Through the woods

My sister's dog, Loki has become like our second dog. We take him on hikes with us and he stays at our house once or twice a week. Such a fun dog! He and Indi are around the same age and get along so well. They have similar energy and play styles. He doesn't have that "space bubble" like I've noticed in a lot of border collies, (at least not when it comes to playing with other dogs). He doesn't mind being moosed around by Indigo, who is much larger than him. My sister has problems with him growling when she moves in bed and disturbs him!
Today we took them for a run by the Boise river.

They run and chase and wrestle.

Indi jumped into the river. It didn't seem to phase her (it is VERY cold in January!).

Loki does his border collie thing...

stalking....

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      and then he pounces.

Such good friends!

Pictureless Wednesday

Rally-O in May

Yesterday Indi and I competed in our second Rally obedience trial together. It went pretty well! She wasn't 100% focused on me but I'd say she did very well overall. There were two trials in one day and we qualified in both of them earning our Rally Novice title.
The first run she was a little distracted but still payed close enough attention to me to get through. I decided to re do one station since she surged ahead when I stopped and I knew we could do better. We ended up with a score of 83 out of 100 and a second place.
My husband was nice enough to come watch and film us. At the 28 second mark you can see when Indi noticed her Daddy on the sidelines.

The second run seemed a little more together. We scored an 86 out of 100 and another second place. I debated re doing the very last station since she sat crooked in front of me and wasn't paying attention but decided to let that one go. Also, I totally didn't realize until watching these videos that on the figure 8 exercise I crossed the middle line four times instead of three, on both runs!

I have tried hard to only use force free training with her, using a tug toy, ball or food as a reward in training and I think the excitement of training together has transferred well into the ring.  The few times she decides to sniff or do her own thing instead of work with me I either start again or just stop training. I don't know how well it will work when she is off leash for Rally Advanced but we will see!

I was very proud of my dog! I love my Indigo!

practicing agility

Two Saturdays ago we went to a practice, here is a video.

The beginning didn't end up on tape but I wish it had! Indi actually held her start line stay, twice! She appears to have traded her start line stay for her two on two off contacts. I could not get her to stop on a-frame or dogwalk! Other than that, it was a little wild and didn't exactly feel controlled but was fun none the less. Throughout the following week at home we practiced actually stopping at the bottoms of the contacts. Indi stops, I say YES and then my release word and then toss her the ball.
Looking very much forward to a show this coming Friday and Saturday! Hoping that I can run fast enough for my dog and be where I need to be when I need to be there.

Snake River birds of prey area

Yesterday we took the dogs hiking at a beautiful place along the Snake River, about an hour from Boise. The river on one side and these massive cliffs on the other side where falcons nest and ravens soar. See the ravens? You can hear them as you walk along the cliffs.

That blue sky was just so perfect!

The rocks at the base of the cliffs are inhabited by rock chucks, a kind of marmot. They have this piercing whistle that really drives the dogs crazy! They can't get all the way up to where the rock chucks are but they hear them and know it must be some kind of animal.
Both dogs really had a fantastic time climbing rocks and peeking into hiding holes.

 

Neat moss covered rocks.





 



Giant squishy feet!

 

A piece of a tiny jawbone.



Indi stopped to listen when she noticed the pigeons cooing in the cliffs.

 

My funny husband.

 

What an absolutely perfect day!





a day at the dunes

Last weekend we took the dogs to the Bruneau Sand Dunes and oh how much fun they had!

They ran and ran and RAN! Bunnies! Sand! BUNNIES!!!

We only actually saw one rabbit and it lost both dogs within 10 seconds but that just made them more excited.
Watching Rye it was hard to believe that he will be 13 next month! He doesn't always have this much enthusiasm but.....SAND and BUNNIES!

 

Rye begs for part of my sandwich.




I think they had fun.

