dogs + horses + dogs +...

We spent another two days upstate at Deb Goodie's place, running dogs in front of horses and identifying places to work on in our training once we're back home. We did get to see Marisa and her great dog, AFC Cliffside's Run'In On Hi Test, aka Tess. Tess has drive like crazy and lovely manners. Here's a great picture of her at full-tilt fresh off her breakaway. Whooooooooweeee!

As with our last visit, the real highlight was watching Momo have two energetic runs in front of the horse. I have no aspirations to make a trial dog of him -- but he has now come to equate horse = birds = fun and as a result has developed a nice breakaway. He may not be as bold as Mr. Enthusiasm, but he has a great nose, good bird manners, and loves to do well for his dad. Jozsi had an awesome run on Wednesday afternoon with three solid finds, but a great first find on Thursday morning, but got a little squirrely as he squared up for his second bird.

The interesting point for us to consider with Mr. Enthusiasm is what might be going on in his head in such situations when he gets birdy, initially stops, but then angles around before either stopping himself or whoa'ing on command. (I should point out that I don't normally 'whoa' a dog during birdwork, figuring that the dog has the genetics and the self-discipline to know when to stop itself -- and I don't want to create a dog that is nervous about messing up when it comes to its birdwork.) But in this scenario I had called 'stay' as he started to move for the second time.

To deal with the second part first -- of the dog apparently disobeying an obedience command that he is normally very good with: Deb did point out that vizslas, in her experience especially, are very context specific and so if I gave him a command out-of-context, ie. telling him to stay while he was actually moving, perhaps that was why he had failed to acknowledge it. Nevertheless, how you train for that is determined by what may be going on with the first part.

And so to deal with the first part second -- of a dog seemingly moving after establishing a (first) point: Kim Sampson (of Upland Equations and Strideaway fame) wrote the following on a bulletin board we both participate in: "For me it comes down to reading the dog's intentions. And, there is a huge difference between a dog self-relocating because he loses "contact" with a bird, and a dog relocating/repositioning just because the bird is moving. I want the first scenario, don't want the second. Watch the dog in enough different situations and it's pretty easy to tell the difference. I think it's fair to correct a dog for movement if his intentions are to get closer for the sake of getting closer or in an attempt to catch the bird." The emphasis here is that 'contact' means scent contact.

One of my challenges is that I have seen Jozsi deliberately take out birds, either wet birds he knows can't fly well, or deliberately bump birds in the open. Again, not all by any stretch of the imagination, but enough to see that there is a pattern to his behavior. But having said that, and while delicately disagreeing with Deb about Jozsi's second bird of the morning, this appeared to have been a dog losing contact with the bird (which he couldn't see and was masked by thigh-high grass) and merely relocating to get a better angle across the wind to re-establish contact. But I should think about adding some launcher work into our training repertoire to both discourage Jozsi from working too close, but also to work on his stop-to-flush.

The other nice part about getting up to Deb's twice in two weeks was being able to get some horse time on one of her horses, PC, and really start to feel like I knew how to use the horse to the full advantage (effectively to learn the subtleties of the horse's brakes and accelerator). The other nice part was getting to ride one of Deb's other horses, Dakota -- who is both a Missouri Fox Trotter and a gelding, as opposed to Deb's two other horses (which are both Tennessee Walkers and mares). Being able to find and maintain their smooth foxtrot or running-walk was just fun all by itself.

This picture is just for fun, of the boys waiting to get out of their Taj Mahal. Being an insulated box under a truck cap, it really does stay at least 20degrees cooler in there. We had temperatures up around 80degress and the (black) truck was parked in open sunlight -- but each time I took a dog out they were cool to the touch.

So we're going to keep working on our basic obedience in preparation for our upcoming VCCNE Versatility Test on August 1st up at Sharpe's Farm -- but also reminding Jozsi of his 'stop' command (which I use a whistle for and overlay with the tone on the e-collar) and styling him up by reminding him to keep his head high once he has established point.

a friend's passing

We received sad news this morning that our breeder, Lisa DeForest, passed away last night after several months from a not-fully-understood, but debilitating illness that had left her increasingly weak and struggling to breathe.

She was a quiet person, never one to brag, although she had plenty of reasons she could have been forgiven for. Over her career as a breeder, she produced two Dual Champions -- Selkie (1986) and Jason (2001) -- and provided the dam or sire to at least four others. Selkie was by all accounts a remarkable dog and was the first (and may still be the only) vizsla to win both the National and the National Amateur Field Championship in the same year, 1988. Lisa also produced the 2005 National Field Champion, Mason, a dog that she herself handled to a 2nd in the 2005 National Amateur Field Championship and a 3rd in last year's National Amateur Field Championship -- from which this picture is taken; he also took 2nd in the last year's National Gun Dog Championship. Lisa was committed to producing hard-running vizslas, believing that field-trialing performance was a reliable indicator of a dog's intensity, stamina, and style -- and Skip Wonnell's Vizsla Field Trial Database has forty dogs that have earned trial placements listed in it that bear Lisa's kennel name, Upwind.

