March 2009Monthly Archives

Tatum’s Taking the Dumbbell!

Yay! I’m so excited. For a while there I didn’t think she’d ever take the dumbbell on her own.

Tatum Dumbbell

I’ve been putting squeeze cheese on the dumbbell for her to lick, which she really likes. And no matter how many times I’ve read, in clicker training books, that a dog will naturally just open her mouth to take the thing after a while… I have never had a dog do that. Or else maybe I’m just not patient enough. LOL

So, with the help of my trainer, I rolled the bar of the dumbbell into her mouth when she was licking. She wasn’t too crazy about that, but when the dumbbell was in, I would click, and you could tell she understood that.

It only took a couple of days for her to start opening her mouth and taking the dumbbell in on her own! I was thrilled! So I didn’t need to start a hair loss treatment as I wasn’t pulling my hair out for too long!

So now we work on duration.. how long the dumbbell stays in her mouth. It’ll come, for sure. And she has to take it when it’s on the ground. All doable. I did it all with Levi and Lucy and they love the dumbbell.

My smart smooth collie girl is gonna do obedience!

Cynthia

March 30, 2009

Tatum

13 comments

Obedience, Tatum, Training

Gonna Take some Pictures

Maybe I’m just vain.. but I think I do a fair job taking pictures. I have fairly good timing so I can get nice box shots for flyball. And I like the creative shots that are uncommon and fun. So I’m going to pack up my Olympus e300 DSLR and a friend’s printer and take them to the flyball tournament in Pahrump, Nevada, in April.

Kai on the Box

Maybe I’ll sell some. I’d love to get some nice pictures of people’s dogs too them. I won’t charge too much. And my team, of course, gets free ones.

Playing Tug

So wish me luck. I like my camera. I also have an account at PrintRoom.com where people can buy copies later one if they want some. My PrintRoom Page… if you want to see some. I don’t have much on there yet, though. Maybe I’d make enough money to buy New York Yankees tickets… but I’d probably spend it on supplies for more pictures!

Webcam is Back!

Okay.. I know it’s been forever since I set up the webcam since the last server crash. I’ve just been putting it off. I love having a webcam running at home and I do miss it. It’s primitive so far, but check out this link:

The Collie Cam

I hope to get it looking a bit better over the next weeks… but you know, time is always limited and there is just never enough of it.

Cams are fun, there are zillions on the web, some even of San Diego hotels. But mine is the most fun, as you may or may not see a collie or a border collie! LOL

I’m moving the cam downstairs, too, to view the dog shelf. It’s not there yet, but it will be in just a few minutes, I hope! LOL

Popcorn Poop

Okay.. don’t let Levi near a fire! Well, he’s probably safe now, but after we came home and discovered he’d eaten three boxes of microwave popcorn… that’s three whole boxes with about four bags in each, I was thinking he might pop, literally, if we got him close to any heat!

Popcorn Poop

So to the right is a picture of his poop from today. And to the left is a picture of his poop from yesterday. Yeah, that’s poop. I know it doesn’t look like poop, it looks like pure popcorn. But he ate a lot, and so it came out just the same as it went in. Such is conversion rate optimization for the popcorn poop!

Popcorn Out

Bhahaaa… we were actually not too worried about him eating so much popcorn. We were a bit concerned, but it didn’t constitute a visit to the vet, fortunately.

It reminds me of Kip, my old shepherd mix, who used to love to eat bird seed. His poop came out filled with bird seed and just crumbling to peices.

It’s amazing these things our dogs will eat. Eww. It’s gonna be fun trying to pick up that popcorn poop in the yard… maybe we’ll grow a popcorn bush. LOL oh, I guess that would be corn, maybe we’ll have corn this year in our grass!

Classes Gonna Start!

Okay I know I know it’s not like I don’t do regular training with my dogs, but I’m excited because Tatum is going to be going to regular obedience and agility classes soon. Probably with the start of April. Should be fun.

Tatum Sitting

Levi’s obedience is winding down, he’ll still do ASCA which will be fun. And he can jump at 16″. Tatum is just starting. And I love working with her. I’ve been working stands, stays, recalls and heeling in the front yard now that it’s warm. I love that it’s starting to warm up outside! I gotta pull down the Bamboo shades to keep the heat of the sun out, but I like it, so they stay up.

