Halloween night

The candy bowel is full

Kyle is in the ready position

But alas the doorway is empty

Whats a girl to do

Happy Halloween!

The fine art of shedding

Not really sure what I have gotten myself into. Next year Isla and I will be moving up to Open. Running in open I can handle. Never mind running against two national champions and many other top handlers. Running in open in Alberta is tough. The only thing that would make it tougher would be if Alasdair MacRae deiced to move here. The learning to shed that is going to be my winters long challenge. My moral support team consists of..................

Alasdair MacRae

By way of his shedding video

And Scott Glen
By way of me driving to his house to pester him.

I am not sure how they make it look so easy. It looks so much easier sitting on the side lines from my comfy lawn chair. I can tell you we have been practicing for just about a week now and sometimes it works and the other times there are swear words. Many a time I have tried something and then ran into the house to watch the DVD so Alasdair could tell me how to do it properly. I am thinking about doing a little shedding video diary. But I no one to video me.

Sorry

Still Stalking

Went to Jenny's for a couple of days to hang out and work some dogs. Of course I brought the stalker.

Daytime Stalking

Night time stalking

I never realized how my dogs don't know how to hang out in the yard by themselves. When they were loose in Jenny's yard they just spent the whole time sitting at the door waiting for me to come out. Risk was the only one that actually had to see me.

Have dog trailer will travel

A couple of weeks ago we got a second vehicle. We have been thinking about getting a smaller more economical vehicle to run to town in or if I was just going to a trial close by. We found a Jeep Liberty Diesel which was perfect. Kyle really only wanted a diesel any way. Then I was thinking about hauling dogs around. I have been thinking about buying a dog trailer for some time now. My problem with a dog trailer is that you are so limited with the amount of dogs you can haul. They also don't have alot of storage space unless I want to spend thousands of dollars. A friend of mine suggested a little utility trailer. So I went hunting on line and found a perfect match. Since our little jeep is a turbo diesel it can pull a small trailer. The new trailer weigths 900 lbs and can hold alot of dogs and leaves plenty of room for storage. It will come in handy when I am going on quick trips and don't really want to take the holiday trailer.

Did I mention that I have a matching obsession.

Right now I only have four crates in the trailer but as you can see there is room for more. Risk is the trailer model for today.

Saw this today and thought it was funny.....

Small town paparazzi

Our little town of High River is small and quaint. I am sure when the founders of High River settled here they never thought to the future when their small town would be come a suburb of Calgary. The streets are narrow and there is very little parking. There are two things that disrupt the small town balance that is High River. One is a funeral and the other which is far more common and more disruptive filming of movies or TV shows. When the movie trucks move in whole streets are shut down and traffic is a nightmare. Our little town is busy movie central. I took these covert Paparazzi shots with my cell phone yesterday.

Yesterdays shooting was for a TV series CBC's Heartland.

I actually watch this show and kind of like it.

Please sir I would like to have a shower and my dogs are thirsty...

Three days ago our pump in our water well quit working. And of course because we live in booming Alberta no one can get to you in less then two weeks. Two weeks are you kidding me. You don't realize how much you use water until it is gone.

Today I awoke to this.............................................................. I guess me crying on the phone really worked.

Glory days I can have a shower. I do have to confess that we have been using the holiday trailer for the bathroom and the shower. However this morning Kyle informed me that the shower in the trailer was now broken. Kyle has spent three days straight hauling water for our growing herd of cattle and of course the sheep and dogs.

She is a comin'

Like it or not.......
Winter is coming......
I spent the day getting sheep troughs ready, putting shelters in the right pastures and making sure all the heaters for the waterers are working.
No one wants a repeat of last years frozen waterer saga.

Zoey is looking for a home

Unfortunately Zoey is looking for a new home. Zoey has been diagnosed with hip dysplasia. I have been reassured by a canine physiotherapist that her hips will no way effect her quality of life. But she may not be able to be a full time working or open trial dog. What I would like for Zoey would be a home where she can work sheep casually and maybe do some trialing ASCA or AHBA or even novice field trials. I have worked Zoey a little bit on sheep and she shows alot of potential. She is easy to handle and moves off my pressure nicely.
It will break my heart to see this girl go. I have been really conflicted and thought about keeping her but then in the back of my mind I am worried about training her for two years and having her not be able to run Open. This recently happened to me with Kipp I spent years training him to find out he just is not going to make a trial dog. Trialing in Open is what I want to do and having a kennel full on dogs that just don't cut it just dosen't work.
Wow, Sorry about the rant.

Zoey is a great little dog. She gets along well with other dogs and loves people.

Trial report

Sorry I waited till Tuesday to report on the weekend. Isla had a super weekend. She ended up overall intermediate winner. And on Sunday tied for 1st in the pro novice. She temporally lost her mind on Saturday in the pro novice. She ran so wide I couldn't see her most of the time. She had me worried that the weekend was not going to go well. But Sunday came and she stepped up and ran in the high 80's in both classes.

Ice didn't run like I know he can. I think he just needs to get out and travel. He ran like he didn't really know his job. Very unsure that he was doing the right thing. That being said he still placed 2nd in the intermediate on the first day. Penny took some pictures of Ice for me. There was also a photographer taking pictures. He got some really nice ones of Isla. I am waiting for him to send them to me.

Tis the season

to roll in cow shit........

We have started to bring our cows home from summer grazing and the dogs find it particularly fun. It started with Ice finding a really juicy cow pie and rolled in it. Then today it was Isla turn. So this weekend at the trial I will have some really clean dogs. Sorry no pics I was to discussed.
Oh yes and I have decided to run Ice this weekend. I am worried he has a case of backyard champion syndrome. I have not had a chance to work him anywhere else but at home. At home he is working crackers. I guess you won't know till you try. I will let you all know on Monday how it went.