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Monday, 29 October 2007
Trial Season comes to an end....
Mood:  sad
Topic: Herding

Well, Tap and Pat competed in their last competition of the season over the weekend near Kingston, Ontario.  Under UK judge Bobby Henderson, about 40 Open handlers and their dogs ran on a commercial flock of undogged ewes and yearlings reminding me of the Wapoos Island sheep used at Grass Creek park, but maybe a tad less "feral".  The venue was beautiful and the field had a potential 400+ yard outrun, which was scaled down once it was discovered how difficult the sheep were going to be!

Handled by a very nice farmer and a couple of less than trained dogs, the sheep were bold and rather uncaring of any dog who didn't enforce their presence from the beginning.  Strong eye and heading was not tolerated by them, nor was flip flopping back and forth behind.  They would simply stop and turn on the dog, stomping their feet and cursing their sheep's curses.  If the dog gave any ground at all, the sheep simply stood and grazed, ignoring the dog altogether, or run over the dog to get into the safety of the woods!

Overly strong dogs also got into trouble, with 3 way splits happening on the fetch, with lots of "off course" RETs and many DQs. After watching the first few dogs "run", I pretty much thought Pat and Tap would be finished at the Lift!  However, both my girls surprised me and I guess all those fun "gripping" exercises (poor ram lambs!) have paid off!

While neither had high enough scores to get in the money on Saturday, they earned very decent scores and I was very proud of the usually so cautious Tap - she handled them beautifully, giving and taking as necessary to keep things moving.  Pat needed a grip to get things going, but the judge allowed reasonable grips and only deducted points instead of DQing.

On Sunday, Pat's eye took over and after several stalls on the outrun I knew we were sunk - she wouldn't release the pressure to their heads and gripped off on the cross drive. But she got to do some set out work, which she loves and is so good at, being a calm and absolutely biddable dog, who is not too pushy.

Tap was having a run that probably would have got us in...At the pen, she was tremedous, with her small quick flanks and absolute "stop on a dime" type handling, she worked them in...all to the last tail, when I took over and screwed it up!  When the lamb leaped out, Tap was there in an Arnold "Make my Day" type of way and had a tremedous grip, earning us a DQ. Oh well, she was a very good girl and in the past, might have turned away on that lamb...So now, we need to put the grip on command, without loosing her new found confidence.  Winter work!


Posted by Creekside Border Collies at 10:30 AM EDT
Saturday, 6 October 2007
2007 USBCHA National Sheepdog Championships
Topic: Herding
 
It was a very fun week!  I hauled a 19 foot trailer to camp on site and it made the experience so much more enjoyable!  The dogs were relaxed, had there own space and I could watch when I wanted, sleep when I wanted, eat when I wanted etc.  I took two days to do the drive, taking an easy route to save driving anywhere near NY City or Hartford.  The first night on the road we slept in a WalMart parking lot - very strange to get up and do one's grocery shopping at 5 am!

The sheep were (according to many veteran handlers) some of the toughest they've seen at a National Finals. I guess the Western handlers, who thought the eastern sheep would be a piece of cake were surprised. You can see on the website http://www.sheepdogfinals2007.com/open1.htm that the Open first go round had close to 50 (out of 150) RET and DQs, and a score of 121 got into the semi finals (usually in the 140's to get in in past Nationals) - so sheep and field combined provided challenges that were hard to overcome for many dogs and handlers - both veteran and rookie.

Tap...
Tap (2004 Pat x Glen; first season in Open) ran 5th on day 1 (the horrible Tuesday afternoon). The sheep were hell bent on getting back over the hill where they had been settled before the running. Many lost their sheep on the lift that afternoon and many more on subsequent days, both pro handler and not. Even past National Champions lost their sheep on the lift, so the great dogs and handlers were not spared! There were a ton of crossovers on the outrun, as the field undulated in several places, there was a low rock wall off to the right that ran about 2/3 into the field, throwing many dogs off.  The busy traffic was also a problem for some dogs, who focused on the movement of the cars.

I wanted to send Tap on a right hand outrun - as that was the way the dogs had a view of the sheep all the way up the field, and handlers could also see their dogs! The left hand outrun was tricky, with rolling hills and several hundred feet out of sight.  Tap - alas, crossed over - she was focused on the very busy road traffic to the left - but once on the left was brilliant - went beautifully to where the sheep were set 465 yards away with a man on horseback.  She got the sheep lifted but they were trying desperately to escape and she had a heck of a time in her inexperience to keep them on the field. About 1/4 down the fetch, she got them settled and stopped - and then was afraid to do anything but hold them. So we didn't get them down the field...But she didn't loose them.  She felt all alone up there and needs more confidence to push them when I'm not there to help. We will continue to do confidence building work...We need to run on tougher sheep!

Kess...
Kess (2000 Jess x Ken) took Jinty's place in the running order, and would have easily made the semi finals...If she hadn't gone over the hill to the exhaust pen first on her outrun! She has done so much working at set out at so many trials, she was convinced that was what she was being sent to do! But she did truck those heavy sheep around the course and didn't let them get the best of her! She came close to gripping at the shed (many dogs got very frustrated and showed it after having to work so hard pushing them around the course!), but finished the run with a good pen. I am always so surprised at her ability to get such big, pushy sheep around - she is about 25 lbs and so small she doesn't come to Warren's boot tops! Sheep don't question her and she just gets the job done.

