Condobloke
Well-Known Member
onya Georgie !!
Only two, BUT, of course, she was the superior example !!
Only two, BUT, of course, she was the superior example !!
Change distros or just rename...
- Thread starter MikeRocor
- Start date
I may be biased about this.
There's another show today (Sunday) - same venue, different judge, presumably mostly the same dogs. I'll be curious to see if the results are any different.
Mind you, I'm not going to these things myself - the spare hooman (my sister) is attending with one of her dog show nut friends (and the other corgi in Georgie's class (a lesser dog, IMO)).
Alright then. Georgie took "winner's bitch" at today's show to earn her first two pints toward her championship.
There were enough entries registered to make the show a 3 point "major" but one of them finished her championship yesterday so didn't bother to show today and that took the total below the threshold for that third point. Still, points is points.
We won't have the official picture(s) for a few days but below is a pic of Georgie practicing "being a show dog". I presume the professional pic from the show will be (a lot) better.
(I was like this with my kids, too.)
There were enough entries registered to make the show a 3 point "major" but one of them finished her championship yesterday so didn't bother to show today and that took the total below the threshold for that third point. Still, points is points.
We won't have the official picture(s) for a few days but below is a pic of Georgie practicing "being a show dog". I presume the professional pic from the show will be (a lot) better.
(I was like this with my kids, too.)
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
The look on that face.....tells us exactly who feeds her
It's even worse. -I- am usually the one doing the feeding, but JXN does all the showing and doggie sports so she's the most reliable source of -treats-. Even though she's also the one that does most of the toenail trimming, they still seem to like her. (But they sleep with me!)
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
That says it all. Security is trumps
Miss Georgie made out pretty well at York, PA this weekend. No points on Saturday, though I understand it was a close call, but she took two points on Sunday. I guess the "Purina" hand towel was consolation prize for Saturday's effort. Two points toward her championship was the only "prize" for doing better on Sunday.
So Georgie has this bone - it's one of those "RedBarn" brand bones - the ones with the lamb flavored filling, although this one hasn't had any filling left for months - about three inches long and hollow such that I can fit a finger through it (or wedge a tiny milkbone treat in the middle). I was sitting on the floor playing with her with it - grabbing it and pretending to gnaw on it when the spare hooman interrupted to ask me something so I just stuck my index finger in the bone and let Georgie gnaw on it (the bone) while I pretended to pay attention to the spare hooman. After responding to the question, I mentioned, "You know, I have this fear that one day her teeth will slide off of the bone and chomp my finger right off before she realizes what's happened." At that very moment Georgie very deliberately let go of the bone, gently chomped my finger and then went back to vigorously gnawing the bone.
I've suspected for a long time that dogs understand more than they usually let on and that the only reason they don't hold conversations with us is because their mouths aren't the right shape for English. I wonder if the "wookie sounds" that she makes while mauling my hand are actually some Asian language and I just don't understand.
I've suspected for a long time that dogs understand more than they usually let on and that the only reason they don't hold conversations with us is because their mouths aren't the right shape for English. I wonder if the "wookie sounds" that she makes while mauling my hand are actually some Asian language and I just don't understand.
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
She is in tune with your usual body language. Definitely a keeper. even after show stuff etc etc she is a keeper
I uploaded a picture of Georgie to Grok3 and asked it to draw her as a fantasy princess. I had a lot of fun with it, laughing out loud much of the time. The dialog, over several iterations, was decently life-like, but it clearly just can't get some things right. After one of the iterations, I pointed out that it had shown me a dog with three ears, so it updated the description to include, "with exactly two ears". This was the result:
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
Wow !.....she is very aware of her own self worth.
Yeah, well... she doesn't look so dignified when she poops on the kitchen floor. The little wench!
But no she's not all full of herself or anything.
Did a little scent work with Dollar yesterday - she's done it before, more than I have, so that worked. Then I tried Georgie on the same searches. She's clearly an amateur at it but she did ok. It's a start. The spare hooman has been twisting my arm a bit to get more involved in these kinds of things.
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
Competitive searching - An item scented with a tiny bit of an essential oil ("birch" for beginners, I don't know why) is hidden in a defined area and the dog has to find it (and the handler has to recognize that the dog found it, which is not always easy) within a certain amount of time.
