Sanity (Un)Checked

Yesterday we got a new puppy, yet another Ridgeview aussie, yet another black tri, yet another girl. Her registered name will be Ridgeview’s Peacekeeper, and her call name will be “Aeryn” after the Farscape’s Aeryn Sun, the cranky but ultimately good former Peacekeeper soldier. (if you’re not hopeless Sci-Fi geeks, you may need to refer to the link to have any clue what I’m talking about)

We had kicked around some other ideas, but nothing stuck. I’d always wanted to call out dog “Outlaw Belle Star” and call her Belle, but someone pointed out to me the irony of naming an obedience dog “Outlaw”. If we were getting a red, I would have been happy to call her “I Love Lucy”, if for no other reason than I could do a Desi Arnaz impression and say ” Lucy, you got some ’splaining to do…” Fortunately for the dog training world, there were no reds in the this litter, so you all will be spared that joy.

Finally I hit on the Aeryn idea. Her namesake is tough, smart, brave, cranky, sometimes hard to live with, but basically moving in the right direction. If my Aeryn turns out the same way, I think I’ll take it.

I survived. Yesterday (03/11/07) I completed my first UKC judging assigment at For Your Canine in Schiller Park, IL. It was a great trial, nice building, excellent organization, etc. I really couldn’t have been luckier for a first time judging. Despite literally being next door to O’Hare airport, the aircraft noise wasn’t bad, and certainly didn’t bother the dogs.

The teams were also pretty darned good, including former National Obedience Champ Lynn Heidinger, who handled with her usual precision and grace. That was fun to judge.

In any case, I made it through the day without too many goofs, and I honestly don’t think I messed anyone up. Judges probably should borrow that part of the Hippocratic oath - “First, do no harm.”

Becky and Riker also tried for their 3rd UUD leg, but didn’t make it, and Molly was a bored diva most of the day, poor girl.

Anyway, it was a great experience, but now, the day after, my legs are almost as sore as they used to be after a marathon.

I’m currently reading Excel-Erated Learning, by Pamela Reid and I recommend it highly. It’s an attempt to put uptodate research on canine learning into terms that dog trainers and handlers can understand and use.

The most impressive thing so far? She has a clear and compelling explanation of just how and why the classic ear pinch works so well for training the retrieve.

When we were keeping and training Maya, I followed the classic method for the first time, blindly following the instructions off of an Ann Marie Silverton video. And it worked. In fact Maya ended up with a great forced retrieve at the age of 6 months.

I was surprised and somewhat puzzled, since the “take it” command is never used until the earpinch is first applied, and the pinch is applied no matter how the dog acts. Seemed unfair to me.

And that shows how much I knew. It turns out the method is so effective because you are teaching the dog that “take it” means “ear pinch” and that they can stop the ear pinch if the grab the dumbbell quickly enough. This gives them control and tends to make the behavior self-reinforcing - every time they retrieve they feel as they have successfully beaten the pinch.

Dang… I never would have thought of that..

While I’m on a roll, I should mention that the UKC has released their answer to the AKC conflict of interest policy. It’s almost funny - it’s the opposite of the AKC’s in almost every way.

While the AKC is out to crush competition and extract loyalty from its judges, with a “we made you and we can break you” sort of attitude, the UKC statement (http://www.ukcdogs.com, news item for 08/10/20076) flat out states that judges have the right to judge wherever they’re qualified. And that wider experience makes them better judges, which benefits the sport, which in turn benefits the UKC. Very enlightened, indeed.

Of course there’s always a “gotcha”. The reason I’m not quoting the UKC statement verbatim is that it’s copyrighted and the person I contacted at their offices hinted that I’d better not use it without permission. I guess enlightenment only goes so far.

Having just gone through the UKC’s process to become an obedience judge, I thought I’d note a few things that helped along the way.

First of all, do your homework. The process isn’t impossibly difficult, but at every step being prepared helps. Read the rules, practice calling commands, etc. The horror stories I heard from judges about unqualified judge candidates all tended to be about people who assumed their license would be handed to them with no effort on their part.

Secondly, be willing to go the extra mile, particularly when you apprentice. You may only have to do the official classes, but be willing to help with whatever else is on offer. I judged a fun match at my first apprenticeship and at the second when a courtesy dog was needed I jumped in to offer Molly. In other words, plan on being around for the whole day and make yourself useful.

Finally, make and use personal contacts. Even before you start the process talk to the judges you show under, get their advice and support. (Of course you are actually showing in UKC, right? ) Established judges have a lot of great advice and when you get to the point of setting up apprenticeships, it’s much easier if the judges you are asking know you and have a sense that you are serious about it.