Our two boys share a common grandmother, Wylie, who while not strictly an Upwind dog was co-owned by Lisa and Wendy Russell at Widdershins and took 3rd at both the National Field Championship and the National Gun Dog Championship in 2003. Lisa and Wendy collaborated on a number of breedings and co-owned a number of great dogs together -- and while our dog, Jozsi, was whelped at Widdershins, I feel as though it was more than good fortune that Lisa happened to come by when I was picking him up. Another of the genuinely great dogs she contributed to is Yogurt -- it is genuinely sad to know that we lost both Yogurt's owner, Patrick Cooke, and Lisa within a year of each other -- and I was amused to hear from Deb Goodie this past weekend how Patrick chose such an unusual name for his dog. I gather that he had been at a trial following a brace that Lisa was handling one of her dogs in and while everyone has their distinctive holler, Lisa's was "Yo! girl!" Patrick misheard it and subsequently decided to name his dog 'Yogurt' in honor of that performance.

I spoke to Lisa quite frequently this fall and winter about Jozsi's progress as a Derby dog and even as she found it increasingly difficult to gather air and talk, you could always feel her pride in knowing that one of her dogs was doing well and having fun. We joked in December that she was looking forward to watching him at Nationals some day -- and that she hoped we'd be sharing the podium with her. Whatever happens this fall, it makes me sad to think she won't have that opportunity -- at least not down on the ground from horseback. Hopefully the afterlife looks a lot like a trial ground that you can enjoy with all your great dogs.

back to training

But with a twist... we' ve been working hard on basic obedience with both boys -- and especially the 'long stay.' As might be gathered, this is an indicator that the Mominator failed to earn either of the final two Obedience legs at the CVVC's Versatility Day two weeks ago due to his decision to 'freestyle' during the 'long stay' portion of the both tests. The VCCNE has its Versatility Day on August 1st up at Sharpe's Farm. Hopefully we can get both boys finished up with the obedience and conformation parts of their Versatility Certificates. And so, in the meantime, I have been taking the boys to the softball fields near the house while there are games being played, setting one up in front of the other, making them sit or stand in the sunshine, with the wind in their faces or at their backs, while everyone else in the park looks at me like I'm mad. It's all proofing.

The twist, though, is that we started horseback training in preperation for the fall season. We went up to our friend and pro trainer, Deb Goodie's, place upstate to do some training with her, her horses, and some birds. We'd planned to go earlier, but the weather in the northeast has been very wet -- and as a result, the grass at Deb's is wicked tall, and the ground very damp. Perfect for woodcock as it turned out, but another great reason to train from a horse.

I had wanted to start horse training to build my confidence in my horsemanship, Jozsi's comfort with looking to me and the horse for directional cues (rather than relying on my voice, my whistle, or coming back around to check in), as well as general strategy for working with a scout. It feels like there's so much to process -- happily, though, Jozsi is a better dog than I am a handler. Sadly, I didn't get any great video of Jozsi breaking away -- which is always a hoot -- but did get this clip. After running Jozsi this morning, we then ran Yogurt, The Most Awesome, to see what she might find in the undergrowth. After a lovely point on a woodcock in a thicket, Yogurt then went on to establish this point.

As you can see, the grass was deep and the quail we had put out the day before had decided to covey up in the tall grass near a pond, close to water, but safe from the air (you can also hear a frog croak in the undergrowth). To Deb's right, there is what looks like is a very small rise. What you can't see is that the undergrowth actually gets deeper, much deeper, before it drops off to the pond. It was approximately 18" taller than the average vizsla. I know this because Momo found a third quail in there about a half-hour later -- and was completely invisible even from horseback! It took three minutes to delicately plough through it without tripping over him by mistake.

Momo probably actually deserves the most credit for the two days. He was run off a horse for the first time yesterday and was definitely a little nervous. But this morning, he was all over it and a hunting fiend. He will never be a field-trial contender, but this was definitely fun for him.

And so, now, after two days of busting through tall grass and standing water, both dogs have sacked out happy, dreaming quail hunting dreams.

that dog can hunt...