Some people say you should teach your dog to signal in a certain way when it has located the hide. Others say you should learn your dog's signalling body language, whatever that happens to be.
Some dogs will just sniff vigorously around the item when they've found it - but that's easy to misread if the dog is sniffing vigorously around the whole area.
Some dogs will sniff over to the item, look at it, then look over at their human as if to say, "It;s right hear. Call it already!" But, since they get a treat when they do that, they might be lying in order to get more treats.
If you "call" it and it's not there, your dog is disqualified for that run. If you don't call it and you run out of time, your dog gets no score for that run (Which, I guess, is a lot like being DQ'ed).
In beginner level, there's one "hide" and your dog either finds it or doesn't. In later levels there are two hides and, later, an unknown number of hides.
I may have some of the details wrong, but that's the sport in anutcase nutshell.
Essential oils are like the "elements" of scent. Whereas most smells have a mix of scents, an essential oil has a single pure scent, which is pretty much never found in nature so once the dog picks up that scent there's no mistaking it for something else - he just has to find the source. There are at least three or four essential oils commonly used but I don't remember what the others are.
Why do I even know this crap? This is not my sport! AAAAaaaaahhhhhhh...
The dogs enjoy it.
Some people say you should teach your dog to signal in a certain way when it has located the hide. Others say you should learn your dog's signalling body language, whatever that happens to be.
Some dogs will just sniff vigorously around the item when they've found it - but that's easy to misread if the dog is sniffing vigorously around the whole area.
Some dogs will sniff over to the item, look at it, then look over at their human as if to say, "It;s right hear. Call it already!" But, since they get a treat when they do that, they might be lying in order to get more treats.
If you "call" it and it's not there, your dog is disqualified for that run. If you don't call it and you run out of time, your dog gets no score for that run (Which, I guess, is a lot like being DQ'ed).
In beginner level, there's one "hide" and your dog either finds it or doesn't. In later levels there are two hides and, later, an unknown number of hides.
I may have some of the details wrong, but that's the sport in a
Essential oils are like the "elements" of scent. Whereas most smells have a mix of scents, an essential oil has a single pure scent, which is pretty much never found in nature so once the dog picks up that scent there's no mistaking it for something else - he just has to find the source. There are at least three or four essential oils commonly used but I don't remember what the others are.
Why do I even know this crap? This is not my sport! AAAAaaaaahhhhhhh...
The dogs enjoy it.
I don't think I've commented in this thread until now...
I can speak a bit on this. My dogs point, though the current dog is a lazy pointer. He'll stand there pointing at it with his nose, tail doing nothing - or wagging. if the scent is on the ground and the object is not there, he'll indicate this by following the scent, actively sniffing in a pattern of his own design. I can encourage him to be a bit more efficient but I don't.
I'm a golden retriever man. I've pretty much always owned a golden, as much as I could. I've had dogs from the same lineage for a while now. They're a robust specimen with a nice reddish hue to their adult fur.
My dog is meant to hunt and retrieve. It is also meant to track. The hunting and retrieving are quickly learned but a young golden is hard to keep concentrating for long. The play method and lots of practice helps. They settle down to become acceptable trackers. They're not ideal but they're better than many other dogs and they're certainly better than a human nose.
Also, regarding the hunting, the current one is a very lazy pointer. At least he stares at it, though he's easily fooled by the sneaky partridge (as am I). He'll happily bring back what I shoot as he knows that I appreciate that and they want to make you appreciate them. That's half the battle, right there - at least with goldens. They're eager to please. You just need to let them know what pleases you.
It also can help to have a 'special toy'. They only get to play with that toy when they're working. So, when they see you head out with that toy, they know they're going to get to please you and play with their special toy. You do need to limit how much they play with that special toy to make sure that it stays special. You can even just use a new tennis ball. It's a special day when they get to play with a tennis ball that they've not chewed on before.
This one is short-named Zack. I call him Stupid. He's a loveable dog, but he is sure stupid - at least as far as godens go.
See, he'll keep bringing a ball/toy back to you over and over again. You can throw two in completely different directions and he'll be smart enough to bring them both back.