Pat...
Pat ran mid morning on Thursday.  I sent her to the left (learned my lesson!) and she ran out beautifully, but got hung up around the horse ("do you want me to bring that down too?"), which was a brand new experience for her. She as well was a little unsure on the long, difficult fetch and took matters into her own hands - not taking a single flank command from me! But got them to my feet with no major battles. Leg one of the drive was very nice - she gets into that super nice pace - but we (like SO many other handlers) misjudged the cross drive gates and were slightly low. We got a decent shed, but ran out of time at the pen. Her score was 99, which puts us overall in round one at 58th out of 150. Respectable, but not enough to get us into the semi finals (just needed one less stop on the outrun and our pen points...Oh, if ONLY.... :)  Nevertheless, I was proud of Pat,and got some compliments on her (and my) handling of the split lamb situation on the return leg of the drive - a disaster that had sunk the run just prior to mine!
After many dogs failed to see their sheep, I wasn't about to take any chances with Pat! We simply don't get these big outruns in the Northeast and Pat certainly wasn't used to running out nearly 500 yards! Photo by John Hartman
Pat and I setting up for the shed. Photo by John Hartman
A completed shed. Photo by Doug McDonough
Unfortunately, Pat and I timed out ot the pen.  We needed a few extra minutes to get their heads turned!  They certainly didn't run into the pen and any sudden movements from dog or handler was apt to scatter them around the pen.  Photo by John Hartman
 
Glen...
Glen (sire of 2004 and 2006 litters, 2002 USBCHA National Finals "Rookie of the Year") ran at high noon (an AWFUL time to run). It was so very hot!  Glen also had trouble on his fetch and cross drive, and ended up with a score of 120, which had him at 40th place so was in the semi finals ....Until near the end when a controversial call by the directing committee allowed a dog that was overheating to the extent that the Judges called the handler off was given her score back.  Below is the explanation from comebye.net:

"It looked for a while like Laura would not make it. Zac got to the shed but was obviously feeling the heat. After a couple of trips to the water tank, they weren't making much progress at the pen and "time" was called by the judges with about a minute left on the clock. The judges and trial committee decided that Laura and Zac could keep their points up to where the judges called time and their 121 was enough for the final spot in tomorrow's round."  So she pushed Warren and Glen out of the running, which was very depressing for all of us.  :(
 
Warren and Glen setting up the shed in Friday's running.
Photo by Doug McDonough

All in all, it was a very fun week - saw lots of great dogs, and some nice males as potentials for the next Tap litter. I am looking for a male with fearless push, but with style and still biddable and easy tempered, and logistically feasible, as Tap will be bred in the winter so not great for long distance driving. There were several that caught my eye and that I met, so now down to the final research!

Posted by Creekside Border Collies at 2:02 PM EDT
Updated: Monday, 5 November 2007 2:17 PM EST
Friday, 24 August 2007
2007 AAC Nationals
Topic: Agility

Blaze and I traveled with friend Lisanne and her Border Collie, Sally to Halton Hills, Ontario after each qualifying for the Nationals in the Quebec Regional Championship.  Blaze is a nervous traveler - he does not like the car, although he is very happy once he's there!

The drive was LONG!  Our hotel was good, had a full kitchen so even though it was a 25 minute drive to the site, it was worth it!  This part of Ontario hadn't seen rain in weeks!  I couldn't believe how DRY and dusty the site was. The entire well had dried up, so water had to be trucked to the site daily.  Needless to say, Blaze sure missed the "hose" as his reward, but managed to play quite happily in the discusting mucky water of the kiddy pools scattered around the rings.

Did I mention dusty?  Well it was like a desert - the grass was all shrivelled and dormant - dogs left a dust trail in the "grass" rings and the footing was like concrete, with no traction at all! Nobody's fault - can only blame Mother Nature!

Blaze was up and down - we had a very discouraging warm up day - missing all our contacts, going off course and weaving slowly...But he ran beautifully the next day in his Standard run, placing us 3rd out of 85 (or so) dogs in the 26" division!  Gamblers was shaky but successful, Jumpers was not so pretty with an off course.

The best part was that Blaze made it through 2 competitive rounds of Steeplechase to earn a spot in Sunday's Finals! He placed 7th in Thursday's qualifying round, 6th in the semis on Saturday.  I was so proud of him!  Alas, by day 4 Blaze's brain was fried and the loudspeakers blaring music and running commentaries directly into the ring during the Final round made him so worried and I chose to leave the ring after a very un-Blaze like struggle at the weaves.

WHY does the AAC have to take a highly competitive ATHLETIC event and dumb it down to a "Superdog" show for kids? It made the final event a bit of a farce, with top name handlers getting mightily distracted by the music, throwing their timing off...You only see the loud clapping and cheering and horn blowing at the World Championships AFTER a dog has faulted!

Blaze was very happy to get home and let the sheepdogs take over my life for a while while he had some agility down time.

There are some pics on my website (go to Blaze's page).  Below is my favorite photo!


Posted by Creekside Border Collies at 2:34 PM EDT

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