ResqTails

Hehe, I’m too excited to not give you another hint about the PVC.  It’s thankfully not being used to have to fix a plumbing problem.  How aweful to have to go buy PVC for it’s intended use!  That would really be aweful.  In fact, the guy at the plumbing store couldn’t figure out what in the world I would need the rest of what I ordered for.  It didn’t make any sense to him, but I have a feeling it will make perfect sense to you agility people out there.  Nope, nope, we’re not making the dogs riding toys out of pvc, but it is kind of a toy, I guess…

So, these were delivered late yesterday afternoon.  I wondered if we were going to be able to get them off the truck at first.  The poor kid really had trouble.  Anyway, we managed, he and I to get them off and now here they are…just waiting.  Waiting for someone who knows what they are doing to put them to good use.  Any guesses what we’re doing this weekend?  LOL  I can guarantee there will no need for anyone to be wearing any sexy costumes around here…

Ok, here it is. The dreaded stride regulator. Looks innocent enough, right? Isn’t if funny how a silly old piece of PVC cut in half and laying on the ground can be so complicated? LOL After all it’s only purpose for us was supposed to be to help the dog find the correct take-off point for the jump we are working. Doesn’t do it’s job though if the dog thinks that it’s a marker saying. “Place your front feet as close to the front of me as possible”. Anyway, I just thought I’d post a little picture of the beastly thing.

I think after all this hard work, Dare and I are going to need to sit down in front of an outdoor fireplace and just relax for a while.

Well, I thought that earlier in the week my training challenge might be to take Twist to a ring set-up to work on his stays, but my friend changed her mind about going up to the ASCA trial yesterday. Which was fine. I was tired anyway. Then she emailed this morning saying maybe we should go today, but then we both decided against making the drive to Salt Lake this afternoon. It’s such a bummer that the ring set-ups and stuff are 2 1/2 hours away, (one way). Makes it so hard to be motivated to go.

So, I guess you’re just going to have to hear about Dare’s stride regulator work for this week. It’s certainly a challenge. Even though it’s an odd one. So, here’s the challenge. Dare jumps the stride regulator. The problem is that she lands as close to the front of it as possible. So for all intents and purposes it’s pointless. LOL Personally, I’d just bag the whole idea, but the person we are working with on Dare’s jump training said it would be helpful to us if we could get her to use it correctly.

Here’s what we’ve tried this week. She suggested just setting her up a foot or so behind it and going out in front and kneeling with a treat in my hand like a target to try to get her to land further away from the front of the jump. It was kind of successful. Then she said we could also try just having a fun game of fetch over the stride regulator and see if that lengthened out the stride. We tried that too. Next you’ll remember Diana suggested uprights might help. I had tried this earlier, but thought I’d try it again anyway. My mom suggested flipping the stride regulator upside down to present a different picture. Tried that on Friday I think it was. Andrea had suggested striping the stride regulator like a jump bar to see if that visual helped. Tried that tonight.

Here’s what seemed to be true in almost every scenario. If she was set up just behind the stride regulator, and I targeted her out a couple of feet from the front, she did land a little further out in front than before. However, if I put another jump out 4 feet from the stride regulator and targeted past the second jump, she reverted right back to her pattern of jumping and landing her front and rear feet directly in front of the stride regulator rather than splitting the difference of the 4′ between the jumps.

In the case of the fetching over the stride regulator. That was a mixed grab bag of results. Sometimes she looked like she was just striding over it, like you might expect. Other times she jumped it, with a decent amount of distance on the landing side, and once…she came back to me carrying the toy and took off about 7 feet in front of the stride regulator in this huge leap.

Go figure.

I think when the trainer gets back on Monday she’s going to be wishing she had looked for different jobs while she was gone, so she didn’t have to try to figure out what in the world is going on in Dare’s brain as far as jumping is concerned.

One of the interesting things about having the boarding kennel here is the variety of things that people bring along with their pets. I see a huge range of foods, ranging from brands you can get at any grocery store, to exclusive brands you’ve never heard of. I also get to talk to people about supplements and treats and edible dog dental chews.

