Turkeys and working dogs

Oh my what a glorious day! Sunshine with a hint of frost due anytime. So lovely compared to yucko Tuesday. ;-)
The morning started off meeting at Rose's to head south of the border to the Safeway in Lynden, WA. Quick scoot into the duty free where Nancy ducked in & bought a chocolate bar which meant we could avoid about an hour wait to get thru the border. She collected our passports and then made huge guffaws at all of our photos! The customs guard took one look at us & pretty much waved us through. Six women comfortably traveling in Nancy's truck to take advantage of the US Thanksgiving sale: turkeys at 27/37 CENTS per lb. with a $25 grocery purchase! Most of them bought a 16lb+ for about $6. I was not thinking and bought one of the smaller 14lb ones for under $5 - I should have gone for the bigger size and just fed the extra leftovers to my dogs....duh. Oh well, next time. Or maybe go down again this weekend; easy enough to find a few needed groceries for $25 and then buy 16+lbs worth of turkey for dog food for $6. Could cook it up and carve all the meat for the freezer, then make stock out of the carcass. I must confess that it would seem somehow sacrilegious to feed all that to dogs! lol
No border delay coming home with the customs agent also taking one look at the packed truck of shoppers and deciding we were no threat to Canada's security. Although he did educate us that there is a $20 limit on dairy coming back into Canada - which was news to all of us. Plus he nicely informed that 3 of the 6 passports needed signatures(not mine). lol
Then back to Rose's after an hour or so of shopping to work our dogs. On sheep not turkeys. lol Go figure what a difference a day can make: I told the gals what problems I was having with Owen....but he worked just fine. Still a bit stubborn on his bad side - the come by inside flank at a distance, but no poop eating or hesitating on the drive. Still falling off the pressure but more willing to hold it longer. A very good session with him & completely opposite to Tues. Just goes to show you that maybe dogs can have just an 'off' day. Jayne had to sit out so that I could work Blair on shedding and slicing flanks. He was pretty good after getting a few chastising comments from me. Although his 'out' still seems to mean 'speed up' more than it means kick out so we need to continue to work on that.
Next year will be Marg & Kane's first full time year in Open so they were working on some shedding too. Rose has also been putting more time into it with Jana, so along with some long distance instruction from David Rees, she put us both to shame. lol
All in all, what a sweet day!
Plus Thursday is TV Survivor night and boy oh boy what a season this one is turning out to be!!

Tues. at McLeods'

Well it was a typical winter day yesterday; windy & rainy. Today I am home and of course it is sunny. :-) However the coldest morning so far I think at about 6c.
Jayne worked very well yesterday with no busting through. We did quite a bit of driving with lots of small inside flanks and little cross-drives. She is still taking her lie downs consistently which has made ALL the difference. Combined with more distance on the drive I think. I have also done more fenceline work but differently than what I did before. Now it is me on the fence, asking her to go between me and the sheep in a complete 360 flank. Plus I really try to talk calmly and remind her to be 'steady'. She still goes too wide at times but I think she is just trying to be as far off the sheep as our little field will allow. When I've worked her in a big space that seems to sort it self out.
Owen, on the other hand, is now my problem child. I am starting to see the stubborn side of him that Lee found out. My 'easy' boy is now the hard one. ;-) He is still very good at taking lie downs. But he is being very resistant to taking inside flanks at any distance - even in the small field. He is totally falling off the pressure as soon as we start to drive so when I ask for the inside flank or a 'here, here Owen', he is feeling quite stressed and starting to eat poop. sigh.......ya fix one thing and break another. lol

