Crossing Paws - Month 2 -- Apr 10, 2011

Here is video at month two of training the 'crossing paws' trick. All in all, not an easy trick to teach - in my opinion.

Happy Second Birthday Echo -- Apr 3, 2011

Echo traveled to Albany, OR for the weekend and attended the Chintimini dog show along with his best buddy, Roddy the beagle.

He earned his Rally Novice title on his birthday by qualifying for the second and third legs on Saturday and Sunday.






Here is the scoreboard from Saturday, entry number R80. We totally blew one station on the first attempt and then the retry & had several deductions for tight leash. Judge was Theresa Temple. Did pretty well otherwise.











Scoreboard from Sunday, again entry R80. Much better run today; 3 pt deduction for repeating station & 5 1-point deductions for tight leash. Judges was Chris Primmer.

I talked to the judge afterwards - she was fairly impressed with the run and encouraged us to continue. Said that Echo has great potential. I asked about the tight leash deductions, concerned the fault was my pulling - she said no, it was Echo wandering and was fairly certain this was due to his young age and that it would improve with time.

We also entered Beginning Novice A on Saturday. Hahaha. Five exercises total, 40 pts each. -2 points on heeling, -3 points on figure eight, NQ on sit for exam, NQ on sity stay - I made 3/4 of the way until he popped up, NQ on recall - he didn't want to stay. Oh well, good experience - Not bad considering we didn't even practice in any type of ring.

1st Day of Spring - March 20, 2011

Traveled over to central Oregon for the Spring Equinox. Curiously, it snowed & Beagle paw prints were left all over the place.











Lynne and Roddy














Deschutes River















Looking for some critters in the rocks.















Here's the Roddy dog on a three hour hike along the Deschutes River Trail.

Crossing Paws Trick 1st Month -- Mar 08, 2011

Video of Roddy, then Echo, & the crossing your paws trick, as demo'ed at kikopup on youtube. This trick training is a friendly challenge with TeamBeagle, curious to see how Bob and Brew are doing with this.

Roddy developed a bad habit of just shifting his body to the right when touching with his left paw. Initially I was just working with his left paw, trying to get a cross. So, I've backed up and now am trying to teach both left and right paws, straight ahead and then gradually introduce the crossing. Echo has the cross with left paw learned fairly well & we working hard on the right.

Another update in a month.

Had to Stop at Walking Man Brewing -- Feb 20, 2011

Had to stop at Walking Man Brewing for a black cherry stout, cuz Echo dragged me all the way around the Dog Mountain loop on Sunday; eight miles, 2900' elevation. Four inches or so of snow on the top, moderate winds of 20 -25 from the old lookout site and up, no rain, pretty darn good day to be out. But, given the wind, opted for a brew indoors at the brewpub, rather than at the trailhead.

Walking Man in Stevenson, WA

Train at the the Dog Mtn trailhead, I love trains.

Echo is ready for a day of hiking, looking good in this coat.

Heading into the snow, final push to the old lookout site

Shot at the lookout site.

Looking west from lookout site


















Traverse across Dog Mtn. Bit more of a challenge with Echo. Trail was fairly icy, Echo was excited and pulling this way and that - but, able to keep my balance across the traverse.


















Echo plowing through the snow.
















Nice shot snow on the trees.











No booties on this beagle!!!

Rose City Classic Dog Show -- Jan 22, 2011

Echo entered the Rose City Classic (http://rosecityclassic.org/) in Rally Obedience Novice A, here in Portland. Amazingly, he picked up a qualifying score on 90, not bad for our very first competition. Big thanx to Janet Kautz at TeamBeagle for helping out & for the post on the teamBeagle blog.




The judges sheet






& the qualifying pup:















1st video, shot by Lynne:





Here is another video, different angle, shot by my son.

Sunday Dinner -- Jan 16, 2011

Rainy weekend here in Gresham, a serious soaking, darn near flooding, continual rain. Lucky for us, we don't live near a flood plain. Was a good day to cook up a pot of stew for the dogs, was so good; and the dogs shared with us -- hahahaha. Yeah, yeah, yeah -- fall stew in the winter; sue me!



















Yep, full barking mode...