I'm back...with video!

Last week was not terribly exciting, mostly running and working and a bit of agility training.  But then Friday we were off to Wichita to what is sadly going to be the last NADAC Run4Rescue trial.  We had a good time, picked up a few Qs and had a surprise birthday celebration for Cheri while we were there.

Legend's summary...good parts
1.  Two Qs in elite regular, one in elite jumpers, and one in elite tunnelers.
2.  She nailed all but one set of weave poles and there she missed the entrance, not the exit.
3. She only refused one A-frame all weekend.
4.  She had a beautiful discrimination at a high speed, from a distance.
5.  Lovely run with Cheri in jumpers but just missed course time.  They probably would have made it if they were more used to running together.

and the not as good parts...
6.  She did refuse one A-frame-thought we might be over that.
7.  Missed more than one discrimination-she has been nailing most of them at home so I was a little bummed about this.
8.  All our hard work and still no chances Qs.  But she is at least starting to get it-she tries to figure out what I want and offer things instead of standing on the line staring at me!

Overall, while she did have a few ho-hum moments I thought her speed and drive were quite nice this weekend.  She did the "out" line of a chances run which consisted of four hoops in a gear I don't think I have ever seen at a trial.  I was very pleasantly surprised.  Actually she finished almost all her runs ahead of me as I sprinted to keep up!  And as a bonus a friend and trainer from KC even commented on how much improvement she has shown and all the teamwork we had going.

Lyric's summary...good stuff
1.  One Q in open weavers (new title!), one in elite jumpers, two in elite regular, and one in open jumpers.
2.  This little dog is getting faster all the time!
3.  Got all but one set of weave poles on the first try!  Last trial she did not complete a single set!
4.  No chances Qs but is making some progress, small steps but getting somewhere.

and not so good...
5.  Missed almost all the discriminations!  I know we need more work on this but still didn't expect it to be that bad!  I don't really have anything else that I wasn't happy with this weekend.  Tunnel sucking and missed discriminations were most of our issues.

NADAC keeps track of the top 10 dogs by breed for each year for each class.  You need 30 points in elite to be eligible for the list.  There are only a handful of Poms that make the list so this year Lyric is going to take a crack at top dog.  It looks like our main competition is a dog named Pepper.

Ok here are some videos...

Legend in elite jumpers with me handling.  I tried to video the one with Cheri as well but the camera died after the first jump.

Legend in elite regular.  I don't usually post videos where she refuses the A-frame because I don't like those, but the rest of this run is so nice and it shows off her best discrimination of the weekend.  She was flying down a line of hoops and I was nowhere near her at the time but she listened like a champ-training is starting to pay off!

This is probably the fastest Lyric has ever run.  For the NADAC people out there, she got a DRI of 90 on this run.  And although I don't really understand what this is or how it's calculated I am fairly certain 90 is pretty good.  Her YPS was 4.87-not bad for short stuff.

And here is Lyric finishing her open weavers title

And one of Lyric's elite regular Qs.

Meanwhile, back at home...Kahuna has climbed out the x-pen overnight three times now!  Fortunatly he's pretty well behaved so this had not ended badly for our house or for him.  We had to make a pen from a taller cage and so far that seems to be working.

Odds and ends

I made a book of Legend's trip with the same company I use to print blog books.  I ordered it Tuesday and it's already here!  And I love it.

There are these yellow flowers in our pasture that I thought would be pretty with Zodiac so I took him out to pose-which you know, he loves.  Not.

Then Squirt came over and posed nicely for this picture.  He doesn't look 16 does he?  It's probably because he's had such an easy life!



Yesterday I had some unexpected but appreciated help doing my yard work.  We got my poor weedy, stemmy berry patch cleaned up.  Something I've been putting off all winter!  We got so much done we even had time to plant a little veggie garden and some new flowers.

I don't think this comes back every year-which is my goal, but it did look good with the new Calla lily.

Whatever happened to Holli?

Holli got adopted!  While we were on vacation a previous adopter decided to take her for a "test drive."  Despite Holli's mischief she decided she was a keeper and we finalized the paperwork earlier this week.  Now she has two sisters, a nice yard, and a mom to spend lots of time with her. 

We have gotten in some agility training this week.  Lyric hasn't worked on discriminations in weeks and it showed!  But her weave poles are going well and her teeter is getting proofed.  Legend did some good distance work and was so-so on discriminations but is still a little squirrely about her weave poles.  Getting better though.  Always has to be something.  She isn't one to make things easy!

Kahuna is doing great-litter training coming along quite well so far, he's a genius!

These pictures are nothing special, just what I had on the camera.

How can you resist this?  You just want to pick him up every time you walk by the cage!

Excitement of the week

I suppose it's a good thing if we get our drama for the week out of the way on Monday night?  Moses got loose last night.  (For those of you who don't know he's the idiot horse I wish I didn't have). I accidentally left the walk-through people door open in the barn when I went out to feed last night.  While I was out closing the pasture gate to keep the horses corralled for the night, Moses wandered in the barn, and right out the door into the yard. 

He careened around our yard for a bit, then the neighbors yard.  At first Squirt's pitiful calls of loneliness kept him coming back, he just wasn't smart enough to back through the door he came out.  Then he branched out and galloped off down the road through another person's field and discovered the herd of ponies down the road.  He was quite smitten with the ponies and refused to move away from their fence.  Since he is not a horse that can be caught in a regular situation there was no way I was catching him in this situation.  This left me chasing him around the neighborhood, with darkness approaching, carrying a dressage whip and screaming "go home!" Hopefully no one actually witnessed this.  As luck (?) would have it, Moses is out of shape, middle aged, and a little lame so he eventually gave up and went home.  We opened the gate, he walked in and calmly started eating dinner like nothing happened.  Jerk.  So to all the unsuspecting neighbors, sorry about the mysterious hoofprints in your yard.

