Tikkas growing up

Little Tikka is now 14 weeks old and is growing up fast. She has been in the displays since i got her at 7 weeks and i am very pleased with how she has worked. At many of the events there is lots of noise and distractions but she has stuck with me. Her play drive has really come on and now she loves a tennis ball which she had no interest in. She has always been a foody dog and her eyes light up when she knows there is some food on the cards.

A cracking demo night

On the 20th of November i was teaching a day workshop for a group in Somerset. As i often do i followed this with one of the cabaret evenings where i show some of the training behind the dogs and some short routines. Sometimes these nights go really well with the dogs working at their best and often playing a little bit to the crowd. This was one of those nights and i was so pleased with how the dogs worked. I started with little Betty who has over the last couple of months had a few attentions issues but i have been working hard on this. I was very happy with her and even choose to do something i had never done with her attention training before. Basically i put a load of toys onto the floor and then got her to watch me as we negotiated through all the toys. I was so pleased with her as you could see she wanted to go and see what they were but paid 100 % attention as i moved her around them. She also later in the evening performed her new supersonic vaulting jump move which even makes me smile when she does it.
Next was Whizzy and as she has a show soon i concentrated on keeping her under control but also doing the moves cleanly. As usual she was full of life and showed the audience her bubbly personality. Disco came out to do her pieces and then it was the turn of Pogo who can be a bit lacklustre for me on some demo nights as she knows i have not got my full attention on her as i am talking to the audience. Well this night she was very up for it and full on so i really had to keep control. I used this night to preview some of the sequences of her new freestyle routine with some of the props i will be using. Most of the sequences went well but a couple still need some more sharpening but we have plenty of time left. I often worry if it is going really well at this stage as we might of peaked too early and then it goes downhill nearer the event.
Only a few more events to do before the Christmas break one of which is my annual trip to Cara dog training club to teach a workshop which is always a great way to finish my teaching year.

Back to training

On the last weekend in October i made my way to Belguim to teach a two day workshop. The first day was for advanced handlers and i was very privileged to have top handlers from a few countries attending. The day went well although my heart did sink a little when a handler said she needed to teach her dogs some WOW moves as unless her dog did these she thought her dog would not get anywhere in the top class. I must admit my heart sank a little as she was basically saying that judges are putting more emphasis on the moves than the choreography. This has been my problem with the sport this year as it seems that some handlers are doing trick shows with a backing track rather than putting the moves to the music.
I was wined and dined very well during my stay and had been booked in a lovely bed and breakfast while i was there which i highly recommend if you are ever in Belgium www.koeckenhuys.be
Getting back late on the Sunday night i was pretty tired but come Monday morning i was energised enough to go out and do some training with Pogo on her routines. I concentrated mainly on her freestyle routine as I'm not that worried this year how she does in her HTM also she knows her positions in HTM so it makes it a little easier to practise them at home. With our freestyle routine we really have to go out and train it as the props needs some space around them. I already knew that there was at least one area which i needed to work on but as is so often the case, the moves i thought she was doing really well didn't go as well as they should. So its back to practising these few moves over the next week to try and get them more reliable. Its funny how when you are training a routine if just one or two bits go wrong out of all the bits you practise it feels like the routine is not going well. I tried to walk out the routine without the dog to convince myself that actually most of the routine is sort of there but until i get these three moves exactly right every time i will not be happy.

What do you do on a weekend off ?

Well I'm not sure where the summer has gone as it only feels like a few weeks ago we started doing the outside demos again but actually it was back in May when i started the arena shows. I have just done the last displays of the outside season so now its only workshops or displays inside.
It seems the last few weeks everytime we have done demos there has been some sort of animal excrement in the ring which some of the dogs found very tasty : ). There was a new one to their menu last weekend which was deer dung, i wish someone would freeze dry rabbit. horse or deer dung as it must be so tasty.
The last display was for the Animal health trust Gala day www.aht.org.uk where we met up with Elaine Hill and her sheepdog display as well as the Rockwood dog display team. Our last display in the afternoon went so well i think it might have been one of the best we have done all season. Its hard to know why some displays go better than others but it just one of those things i think plus of course the environment you are in.
The last weekend of September will see me teaching in Sweden, i have not been there before so it will be good to meet some new freestylers. I will be getting back late on Sunday night and then having to get up early to go to Colchester in order to film the opening titles of the Sky Tv show Dogumentary. They have decided to use my dogs in the opening sequence so fingers crossed the dogs do their thing. Heaven knows what this programme will be like, i have a feeling i will be cringing at points and that's just when i come onto the screen !

Routine panic !

In the last week i have been getting into Pogos two routines a bit more as i think i am panicking a bit that i haven't done as much as i normally do by now. It all started with the HTM routine where i had rigged up a prop to see if it will work. Starting to work Pogo a bit more with it i came to the conclusion it was ok but i didn't think i was going to use it enough to warrant having it in the routine. So that meant that i had to look at the whole routine again and ended up changing quite a bit of it.
Then a few days later i started to panic a bit about the freestyle routine which i had already written but i didn't factor in that I'm getting older ! i had a sequence which i found out my legs don't really seem to work with so another piece to choreograph again. I know there is four months to go before the semis and the coming months will be a little less hectic but i really do need to pull my finger out and do some practice on these routines.