Barries' BCSD Trial, Yarrow BC

Blair the WonderDog is ready to work. It was raining steady when Marg arrived at my house to load up and head out to Yarrow for Jacqui and Dave's BCSDA trial today. However the sun came out shortly after we arrived and we had great weather all day!
The Barrie's were good enough to set up a second course in their back hay field for the Open dogs. It was a regualar ISDS course but judged time/points: 4 pts. for fetch panels as you can see Blair blasting them through at a dead run ignoring my lie down whistles AND my bellowed corrections.
I had a good handle on him close at hand for the driving portion but here I am being a bit hesitant and worried about sheep taking off to the heavy draw. So Blair had to do a lot of stop/start/flank/stop/start kind of work. Good for his mind....but not making for a steady pace and good time.
This may be out of sequence...I think this was the turn at the post. We had a good pace going to this point.
Looks like a bit of a wobble after the turn at the post, needing to get back on line to hit those first drive panels up to the right. It was very interesting and different to run a 'field' course as time/points for hitting panels and forget the lines.....just deal with heavy draws to exhaust and back to set out.
Here is my boy being very intent as usual.
Nice tongue!!! LOL
It was a well organized lovely trial in good weather. Dave cooked up a great lunch as usual. Brian Nelson kicked butt all day; winning P/N with Beau and 1st & 2nd in Open. Rose & Jana were 3rd in Open. Blair placed 4th - tie broken with Jana on first drive panel by .02 seconds. LOL We timed out on the pen as both our dogs were being WAY too tight!
All photos taken by Rose McLeod. She faithfully took pix of pretty well ALL the runs, but only emailed me ones of Blair. More to come on FB or BCSDA website.

Another sunny day

Sunny but cool enough for ol'Roy to wear the doggy coat he is borrowing from Wyatt this winter. He went on a private 'hunger strike' while the girls on his farm were in season so he lost quite a bit of weight. Not a good idea at age 15! So the coat will keep him dry & warm when outside which will aid keeping the weight on.
Roy enjoying some extra attention during the 'Coffee Club' meeting.
Owen just wants me to finish drinking my coffee and take him out to work sheep! "C'mon already!"
"This is more like it!"

Jayne ready to be sent to fetch the sheep. But will be asked to walk up instead.
Jayne driving.
Jayne's nice pace on this fetch.
Definition of 'intense'. She did very good today - no busting through, didn't lose her head.

Working Dogs on Sunday

The weather surprised us this weekend with sunshine instead of the forecast rain. So Pam hauled her sheep to the big field for us. Here is a waiting group in the pens up on the parking area.
Bruce and Rose getting set up.
Lani, Lynda, Susan & son Ewan watching Rose work Meg.
Rose's grand old Roy is watching too. And thinking that he could still get the job done.
My Jayne getting in some good work. She has been SO much better since Lee's clinic. Although this day we had some issues to work through about bringing sheep off a fence. Otherwise I was very pleased with her.
Susan&Ewan double-handle while setting sheep for Rose's Meg who is coming around on an 'away' outrun.
Lynda's Try coming around a little tight as the sheep are already leaving.
Meg doing some nice driving.
Bruce, Rose, Ewan and Susan watching Lynda working Try.
Pearse's Riel also watching intently.
My Owen after a good session. Lynda & I did some setting for each other's young dogs to get them used to picking up off someone.
Lynda's young Lark.
Bruce working Josh.
Rose getting ready to send Meg to where Susan is holding sheep for them.
Rose's Jana watches and says that 'she' can do much better than bad Meg. ;-)
Jana's pups, Lexy & Sam are also watching and wishing they were out there working the sheep.
Blair doing some driving. It was a lovely day to sit and watch good dogs; no better way to spend a warm afternoon in November. Back to the rain today but who cares on a Monday!
All photos taken by Rose or myself.

Busted!

Does a full moon affect dogs too? This was taken at 5pm on Halloween from my deck looking east.
Hole#2 now filled in and raked but all ready to become a big mess.
Hole#1 placed exactly where the most traffic goes in & out of the house.
I changed the location of the cross-fence in an effort to protect the grass this winter. Obviously a lost cause.
Who would the culprit be? Clue number one: which dog does NOT have a toy to fend off boredom?

Tues. at McLeods'

Another nice day with mixed sun & cloud in between passing rainstorm fronts. Back to rain for tomorrow & the rest of the week though. We had coffee and caught up on the news from the trial last weekend and the BCSDA AGM. I told Rose and Marg all about the clinic and my trip. In between we worked dogs. ;-)
Jayne is like a new dog since her 'come to Jesus meeting' with Lee last week. Took her lie downs instantly and didn't bust through once. Holding her off the sheep while driving as much as possible helps too. I even asked her to do the inside flank exercise along the fenceline. That was very hard for her - feeling all that pressure in such a tight space, but she managed to keep her head more or less. Owen was able to do the exercise much better too. The sheep were not standing as tight to me/the fence and there was no Lee to add to the pressure either. lol So hopefully we can continue to make slow progress and not slide back into bad habits. We shall see how it goes again on Thursday. Then probably no work this weekend with Halloween and bad weather; it doesn't sound like Pam will trailer her sheep to the big field.