Signed, Sealed and Delivered

I took the plunge, filled out the forms and mailed them. It's official - Moto and Pinch are entered in our club's upcoming Obedience trial. Both will try out the Beginner Novice class. Each has a separate goal.

I have a new theory in training Moto. Instead of worrying about overworking him, he gets trained every day. Since he lacks self-confidence, what I'm doing now is one day we work on stuff at home, in the safety of the yard or inside the house. He has absolutely no problems doing anything at home. The next day I take him some place new with mild distractions. We do the same exercises. It seems to be helping. I'm anxious to see if this new training method will give him the confidence he needs in the show ring. We'll see.

For Pinch, it's a pretty big step and possibly premature. But it's local and it's "just" Beginner Novice. I'm not in it to win it, I just want to see how he handles performing at shows. He goes with Moto and I when we go someplace new. He's so different! With Moto we need to walk around, look at things, take in the area before we begin working. All my Shelties have needed at least a little bit of this. Not Mr. Pinch. He gets out, looks around and seems to say "COOL! We ARE going to do stuff here, aren't we?" He's still very green and needs to be reminded of his Attention job. Completely fearless, his pitfalls will be in the other direction - geting overexcited.

It will be fun and challenging handling two completely different dogs in the same class. Ultimately, I want them to have a good ring experience. Moto's made huge strides in herding and I'm hoping for the same in Obedience. Interesting to note he's MUCH happier working every day.

Live and learn!