OK, so nothing too surprising, I admit. But it worked for me.

I am now UKC obedience judge #6679, licensed for all classes. Wow… Things are going to start happening to me now….

Actually, I was very impressed by the UKC’s judge approval process. Unlike some other huge registry that will remain nameless, it is actually possible to qualify to judge all 3 classes in a reasonable time. The written test was tricky, but not unfairly so, the prerequisites seemed fair, and the apprenticeship requirement turned out to be the best part of the whole exercise.

I had heard judges telling horror stories of shockingly unqualified apprentices and the like, but the current rules, requiring a UKC title at the level you are applying for, seem to have taken care of that.

Anyway, I was a bit concerned that as an apprentice I would be viewed as liability, but quite the opposite was true. The judges, trial officials, even the exhibitors were amazingly supportive and welcoming. The judges in particular bent over backwards to give as much advice as they could. Each of them wanted me to avoid the mistakes they had made. For that I thank them, but I’m afraid in the end it won’t really work. I probably wouldn’t have made their mistakes anyway, and I’m certain I’ll go and find my own mistakes to make.

So it’s finished.

This past weekend I finished my UKC apprentice judging with John Fowler and Janice Scherzer, after starting with Jerry Shields two weeks earlier. My deepest thanks to all three of them for doing their best to be supportive and trying their darnedest to make sure I don’t repeat their mistakes. I got three slightly different views and approaches and the whole process was very educational.

Apprenticing was fun in an odd way. First of all, you are in the ring with the officiating judge, which is a view a trial that most of us are not so familiar with. But as an apprentice, not only are you supposed to be watching everything that goes on, you also have to be sure to stay out of the way and make sure you don’t stress an already nervous dog and/or handler. So it can be a bit intense at first.

In fact, the first trial was the hardest. Not that Jerry was hard to work with (far from it) but all of the mental processing I had to do as I learned what to watch for was tough. The second trial was easier, and the third was the easiest of all. Not that it was exactly easy, mind you, but at least it started to seem managable.

I was also pleased that my scores were in the same ballpark as all three judges. I had been thinking I would end up either being way to easy or way to hard.

Anyway, I have to wait until the paperwork clears the UKC home office, something that may not be fast, and then I should be good to go.

If you’ve read this blog before you may notice that several of the entries are missing. That’s because we’ve been under minor attack from crackers. In early July the site got trashed twice (on consecutive weekends) and I ended up having to restore from an old backup.

I guess this would be a good time to insert some conventional wisdom about keeping everything backed up, but right now I’m too irritated to bother.

Needless to say, a few changes will be made…

Since my last post we’ve managed to stabilize the injury situation. Molly, in spite of being the old lady at almost 7, turned out to in better shape and is coming back from her strained shoulders nicely. She should be 100% by March.

Riker, on the other hand, turned out to have a more serious problem. We started to fear a ligament tear in his knee, so we got him in for x-rays. The vet played it very cool at the initial visit, but it was clear that’s what he was thinking, too. In fact, to everyone’s surprise (including the vet, who took extra x-rays to make sure) Riker’s knees and rear joints were fine.

That lead to the conclusion that he had a bad groin pull, instead of a knee injury. Let me tell you, we were overjoyed to have that diagnosis. Recovery will be slow, but now after a couple of weeks of complete rest (yes, he IS going stir crazy) he is starting to put full weight on it and the limp is going away.

Injuries (not to put to fine a point on it) suck. And they suck even worse when it’s not ourselves, but our canine teammates, who are suffering.

This past month has seen both of our aussies come up lame. Molly was first. We were barely into the new year when she decided to prove to some youngsters that she might be middle-aged, but by gum she still had some speed. I didn’t actually see it, but Becky reports that she put on a truly stunning burst of speed. Good for you kid.

Except, of course that by nightfall she couldn’t put any weight on her right front foot. I was strongly reminded of the time I hobbled for days after out-sprinting a 15 year-old at the end of a 5K.

Riker soon followed by hurting his right back knee doing sharp turns around a tree while playing with a new little friend.

Runners soon learn that the one thing that most increases your odds of getting injured is already being injured. You think you’re OK, but push just slightly over the edge and you’re back where you started, or worse.

And that’s exactly what Molly and Riker have been going through. A little limping in the evening, then apparently OK the next day, but as soon as we turn our backs, one or the other will put on extra sprint and end up limping again.

So we’ve clamped down even tighter on their activities and that seems to be helping. The problem is that they both are now so bored from reduced activity that they are even more likely to go bananas if we don’t watch them.

Did I mention that injuries suck?