Kudos to the AKC for increasing the number of online programs and titles that they offer during this pandemic. Personally, I’m very excited by the Rally Novice Virtual Pilot program. Rally has been on my short list of events to train for with Piper and now is the perfect time to start.
Because I have absolutely NO experience with Rally, I’ve signed up for Dusty Trieschman’s Introduction to Rally Obedience course through Leerburg University. Virtual class to help us earn a virtual title? Loving this accessibility!
Last April, we traveled to Reno and Atascadero to finish up Piper’s novice scent work title. This year, we’re living under a stay-at-home order due to the Coronavirus pandemic. My, how things have changed.
Ben and I are lucky enough to be able to work from home. We set up two separate offices and deemed Piper our office manager. We’ve had to file a few HR complaints about her for excessive physical affection in the workplace, but otherwise, working from home is going well.
Right now, I’m grateful for Piper’s temperament. She still has energy (she’s a 2 y/o Lab, so duh), but a quick walk and some indoor scent work activities are enough to get her wiggles out. We’re grieving the inevitable loss of the dock diving season, but using this time as an opportunity to strengthen her manners before we add a puppy to the pack. This also gives us time to make some lasting memories with Rylie, our almost-15-year-old medical miracle senior girl.
So long story short, COVID-19 suuuuuuuuucks, but we’re making the best out of the situation.
After the off-leash park snafu, I decided to get back to basics with Piper. While nose work/scent work was a very fun activity, it instilled a few problematic behaviors:
One of the activities in nose work/scent work is handler discrimination (HD), and the first level of that competition is training the dog to find your sock hidden in a box. In hindsight, teaching a one-year-old puppy to hunt for my socks may not have been a great idea. Now I find my most scented dirty clothes items (underwear, bras, socks) strewn throughout the house. Yuck!
In the element category of nose work/scent work, you use a long lead (leash) to allow the dog to walk in front of you to find the hidden scent item. This helps you stay out of their way so you don’t inadvertently distract them. When walking around the neighborhood, Piper tries to recreate this distance on her shorter walking leash, which means she pulls the entire way. Also, instead of focusing on me, she keeps her nose down trying to find various scents.
To remedy this, I decided to complete the AKC Fit Dog Challenge. In this challenge, you commit to walking your dog for at least 30 minutes, at least five times a week, for at least three months. We started in mid-July and are now on our very last week. If you’re doing the math, we took two weeks off in the middle for injury/illness (one for her, one for me).
With a more consistent walking schedule, Piper’s leash manners have indeed improved. Her first walk after a break is the hardest, so the chain collar usually has to make an appearance. After that, though, her form is pretty lovely. My favorite days are two- or three-walk days (yes yes, sometimes we have to play catch-up on the weekends) because she’s super calm. I can start imagining what she’ll be like as a mature adult doggo, and I love what I see!
Update: Just submitted our AKC Fit Dog form on 11/18/19. Apparently the rules changed and you only need to do three 30 min. walks a week for 3 months. I guess we’re star students!
Last week, Ben and I loaded the girls into the car to take them to the park. I haven’t been working as much with Piper so she was dealing with some excess energy that needed to be burned off. A long game of fetch seemed like the perfect remedy.
When Ben was unloading Rylie (whose 14-year-old body needs to be carried into and out of the car), Piper bolted out of the door and into the street. Luckily there were no cars coming. This was reminder #1 that I’ve been slacking on training.
I put Pips right back in the car, made her wait, then let her back out the right way. Walked her down the hill to the bottom of the park, checked our surroundings, and let her off leash for a game of fetch. She bolted again, this time for an off-leash dog on the other side of the park. She completely ignored my recall, which she has NEVER done before. Thankfully, the German Shepherd was well-behaved and his owner was chill as I apologized profusely for my poorly behaved dog and my irresponsibility as a handler. Reminder #2 that there are consequences when you take obedience for granted.
