Seita

Well I achieved my plan last night! Won the ring and finished her CCD title... next goal is a perfect score! As for my training, I try to train with heaps of distractions, actually I pretty much only train in locations that have distractions these days... but there are some distractions that are more tempting than others and I need to find those and train for them. But yesterday there was agility on at the same time and my girl paid absolutely no attention to it which was a real improvement from 3 weeks ago at her first trial when she was slightly distracted by that.

Well Done!!!! From someone who also just finished a CCD title in 3 straight trials I know how it feels! Great hey?! :p I hope that CD title isn't too far away!!! :D

Well, last night we had our third trial in CCD and got our third qualify! Ella worked fantastic despite it being 3pm in the afternoon and fairly muggy. We ended up with a score of 97/100 and also finally managed to win the ring! She lost 1 point per exercise, so I'm pretty stoked with that! We'll be taking a month off while we wait for the next novice sweepstakes to enter and do some polishing on novice and open work during that time. If anyone's interested here is the link to the video of her trial: and here's a photo of her with her prizes and qual cards.

Well currently I have only been to 2 trials with my current dog and I have been at both 99% certain that she would pass and she has. I am also 99% certain that she will pass this weekend and get her title. But I have not suceeded in winning the ring yet and I think the points that I've lost has been due to a combination of nerves and poor handling on my behalf, as well as the added distractions of a trial. At her first trial there was agility happening at the same time and that was something I hadn't trained for and she got slightly distracted by that. So I guess her loss of points was also from not enough distraction training!

Dogdude, thanks for that. I actually keep a fairly detailed spreadsheet of all her competition results. It includes the breakdown of scores for each exercise and comments on what I think she needs improvement on plus any comments from the judge. I've had the same judge the last 2 trials and he's been very friendly and offering lots of comments. For example after the first trial he said when she calmed down a little (she was a bit over the top) she would be a great working dog... well in the second trial she was calmed down significantly and well he gave her 28/30 for the heelwork! Different judge next week so we'll see what happens. She lost the majority of her points on silly little things in the second trial - moved 2 feet on the stand and sat crooked on the recall - I reckon that those are just about ironed out now so we should be looking at a pretty nice score this coming weekend! :rolleyes:

Well we had our second trial last night and managed another qualify! We improved over the week and got 90/100 last night and 2nd place!! Last one is (hopefully) next week.

CCD is 75 points to qualify. CD is heaps easier now too!!! Only one lot of heelwork (offlead), one stand for exam, a recall and a change of position plus the stays! I just had my first trial in about 4 years last weekend and am sooo glad that they finally dumped the two lots of heelwork in novice!

I'd like to know who the vet is as well! Last time I asked my vet about titre testing he wasn't very keen on the idea at all but did look into it for me and phoned me back to let me know how much it would cost. You can PM me if you like!

Thanks soo much guys!

Hi, Does anyone know of any clubs in and around Brisbane that do flyball? Prefferably on the south side. I have friends with a young acd x that are interested in getting involved in flyball but don't know where. They will have done basic obedience with the pup before joining a flyball club. Thanks

Thats sort of good news, March was going to be a terrible time for me. I hope you are able to reschedule as later in the year I'll probably be able to make a whole 3 days!! Keep up posted please?

Whoops, yes it was for CCD and yes at Redlands. I think (work permitting) we'll be trialling at Brisbane next weekend and then either logan or southside (I can't remember which) the following weekend. Thanks Dogdude, I'll keep you posted. If you've got a pup which high drive I would soo recommend this style of training. It's taken me almost 18months to get her to the level I wanted (much longer than if I'd trained her in a more conventional method) but her work is soo much more focussed than any dog I ever trained in another method. I started her in drive at around 6 months old and she's 22 months now so it's been a slow process but that's been my fault probably more than the dog's! Goodluck with your puppy when you start training!

Tonight was my dog's first trial ever and my first trial in about 4 years. We managed a qualify and 4th place! The bit that's special about all this is Ella has been trained in drive (k9force's way), a method that I've never used before and to say I am pleased with how she worked would be an understatement!!! Thanks K9force for all your help getting Miss Ella ready for this!!

Just wondering, could someone come for just one day? I don't think I can get the time off work to attend all three days, I'll most likely only get one of those days off, but would still love to come.

