get him using that silly little noggin of his.
And of course. The Video.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Saturday, December 25, 2010
Thursday, December 23, 2010
2011 Should Be Awesome
I got a bit of a timetable for the classes and disciplines being held at our training club for the start of next year, and I'm super excited.
Fletcher's enrolled in a four week puppy preschool course, starting on the fourth of January. After that I'll probably give him a bit of a break for a few weeks- just so he's a touch older- and then he'll be going into Obedience One. After that he'll start down the Rally Obedience course. I'll be putting him into Puppy Gym- which is basically foundation agility- at the club as well once he's a bit older as well, and there's DWD workshops once a month I'm thinking about going along to later in the year with him since I'm almost completely certain I want trial in freestyle.
Charlie's going to be going back into Rally Three- and we're going to work much harder at it this time round. And, I'm very thrilled about this, the Commando course is being put back up again on Sunday mornings so we'll be going along to that as well. Then we have our agility and agility trialling, which I want to do a whole lot more of next year.
Herding lessons are also on my agenda from the middle of '11. Once I have my P plates, I want to start that on a semi regular basis and see what happens with both of them.
We've also got a demo on Australia Day, which is always so much fun- and will be a great experience for Fletcher.
Fletcher's enrolled in a four week puppy preschool course, starting on the fourth of January. After that I'll probably give him a bit of a break for a few weeks- just so he's a touch older- and then he'll be going into Obedience One. After that he'll start down the Rally Obedience course. I'll be putting him into Puppy Gym- which is basically foundation agility- at the club as well once he's a bit older as well, and there's DWD workshops once a month I'm thinking about going along to later in the year with him since I'm almost completely certain I want trial in freestyle.
Charlie's going to be going back into Rally Three- and we're going to work much harder at it this time round. And, I'm very thrilled about this, the Commando course is being put back up again on Sunday mornings so we'll be going along to that as well. Then we have our agility and agility trialling, which I want to do a whole lot more of next year.
Herding lessons are also on my agenda from the middle of '11. Once I have my P plates, I want to start that on a semi regular basis and see what happens with both of them.
We've also got a demo on Australia Day, which is always so much fun- and will be a great experience for Fletcher.
Wednesday, December 15, 2010
Update Time
I haven't posted anything for a little while so here we go.
I've had Fletcher for two and a half weeks and so far he's made me laugh and cry and tear my hair out in absolute frustration. We have a few mouthing and biting issues that are slowly- very, very, very slowly- being made progress on. He's more or less got "sit" down pat, unless he gets distracted and then he's off and there's no way to get him back. I've started luring him for "drop" and will keep working at that. He's had an automatic sit and focus for his meals since day two and I started moving the bowl out to my side and up and down yesterday, working on focus away from the food and directed at my eyes. Absolutely no issues with that so far; I put the bowl out to the side the first time and he didn't even look at it, just kept staring at my eyes, so I'm super happy with that. Now if only he could have even an inch of that focused attention for everything else...
He had his second injection last Tuesday and will go in for his third and final in about three weeks time. I've also just booked him in for puppy preschool and he'll start that in three weeks, too. He went for his first proper swim in our pool this afternoon before it bucketed down with rain and seemed to quite enjoy it, so I can't wait until I can start to take him to the beach with Charlie- should only be about five more weeks and then he'll be classified "fully vaccinated" and can go and mingle. As far as his eye goes, it does seem like he has mild entropian in it, and he does tear in it a fair bit- and it seems to irritate him on occasion, especially if he bumps into something- so at this stage I'm almost definitely going to be looking at having it operated on once he's a bit older.
Poor Charlie's been a giant, furry, barking toy for Fletcher to chew on these past couple of weeks. We haven't been to many agility training sessions because of the crappy weather and we're having a short break until the 10th of January so it's a bit of a pain not having any equipment at home. I've got my fingers crossed dad might be able to finally give me a hand over the holidays so I can, at least, get one contact piece finished to practice on. Fletcher seems to have given him a boost, though, in terms of drive. He was so flat and sluggish for a few weeks, I got Fletcher and that Monday at training he was back to zooming about and responding so much quicker. Nothing like a puppy to give motivation. He's had a really long rest from rally classes- not really by choice, more so because of the weather, schoolwork, me being sick, Charlie hurting his leg... every Wednesday there seemed to be something on or wrong- so next year we're going to be back to them and putting way more effort into that than we have this past year. I've also got a big long list of agility, jumpers and games trials that should be on over next year and a lot are within a handy distance so fingers crossed we can do a lot more competing as well; getting my P plates near the middle of next year as well as turning eighteen (therefore not being a supervised junior anymore) should increase our options a bit more as well.