This park trip could have turned out very bad (twice), but luckily it didn’t. I got a good reminder that even well-trained dogs can revert to bad behaviors when you don’t work consistently with them. Looks like we need to take a step back from performance events and get back to obedience basics. Lesson learned.
Side note: When we finally caught up to Pips and the Shepherd, his owner asked what kind of dogs the girls were. When I said “Labradors” he said “Oh, they’re really small.” I think I mumbled “They’re the English style” but it took all my willpower not to say “Nope, this is how they’re supposed to look.” Oh well…
She did it! Piper earned her Scent Work Novice title at the Portuguese Water Dog Club Scent Work Trial in Atascadero, CA on April 23, 2019. SWN is a multi-class title which required her to earn four previous novice scent work titles (each with three qualifying legs). Here’s how she finished those:
She earned her third qualifying leg in both Scent Work Novice Containers and Exteriors in Reno, NV at the Truckee Meadows Scent Work Trial. Piper earned her third qualifying leg in both Scent Work Novice Interiors and Buried in Atascadero, finishing all the element titles she needed to earn Scent Work Novice (SWN)
Pips actually earned fourth place in Novice A Interiors and Containers in Reno. She’s a methodical dog (meaning we work very very slowly to find the hide), so she usually only places when a limited number of dogs qualify. Since only four dogs qualified in each of these events, she placed :). In buried, she was the fifth of five qualifying dogs.
Now that she’s earned her novice title, we’re taking a break from traditional scent work before moving up to advanced. Our next scent work goal is Novice Handler Discrimination (HD) which we’ve tried at three trials without any luck. In this event, the goal is for her to find my dirty sock hidden in a box among other identical boxes. This proves that she recognizes my personal smell. So far, Pips has false alerted on the judge’s distraction sock (also hidden in a box) so it’s clear she knows to look for a smelly sock. Now we just need to practice with distractor socks at home to make sure she’s sniffing for MY smell.
Overall, the journey through novice scent work has been enjoyable. This is the most intense training I’ve ever done with a dog, and I’ve learned a lot about myself as a trainer, handler, and competitor. I can’t wait to see what new challenges await us in this dynamic sport!
January and February definitely gave us a run for our money this year. In early January, we learned our old gal Rylie (almost 14 y/o) had lung cancer. We opted for surgery to remove the primary tumor, then started her on chemotherapy. Chemo didn’t work out for her, but we know that the surgery bought us a bit more time with her.
Rylie recovering after surgery
In the middle of Ry’s recovery, I flew back to Arkansas to support my sister Dawn during and after her brain surgery. Yup, you read that right. My 34-year-old sister found out she had a brain tumor in the fall, and after months of battling insurance companies and the health care system’s red tape, she was finally scheduled for surgery at the end of January. Just like Ry, Dawn came through her surgery like a champ and is finally feeling like herself again.
Once the crises passed and life evened out at the beginning of March, our training goal for this spring became finishing Piper’s overarching novice nosework title. Pips has one qualifying leg in each of the events (interiors, exteriors, containers, and buried) so we signed her up for these four PLUS handler discrimination at the March 23 Northern California Golden Retriever Club’s Scentwork Trial. A fun bonus of the trial was that the main novice judge was Donna Soderstrom, Piper’s nosework and obedience trainer.
We worked hard on Handler Discrimination and Piper really seemed to have a handle on it at home and at class. However, she did another false alert at the trial. I’m not quite sure if she knows what I’m asking of her here:
Just like last time, we used that false alert to approach the rest of the events more tentatively. It worked for containers and buried (the events she seems to hate the most in training). Interiors was an NQ, partially because I didn’t recognize her interest close to the hide, and partially because she false alerted away from it. Looks like our teamwork broke down. We need to keep practicing so I get better at differentiating true interest from guesses. Also, Donna gave us the option of competing off-lead in interiors and I wish I would have taken her up on it. I think this would have let Pips move more independently and not get distracted by me. Lesson learned.
