(no subject)
Today I gave Faith a much-needed and sorely underappreciated bath. It's funny how those ridiculous poofs she sports turn into sopping and bedraggled clumps. After her bath I brushed her out and dried her with my dinky little hairdryer. One of these days when I get rich I'm going to buy a real commercial dog dryer, the kind that stands up by itself. Faith enjoyed neither the bath nor the grooming, but luckily she doesn't hold a grudge.
The last time I posted, Faith was loving the weave poles not so much, but I'm happy to report now that (in my unbiased opinion, at least) she is the weave pole star of the class! We had agility yesterday as usual, and she is really starting to get it. I've been a little worried about the weaves because one of my agility books says stresses teaching the dog to weave QUICKLY instead of trying to speed up a slow weave once the pattern is established. Karen (our instructor, whom I adore), on the other hand, stresses accuracy and says to hell with speed. Quite a few people on our flyball team train agility with Karen, and I have noticed that most of their dogs are pretty slow on the weave poles. But whatever! I am no longer worried because of two things: 1) Faith is a Standard Poodle, which means she can unlearn any bad habit I give her (and she's already demonstrated this several times!) and 2) if I decide I simply MUST have a lightning-fast weaving maniac, I shall use that as an excuse to get the border collie I've secretly started wanting. (Because, you know, I'm a moron and think I can handle a dog with even more ridiculously copious amounts of energy than mine.)
I've started training Faith's formal retrieve, because in the APDT RL2 test, she has to retrieve a dumbbell. It's amazing how difficult this is turning out to be, considering what a natural retriever she is. She's never been asked to really hold something in her mouth for any length of time, and she thinks it's really stupid that I'm asking her to do it now.
The last time I posted, Faith was loving the weave poles not so much, but I'm happy to report now that (in my unbiased opinion, at least) she is the weave pole star of the class! We had agility yesterday as usual, and she is really starting to get it. I've been a little worried about the weaves because one of my agility books says stresses teaching the dog to weave QUICKLY instead of trying to speed up a slow weave once the pattern is established. Karen (our instructor, whom I adore), on the other hand, stresses accuracy and says to hell with speed. Quite a few people on our flyball team train agility with Karen, and I have noticed that most of their dogs are pretty slow on the weave poles. But whatever! I am no longer worried because of two things: 1) Faith is a Standard Poodle, which means she can unlearn any bad habit I give her (and she's already demonstrated this several times!) and 2) if I decide I simply MUST have a lightning-fast weaving maniac, I shall use that as an excuse to get the border collie I've secretly started wanting. (Because, you know, I'm a moron and think I can handle a dog with even more ridiculously copious amounts of energy than mine.)
I've started training Faith's formal retrieve, because in the APDT RL2 test, she has to retrieve a dumbbell. It's amazing how difficult this is turning out to be, considering what a natural retriever she is. She's never been asked to really hold something in her mouth for any length of time, and she thinks it's really stupid that I'm asking her to do it now.