Another high, another low
My wonderful Ratting dog has been "semi-retired" in this field after an amazing time at the first Nationals for this event (he took home the bronze!) so we could concentrate on agility during his younger years. He's really a ton of fun in the ring and whirls around like a madman flashing his tail like a banner daring photographers to try to catch him in action. He caves to pressure so easily that I cannot ever suggest he check out a specific tube or even an area of the ring to examine. I'm as much of a spectator as those who crowd to watch him.
We've entered him in 1-2 trials per year since then so he rarely gets the chance to play the game anymore. This past weekend was our chance to visit with friends and jump back into the rings one more time. He was two qualifying runs away from his next championship and there were three shots over the weekend.
As if he'd had no time off at all, Tashi nailed his first run of the weekend with a great run and fastest time of all the master level dogs. We had a rough go the next day and found "an extra rat" after he was done searching (the number of hides is unknown to competitors and he sometimes succumbs to the pressure with a false alert).
On the last day I noticed he appeared a little sad and possibly scared when I got him out of the car for his run. He perked up easily enough when he realized where we were headed so I figured that perhaps a noise might have been bothering him that I didn't hear? Anyway, he seemed ok so off we went.
My beautiful boy had his flare back in full gear again and grabbed that last chance for a qualifying score - fastest dog in the class again! I took him out to run off the energy and he seemed fine to me, so I loaded him back up when he was cooled down and watched the rest of my class. It was a challenging course and very few dogs qualified. Since I'd planned to drop him down to "games only" after this run and also because he had some very pretty ribbons to show off, I stayed for pictures. When I retrieved him from the car again he seemed sad. Odd.
After pictures we went home, ate dinner and settled in. I thought he took the stairs funny but then discovered he was dragging a stick in his tail. At bedtime I noticed he was quite hesitant to jump up on the bed with me. Do you think he could just be tired from the long weekend?
But by morning it was worse. Now he's not running, jumping and playing as normal... even struggling with stairs.
The ER doctor couldn't find anything wrong (rest, pain meds, watch) and his PT doctor is booked more than a month out. Still waiting on the chiropractor. I've got decisions to make fairly quickly regarding agility trials coming up, but now we wait. Again.
I hate the unknown waiting.
:/
We've entered him in 1-2 trials per year since then so he rarely gets the chance to play the game anymore. This past weekend was our chance to visit with friends and jump back into the rings one more time. He was two qualifying runs away from his next championship and there were three shots over the weekend.
As if he'd had no time off at all, Tashi nailed his first run of the weekend with a great run and fastest time of all the master level dogs. We had a rough go the next day and found "an extra rat" after he was done searching (the number of hides is unknown to competitors and he sometimes succumbs to the pressure with a false alert).
On the last day I noticed he appeared a little sad and possibly scared when I got him out of the car for his run. He perked up easily enough when he realized where we were headed so I figured that perhaps a noise might have been bothering him that I didn't hear? Anyway, he seemed ok so off we went.
My beautiful boy had his flare back in full gear again and grabbed that last chance for a qualifying score - fastest dog in the class again! I took him out to run off the energy and he seemed fine to me, so I loaded him back up when he was cooled down and watched the rest of my class. It was a challenging course and very few dogs qualified. Since I'd planned to drop him down to "games only" after this run and also because he had some very pretty ribbons to show off, I stayed for pictures. When I retrieved him from the car again he seemed sad. Odd.
After pictures we went home, ate dinner and settled in. I thought he took the stairs funny but then discovered he was dragging a stick in his tail. At bedtime I noticed he was quite hesitant to jump up on the bed with me. Do you think he could just be tired from the long weekend?
But by morning it was worse. Now he's not running, jumping and playing as normal... even struggling with stairs.
The ER doctor couldn't find anything wrong (rest, pain meds, watch) and his PT doctor is booked more than a month out. Still waiting on the chiropractor. I've got decisions to make fairly quickly regarding agility trials coming up, but now we wait. Again.
I hate the unknown waiting.
:/