Let's hear it for Team VCCNE! First, there was Fruska, then there was Baron, followed by Jozsi, and now, most recently, we have Widdershins Flyin Kyler as a trophy winner at the Connecticut Valley Vizsla Club Hunting Dog Championships! Bravo to Kyler, 2009 winner of the Hunting Dog Excellent (HDE) stake.

It was a hot, humid day at Flaherty this year. It was arguably hotter last year for Mr. Enthusiasm's moment of glory, but the air was thick, thick, thick and the breeze skinny, skinny, skinny! Belonging to the CVVC's field trial committee who organizes this event, I had to work the event and so didn't get to see Kyler's run. I know Mike enjoyed his run with Kyler... which is arguably all we should all ask for when we run our dogs.

But we had a bonus day because, in addition to Kyler's run in HDE, her daughter, Rogue, also earned a judges' Award of Merit in the Hunting Dog stake. The judges were clear that they loved her foot-speed and intensity... and that if she had maintained her points just a little longer, she would have done even better. Wooah, Nellie, this little girl is a hard-running 10mos old -- and I can hardly wait to run her from a horse again come fall.

It was actually a double bonus day because our own Widdershins Momchil, aka. The Mominator, was also awarded a judges' Award of Merit in Hunting Dog Excellent. I have said it before, I'm sure, that Momo will probably never make anyone gasp for breath in a competitive environment, but he is a good, good boy who will find you birds. He had a stop-to-flush, an honor, a nice back-course find, and then behaved beautifully in the bird-field proper. Both dogs went on their own points before the handlers could get there... and for safety reasons, the judges elected to work his bracemate's bird first. The bird didn't fly hard enough to be shot -- but as it was blanked on the ground, Momo's bird flushed. So in addition to behaving while all this silliness was going on, I had to send him on to find another bird. He found a chukar that also chose not to fly (probably a side-effect of thick air and/or moisture on the grass). It was shot on the ground and he performed a very nice retrieve. The ribbon was a nice validation for a good, good dog.

Tomorrow we have two rounds of versatility testing for each of the boys: two legs each of Obedience and Conformation. If Momo passes these, he will have earned his Versatility Certificate; if Jozsi does too, he may be able to complete his third legs of these two areas in August at our VCCNE test at Sharpe's Farm.

In the meantime, here's a quick salute to Wendy + Chris Russell at Widdershins for producing two great dogs, and making the the third possible.

lots and lots of highlights

There's been a lot going on over the last two weeks or so. I'll try to be brief.

First of all, it's hard to imagine that two years has passed, but Mr. Enthusiasm, our own Widdershins Upwind Jozsi, turned 2yrs old on May 15th. And for his second birthday he got... X-rays! and dilated pupils! We decided to keep Jozsi intact to see if he turned into half the dog we thought he might based on the great dogs he has back there in his pedigree. And frankly, he's a good enough dog that he really should contribute to the breed by producing pups -- and our breeders have agreed to remove his limited registration status from his AKC registration. We have no plans to become breeders ourselves, but we've let folks know that he could be available in the future. But first he had to pass his OFA hip and elbow evaluations and his CERF eye exam to minimize the prospect that he might transmit joint dysplasia or heritable eye diseases. The CERF exam provides immediate results, the OFA evaluations can take 2-3 weeks. I am an anxious parent and so I overnighted his X-rays to them, and called them after 2 weeks. In as much as anything can be in a dog whose nicknames are 'Crackfiend' and 'Mr. 200mph', he is normal and therefore an eligible bachelor. And we have some interested parties... V-Harmony is in full effect! (The picture is from this past Friday. Nice lip curl!)

Speaking of V-Harmony, we got to see Vizsla Superstar, HRH

Brizstow Jones (and Karen and Glenn) the following weekend. As ever, she is lovely and sooo very excited to get out into the rough tough Bronx, to run with her two loyal troubadors of fun, and smell new smells like a gajillion left-over paintballs, the random guy under the bridge cracking his 11am six-pack, and all kinds of other things I'm glad human noses can't smell. And so here she is... Air Brizstow!

I just got back from taking the boys up to the Hudson Valley GSP Hunt Test up at Flaherty. I wanted to run Momo on Saturday in his first attempt at Master Hunter (MH) to see how all our spring training had gone and had volunteered to help out as a line marshall for Sunday. And being up at Flaherty, I took the opportunity to bring a bunch of quail to use as training birds for both Mominator and Mr. Enthusiasm (who also needs to keep working on his honor). We got two great training runs on on Friday -- and I have to admit I was really pleased with how the two guys did together. Momo really seems to have figured out the honor and both boys were looking pretty damn still on their feet. I think this is a great pic, one of several in fact from the afternoon.

