Smooth Collies, Border Collies, Danish-Swedish Farmdog

November 2008Monthly Archives

Lucy Goes to the Vet

LucyI seem to only get pictures of Lucy in her chair anymore. I need some of her standing… as she does stand and walk around too! But she is just so cute in her chair.

Lucy gets to go to the vet today.  She’s been drinking a lot, and urinating a lot, and her urine is pretty clear, which means she is drinking too much. She could have a urinary trac infection. Or the vet said she could have diabetes, so we are going to test for that too.  And if both are negative, then we will look into some incontinence medication for her.

She’s always had spay incontinence but lately it’s gotten pretty bad. She doesn’t seem to know when she has to go potty. If we make her go out (with much grumbling and growling) she will pee just fine. But if we don’t, she will just lay around and leak. And I’m quite tired of having to clean the bed and wash my sheets. I have one of those water proof mattress covers on my bed, I think it’s the only thing keeping my mattress alive. Maybe something we are feeding her is like a diuretic…? Aren’t diet pills a diuretic sometimes? We don’t give her those though!

Lucy was at the vet on Saturday too… she sounded like she was breathing heavy with something stuck in her breathing tube (what is that called anyway? hrm..). But it turns out she just has a cold, or so they said.  So she’s on benadryl. None of our other dogs seem sick in any way. I wonder if Lucy’s immune system is just weak now that she has the megaesophagus. And we always worry about her because of that, too. My silly collie girl. She’s too young to be sick. She’s not even 10 yet.

Some Agility Training

Chase FrisbeeWell at long last I finally took Chase out for some agility training. It’s been quite a long time since we have done agility.. I think the beginning of September.  Got too busy with the cruise and obedience and flyball.

Chase does awesome.  My friend and trainer is pretty impressed how good he can be at agility, since he freshly comes off flyball practice and tournaments. And he still pays attention to me and remembers his agility. Though, strangely enough, he didn’t remember his distance as well as he remembered his close work.  Which is odd, because he is such a good distance dog.

This picture is of Chase, but a couple of months ago.  It was cold today, somewhere in the 50s. But Chase loves it cold.

We practice a serpentine.. I have not done many serpentine’s with him.  My friend Julie showed me how to run a serpentine… setting him up at a steep angle to the first jump, and me running in a straight line along the jumps. Wow, it worked great! Chase didn’t drop a bar and ran smoothly and hit his contact on the A-Frame.. we did the frame after the last of the 3 serpentine jumps.

It was fun, I hope to do some more agility training with him before we run in the USDAA trial December 7th.  We’ll just have fun. I entered Levi, too. In just one run a day in agility. I’m also going to enter Levi in the ASCA and UKC obedience that’s going to be there, too. He’s in novice in both, so he should do a good job! No out of sight stays!  :) As long as I have my eyeglasses and can see what is going on!

I Interrupt the Dog World for Shopping!

eBill Me

So… I haven’t been posting in a couple of days, instead I’ve been napping, cleaning the kitchen a little bit, doing some dog training, and kinda goofing off. Well, relaxing goofing off really. Which I need more of, and I don’t get enough of, and so I’m going to get some!

And did you know that Christmas is coming up really, really fast? Oh my gosh… I am not ready, I have to do major holiday shopping and it’s almost getting too late to do it online.

I usually pay with my credit card but I’m getting tired of paying the bill each month. So I’m looking at this new service called eBillMe. You use cash to pay… they deduct the cash amount directly out of your checking account. It’s kinda like an echeck but a little bit different. And, they are having a contest too, which would give me some cash over the holidays if I won!

So go check out the link, and you’ll be helping me win a contest! He he.. well, not sure if this blog is popular enough to get enough clicks, but I can try can’t I? ;)

Okay back to dog training… gonna go train some agility with Chase this afternoon. Should be fun. Then I’m coming home and maybe I’ll nap again!

Always on Cue, Only on Cue

The Dog Park Okay so this part of clicker training has escaped me from the first day I started clicker training. yeah I know I’m a dork sometimes. It’s really hard for me to learn out of a book. I love to read, I love to learn about dog behavior and clicker training and how it works… there’s just a lot of it that I have to have someone answer my questions directly or else I get lost.

It’s the same with my work. I can’t learn programming out of a book. Oh.. I can learn a fair amount, but to really know it, I really have to work in a class or with a teacher.

So today during our chat discussion for my Cyber Agility course, our instructor, Helix, explained what I have been missing for years. So don’t laugh just listen. LOL

My dogs are great at offering behaviors. The offer all over the place and I’ve never understood how to get them to stop offering and only do the thing on cue! So she said… are you ready for the revelation? Wait for it….

Stop clicking the offered behavior! LOL yup, simple as that. Only click when you give the cue for the behavior, not the offering of it. Okay so see, maybe I’m just a dork, and never got that before. But now I get it and I’m excited about trying it! Though I feel kinda mean about not clicking, but Helix also said it’s just giving the dog information by not clicking. There’s no need to feel mean!

Today we went to the dog park too, and I lost Tatum for about 20 minutes. Ugh.. she is a dork. The picture above is when we just got there. I wish I could take all six dogs but I can’t handle that many just on my own, especially when I have to keep a close eye on Tatum. Not that I did good at it anyway. :) Someone found her, called home from her tag, and my husband gave her my cell phone number and she called my cell and she told me where my brat girl was. LOL. She even got stuck in the stream and a nice gentleman pulled her out. That Tatum… she is a brat! I love her! Fortunately I didn’t get any Plantar Fasciitis on the walk.. lol, my feet are good an healthy! And my sprained ankle hardly hurts at all anymore.