So Thursday nights is probably going to be Tatum’s obedience night, and Friday night will be agility night. The downside is that I won’t really have a day off on the weekends. Bleh. So I might have to bug out of classes once in a while, or flyball practice, just to keep my own sanity. But that’s okay, I have to set boundaries and it’s always a learning process.

This picture is of Tatum when we were practicing stays at a trial a while ago. Isn’t she doing great! I am thrilled that she understands what stay means. And her recalls are getting to be enthusiastic, and so is her heeling. There is so freakin’ much heeling in obedience, and I really want my dogs to have happy drivey heeling! Even the Tot, my shy little collie girl who just really isn’t shy anymore.

Cynthia

March 22, 2009

Levi, Obedience, Tatum

3 comments

Levi, Obedience, Training

Blown Pad

Well, my Husband took Muffit and Chase to the park yesterday and Chase blew his pad. Poor boy. He has the most sensitive feet.

Blown Pad

So this evening we put some Vitamin E on his pad, put on gauze (okay it’s a band aid, LOL) and then wrapped his foot with vet wrap (notice the blue, our flyball team colors… lol Christy did I pay you for this?). And Chase, needless to say, doesn’t like having anything on his foot. So instead of giving him diamond hoop earrings, we gave him a bully stick, which he likes better anyway. However, he chews them way too fast. This is a 12 inch bully stick, and he chewed it probably in under fifteen minutes. The dork. We usually only give him the 6 inchers because if they don’t do down right… or get stuck… well, we worry.

So now the bully stick is gone, though he did have fun chewing it. And so he is sitting next to me so I can keep him from chewing his vet wrap off his blown pad. He’s been limping a lot the last day, and so really he needs something on it to help the pain, and to help it heal.

The rest of the dogs are stuck upstairs, and are pretty upset. Chase doesn’t like the other dogs around him when he’s restrained or hurt and he’ll growl at them… or more. So he gets to be special boy for a bit!

Agility Weekend and Sore Knees

Well, back from another agility weekend. We had a DOCNA trial and it was a lot of fun. Chase did great, he loves the wide open courses. Levi also did great. Levi Q’d in three out of his four runs. He loves jumping at 16″. When he’s 10 years old, he can run in grand veterans in DOCNA and jump 12″. So that will be fun too!

My knees hurt quite bad today. Ugh. I’ve been giving the dogs some horse supplements, glucosamine (the horse stuff is cheaper than the dog version). And maybe I need to start taking glucosamine, too. I just hate that the pills are so big, and so expensive.

Chase also had fun, though he dropped too many bars and had a couple too many off courses. Still it’s fun to run him and we are working better together all the time. I think we need to work on bar knocking this summer. He’s fast, and when he turns, sometimes it’s hard for him to keep the bars up. So we need to train for that!

Anyway, I’m whiped out today. I need to go to bed really early!

Three Old Dogs

It’s tough having three old dogs in the house. Of course we love them all, and it’s not like we have to spend lot of time exercising them and doing lots of things with them. However, as they age, we have to spend more on medical care. And make sure they get high quality food, a fair amount of exercise to keep them in shape, and good health care.

This picture is from May 5, 2002. We got Angel back in 2002. From left to right, Lucy, Angel (in my husband’s lap), and Levi is with me. All our smooth blue collies. They are such dolls and we love all of them.

Lucy now has megaesophagus and she’s just 10 years old. But we are thrilled that we are managing it okay and she is doing well. Lucy is also pretty incontinent and we need steam cleaners to keep the carpets clean, but we don’t have many carpets so that’s good! Angel is about 12 years old, we are guessing, because she’s a rescue. Angel is very healthy though and so we are happy about that. And Levi is 9.5 years old. He’s also very healthy but he does have arthritis now, typical of an older dog.

I’ll be a wreck when these three go. I love them all. And Levi is my soul mate dog. They are unique and wonderful and we hope they live a few more years with us so we can cherish and love them!

Cynthia

March 10, 2009

Angel, Levi, Lucy

8 comments

Age, Angel, Health, Levi, Lucy