Then Saturday came around and Mominator was up. We were the third brace of MH and my suspicions were confirmed by reports from the first braces that, in addition to any birds that had been planted, there were also sufficient numbers of quail left from field trials passed that the first two dogs encountered coveys of quail. I had a game-plan to work the marsh edge away from the trees as soon as possible, knowing that the likelihood of encountering birds was slim. However, as soon as we entered the backcourse proper, Momo made an impressive find on a quail in dense undergrowth, dense enough that while I could hear it scurry I never saw it till it flushed. Then his bracemate went on point and Momo did a beautiful honor. We then managed to get away from the trees and out into the sunlight and headed out for the birdfield. Along the way, our bracemate encountered the previously mentioned coveys of quail and despite some fairly impressive self-control finally got picked up after a quail got up in front of her face, sufficiently close to poop on her nose, then fell to the ground again, sliding down her leg -- and while she never moved her feet, she leant around and picked up the bird in her mouth. Sadly, a no-no.

We made it to the birdfield where Momo immediately located a chukar. Sadly, said chukar had gotten soaked from the long foliage and the night-before's rain. Even though I hoofed it up, it barely flapped, plopped into the grass about 4' ahead and could be heard digging for China. I checked with the judge that I could pick the bird up and toss it, and then resumed ferreting around for the bird. I finally dropped to a knee to scoop it out off the weeds -- and apparently at that point, Momo stepped forward about 4-5'. I didn't know this till after the bird had been shot and he'd retrieved it -- so it was a shame to know he was done early. Nevertheless, the lesson here for me is that if I have to do it again, I won't turn my back on the dog again to try and grab a bird... not because I don't trust him so much as to give him a clear view of what's happening. While we were ultimately unsuccessful, I feel very pleased with the boy and can keep training for these kinds of scenarios. If there can be such a thing, the nice part about MH is that it's so easy to screw up that there's almost no point in getting anxious. While good, consistent training will help stack luck on your side, it's hard to train for unprepared bracemates, covies of birds both wild or planted, and the particular performance penchants of individual judges. As an indicator of how difficult MH can be, while no one thing screwed up every dog, not a single dog of the eleven that tried out for MH on Saturday qualified. And this included the winner of the AKC's Pointing Dog Championship, Sioux.

And finally: so how hard does your dog run? Both Saturday and Sunday mornings, I was up at 5:15am to run the dogs on the grounds for a little short of an hour to get them all conked out for what would be several hours in their Taj Mahal dog box. This morning we got back to the tent and the truck and I got their breakfast out and noticed this. Sadly, I took the clip on my cell-phone so it's a small picture but hopefully you can still make it out.

My dog runs so hard that steam comes off him!! Here's to Mr. 200mph!

smorgasbord

ere's an assortment of pictures from the weekend. We were up at the PANE Field Trial at Flaherty, giving Mr. Enthusiasm his last run of the spring season. We knew we had the first brace of the morning at 7am and so got to the field nice and early to arrange for horses and locate my trusty scout, Dennis. So the first picture is of the sun clearing the trees while horses chomp their breakfast.

The conditions were almost too good to run a dog: relatively dry air, cool temperatures, and a breeze. I say too good because I could feel it gusting -- and gusting makes pinpointing birds a little harder for the dogs and makes the birds on the ground a little squirrely and less likely to stay put.

This bird, on the other hand, could hardly be called squirrely. It might have been completely lovestruck mad -- but this grouse kept wandering out of the treeline and circling a complete string of vizslas and German Shorthairs, driving them sufficiently crazy to merit the pro whose dogs they were to kennel them up and resolve to try and chase said grouse into a new neighborhood. It was a monster bird -- and yes, I took this picture from about 6ft as it ran around a horse trailer.

We headed out on our brace at about 7:15am and Jozsi broke away like a madman. We've been working on phasing out the handsignals that can be convenient for foot-handling and translating them into hollers and calls -- and he seems to be getting the hand of it. Even though he runs hard and is beginning to nicely extend himself in front of the horse, he has a great handle. Sadly, though, he only had 15mins of glory... in a 30min stake! He had found two birds already before he cut into a swampy area and, as Dennis later relayed, but which I guessed from watching a bird pop out, he then located a third which started running in front of him. He relocated once, then it flushed and then he broke to chase for a few steps. While his stop-to-flush is normally pretty reliable, this is still pretty good progress for the wee madman. But his time was up. Nevertheless the judge really enjoyed his 15mins and was very complimentary about his range, his responsiveness, and his general state of being 'broke.' He was actually a little surprised that Jozsi was still eligible to be a Derby dog.