Sometimes I find myself intrigued by new products and sometimes not so much. One thing I have to admit that I love the idea of is dental chewies that would really give you clean teeth. Honestly, I think I would just love anything that would extend the time between vet visits for dentals. LOL

I wonder about these Nylabone Nubz dental treats. They are supposed to clean teeth, freshen breath, (which is what Raven needs so badly!), reduce plaque and tartar. They have no added sugar, salt, plastic or preservatives and they are Gluten-free.

So, I tend to be a sucker for a sale, and I guess there is a coupon for $3.50 in the Costco monthly coupon book that’s good until the 12th of September. I might have to go take a look, and stop at Costco on my next trip to Salt Lake.

So, this morning I’m chatting with my mom, like I do every morning. It’s a routine for us. I call and check and make sure that they are doing fine at the farm and she asks what plans I have for the day, and then off we go. LOL Well, this morning she was asking about Dare’s jump training, and I was telling her that a friend of ours wanted to see some video of Dare doing some one jump and two jump exercises. In these exercises, she wanted me to switch up the jump heights, and the even if the bar is straight across or not, each repetition. Just to provide a different visual for her to solve in jumping. Our friend said she even hangs odd things off the jumps sometimes, to change things up. Wonder if she’s ever lit up the jump with white led christmas lights? Just kidding!

Anyway, the other trainer that has been helping with our jumping asked that I work with Dare on recognizing the stride regulator as a jump. At this point, Dare seems to be convinced that a stride regulator is an object that you attempt to land your front feet directly in front of, no matter how far away from the next obstacle this places your take-off. Oh, and sometimes, it’s just a springboard for your back feet. Bleh, not ideal. So, yesterday I worked on trying to just get her to lengthen out her stride over the stride regulator by playing fetch back and forth, etc. I had some success, but nothing ground breaking.

So back to my mom…I’m telling her the same thing I’ve just written, and she says, “Why don’t you try flipping the stride regulator over?” It kind of took me by suprise. What an interesting, simple thing to try. Why hadn’t I thought of that? LOL All I’m trying to do is get her to look at the stride regulator in a different manner, and it being upside down would certainly look different. Sometimes my mom just cracks me up. She is so practical, and yet absolutely brilliant at times. Anyway, I can’t wait to give that a try tomorrow. Even if it doesn’t work, I think my mom should get bonus points for a new twist on this exercise.

I seem to struggle to find balance in most areas of my life. I don’t know if that’s true of many of you, or not. I feel like even when I find a nice balance, I don’t keep it long. LOL

In regards to training, I find myself all overwhelmed by Dare’s jump training right now. I really don’t think it would be an exaggeration to say that it’s almost all consuming at times. I think it was Sara that commented that a lot of her readers were up much later than she stays up the other day. Well, I can tell you that I was probably up way past my normal bedtime watching and rewatching and rewatching video of Dare jumping. (And in between, reading other people’s blogs). Before I turn this into a novel about jump training, I’m going to move along. I’ll post more on the details of Dare’s jump work and what’s going on with it on her blog.

As far as achieving a balance with the boarding kennel…My husband was going to look into gates for me, but he hasn’t gotten around to it yet. I have tried to find a little balance even without my plan of making things more formal with the gate by just telling people that pick up times are earlier than I have let them be in the past. Believe it or not, even with all the annoyance it causes me to wait around for people to show up, or worse yet to just have them show up unannounced at odd hours, I still find it nearly impossible to actually set boundaries for them. Too bad a barcode scanner wasn’t the answer to my problems. I’d buy one today.

I haven’t found any balance with the schoolwork yet either. I’m ready to just give up completely on it. I keep thinking if I can’t find time to devote to the schooling, how will I find time to do the work from home, even if I was one of the few people that pass their certification?

Well, that’s enough ranting for tonight. Maybe I’ll try to get to bed before midnight and watch jump videos with fresh eyes in the morning. What a thought! LOL

Here is the video of Twist from the last day of the Obedience trial. Gotta love my dorky boy! One of these days, everything is going to fall into place and we’re going to get that last leg. LOL