Our first agility trial

We bombed it. I'm not sure why I let myself get talked into going, we weren't ready, but it was fun and a learning experience. No better way to learn until you actually set foot on a true course.

I was most worried about the teeter...so, last Friday I scrambled trying to find somewhere where I could go to practice working on a teeter. Luckily, we found a very nice woman who doesn't live too far from us who let us use the equipment she has. Unfortunately, in my frenzy to find a teeter, I forgot that UKC has some different obstacles than AKC and forgot about the open hoop tunnel. But I wasn't the only handler out there with a dog who didn't Q and I wasn't the only person who had a dog not responding to recalls or the only handler who's dog had their nose glued to the ground - because, oh yeah, it was an outdoor trial. How I missed that, I had no idea.

In our first run he knocked down a bar on one of the first few jumps, which is an automatic DQ. He wasn't listening to my recalls, but he didn't really refuse anything. Then he came off the dogwalk, ran over to say hi to the person sitting there who was to reset the chute for each dog, then began prancing and sniffing down the back line of the fence - and I knew exactly what he was going to do. He pooped in the back corner of the ring. If we hadn't already been DQ'd, we would have been then.

I was kind of upset because they made me stand by the pile so they "knew where it was" (it was right in the corner, hard to miss) instead of scooping him up and putting him in his crate. So, while I'm standing next to this poop pile, my dog is having a gay old time running around the ring.

The second run was better. He knocked down one bar, and refused a tunnel (it was an open hoop tunnel, something he's never seen before), but his recalls and attention were much better. Still, nose was glued to the ground. He did the teeter and the dog walk just fine, yet again proving that dogs will no always behave how you expect them to behave in a trial.

But I wasn't mad. In fact, I was happy there was much improvement between the first and second runs. Many people came up to me and said that they've all had the same probems with their dogs, everyone loved Howie and thought he would one day be a star. They thought I as doing a great job with him, and he was such a charmer to everyone who came over to say hi.

So, even though we didn't get any qualifying scores, I think it was still productive. I know what we need to work on, and hopefully this will help us get ready for our next trial.