My Herding Dogs: June 2005

Tired trial dog! After a long weekend of trialing, I think she deserves to be asleep in our bed!

We had a great time at the Sand And Sea ASCA Trial that was moved to John Harvey's place in Moorepark! Grace ended up High In Trial other Breed and won her mother a belt buckle. She didn't earn her WTCH, we missed qualifying on cattle on Saturday, even though she won the cattle class. She did earn her advanced duck title on Saturday! The cattle were pretty tough. They were really shy on humans and you had to get out of the way in a hurry. Grace was a little to "hot" on them on Saturday and we ended up running out of time. She was awesome on Sunday and I worked better for her. I still didn't get out of the way enough at the center pen but she earned a respectable score of 104! Once again, I'm a proud dog mom. Pictures below.

The Buckle... took me 32 years but I got one!

Look at my girl with her High In Trial Other Breed ribbon, her High In Trial Cattle, High In Trial Ducks, second place sheep and winning cattle & duck ribbons... oh and that beautiful belt buckle.

Grace and Alex... my two favorites!

Judge, Wayne Harris posing with Mary Jean and Rascal. This is the lady who I gave my ducks to. She wanted to pose with Wayne because he was one of the judges who gave Rascal his Started Title at the Australian Shepherd Club Nationals last year. Notice the frindged skirt over the jeans and the purple boa around Rascal's neck. Sunday, was also his 8th birthday!

Alex wanted to get at least one photo with the Del Mar sign in the background!

How pretty is this approach to the "Y shoot!" Look how straight her line is, how quiet the sheep are! Beautifullness!!!! I'm so proud of her!

Great Time at the Fair!

I hate going to the fair! But, when you take your dog, a bunch of friends and family, and you herd sheep...the fair is a blast! I definitely entered Grace over her head but boy did she impress me. I can't tell you how pleased I am with the way she worked. The course was actually the ASCA "C" Course. So you have a "take pen", which Grace did nicely but when the sheep exited the pen they went into a corder by the left side of the pen and we had Hell getting them out of there. I was so proud of my pup because she didn't tear any sheep apart and yet stayed strong going into the corner trying to fish them out. The one ewe was not nice! Once we got them out we had a straight drive, down the center of the arena away from the handler's post. This was the longest drive she had ever done away from me, about 65 or 70 yards. There was a set of panels on the right that we had to go through clockwise and then you had figure-eight turn to the second set of panels and then heading back toward me there was a "Y shoot" and then a repen. She had a really straight drive, a good turn and made all three sheep through the first panel but we missed on two attempts at our second panel. Her drive to the Y shoot was straight and her pace was awesome, as was her repen. I'm so proud of her.

I really want to thank all my friends and family who showed up. Dad, Greg & Nancy, Grandma and Anne Baker, Robbi and of course Alex. I thought for sure we were entered so far over our head that it was going to be an embarrassment. Thank goodness this dog gives me 110% every time (well, almost every time)!

Del Mar Fair Herding Trial

Grace's next trial is at the Del Mar Fair on Tuesday, June 21 at 6:00 PM. The event will be held in the arena near the simulcast facility. She is entered in the advance class which might be over her head but it was the only class that offered cash prizes!

Here is Grace bringing the ducks in to shed. It was her first attempt at a shed and she did it perfectly, loosing 0 points.

Here is Grace's lift. This is what you call "picture perfect". She lost 0 points on her outrun, 0 points on her lift and 0 points on her fetch.

Here is Juanita bringing the sheep to me at the pen. She has them right on line and not too fast.

Here are my stars, Juanita with her 4th place ribbon and her two qualifying ribbons and Grace with her 2 first place ribbons, her second place ribbon, her three qualifying ribbons and her High In Trial ribbon. Grace looks proud... Juanita looks tired!

June 12 IEHDA Trial!

My two sheep dogs, Grace & Juanita had another outstanding weekend!

I'll start my bragging with Juanita, the Chihuahua. She took more than a year "hiatus" from herding and only had two lessons before entering this trial. She tried the duck class and decided ducks weren't worth her time so I called the run. In her first sheep class she ran against 11 dogs and while she didn't place she finished the course and got a qualifying score for HTDI. In her afternoon class she faced 9 other dogs and finished 4th! She got another qualifying score and earned the title HTDIs (Herding Trial Dog level 1 on sheep). She is now recognized as Juanita HTDIs. Woo hoo!! She is still the only Chihuahua ever to have a herding title.
Grace did pretty well, although I believe she is jealous of Juanita and didn't put her best effort in. She was second in her first sheep class with a score of 75 and earned her HTDIIs title. She won both of her HTDIII duck classes with scores of 84 and 92.5. Her score of 92.5 earned her High In Trial. She also earned her HTDIIId title. Grace has 5 High in Trial scores and is now recognized as: Grace, ATDs, OPNcd, HTDIIs,ge, HTDIIId.

Herding Dogs!

Here are some photos from our trip to Punta Bana, just south of Ensenada, Mexico. We took Grace with us and had a great time. We even had the opportunity to get some herding done while there.

She watched the Baja 500 with us!

This is Savino, he owns the herd of sheep and goats and though my spanish is limited, he understood that I wanted to work my dog on his herd. He got a kick out of it!