Trial results and other things

The good news is Legend does not seem to be afflicted with whatever ring stress she was experiencing at the last few trials. I am hopeful that this continues to be the case because no one wants a dog with that kind of issue! The bad news is we didn't actually qualify in anything this weekend. Althought there we lots of nice parts and some very close runs. She was apparently obsessed with the wrong end of the tunnel this weekend and actually just tunnels in general, which is odd for her. Zodiac finished his NAP and NJP but seemed to have trouble jumping again so I think he will be focusing on obedience almost exclusively for now.

In other news...

There have been requests for pictures of my hair cut-we'll see, I'm not much for posting pics of myself unless I'm running a dog at the time!

And now I have to give my soapbox speech. I have found that there is a lot of discussion lately on whether or not to spay/neuter your agility dog. Those who are against argue that it allows the dog to be more muscular and alters the time of growth plate closure thus giving you a competitive edge. I don't know for sure but I really doubt there are any studies comparing the performance of intact versus altered dogs. I do know however that there many medical and behavioral benefits to having your dog spayed and neutered. I personally would not want to risk the health and well being of my dog so that he or she might have some advantage over another dog. And quite frankly I find it surprising that, given the stronger than average bond a person has with their agility dog that anyone would risk a shorter or less healthy lifespan for them if they didn't have too. On top of that most people are not prepared for the responsibility of owning an intact dog-although many agility owners probably do keep a close watch on their dogs. Not to mention that in this world of extreme pet overpopulation I find that there is just very little reason for most dogs to be walking around intact. Granted there are some really nice dogs with health clearances and performance records that if bred will continue to improve their respective breeds but too many people just breed their dogs "because" and don't have a really good reason. If more people are leaving their dogs intact for performance purposes then more people will be tempted to breed them-without doing proper research and health checks. I guess the bottom line is I just see too many nice dogs without homes and too many dogs with reproductive disease to think this is a good practice. For every litter of average dogs people breed, dogs like Legend and Zodiac sit in shelters-waiting. I know this started as why not to leave you agility dog intact and has morphed into the pet overpopulation and irresponsible breeding but I guess I feel that one potentially leads to another, or that I just can't ever leave that second issue alone....

Anyway, my final two cents-my 3 altered dogs have 30 agility titles and counting and the male that was neutered as an adult always gets mistaken for a female. So not all theories hold true in all cases.

Everyone is entitled to their opinion and now you know mine on this subject!