A Tatum Training Session

Tatum and Levi CampingWell… I’ve been working with Tatum some. Not as much as I should, I know… but what the heck. Maybe tomorrow I’ll have a big training day. The advantage to having six dogs is that if I am only supposed to work a dog for five to fifteen minutes each, and I’m in training mode, I just switch to another dog!

So anyway, Tatum is a pretty stubborn and sassy girl. All my training career (not sure if I can call it a career since I make no money.. I just spend money!) I have had trouble fading the treats. Lucy is a prime example, she would not work unless I had treats in my pocket.  It seems Tatum is becomming the same way. With Lucy, we had to put the bag away, and the when she did what I asked, we ran to the bag for treats. And then randomizing when she gets the treats.

Tatum, it seems, may think that the treat, or the lure, is part of the exercise. Like a treat in her nose and a hand going up is part of the sit.  She does know the verbal, she will, occasionally, sit for just the verbal, but not usually. And, unfortunately, I don’t really know how to effectively clicker train and fade the treats at the same time.

So this is something we are working on. And, my trainer found out that collie girls can be stubborn brats! LOL but we already knew that. I love Tatum’s sass and that’s one of the reasons I couldnt’ resist keeping her. She has a major attitude and is really full of herself.

In training her on Saturday I’d walk her around the room then tell her to sit… and she didn’t. If I didn’t lure her into it or show her the treats. So i walked away and let her stand in the middle of the room until she did something. Well, she stood for probably five to eight minutes. Not moving, just standing, with this mad look on her face.  Finally she laid down and when she did, she got a click and a treat.

Oh boy this girl is going to be a challenge. I did expect that, though. I never did know how to train Lucy, my older collie girl. Levi is such a pleaser… the boys are usually such dorks and goofy and just want to please and will do anything. Chase is more like a collie girl but he’s still a boy and has his boy ways.  Tatum… she is going to be a steep learning curve for me.

So no more luring with her, I have to put the bag of treats away, then when she does what I ask… one command at a time, like we work on sit for one week, then I’ll go and get the treats.

I don’t want to make her afraid or freak her out or anything, she does have that bad past she came from living at a hoarder’s house.  But she hasn’t cowered or stopped taking treats for months. I really think she’s not afraid anymore, she’s just being sassy!  So we’ll see how obedience goes with this sassy girl of mine!

Tip Tail Has Had a Makeover!

Pretty Angelwell, finally I found a new wordpress theme that I like for this blog. yay! I was using the Dkret3 theme for years and years… and I liked it, I just got tired of customizing it every time I wanted something different.  Customizing is okay and can be fun as long as you have time… but I just don’t anymore. And so I found this free them that I like even better, anyway!

New colors and a new layout. And I love the little images I put of all my dogs in the top right corner.  Yay!  What a nice theme.. to have a sidebar option in the header. All themes should have that option!  And I like blue, even though blue has been over done in my life, because it’s kinda my favorite color.  I use it all over, but I like this blue and so I think I’ll keep it.

A new fresh theme is always nice, like a new coat of paint or a vacation and getting Outer Banks rentals for something different.

Oh and the picture.. that is Angel!  She is such a sweetie. I snapped that when we were camping last April, 2008, at Topaz Mountain.  She had a great time, as did all the dogs, and us too of course.

Well, back to work.. just wanted to say I’m excited about this new theme! I have to have a nice layout in order to want to post to my blogs. Dunno why… I just do. I like things nice and neat and clean on my laptop and my sites.  I wish I did in my house, too!

On the Couch and On the Bed

yeah.. our dogs are spoiled. :) And I am a big pushover when it comes to the dogs laying on the bed. They will move when I stand up… sometimes Lucy will growl, but I laugh at her and make her move anyway.

The first picture, on the couch, is Tatum, Levi, Glitter (the sheltie we are baby sitting) and Muffit.

The second picture, on the bed, is Levi, Muffit, Angel and Glitter. Glitter is a sweetheart! She always has to be with me or on me. She’s a doll. At one point Lucy was also on the bed, but my husband didn’t get a picture with all five dogs on the bed, just the four! And I’m snuggled under my blankets sleeping. :)

As you see. Glitter the sheltie is right up there on both pics! LOL she is a fancy pants sheltie for sure. A spunky girl, she needs some fancy jewelry to fit her personality. Chip, her brother, is a sweet boy. He’s young, and he and Muffit have been playing a lot and wearing each other out, which is always good!

Happy Big Nine Levi

Yesterday… November 5, 2008, was Levi’s 9th Birthday. Happy Birthday Levi!

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I can’t beleive my boy is already 9 years old. It seems like just yesterday I was talking to his breeder and going up to Idaho with my husband to check out little baby Levi.

twoblue

He is the blue smooth in the forground. You can see that the black on his head is still the same. He was such a cute puppy! I wish I had more puppy pictures of him… I think it was pre-digital camera when I got these pictures even.

Now he is nine, and still in good shape. I’m not in quite as good shape and i hope I’m not getting fibromyalgia.. that wouldn’t be good!

Happy Nine Levi! I love you… Levi is my soul mate dog.