This is because he can fit two tennis balls in his mouth.
So, when you're done playing with him or done giving him a workout, you just throw three balls.
He can't fit three balls in his mouth. He will be all sorts of frustrated but he will keep trying to fit all three balls in his mouth until you call his name and tell him to come (or whistle properly).
If you really want to play with him, and give him some neck strength, you can use a long/heavy stick. He'll happily bring that back. He'll try to bring back basically anything you tell him to bring back.
When you're done throwing the stick, throw it up high so that it goes deeper into the woods. He'll pick he stick up in the middle and be unable to fit it between the trees. Eventually, he figures out that he can drag it by one end but he'll try to carry it in the middle for quite a while.
He also appears to get a bit mad at you if you do that to him. That's okay. If he's not happy then you can always throw the stick again. He will eventually decide to not go get it but you've really got to work at it to make him do that. As far as the balls go, he'll retrieve those for longer than I can throw them. It's just the sticks in the woods that frustrate him.
I've been watching the thread and enjoying the progress. I'm not into showing my dog. He's got enough of an ego already and I prefer a dog that works for me. So, seeing this progress has been a bit novel. I'm not even really familiar with this breed you have.
Zack sounds like a lot of fun... but for that reason, Dollar would harass him non-stop. She has appointed herself the fun-police and the rate of recidivism among Golden fun offenders is just through the roof. We have a good sized piece of yard, maybe 50 x 100 feet, fenced in but no woods and too many neighbors with dogs to let our dogs run free in the rest of the yard. the fenced in area is usually muddy enough that I don't let the Corgis in it at all as they're usually in the living area of the house (and on the furniture).
Georgie will fetch a toy and bring it back for pretty much a long as I'm willing but Dollar is only interested in a toy until it stops moving/rolling (unless someone else is having fun with it).
Having the herding genes, as opposed to the hunting genes, searching and pointing out hidden items isn't quite so natural for the Corgis, but they're usually eager to learn - they do want to please their humans. The Belgian Malinois is good at scent work but I think she thinks she's smarter than her handler (not commenting on whether or not that might be the case). The Beagle, of course, is the queen of scent work and the Chihuahua will do pretty much anything if he thinks it will make him look like a real dog.
In organized scent work, the dog needs to find the scented item and alert on it but never pick it up and bring it to you because that taints the search area for the next dog. In a trial, that's actually a disqualifying error. Find it, but don't mess with it. The handler is right with the dog, so "retrieving" it isn't usually an issue, but in the later levels, when they do off-lead work, there might be more opportunities do go wrong.
Georgie will fetch a toy and bring it back for pretty much a long as I'm willing but Dollar is only interested in a toy until it stops moving/rolling (unless someone else is having fun with it).
Having the herding genes, as opposed to the hunting genes, searching and pointing out hidden items isn't quite so natural for the Corgis, but they're usually eager to learn - they do want to please their humans. The Belgian Malinois is good at scent work but I think she thinks she's smarter than her handler (not commenting on whether or not that might be the case). The Beagle, of course, is the queen of scent work and the Chihuahua will do pretty much anything if he thinks it will make him look like a real dog.
In organized scent work, the dog needs to find the scented item and alert on it but never pick it up and bring it to you because that taints the search area for the next dog. In a trial, that's actually a disqualifying error. Find it, but don't mess with it. The handler is right with the dog, so "retrieving" it isn't usually an issue, but in the later levels, when they do off-lead work, there might be more opportunities do go wrong.
He's getting old now, but we've kept his lineage alive. It's time to retire him and have him help teach his replacement and he can enjoy his un-earned retirement. He has 'lovable' going for him.
That's the only time that I have more than one dog. During that phase, I have two dogs. The older dog sticks around for as long as he has a quality life.
Anyhow, he has learned to be patient with other dogs. He also has a mystical skill where he just somehow ends up under your hand. You'll look down and notice that you're petting him and not know quite how that happened - or even when it happened.
Condobloke
Well-Known Member
In a dog , that's called lateral thinking. My kelpie, Belle, had that, in spades. (Belle...see my avatar)
He is really attached to you. That tells of the real 'you', as experienced by a dog (who has way better instincts than the vast majority of human beings)