1. Ok I am training for UD at the moment too and have also never gone through the class. There was a thread started a few weeks ago about teaching the scent discrimination which I'm using and it's going quite well... I'd definitely recommend using a similar sort of program to teach this. Also, the dogscouts website has a lot of games that you can teach which really help with UD training. That's about all the advice or tips I have for UD! 2. As for razzing up my dog... well I am blessed to have a super high drive dog who really just needs a sidewards glance to get her excited but when I really want some energy from her I get down low to her level and speak to her in a deeper tone but still sort of excited (does that make sense?). My girl also responds well to being rubbed on the sides while I'm doing this! I probably look completely nuts crouching down in front of my dog, growling at her and playing this silly game of touching her sides - she twists to follow my hand and then I touch the other side and she twists back the other way again! Also running around with her gets her stirred up, just in a small area with somewhat erratic movements. My dog also lives to work, so training her really easy little tricks and then praising her excitedly gets her pretty worked up... so much that I often need to calm her down again before doing any more training. I do this with tricks like shake hands, turn around in a circle, put her front feet on a book, keep her front feet on that book, back up... etc. Hope this helps!

Sentinel Spectrum here as well. If you're worried about it, you can get your dog DNA tested for the MDR1 gene.

My aim for next year is CCD, CD and CDX before my girl goes off to have a litter! All the foundations are there I just need to enter some trials!!

I know Steve is possibly heading up to QLD in the first half of next year, maybe Erny would like to join him??

Do you guys want to come to QLD and do a similar workshop??

It's a flea and tick collar, I need the tick collar as I'm in Brisbane so I figured I may as well do both just in case. And as already mentioned by someone else sentinel apparently doesn't kill adult fleas - so the collar would work on that. I'm trying the medicated shampoo to see whether it has an effect on her scratching, I only just started with it and if I don't see improvement in a few weeks time then I'll stop with it. As for diet, she is fed a predominately chicken based diet but I do throw in the occasional beef bone, lamp flaps or other random offcuts. I've also mentioned previously that I tend to feed a certain meat in batches (lamb flaps this fortnight, chicken next etc) and I have never noticed a difference in her scratching from meat to meat. If the shampoos and other bits I'm using don't work then I will trial her on kangaroo for a while

Well... I decided to give Ella some capstar tablets yesterday, along with a malaseb bath followed by some aloveen conditioner. I also started her on megaderm yesterday too. I definitely don't think it's fleas as she was itching again last night and this morning - that is after the capstar was given. I also changed her bedding and washed it etc. I will try and keep her inside and off the grass for a while and see what that does for her itching.

Sas, I really feel for your poor boy. Please let us know when you find out or fix whatever is bugging him soo badly.

Her paws aren't very bad, I've noticed her have a chew on them a few times but she scratches mostly at her neck and chews a little at her flanks. She's mainly inside, she's only outside when no one's home but she does spend a bit of time outside when we are home and the doors are open. I guess I could try put her outside only for a few weeks... I don't really want to!!! I'm not sure she'll be very impressed with that idea!

Poodlefan - the ingredients list on the vetsallnatural health booster is: dolomite, liver granules, flax seed meal, vitamin C powder, green tea, milk thistle extract, grape seed extract, brewers yeast, barley grass powder, kelp granules, parsley powder, ginger, lecithin granules, wheat germ, garlic powder, collostrum powder, shark cartilage powder, boron chelate, zinc chelate. I also added the flaxseed oil (coldpressed, health food store type) because Dr Billinghurst's book "give your dog a bone" suggests it as one of the better oils to add to a diet... I only added it again to her diet when she started itching more and it hasn't had any effect... the same with the health booster. I stopped adding both of them earlier this year but when she started itching I decided to try adding them back in. Yep megaderm is the oil blend... I should have it by the end of the week. JulesP - I have used flaxseed in the past with her and had no problems, as mentioned I only started her on it again after she started itching. As for meats, she gets fed a bit of an assortment, usually chicken frames, lamb flaps and beef bones... I've never noticed a change when I swap from one meat to the other - I usually feed different types of meat in phases depending on what I get on special when... at the moment shes on lamb, last few weeks it was beef off cuts and next lot will probably be chicken again. Sorry if this is a silly question, but would there be other symptoms aside from the scratching if it is a food allergy? My last dog that had a food allergy had a terrible coat and hot spots as well as the itching, an elimination diet and malaseb sorted it all out for her though... I just expected that if Ella does have a food allergy there would be more than just scratching???

poodlefan - she is fed BARF, so raw meaty bones, pureed vegies and I add sardines, vetsallnatural health booster powder, LSA mix powder, flaxseed oil and the occasional egg. There is no wheat in her diet. I thought it might be her diet at first, thinking that it might have been not enough oils etc which could lead to dry skin but I've bumped up the oils and stuff like that and her skin and coat looks really healthy at the moment. I've also just purchased some megaderm and I'll see if a month of that helps at all. JulesP - I use a flea and tick collar that would kill adult fleas wouldn't it? Like I said her skin and coat looks great and she doesn't appear to have any redness or irritation but she does scratch fairly often... I guess the itchy feet might mean something on the grass is bugging her? I'll try the malaseb stuff (I think I've spelt it differently every single time I've written that!) for a while and see if that helps with the itchiness at all? Thanks again for everyone's responses!!