Agility puppy class

Yesterday morning I took Skye to a puppy party at Whirlwind Agility. It was completely different from what we did at the 'regular' puppy course the last five weeks. It was much more focused on experiencing all kinds of different things and less about basic obedience. Our group consisted of five pups: two border collies, two border collie crosses and Skye. And even though Skye was the eldest puppy, she was the smallest one as well. So when the puppies played together she often got kind of run over by the others. Fortunately, she wasn't too impressed by all this. Still, I think it is a bit of a shame that she is the only small dog in this group. I had to watch her carefully when she was playing with the other puppies, while on the other hand not protecting her too much.

Besides playing together, the puppies also got to meet the horses in a paddock nearby. They watched them from our arms. Skye didn't like the horses too much. But she wasn't overly scared either. I was quite happy with her reaction. She still liked to eat the chicken I offered her, so she wasn't too stressed. We also went to another field where older dogs were being trained. The pups watched the dogs jump over some obstacles as they walked on the sandy ground of the training field. Skye really liked this.

After some more playing, the puppies had to step over some poles that were lying on the floor. This exercise was done to make them more aware of their hind legs. This was quite easy for Skye, as she had done things like this last week at Hannah's workshop. All in all, we had a really good time and the lesson was over before we knew it.

And of course Skye slept like a baby afterwards.

Crows, squirrels and sticks

When I take Skye out for a walk she loves chasing crows and squirrels. She doesn't get anywhere near them, but that doesn't matter to her. It's very funny to watch.

When going after squirrels, at first she didn't understand that they go into trees. They usually do so on the backside of the tree, so you don't actually see them do it. The first time this happened, Skye was so confused. All of a sudden the squirrel was gone! And no matter where she looked (well, except for up of course), she couldn't find it. She gave me a look like: do you know what just happened here?

Skye also loves sticks. I think she's about to start teething. She just has to have something in her mouth to chew on.

Uh-oh

Last Saturday I talked with Lian about how great Skye's ears were looking, the tips falling forward nicely. Well, I shouldn't have done that. The next day her left ear went up. As it didn't go down again after a few days (like her right ear did a few weeks ago), we decided to get the kaolin poultice out.

Before ...

After!

Co-ordination and Balance

Yesterday afternoon Skye and I went to Hannah Banks' workshop: Foundations of Co-ordination & Balance for Agility Dogs. We had such a good time! Even though at first I wasn't sure we would. Skye was quite shy when we entered the hall where the workshop was going to take place. There were lots of new dogs to meet and strange noises to get used to. She wasn't too keen about the first exercises we did either. But fortunately, after a while, she started to enjoy herself. Very much actually!

We did all kinds of exercises to make the dogs more aware of their hind legs and to strenghten their muscles in that part of their bodies. It was very nice to see the dogs doing the exercises that Hannah had set up for us. All the dogs did very well. And even though Skye is still quite small, she didn't have any trouble doing what was asked from her. Here are some pictures of a few of the things we did.

She loved the wobble boards. This is the square one.

There was a round wobble board too, which was very wobbly indeed!

She just couldn't get enough of that one and even did 'sits' and 'downs' on it.

'Stepping' over the little jumps.

After some initial hesitation, Skye loved going up and down the ramp:

such an easy way to earn some chicken!

The wobble cushion.

And last but not least: walking against a ball.

At first I thought Skye might be a bit small for this exercise,

but she was more than happy to do it.

During the workshop Lian and Colin, Skye's breeders, stopped by to see how Skye is doing. It was so nice to see them again. And Skye certainly hadn't forgotten them. She just loved playing with Lian.

Cry baby

I don't know what was wrong with Skye last Saturday. During puppy class she just wouldn't stop crying and whining. She wanted to go either to Joost or to the golden retriever puppy next to us. But I wasn't very interesting, that's for sure! Even my homemade tuna flapjack couldn't convince her otherwise. (Or maybe that was the problem, hahaha). Our trainer said I shouldn't worry about it too much, it just happens sometimes. But it was a bit frustrating, I must admit. After about twenty minutes, she fortunately changed her mind and we could do some exercises. The 'settle down' exercise and the recall went quite well and walking on a loose leash is going better all the time too. So over all I am very happy with her progress.

And who could get angry at those sweet brown eyes?

Mole

When I came home this afternoon, I found a package on the doormat. A few weeks ago, I renewed my Dogs Today subscription and as a gift we received a toy mole! And Skye absolutely loooooooves it. But it had to be killed first, of course!!

Doggy shopping

Over the last few weeks I have gradually been getting Skye used to being alone for a while. I've taken it slow, and today I reached the two hour milestone. So far Skye has been doing very well. Only the first few times, when I left her for only a few minutes, she would cry sometimes. But now she seems to be alright.

As I only have a bicycle at  my disposal (Joost takes the car with him to work), I try to think of little errands I can do every day. But I must say, after a few days I don't need any more veggies, pasta or other groceries. So today I did something different. I went to a real doggy boutique which I spotted a while ago. And of course I couldn't come home empty handed. So I went for a nice flavoured chew bone. Being a boutique, they put it in a posh little bag. Haha!