 

Little stressors

I recently decided to start working with Indigo on a few things that cause her minor stress in life (I say minor because they are things that don't happen very often. She may feel a larger amount of stress about them than I imagine!). I thought I would blog about it, as simple as it seems.
Ever since we got her at 6 months she has disliked having a harness put over her head. I noticed with the harness first but anything that goes over her head is the same for her. At first she would let me put it on but every time it touched her on the way over her skin would crawl. Then she started watching to see if I was getting the harness or just a leash and if it was the harness she would back away and not want to go anymore. I stopped using it. Instead I wrapped her leash under her body and over a shoulder so she wasn't putting so much pressure on her neck. She doesn't mind that.
I had worked with her a small amount in the past but it never went very far and I wasn't very good about continuing the training. This time I was committed to doing it every day for a few weeks.
So every night after work I got my clicker and a handful of treats (I usually use her dinner kibble because she will work for it happily) and we started with the pretty purple leopard print slip lead I got for agility. In the past she would allow me to put it on but then not want to walk in it. She would freeze.
I started out just running my hand over the top of her head to give her the feeling of something going over her head. Before doing this each time I used a predictor word, "over". Each "over" got a click and a treat.
Next I held the lead and click/treat for her touching it with her nose. Then opened the loop and click/treat for touching it again, giving her the treat through the loop. Then I waited for her to put her nose or muzzle into the loop which she did. After that I felt good about putting the lead over her head. I continued saying "over" before putting the slip lead over her head to help her know what was coming and hopefully feel more in control of her situation. If she backed away from the lead at any time I backed up and when she came toward me I would click and treat that. If she were to back up and not come toward me again I would put everything away and do something else for a while.
I also clicked and treated her walking toward me while wearing the lead.

Here is our video, everything we've done over about two weeks, complete with Smokey the cow cat help!

I have moved on to the harness and she is doing very well. I had to switch from kibble to something more special since the kibble just wasn't worth it. Chicken or beef heart makes it worth it!
I put the harness on slowly so nothing flaps against her since that seems to be what she hates and her skin still crawls when it touches her but she doesn't back away from it anymore. She still won't reach down to eat a treat off the floor with the harness on but can walk in it now. Such a good baby girl!

It is somewhat startling how much I love this being.

Christmas in New Meadows

This weekend we went to visit our family in the mountains. When we arrived there was only a small amount of snow on the ground.
On Friday the guys went ice fishing while I took the dogs around the property to play.

Frisbee!!!

 

Later in the day I discovered the PERFECT wall for photos. Something about the lighting was just right. So I had a little fun (and used some Christmas doggy treats) dressing up Indigo. She is so patient and good!

 

 

That night it started to snow....

and we woke up Saturday to a winter wonderland! Well, just six or seven inches but it sure sparkled beautifully in the morning sun!

 

 

We took Indi snowshoeing with us but left Rye home since we didn't want him to get sore jumping through the snow.

This is a hill that Indi has hiked with me before where she was very nervous and stayed right near me the whole time. That was last fall and what a difference a year made! She is a much more confident hiker now. She ran her heart out following trails, sticking her face in the snow and just having so much fun. We really enjoyed watching her explore.

Me and my dog (thanks for taking the photo, Jason!).

When we came back I let Rye out to play a little. Each dog got their turns with the frisbee but Rye just cannot wait til it's his turn. He chases Indi barking at her the whole time. She thinks it's awesome.
My brother is playing with me! My brother loves me!
Rye just says GIVE me that frisbee!

Back inside where Indi climbed up in the "dog chair" and went instantly to sleep and then the weekend was over and we had to drive home. We never like to leave!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indi's Birthday

Indigo turned two years old on Wednesday. For her gift we did an extra agility lesson mid week. We worked weaves, contacts and start lines. For the contacts our teacher had me click for Indi's front feet hitting the ground while I moved ahead of her and she stayed on "target". Then the release word and I tossed her ball back to her to reward for position. We tempted her with a tunnel right after the A-frame and she held position perfectly. Such a good girl!
We worked a few challenging weave entries and she got them all.

She still has a tendancy to knock bars but I don't obsess over it. The fact that she'd rather do agility
than almost anything else is more important to me than keeping every bar up. Her enthusiasm is definitely contagious.

Then we went home for a second gift. A cardboard box.



Joy

Who needs new toys when there's cardboard?
 

JOY!

To finish the day, a piece of salmon with birthday candles in it!



 

 

Rye waits patiently on the couch for the theatrics to be over so he can have some salmon.

To top it all off I got news that a photo I had entered in a calendar contest had won! We received the calendar today and Indi is "Miss April" for the Idaho Humane Society's friends for life calendar!

I entered this photo.

So excited!