Donna gave some overarching advice to those who NQd in interiors about not crowding your dog, and I heard her loud and clear. You know when someone gives general advice to a crowd but you know it’s aimed at you? Yeah, me too :)! So, I gave Pips more room in exteriors and she performed beautifully:
Overall, it was a great day with friends, Piper set three PRs, and we made more progress towards her titles.
Leslie with Piper, Rene with Brooke, Arlene with Cali
So here’s our current scentwork tally:
Handler Discrimination: No qualifying runs
Interiors: One qualifying run (needs two more for title)
Exteriors: Two qualifying runs (needs one more for title)
Containers: Two qualifying runs (needs one more for title)
Buried: Two qualifying runs (needs one more for title)
We’re signed up for two more trials in April, so hopefully we can sew up the SWN title between the two. Stay tuned!
In early December, the San Joaquin Kennel Club and Golden Valley Kennel Club teamed up for a four-day dog show at the Stockton Fairgrounds, about 50 minutes away from out house. Ben and I thought about going to watch the Labrador Retrievers in the show ring and check out the Novia Scotia Duck Tolling Retrievers, a breed we’re researching right now (another story for another day). When I looked at the event premium, I saw that the SJKC was doing Canine Good Citizen and Trick Dog testing. Interesting…
So, we changed plans and decided to bring Piper up to the fairgrounds to get tested. I knew she could pass novice trick easily, but I was worried about her ability to do one of the CGC test items: Test 8: Reaction to another dog.She’s pretty good at ignoring other dogs on walks, but since she’s an environmentally- (rather than handler-) focused dog, I didn’t know how she’d do in a brand new environment surrounded by other doggos. Only one way to find out, though 🙂
Turns out, I had nothing to worry about. We arrived two hours early to help satiate Piper’s curiosity by letting her explore the environment. We also ran into our owner/breeder/handler buddy Erynn Lucas (Von Luka Doberman and Whippets), who graciously grabbed her gorgeous boy Carson to help us practice.
Once we got Piper’s energy out, we were ready to test. She passed all 10 CGC test items with flying colors, then she did five novice tricks. Those included:
Go to your crate (aka “kennel up”)
Hand signal for “sit”
Find it (a treat under a cup)
Spin in a circle to the right
Touch it (her nose to my hand)
So, our sweet girl earned both her CGC and her TKN titles that day. As a fun bonus, AKC sent us an “Achiever Dog” certificate because she has now successfully participated in four dog events/sports/tests. This means Piper has three titles under her belt (DS, CGC, TKN), and she has qualifying scores in four more events for scentwork/nosework. That’s my girl!
I’ll admit it: We slacked on Piper’s nosework/scentwork training while we focused on dock diving this summer. I could offer excuses about the scorching weather here in the summer making training difficult for a black dog, but I won’t. Well, I suppose I kind of did right there. Oops!
Anyway, once the dock diving season wrapped up in October, we started focusing on nosework again. The fall semester and holiday season is a busy time for us, so we crammed for two trials (one in Pleasanton in October, one in Lodi in January) and we did pretty well overall. Here’s how they turned out:
Redwood Belgian Tervuren Fanciers AKC Scentwork Trial on Oct 19th, 2018 (Del Valle)
Novice A Exteriors – Q (qualifying score)
Novice A Containters – NQ (no qualifying score)
She was nice and methodical on exteriors and had a clear alert. So proud of her! She false alerted on the box next to the correct one in containers. Not bad for limited training 🙂
Northern California Golden Retriever Club AKC Scentwork Trial on Jan 5, 2019
Novice A Handler Discrimination – NQ
Novice A Containers – Q
Novice A Buried – Q and 2nd place
Novice A Interiors – Q
She started the trial by false alerting on the box next to the HD box. Very reminiscent of containers at Del Valle. Because of this, I changed my strategy for the next three events. Even when she alerted, I asked her to check the other locations just to be sure. The strategy worked for qualifying because we got the other three correct. Yay! However, it increased our time. On both buried and interiors, her first alerts were correct, so we could have won first place if I called those immediately. However, her first alert was not correct on containers, so we would have NQd if I called that one. Overall, I’m proud of the strategy but hopefully won’t need it with more consistent training. Unfortunately, she also developed a box destruction habit – yikes! The judge strongly recommended that I work on that with her. Wilco.