Which brings us to this picture from this evening. Once again, I stacked him on a lower set of benches, maybe 18" high and a little rickety, and made him stay while I taunted him with two quail hooked up to flight limiters. Arguably the best training moment was during his first stack on the benches when he tried to step forward to get in on a quail that was flapping on the ground -- and the bench tipped. I then re-set him gently and taunted him some more. (I stake out the other dog near the benches so he can see the other and hopefully pick up both the good behaviors and the corrections second-hand.) After rotating Momo through a session on the benches (in which he did great), I then put Mr. Enthusiasm up a second time -- and he stood rock still for probably three minutes or more while I flapped the birds in front of him, around his head, and then ultimately picked them up and put them back in their pen. They both really are good, good dogs.

training day of sorts + update

I had picked up some quail over the weekend (and had forgotten just how big a stink even a dozen of the little creatures can create) and decided to take Momo and Jozsi up to Flaherty to do some training.

I have been gradually working on getting both boys absolutely steady-to-shot, ie. field trial ready with not a single movement of the feet whatever happens in front of them. Momo developed a creep after he was force-fetched which is, I think, him not wanting to bump the bird, but instead anticipating the flush and the retrieve -- which he now loves. Jozsi has always been pretty steady -- and is now having it rigorously enforced.

I have been setting the boys up in turn on the tailgate of my truck and 'stacking' them (which I gather is the technical term used in conformation shows) and making them stand. I'm not worrying about getting their heads 'high and tight' at least for now, but letting them know that moving their feet even a little will get a correction. For now, at least that correction is just me stepping in and physically re-setting them. Once that seems entirely ingrained, we'll start adding the e-collar.

Once we got to Flaherty, I wanted to run the boys loose and plant birds behind them -- and then re-run the course with each one in turn. The picture is of the two of them immediately afterwards -- Momo's face covered in mud, Jozsi wondering when he gets to run again. He did the first 45mins in his Christie's harness pulling 5lbs of welding cables.

Sadly for me, today was Jozsi's day-of-the-month when he seemed to be completely off-kilter. I call him a 'spaniel' when I'm miffed at him, as in "If I wanted a flushing dog, I'd have bought a...". So on his second run, this time by himself, he found three birds but snapped at and took three steps on the first bird, ran in too close on the third, and ran over the third (probably without scenting it, in all honesty). His only redemption at that point was the stop-to-flush. Better that he gets it out now than at a trial.

I then put Momo down. As much as I love Jozsi's unbridled energy, I love the Mominator. If there are birds in the field, he will find them -- and he did. We walked the same course backwards this time -- which to Jozsi's credit again, I realized that the wind had not only changed since we put the birds down, but had also increased slightly. And so, while Momo had the benefit of better scenting conditions, he also found a couple of birds that I hadn't put down, that were left from other trials or training expeditions. He ended up with four finds -- and, as ever, I am trying to gently bully him into standing completely still on point. As we discovered with his force-fetch, though, sometimes his stubborn streak supercedes his sensitive side -- so while gentle repetitions will often do the job very nicely with Momo, I'm anticipating that a short, sharp shock might end up being what is required to seal this deal.

(Interestingly, I think he has figured this out for when he honors. On his last few honors, he has stood without moving, despite me working Jozsi in front of him. A trainer-friend thinks that vizslas are a lot more context-sensitive than German Shorthairs, for example, who tend to be a little more hard-headed but for whom once the concept/command has sunk in, it is universally applied. For her, the good news regarding vizslas is that, if you are running into boggy ground with a skill or teaching technique, you can often just re-evaluate and reconfigure your teaching technique and simply change the command word. I've discovered this with Momo who likes to overthink things -- and for whom 'whoa' became an overly complicated word.)

I decided to take Jozsi out one more time so we could end on a, hopefully, absolutely positive note. I stacked him up on a narrow plank, 'stayed' him, and then tried to torment him into moving his feet by kicking around, firing my pistol, and then by flying a live quail around his head on a string. He didn't move. I think he thinks I'm mad. I may be.

Jozsi has his final field-trial run of the season in Amateur Gun Dog on Sunday at the Pointer Associates trial. Dennis is going to scout for me on his fancy new horse -- and I will scout for him for Sally's run in Open Gun Dog. Wish us luck.

*******

Training update #2: this pic is from this evening (Thursday) taken on my cell-phone. Here's Jozsi perched on two saw-horses literally shaking with intensity at the quail I just flew around his head a few times and landed on the ground to rest. Interestingly, both boys when stacked up on the saw-horses put both front feet on a single plank. Both boys know the routine by now, but just get soooo jacked up once a live bird makes an appearance.