Training today

We had a bumper flyball training session today!! I thought I'd update on how they are all getting on.

My Dogs
Fly - Brilliant as always!!
Neo - Ditto!!
Jamie - Little Git!! He decided to go wide on the box and run down the side of the jumps on the way back. He always does this in training for some reason. We perserved until he ran in again - Monkey!!
Tia - Now doing full runs and is pretty quick. She will make a good third team dog until she gets a bit of confidence. She will only pick up a soft ball and will only go to the box if Soph is box loading but hey ho she's running!!
Fox - Amazing today!! He is running with a dog in the other lane yeay!!! I actually did a victory run around the training field hee hee!
Barley - Getting better with the ball and is single striding nicely up and down the lane. I will take some time to teach her a formal retrieve and then she will be doing it :)
The whole training session was really good and positive. We went from not being able to get a starters team to suddenly having two!! We have some very promising little height dogs coming up too. Very exciting!!

Busy weekend

Phew, I haven't stopped this weekend!!!
On Friday evening Andy gets a text from our friends, Colin and Laura, asking if they were still coming over on Saturday night???? Apparently Andy had a few too many drinks (NOOOOO - not Andy! LOL!!) at Colin's birthday party a few weeks earlier and invited them over! LOL!! We tidied the house, I walked the dogs and we went to bed. What a way to spend a Friday night hey!!! On Saturday morning I got up at six!!!!! to walk the dogs as we were going to visit my sister-in-law, Emma, and her partner, Chris. We met up with Andy's parents and Chris' parents and had a fantastic meal in a wonderful pub near where they live in Buckinghamshire. We went back to Emma and Chris' for a cup of tea and a tour of their new house and came home. On the way home we stopped at Asda to pick up dinner and the all important beer and I started to cook dinner as it was six by the time we got back. We had a lovely evening with our friends, Barley was in heaven with all these people to fuss her and spent the whole evening on one or other of our laps - bless her.
On Sunday morning we had flyball training. I think Fox has reverted back to being a complete little **** and was so naughty!! He kept picking a fight with another dog that he doesn't like and kept running off!! I put him away after about ten minutes as it was obvious that he was not going to concentrate and there is no point forcing the issue with him. Hmmmm I keep telling myself that he is only two and he will get better!! It has become a little mantra! LOL!! Kate and I got the puppies out and they had a lovely hour playing together and trying to get fusses of everyone who came past! They are so good and getting more responsive all the time. I actually think that Barley will be doing Flyball before Fox!
I came home and took the big dogs out for a lovely walk for about two hours all round the farms on the back of where I live. The farmers are very good and keep great paths for the walkers so it is a real pleasure to walk round there. I then came home, got washed and changed and went out for dinner at Andy's parents. Finally getting home at 8.30pm!
Next week will be just as bad. On Saturday we are training the Mad Muttlies as we have Bryn running with them now and we need to check who he can run with and I have to pull out the caravan and get it ready for the following week (Barleylands Show). Then on Sunday it's the flyball AGM. Sooooo busy!!!!

Update

Thought I'd add a quick update as I actually remembered (and managed) to get some pics of Barley.

This is her practising her sheepdog pose waiting for me to throw her ball.


This is her waiting paitently for a treat And this is her in her favourite position in the whole world!!!

As you see she is looking a bit more grown up now.

We had training on Sat and Fox was a bit of a plonker! He went up the jumps beautifully, triggered the box, watched the ball roll down the box, refused to pick up the ball but just stood there on the box, waiting for me to call him back. He was very focused on me even when Kate started walking Stacey (Staffy-Barley's half sister) up and down a bit so I was really pleased at that, we can work on the ball later lol!

On Sat night we went to Kate and Dave's as it was Dave's birthday. It was really nice as Sam, Andy and the girls came down so the whole team was there. Sam brought Fraggle and of course Henry was there so Barley spent the whole evening playing with her brother and sister. Barley is weeny compared to them!!!! They are both about two inches taller and longer then her!!! Bless her! We had a lovely evening. We made plans for our first show in April and decided who was in charge of what. Decided on our calendar for the year. That is most weekends in April, May, June, July, August and September gone! Then we had an amazing Indian, It was great everyone brought a dish and Kate outdid herself with some amazing curries and a superb tiramisu!!! Yummmmmy! Everyone went home about a stone heavier but boy was it gooooood! We are really busy as we have decided to give flyball in the South a real boost this year by hosting 6 shows. Luckily the first one is not full so we are only racing on the Sunday but it means that we can do all the fun stuff on the Sat, singles, pairs, starters and other games. We also have some excellent prizes but that will be revealed at the show!! All in all a great night amazing food and we spent the whole evening talking about flyball till 1am. Sam and I even got onto reminiscing telling Kate and Dave about the early days of the Mutts and the outlandish and weird things we got up to when we had, had a apple juice too many!!!