We signed up for a few more trails in January and February, but we’ve got some health stuff going on with our other dog and my sister, so we’ve put training on hold again and pulled her from those trials. Hopefully we can get back in the swing of things in March.
After Piper received a National Championship invite in dock diving, she still needed to complete nine more jumps to qualify to accept her bid. Luckily, Gold Country Pet Resort added a few more splashes to their schedule so we were able to finish her season in Ione. Here’s how her final splashes of the 2017-2018 season went:
Jumped 14′ and 14’3″ on 9/8, so she earned her first title (Dock Junior). Yay!
Jumped 15′, 16′, 14’8″, and 15’6″ on 10/6, which means she jumped a new personal best.
Jumped 15′, 15’6″, and 11’9″ on 10/7, so she earned her second title (Dock Senior). She also earned second place in the Gold Country Pet Resort end-of-year championship tournament in the Senior Division.
Overall season results: Two titles, a National Championship invite, and a 2nd place tournament finish. The bad news? Her improved distances affected her season average, which moved her up out of the junior division for Nationals and into the senior division (the very, very bottom of the senior division).
Because of this change, we decided not to fly her to Florida for Nationals. If they were in driving distance, sure, we’d go just to have the experience. However, the complexity of flying a dog cross-country was already daunting. Flying a dog cross-country to come in last place in her division? No thanks.
Now, we’re focused on next season’s goals. Here they are:
Yup, you read that right. Pips got invited to the 2018 North American Diving Dogs/AKC National Championships presented by Eukanuba.
How, you might ask, does a dog who’s brand new to dock diving get a national championship invite? Basically, it’s kismet. Not Kismet the dog who also does dock diving. Kismet, fate, destiny, whatever you want to call it. Or….well, maybe it’s just dumb luck. You be the judge:
It all started when we took Piper to her second dock diving trial on Labor Day weekend at Gold Country Pet Resort in Ione, CA in the hopes of earning her first title. She was working on a junior division title, which means she only needed to log two more qualifying jumps with a distance between 10′ and 14’11”. Seemed easy, since her first three jumps the month before came in at 11’6″, 11’6″, and 11’9″.
Well, I don’t know if she ate her Wheaties that morning or what, but her first jump on September 1st was 15’4″. Second jump? 15’2″. Third and final jump? 14′ even. That means she ended the day with four jumps towards a junior title and two jumps toward a senior title. Since you need five qualifying jumps to earn a title, we left empty handed. Booooo! I tried to be proud of her for jumping her personal best, but I wanted to log that first title sooooooooo bad.
The next day, after I got home, I started thinking about something I heard at one of the handler meetings, something about the trial being a national championship qualifier where the two dogs with the highest average scores in each division get an invite. But how did it work with a dog like Piper who split divisions? Apparently, it’s all about averages.
Was Piper’s average of her three jumps that weekend high enough to earn her a qualifying spot in the junior division for nationals? You bet your sweet ass it was!!!!! Ben and I ran the math and we *think* she earned the first spot, but maybe it was the second. It’s not like either of us has an MBA in finance or accounting or something numbers-related. Hehe! Anyway, that’s how Piper secured her national championship invite at her second ever dock diving trial, before even earning a title.
Such a friggin’ little rockstar.
PS: We went back to Ione the next weekend and logged two more jumps in the junior division (14’3″ and 14’0″). That means Piper officially earned her first title: Dock Junior (DJ). Wooooohooooo!
