I DISTINCTLY remember buying a whole sheltie but it appears I only got a HALF of one! Evidence below:
Raven weighs half as much as Jayda. Her muzzle is half as wide. Her feet are half as big. She’s “half a Jayda”!
(Jayda says “… I shall call her … MINI-ME!”)
Here’s a prettier picture of the petite one at 9 mos.
Just last October, Jayda was leaving the ring and hiding in tunnels. The other weekend at Skyline’s trial she showed everyone the wonderful dog *I* know she can be! She got it together and kept it together all weekend – 8 out of 8 QUALIFYING runs, eighty points, 6 1st-places, THREE new titles!
So the lovely Ms. Jayda (aka the Q-Bot or the Big Black Q Machine) adds her NADAC Novice Jumpers, Outstanding Novice Chances and Outstanding Novice Agility to her growing collection of letters :). I’m also seeing gradual improvement in her speed at every trial, which is encouraging.
Is she over her fears? Hardly – getting her from the car to the ring and back can be a challenge. Two of her worst phobias are unfamiliar, open areas … and parking lots! But she seems to have learned that the ring itself is a “safe” place. In there, it is just the two of us, the obstacles she knows and the game she likes to play.
A few things I want to share with anyone in a similar situation – these seem to be working for us:
This goes against the prevailing attitude in agility that “its the dog’s job to come back to you”. I think standing and waiting for the dog to re-engage is fine, IF the dog left to willfully pursue their own agenda (and even then, all too often it reinforces the behavior, especially if the handler subsequently removes the dog from the course). But if Jayda disengages, she doesn’t “need to learn her job” – she’s stressed, she needs my help and I give it to her. Go to her, get right in her face if necessary, anything to get her out of her own head and back on track.
“Sisters!
Sisters!
Never were there such devoted sis-ters …”
Well I don’t know if “devoted” is the right word, but Jayda enjoys playing with Raven … when she isn’t being TOO much of a pest! Poor Raven – nobody wants her when she’s being a pest, unfortunately, her little walnut-sized puppy-brain hasn’t quite figured that out yet.
This picture looks like Jayda’s telling her something – captions, anyone?
My good camera came back from the repair shop just in time to catch a rare photo of “Hat” the feral cat! Hat is VERY shy – I rarely seem him/her. This is the first time I’ve seen Hat around in the daytime – it was nice and sunny and (s)he was catching a few rays in my neighbor’s yard.
So for those who don’t believe that I feed a feral cat with “Sheltie ears” …
Those ears have been scarred and folded over like that for at least 2 years, whether from a fight, a bad case or ear-mites or frostbite. I nicknamed him/her “Hat” because it looks like a bad case of hat-head. Other than the disfigured ears, (s)he appears to be in pretty good condition and carries that big, thick coat that ferals get in winter. I’m guessing Hat is a “he” because we’d have a faster-growing feral population if “she” was an intact female, but I’ve never gotten close enough to get a look. Aren’t those eyes beautiful?
Here’s a picture of Cassie (spayed feral female). If she’s hungry and the dish is empty she waits on the steps for me to feed her – very cute!
I suppose it was inevitible. Raven lives with 3 cats, Raven’s the same size as a cat … Raven thinks she’s a cat!
She likes the kitties a lot…
She would like to be a cat doctor when she grows up. A cat proctologist, to be exact… Jasmine doesn’t think that’s a good idea at all!
(BTW, she also MEOWS like a cat if you step on her toes! Not that I go around deliberately stepping on my puppy’s toes, but the first time I did so by accident I was so surprised by the sound that I promptly did a head-count of the cats, thinking one of THEM had gotten underfoot unseen – nope, all asleep!)
Raven is very jealous of the places the cats can go … all the high places. Poor Raven is barely big enough to jump up on the sofa by herself (unless she gets a running start it can take a couple of tries). So what did she do the other day? Jumped on the sofa … then hopped on the BACK and started walking on the back and arm!
Well, the CATS do it!
Sorry, no pictures of that – I was busy swooping the little darling up and putting her somewhere safer. Not a moment too soon – she was eyeing a glass topped table by the time I crossed the room…
And so the fun begins!
Taught these a few weeks ago but just for the record …
I lure shamelessly for sits and downs, but as soon as they start to “get it” the lure goes away and it becomes a big, honkin’ hand signal. Gradually I fade that to something “normal” and introduce the verbal.
Once you teach a sit and/or down, its a good idea to teach #4 – STAY … or else you’ll end up with a lot of pictures like this …