Fox is a star!!!

We had flyball training today and I just took Fox and Barley. Fox has come on so much in the last few weeks as he loves a ragger. He actually went up to the box, got a ball out of the box and came back over the jumps with other dogs in the vicinity!!!! This is a massive achievement for us. I really didn't think he would ever get the hang of it as he is not a huge ball fan and is very easily distracted but I have spent the week getting him to fetch the ball, and bring it back to me before he can play with the ragger. It has paid off!!! YEAY!!! It has also made him lengthen out over the jumps so we are getting a real idea of how quick he will be. I thought that he may turn out to be too big as he is a very heavy dog but it turns out that he is a bit speedy under that huge frame. I am excited to see how quick he will be.
Barley played with Henry (her brother) both of whom decided to go deaf when we called them back - little monkeys! Henry is so different to Barley. He is much more collie in appearance and is the spit of his dad, he is a really handsome little man. He has a wiry coat while Barley's is very soft (not sure if this is still puppy coat?) and he is much more stubborn then her, lol. They are so similar in basic personality though and are both really gentle little souls who just want their bellies tickled.
I promise to try and take some more pictures soon!!!! It's a bit difficult though when the pup is doing the wall of death around your living room!!

Great week

It has been a very quiet week for me, dog wise, this week, I have focused on work as I have been going for a promotion which I am very pleased to say I have got!! I learned that Jamie got his Flyball Dog Intermediate award and Neo has his Advanced so I am very proud of my two boys!! I also got a blinding deal on my O2 phone, woo hoo!!
My sister and I had a small flyball training session today over our local park, just taking our three young collies and the jumps. Fox has had a few sessions now but is so unfocused that it is taking a while. I have however had him playing with a ragger which he loves and it has completely turned him round. I have so far struggled to get him to go over three jumps as he switches off and either runs round or runs off!! Today however we got him going up to my sister, taking a ball off the ground (I haven't introduced the box yet- too much for his small brain to cope with!!) and coming back over the jumps to get the ragger!!! it only took us about ten mins!!! I'm really pleased with him. I keep saying that he won't run until he is about four but I may be changing my mind a bit, maybe three and a half :).
Tasha's dogs were brilliant. Echo is three and has taken a loooong time to mature. He has also had a problem with other dogs which has knocked my sister's confidence with him. I have taken it upon my self to bully her into bringing him training! :) He did her proud today and went over three jumps in a row. Roo was amazing. She is the most hyper dog I have ever met, you can practically see her little brain going a million miles and hour. After she had calmed down a bit she was coming over four jumps to me for a cuddle then turning around and going over four jumps to Tasha for a cuddle. We don't train with netting at all so this was really good!!
Not a lot to say about Barley but she has been really good and has mastered being walked on the lead. Good little girl

Flyball pup

Well I think she may do flyball, fingers crossed!!!!

Thought I'd update a bit as I always moan at my blogger friends that they don't update enough or AT ALL SAM & KATE!!!! Hee hee!! All Barleys brothers and sisters are all in their new homes now. It nice that we will be able to all keep in touch as we all know each other. My brother has Barley's very pretty but very feisty sister called Bella. So we went to go and say hello at the weekend. The two girls terrorised my brother's huge german shepherd. They nicked all his toys then told him off! LOL!!! I will get some pics the next time I go over there.

We have been doing more training and Barley can 'sit', 'down' & 'leave', We are in the process of learning 'paw' so she is doing really well. She is soooooo sweet! She comes up to you on her belly then immediately rolls over to have her belly rubbed, a characteristic of the litter. I can see them lining up for flyball now, four stollies on their backs!!! :)

She is also getting on really well with the big dogs. They all acknowledge her as my pup and are really good with her. She gets away with murder with them, Jamie especially adores her! The cats on the other hand,well..........!

Training Barley

I have the spent the last two evenings teaching Barley a 'sit'. She was doing really well until a distraction arrived

Meet Kimba my Bengal x cat. He actually knows the 'sit' command and decided to show Barley how it was done!!!

I gave up pretty quickly this evening as it is difficult with the cat joining in too but Barley did really well and was paying attention to me instead of Kimba. Very impressive for such a young puppy.

I started doing some training with a ball in preparation for flyball (you can't start them to young!!) I was rolling a ball and getting to bring it back to me to play tuggy. It worked like a dream and she got the idea very quickly. She loves the ball and the tuggy so we are playing this game in the evenings
She likes this game but needs to learn to grab the ragger and not my hand!! LOL!!

Below is her trying out her collie side and trying to round up Kimba!

Playing the innocent

Sneaking off round the back

Prentending she's found something to sniff on the floor

Realising that this probably wasn't a good idea!!!!