A quick update

As i mentioned in the last post the bank holiday weekend was going to be busy. At the PNM competition i was glad that Whizzy won her intermediate class especially as it was being filmed for a documentary. So Whizzy is now well and truly qualified for advanced freestyle but will have a good rest before i do any advance classes with her.
From the competition it was onto the Eye show where it was very wet on the first day but the second day was sunny but with the Red arrows flying over late our second display was much later which meant we were very late home.
After a busy week of grooming and filming it was time to drive up to see Andy Nickless www.workingsheepdog.co.uk for a sheepdog lesson. As i had not done that much practice i wasn't sure how Pogo would work. At home i had been working on her driving to try and keep her away from the ducks plus slow her down a bit. Not having trained a sheepdog before i was relieved that it seems i had been doing most of it ok and i was impressed that Pogo walked behind the sheep so slowly and the sheep were the calmest i have ever seen them. It was one of those rare occasions when i actually felt in control and Pogo even laid down when told.
Now its time for Paws in the park in Kent www.pawsinthepark.net so i hope to see some of you there.

The sat nav is working hard !

Its been a hectic few weeks with the sat nav being used a lot to navigate us to various venues around the country. We had a brilliant weekend at the Garlic Festival on the Isle of Wight where there was huge crowds. When i did the displays the crowd were four or five deep around the ring and i don't think i ever have had so many children in the ring for the "disco dancing" competition.
A busy week in the grooming salon followed and then a trip to Norfolk to see my good friend Helen and teach two one day freestyle workshops. Helen breeds Novia Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers so the first day was just for this breed which meant i couldn't exactly ask the person with a toller to step forward. Both groups were very enthusiastic in the morning but i think by the afternoon what with the heat and the amount of work i do with the groups they were all needing a bit of rest.
Its no rest for the wicked as over the bank holiday weekend i will be attending the PNM HTM show at Stoneleigh where i will work Whizzy. I don't really need to as she has already gone into advanced but i have had my arm twisted to compete with her for a TV programme, more of that later! Then we will be going on up to Eye in Suffolk for the Eye country show. I have performed displays there many times so i know it will mean a lot of running around as the ring is very large so i have to try and cover as much of it as i can.
A apology to anyone asking me to teach workshops for the rest of this year, I'm afraid i think i don't have that much more time available at weekends, so make sure you get your date for early next year.

New K9 freestyle display videos

Recently i was performing displays at a garden party at Charleston manor where one of the spectators was videoing the event. This event was different from the normal show i do as i often use children from the audience to help me but this was not possible at this event. Also there was no specific ring so the dogs did so well with everyone standing so close while they were working.

Whizzy's double win

Whizzy is just over two now and earlier this year she won both of the novice freestyle classes that i had entered her in. At the end of July we made our way down to the HTM show in Cornwall as i had entered Whizzy in her first intermediate freestyle classes. Luckily for me this is a double show with the same classes being run both days so i was able to enter intermediate twice.
On the Saturday Whizzy worked ok but i think i might of done a tiny bit too much warm up with her plus i felt i rushed things a bit, so i had plenty to work on for the Sunday. I was pleased that she won on the Saturday but knew she could do better so gave myself a talking to and tried to relax before going in on the Sunday. I decided to change a small piece of the routine as Whizzy didn't seem switched on at one section which i think is done to her having done a lot of displays recently. The routine went much better from my point of view and she scored just over 28 points out of 30. So it was a good weekend as these two wins mean that Whizzy now is advanced in freestyle.

Is my freestyle mojo back ?

The last couple of months has seen me really not be as enthused as normal about freestyle. Normally by now i have all the props and routines worked out for next year but for various reasons i haven't got round to it. I of course have been doing a lot of displays of the entertainment show which means after a weekend of doing that you don't feel like doing much.
Anyway i think i have now finally decided on both pieces of music for Pogo although the HTM one might change but i think we should be ok. I eventually found the props that i needed for the freestyle routine and now i just have to make sure they fit in the van!! Plus i need to get some other props made but having rigged up the props as a trial Pogo seems to work ok with them.
I have been doing a little more with Whizzy as she has a competition coming up but i really need to listen to the music a bit more. Fingers crossed she behaves herself and unlike the May competition i hope my handling is better as i feel i let her down.

A nice weekend

The first weekend in July saw us making our way to Ardingly as we had been booked to perform at the Smallholders show. I was looking forward to this event as i am now the owner of four ducks and was eager to get some good advice.
Just like the previous weekend the first day was very hot and not the ideal conditions for running around doing routines. After the first display is was time for a well earned Pimms to quench my thirst. Whilst relaxing between displays it was nice to meet Mo with Breeze and Topaz who anyone that competes in HTM will know from the show circuit.
The weekend went really well with lots of people coming up after the displays to meet the dogs and tell me how much they had enjoyed it. The rest of the show had everything and anything to do with smallholdings and i resisted the temptation to come away with a few chickens ! There were plenty to choose from with the ones that look like a fuzzy white dish mop being one of my favourites.