Ptolomy

The Toller breed standard states: The Toller is highly intelligent, alert, outgoing, and ready for action, though not to the point of nervousness or hyperactivity. He is affectionate and loving with family members and is good with children, showing patience. Some individuals may display reserved behavior in new situations, but this is not to be confused with shyness. Shyness in adult classes should be penalized. I guess the difference is that with a lab anybody that comes up is their new bestest friend - tollers are more likely to stand back, sus you out and then come up and say hello when they are good and ready. Most of my kids and young tollers in general struggle with having a judge walk up and get into their space and want to handle them - in an ideal world if I could stand and talk to the judge for 5 minutes and then have them go over them it would make life much easier! Yes there is a toller being shown at the moment - not many points needed now for her CH title and then I will bring Cider Bear out - oh thats after she has learnt to stand! RosieFT my kids are a bit smaller than your Aussie, so I don't really worry about them swallowing the balls. Rubystar has been using them with her labs - so she might be a better person to ask. I can understand your pouch problem. Last night I had poo bags, food, a jackpot container, which was leaking blood from the goat meat, a clicker and a ball in my pocket - ARGH!

Cider is a girl - just turned 7 months old.

Yep small round balls that are fairly plyable that the dogs love squeaking. They come in 3 sizes and the small ones are ideal for sticking in your pocket and using at training. A couple of my kids aren't ball orientated, but they certainly love the i-squeaks, and so do just about every other dog that I have suggested try them. Unfortunately if you can find somewhere in Oz that sells them they are really expensive. They are much cheaper in the US (Clean Run) but then you have to pay postage.

I have just been to Red Dot to buy CiderBear a chain - since she is 2 leads from 2 nights out so far this week. While there - I also purchased two imitation i-squeak balls (the small ones - ok they are not as good as the genuine i-squeaks as the rubber is much tougher so they are harder to squeak - but at $2.99 each I thought that I would give them a go.

So how did the first night at ACWA go?????

I only had time to upload 2 videos - sorry training took priority The rest are coming...... Leopuppy - I failed Movie Maker 101 - ended up using a program called any DVD Converter which I think is a similar concept to Videoing for Dummies

Woo Hoo - I think I've got it sorted thanks everybody for your help. My Youtube degree certificate is in the mail ;)

Somebody I know is selling a vari kennel $50 The measurements of the Vari Kennel are: 70L x 50H x 50D If anybody is interested PM me and I will give you the email address - the lady selling the kennel will be at the Show N Go on Saturday.

Its a Sanyo Xacti HD camera and it came with Xacti Software CD 1.1 and bugger me I do have Movie Maker! Yes each run is a separate file. Windows 2003????

OOps - not enough Cider.....

I cheated - I found somebody to train my last dog for me - made life real easy Rat - really if you have no previous experience you really are better off joining ACWA on a Tuesday night - and then practice what you learn at home. I made a squillion jumps out of PVC - gees they look good, even if I do say so myself, and if I can make them then anybody can. My son also helped make me an A-frame and I bought a see-saw and weavers. There are lots of DVD's on the market too which may help - but as I said for the first term I would suggest ACWA (says she who is not a member - ooops)

Thanks Smisch - Surely there must be somebody out there with a Youtube degree that can give me step by step instructions????

Now you are asking me hard questions Huski - whay can't you ask me how to teach a dog to line up or teach a dog drop on recall and I can write you an essay...... I am trying to upload the files direct from the camera - so they are huge 50000KB and it says MP4 file - which means gooblygook to me

I videoed some runs at the agility trial on Friday night - most of them were under a minute long - but when I went to upload them today it was going to take 1 1/2 hours to upload each clip - so somebody please tell me what I am doing wrong......

Just one more for her JDX title Ness, but with the Nationals in April, think we might start entering a few opens instead.

The kids and I have had a tough week and we are only just coming out of our hidey holes now. Watching Lexi run and keep all her bars up was the tonic we all needed. I don't run her, so it was special being able to sit on the sidelines and video. Just a reminder about the agility and obedience Show N Go next Saturday 6th Feb at K9.

Lexi won excellent jumping

That's interesting because they did Ciders only a couple of months ago. Have you rung George's Vet practice in Midvale?

Ranford Vet in canning Vale will pull the blood for you - I think they are open 7 days a week - so you could get it done before the Show N Go on the 6th Feb The cost was $66 - I said I just needed the vet nurse to pull the blood - I didn't need to speak to the vet, so that was the cost for the testing.

HMm not knowing the dog, what and how you have trained it is hard to suggest things, but I am assuming that you believe that your dog should know the exercise? For the smelling and peeing I would be inclined to take the dog very nicely by the collar, not say anything and put the dog back in the car for a time out...... Then get the dog out again and see what happens.

It is funny though, some of the different ways they try to do things I remember training Nova for flyball, after him doing a run every different possible way after he knew what the right way was, I reckon he had enough fun and started doing it correctly! Silly.....well smart for him, he brought the ball back nearly every time as he would get a reward for it because he was still 'learning' and you could guarantee if he wasn't rewarded he wouldn't do a run properly next time so you had to break it down and start again. Until he decided enough was enough and started doing it correctly, well nothing got done! It was and still is a learning curve for both of us. Just glad I got him desexed at 3 years rather then leaving it and still be struggling through! Darcy is my entire male who is 5 and is a dream dog too train with his willingness and throw himself at it attitude, a real ditz at times, actually most of the time but he is a handsome ditz! I have to smile - having met both your kids - I would pick Nova over Darcy to train any day ;)

Has anybody found with the entire girls that they are either coming into season, in season, going out of season or having a phantom pregnancy all of which affects their drive/effort/performance? I kept a diary with Blaize and she would work well throughout her season apart from days 9-13 - then her intensity dropped off. I have now decided that tollers don't mature before 4 years of age - so it was really hard to know with Lexi and Beans how much of it was hormonal and how much was immaturity when they had an off day

I have found that the girls learn a lot quicker than the boys. With the boys I have to break thinks down into little tiny pieces, build and then rebuild if I miss a few days training because there is never anything left in the memory bank. The girls have memories like elephants and just never forget. For me, the boys I have trained all wanted to please whereas the girls can have a stick it up your jumper attitude. My next obedience dog will be a boy! So far both boys have been desexed - one at 7 months and one at 12 months. The girls were all entire when they began their trialling career. Blaize was steralised at 6 yrs, Beans at 3 years, Lexi at 3 1/2 years and Lara at 12 months.

Its about as close as I am ever going to get to being a judge ;)

I was there last night - looking like a dork - heeling around show dogs ;)