say yes!

susan garrett has an awesome post in her own blog (http://susangarrett.wordpress.com/) about baggage on rescue dogs - and she cautions that it is not limited to rescue dogs. kinda a nice tie in to my last post - what holds our dogs back is us. if we're not getting something from our dogs, its really because of something we are doing. i *am* the weak factor in this training relationship!





last night was open - and i came back from class sore sore sore sore sore! i was sore to begin with, and we started with some brief heeling warm up while people chatted (i just doodled around) and then individual exercises. i started with recalls and DOR - rah was nice. i tried slowing down my drop signal for him, but he just drops slower (??) - so i went back to my lightening fast drop signal and he was perfect. ok, i guess he needs fast as lightening signals.

** as a side note - i watched a bunch of people and i noticed that most people dont use signals for a lot of things - they are using verbals to drop dogs verbals to send them over jumps - but i use signals for almost everything - to finish rah, to drop him, to send him over jumps - is this due to his attention? will this bite me if he becomes distracted in the ring? must talk to terry about this - there are only a few exercises in which you can do verbal and signals at the same time - call to heel after moving stand, and directed jumping **

moved to ROH - moved him up to 26 inches too. he did nicely - he has a flat jumping style beacuse hes so eager to get to the db - but hes not taking down jumps, and he has to jump so high anyway (and hes so huge) i dont want him trying to clear the jumps with inches to spare anyway. or at least he looks flat from my side - i dont see what he looks like to the side. i know he doesnt tuck his back feet :) anyway - he did nice retrieves but fronts were only so so .

ROF - i brought the flexi back out and his fronts were better - i just guided him into front. he was eager and very excited. panting and frothing as always.

broad jump - he did nicely, but he's starting to anticipate my sending him over the jump so we had to do a lot of having him wait while i stand next to the jump and DONT send him - i heavily rewarded that. becausei do a signal send, i have to be careful o fthat, especially when the judge will say "send your dog' that he doesnt go on that. will hve to proof that in privates with terry. my dog is just too "quick" at this stuff - he learns what needs to be done and anticipates it all. he could do this entire open routine without me.

didnt do fig8 - took a break for 5 minutes, but he was stlil all worked up for heeling... BUT BUT BUT BUT --

he was so worked up - his heeling was BETTER? he wasnt so pushy, he wasnt making full body contact. he still maintained a good heeling position, he was accurate and happy (and hes starting to do the malinois hop, as i call it - after dune - when we change paces, he pops up in place!!! in anticipation) - but he wasnt making full body contact with me. must research this- kathy said i may want to show him onlky in B hoping that i can get heeling towards the end - or just tire him the hell out before we show him. so did lots of heeling and he was good. and then we moved it into signals and he did AWESOME signals - i did slow those down and made them very clear and he was SO GOOD.

hung out a bit and watched everyone else and rah was a good boy. today i have to make treats to celebrate his ASCA CD and his VC certificate.

we have a trial on the 28th and a private set up on the 31st since i am off that day.
im trying to see if i can afford to put him into BOTh open classes or maybe i shoudl pull him out of utility next session to prep him for showing? i have to get my show schedule together too. someone said i SHOULD enter bayshore, that vicky brown is a good judge... its going to be HELL to park.. .and i cant bring berlin, she will likel ybe in heat. ARGH. ARGH ARGH ARG.