On a more adorable note (nope not more bunny pics) here is Lyric looking ever so precious.

 And, yes, he's ok.  He just likes to sleep on his side.  And he sleeps very soundly too.  I had to poke him awake just to make sure he was ok a few times!  And he doesn't jump to his feet like most rabbits, he just calmly sits up.  He is one chill little fella. He did good with the litter box yesterday.  But pooped on the floor overnight.  Still, pretty good for the first two days. 

Making Mondays better...

with more baby bunny pictures!

Seriously, could he be any more adorable?  I think not. 

The Big Kahuna

After Spring died I really missed my giant rabbit.  Summer has a ton of character (too much, really) and is very pretty and outgoing but is only medium sized.  Plus she's pretty active and we thought she would like a companion as rabbits do great in pairs. 

So we got a new baby.  Meet Kahuna, a nine week old Flemish Giant!

As baby bunnies tend to be, he is sweet and cuddly and of course, beyond adorable.  And naturally, Summer hates him.  She already bit him on the face through the cage bars.  Rough day for little Kahuna. 

So now they are separated by two gates.  I knew they might not like each other right away, it took a long time for Holly to like Wiggles, but I was hoping since he was a baby she would not be so hateful.  Hopefully they learn to like each other soon because he is going to grow up fast and I won't have room for 2 big bunny pens!  But first he needs to be litter trained and neutered.  Good news though, he's using his litter and hay box as his safe place so hopefully that will get him started on the right track. 

I haven't weighed him yet but he should reach almost 20 lbs full grown!

Zodiac's new ball

Zodiac likes big toys.  And he really likes to hold one while he's herding Legend.  We have had several large, outdoor balls for him over the years but time, weather, and foster dogs take their toll.  So at Nationals I was able to find him this nice new red ball.  We offered to let Legend play with it in the hotel rooms but she preferred her new squeaky elepahant.  Zodiac seems to think it's just perfect though.

Here they are!

All the videos from the show videographer at nationals.

Warm-up

T2B

JWW

Standard

Hybrid

I fail to understand

why people don't spay their dogs.

First day back at work and I'm presented with a small breed dog for lethargy and not eating. Naturally the owner sent a representative so history taking was not very productive.  But, I'm not sure how observant the owner is anyway since they told said representative that the illness started yesterday. And shockingly, the only record we have on the dog is that she has had two litters of puppies and zero preventive health care. Anyway, poor little dog had a fever, a tell-tale vaginal discharge and a fluid filled structure in her abdomen leaving me very suspicious of a pyometra (infected pus-filled uterus).  A quick x-ray pretty much confirmed this.  Normal protocol for this condition is immediate surgery to have the dog spayed before the uterus ruptures and leaks pus into the abdomen.  Pus, from any source, free floating in the abdomen, is a BAD thing.  Not to mention the long standing infection by itself can cause renal damage.

So, at 5PM no less, we went to surgery.  As I entered the abdomen, pus poured out of my incision.  Well, that's not cool, we are too late.  Poor little dog's prognosis just went from fair, to guarded.  I finished the spay and then lavaged (flushed or "washed") the abdominal cavity with sterile fluids until it was draining clear, and then flushed some more, gave some antibiotics and hoped for the best.

She was lucky.  This morning she was bright and alert, eating and licking her incision!  This could have easily gone the other way.  And she's not totally out of the woods but the odds have tipped in her favor considerably. This is a potentially fatal and completely preventable condition.  And don't think it's only a condition of older females, this dog was only four.

You can read more about pyometra here.  I'm too lazy to write about the details, especially since it's not a disease most dogs will get as it's limited to intact females.

Day 16: Homeward Bound

Amarillo, TX to Ozark, MO

After 4,928 miles....

Legend sees something familiar!

THE END.

Day 15: Texas

Albuquerque, NM to Amarillo, TX

This is not that far of a drive so we thought we would spend a little time seeing the local attractions.  We went to the Cadillac Ranch, which was cool.  We didn't bring any spray paint though.  The rest of our attempt to sight see was relatively unproductive.  We didn't have a lot of time to take in a museum or anything and it's super windy again today. We really didn't want to spend another long afternoon out getting blown away.  So we settled for a steak dinner and a little shopping.  Tomorrow, we go home!  I'm so ready to see the rest of my babies.  Meanwhile, Legend enjoys her last evening as an only child.  I'm not sure how much she is really enjoying it though as we are too tired to entertain her.

 The cars made for a very surreal photo op-very different from the rest of the trip!

 Can you tell it was windy?

Day 14: Petrified Forest National Park

Flagstaff, AZ to Albuquerque, NM

This is a little late-the hotel wireless internet was not working last night.  But, as you can probably guess, yesterday we went to the Petrified Forest and Painted Desert.  There is not much narrative to go with this so here are the pictures I'm sure you have been waiting for!

Petrified wood

 Enjoying the trails

More wood

Cool rock formation

It was super windy, can you tell?

Day 13: Route 66

Lindsay, CA to Flagstaff, AZ

Mostly today was driving, but we did take one scenic byway through Oatman, AZ and Historic Route 66.  There is a herd of "wild" burros that live in Oatman.  They actually are pretty tame as all the tourists feed them.  As you can see, they hang out on the roads and wait for the cars.

This one practically climbed in our car looking for a handout.

They are pretty much all over town and again, not that wild.

Here is Legend, getting her kicks..

According to Wikipedia this stretch of Route 66 was one of the places that inspired scenes in the Pixar movie Cars.

 It's hard to tell in the picture but you can actually see the interstate in the distance (the little white lines are trucks), just like in the movie.