We've got our training club Christmas party on the 19th that Charlie and Fletch will both be going to; it'll be Fletcher's first real outing in such a chaotic environment with so many other strange dogs so I'm a bit nervous but it should all be good. We've also got, on the 21st, a photo shoot for a bit of a media launch thing at the training club as well which is always good fun. And hopefully we'll be able to go out in our dinghy a few times over the next few weeks with the dogs instead of the dog beach- safer for Fletcher as well as not so busy now the school holidays have started.
And that's about it. Busy time coming up, but it's sure to be a whole lot of fun.
I've had Fletcher for two and a half weeks and so far he's made me laugh and cry and tear my hair out in absolute frustration. We have a few mouthing and biting issues that are slowly- very, very, very slowly- being made progress on. He's more or less got "sit" down pat, unless he gets distracted and then he's off and there's no way to get him back. I've started luring him for "drop" and will keep working at that. He's had an automatic sit and focus for his meals since day two and I started moving the bowl out to my side and up and down yesterday, working on focus away from the food and directed at my eyes. Absolutely no issues with that so far; I put the bowl out to the side the first time and he didn't even look at it, just kept staring at my eyes, so I'm super happy with that. Now if only he could have even an inch of that focused attention for everything else...
He had his second injection last Tuesday and will go in for his third and final in about three weeks time. I've also just booked him in for puppy preschool and he'll start that in three weeks, too. He went for his first proper swim in our pool this afternoon before it bucketed down with rain and seemed to quite enjoy it, so I can't wait until I can start to take him to the beach with Charlie- should only be about five more weeks and then he'll be classified "fully vaccinated" and can go and mingle. As far as his eye goes, it does seem like he has mild entropian in it, and he does tear in it a fair bit- and it seems to irritate him on occasion, especially if he bumps into something- so at this stage I'm almost definitely going to be looking at having it operated on once he's a bit older.
Poor Charlie's been a giant, furry, barking toy for Fletcher to chew on these past couple of weeks. We haven't been to many agility training sessions because of the crappy weather and we're having a short break until the 10th of January so it's a bit of a pain not having any equipment at home. I've got my fingers crossed dad might be able to finally give me a hand over the holidays so I can, at least, get one contact piece finished to practice on. Fletcher seems to have given him a boost, though, in terms of drive. He was so flat and sluggish for a few weeks, I got Fletcher and that Monday at training he was back to zooming about and responding so much quicker. Nothing like a puppy to give motivation. He's had a really long rest from rally classes- not really by choice, more so because of the weather, schoolwork, me being sick, Charlie hurting his leg... every Wednesday there seemed to be something on or wrong- so next year we're going to be back to them and putting way more effort into that than we have this past year. I've also got a big long list of agility, jumpers and games trials that should be on over next year and a lot are within a handy distance so fingers crossed we can do a lot more competing as well; getting my P plates near the middle of next year as well as turning eighteen (therefore not being a supervised junior anymore) should increase our options a bit more as well.
We've got our training club Christmas party on the 19th that Charlie and Fletch will both be going to; it'll be Fletcher's first real outing in such a chaotic environment with so many other strange dogs so I'm a bit nervous but it should all be good. We've also got, on the 21st, a photo shoot for a bit of a media launch thing at the training club as well which is always good fun. And hopefully we'll be able to go out in our dinghy a few times over the next few weeks with the dogs instead of the dog beach- safer for Fletcher as well as not so busy now the school holidays have started.
And that's about it. Busy time coming up, but it's sure to be a whole lot of fun.
Monday, December 6, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Ol' Squinty Eye
Fletch has a squint.
The more fancy name for it, though, is a micropalpebral fissure; basically he's got a small set of eyelids on his right eye.
