Down Time

I haven't been home to spend time with Zio, so he's had no practice since the 18th. I guess we have three more practices before Bonham, so we'll have to start making up some time next Sunday. We only have enough dogs for one team at the tournament. Burst, Deuce, Luigi, Scout, and Zio.

A Good Practice

We had a good team practice. Zio remains a constant and is becoming more and more dependable. He is also useful as a distraction to the up and coming dogs that aren't focused on their own lanes and turns. Zio will bark and lunge to "encourage" the dogs in the other lane to go fast and do good turns!

We tried to work with Burst on keeping her in the lane while passing Zio. I intentionally made the first pass very wide and she did fine. On the next run, she bailed out of the lane before I had even released Zio. We moved them both to the lane with the baby gates up so that she HAD to stay in the lane and worked up to reasonably close passes. We will have to keep trying this until she is confident that the big dog coming in her direction isn't going to bother her.

Wisp was limping again after last weeks practice so he's headed to the orthpedic vet Friday to see if they can determine why he keeps coming up injured since our Memphis weekend. Get better Wisp... Bonham is in a month and we're going to need you in Vegas!

Flyball Dog Wrangling

It looks like my wife Susan is going to run Zio at Rude Dog West's Flyball Tournament the last weekend of September. We had 4-5 dogs that could go, but only three handlers.... so Susan needs to learn how to wrangle a flyball dog before the tournament.

The first day of her practice was pretty funny (I might have won AFHV's if I would have had the camcorder going). Zio came running back a little faster than she expected, but she recovered to start some good tug play. While running with the tug playing "keep away", she threw a shoe and ultimately took a tumble to the grass. Zio, being the loyal, loving, caring dog that he is, seized the opportunity to grab the tug and run off with it! Susan managed to stop laughing long enough to give chase as Zio had a rousing game of his version of keep away.

Oh, the practice? Zio was doing good turns with and without the ball. He actually had one of his best days for going to the empty box without hesitation. Good boy, Zio!

Birthday Pictures!

Jumps Too! (or is it Two Jumps?)

Zio has been going to the box fairly consistently from 25-30 feet now. I put a jump in at 15' and he seemed a little confused. I moved it closer to the box and sent him from 10' and he seemed to get the idea. The next session, I moved it back to 15' and he knew what to do. I eventually put a second jump in, which puts him starting from about 30 feet. Fast forward a few sessions and he is pretty consistent going over two jumps to the box and back.

As an interesting note, he sort of lopes to the empty box, but then punches it hard and zooms back to the tug. His last stride to the box is actually a long leap... which is exactly how Susan Owen's Jean-Luc is hitting the empty box! I'd like to try a third jump, but I'll wait until Sunday's practice since I only brought the two home.

Birthday Boy!

Yesterday was the day we celebrated Zio's second birthday! The birthday boy got a piece of carrot cake (complete with a number "2" candle), some squeaker balls, a chew toy, and a big ball that looks like a giant tennis ball.

We managed to get a little play time in outside before it rained and he had a blast. I'll post pictures and a video soon.

Thirty feet!

We've slowly worked our way back to thirty feet now in going to the box without the ball. Zio doesn't go to the box on the first try everytime, but he's starting to get it. He does much better if I get him all excited first before giving him the command to "hit it". I think I'll swing by the practice field and pick up a couple of jumps to use in conjunction with what we're doing now.