It's so uncommon that even Google keeps asking me "Did you mean macropalpebral fissure" and not only baffled his breeder but friends of hers who are sheltie breeders (some for forty plus years); her vet; my vet. My vet got onto an eye specialist and that's the only reason we have the diagnosis. Even the specialist has only seen three cases of it. It's never cropped up in the line Fletcher's from before- and they're all really top quality shelties, too.
So Fletcher's a very special little boy. With a squint.
The eye itself appears healthy and normal, and he's CEA tested and cleared as well as from cleared parents, so apart from having the vision slightly limited just due to the fact that the eye is more "closed" than the other, he should be absolutely fine. He may require surgery later on down the tract, either to assist with that vision- if I find it's hampering him for agility or obedience or daily life or whatever- or if the eyelid rolls inwards or outwards and causes irritation and a lovely pile of problems. I'm so used to it now I don't even notice it, and he may even end up growing it out a bit, so all I can do for the time being is keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best.
His breeder feels awful about it, and I feel awful that she feels awful because it's a complete anomaly. There's nothing to suggest that micropalpebral fissures are genetic, it's not common, there wasn't anything else she could have done to prevent it from cropping up- and she gave me exactly what I wanted: a peppy, vibrant pup that I can trial with.
He's also got an unusually outgoing personality for a sheltie- at least at home, anyway, though I have a feeling he's going to be a handful everywhere else, too, when he matures a bit more- and is so much fun I couldn't even consider giving him back.
Though in a couple more weeks, given how much of a menace he is, I may be liable to change my mind about that... :P
The more fancy name for it, though, is a micropalpebral fissure; basically he's got a small set of eyelids on his right eye.
It's so uncommon that even Google keeps asking me "Did you mean macropalpebral fissure" and not only baffled his breeder but friends of hers who are sheltie breeders (some for forty plus years); her vet; my vet. My vet got onto an eye specialist and that's the only reason we have the diagnosis. Even the specialist has only seen three cases of it. It's never cropped up in the line Fletcher's from before- and they're all really top quality shelties, too.
So Fletcher's a very special little boy. With a squint.
The eye itself appears healthy and normal, and he's CEA tested and cleared as well as from cleared parents, so apart from having the vision slightly limited just due to the fact that the eye is more "closed" than the other, he should be absolutely fine. He may require surgery later on down the tract, either to assist with that vision- if I find it's hampering him for agility or obedience or daily life or whatever- or if the eyelid rolls inwards or outwards and causes irritation and a lovely pile of problems. I'm so used to it now I don't even notice it, and he may even end up growing it out a bit, so all I can do for the time being is keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best.
His breeder feels awful about it, and I feel awful that she feels awful because it's a complete anomaly. There's nothing to suggest that micropalpebral fissures are genetic, it's not common, there wasn't anything else she could have done to prevent it from cropping up- and she gave me exactly what I wanted: a peppy, vibrant pup that I can trial with.
He's also got an unusually outgoing personality for a sheltie- at least at home, anyway, though I have a feeling he's going to be a handful everywhere else, too, when he matures a bit more- and is so much fun I couldn't even consider giving him back.
Though in a couple more weeks, given how much of a menace he is, I may be liable to change my mind about that... :P
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
I'd Kinda Forgotten...
...just how much fun a puppy is.
Fletcher's a little troublemaker. He gets into everything he shouldn't, likes to stalk and then attack your feet, chucks a tantrum when he can't go where he wants to go or do what he wants to do, whinges when he's in his crate, is a bit slow to grasp the concept of going to the toilet only outside, doesn't quite understand when he's being told off- either by me or Charlie or Jack or anyone else 'cause nothing really phases him, barks at absolutely nothing and can't be diverted away from it until he's satisified he's "scared it away"...
But my gosh he's an awesome, hilarious, adorable little dog.
Fletcher's a little troublemaker. He gets into everything he shouldn't, likes to stalk and then attack your feet, chucks a tantrum when he can't go where he wants to go or do what he wants to do, whinges when he's in his crate, is a bit slow to grasp the concept of going to the toilet only outside, doesn't quite understand when he's being told off- either by me or Charlie or Jack or anyone else 'cause nothing really phases him, barks at absolutely nothing and can't be diverted away from it until he's satisified he's "scared it away"...
But my gosh he's an awesome, hilarious, adorable little dog.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)