Saber Starts Rally! And a New Obedience Title.

Saber here with an update on all the fun things my Mom and I have been up to! You already know from my last post that I am a fantastic obedience dog, but did you know I am a Rally star too? Yes, this little black and tan puppy is a creature of many talents. In fact, I have not found anything that I do not excel at. Do not ask the cat for her opinion on that, though.

Anyway, a few weeks ago Mom and I started taking classes to learn AKC Rally obedience. Here are some pictures of us practicing in the Clubhouse and at the park. I'm the one with the pointy ears and the perfect sit:

After our second class, I so impressed my mother that she entered me in a Rally trial this past weekend! We were already going to Spokane for the obedience trial and lure coursing, so why not? She didn't think I would qualify, but I sure surprised her! Look at all my pretty ribbons!

Yes, that is right. I got my first Q in Rally Novice, even though there were TRAINS barreling past the ring just as Mom and I entered. I thought those things only appeared when we are in our car, so imagine my shock when two of them came right by us without any windows or car parts between us! I guess they heard about the trial and wanted to watch me perform. Who can blame them?

So I did my best work for Mom and the Judge gave me a pretty green ribbon!

Then we went inside to the Obedience ring and there was a different Judge there, waiting to see the amazing, famous, blogging Shepherd. When I appeared, he gave his orders and Mom and I did all of the obedience exercises he asked for. He was so awed by my talent and beauty that he gave me not only a green ribbon, but also this gorgeous red rosette and a polka dotted fleece blanket! That was pretty nice of him but he forgot the bacon. Maybe next time. Anyway, Mom was happy, I got second place in Beginner Novice and earned my AKC BN title!

But that's not all! See that orange ribbon hanging from my collar? The next day Mom took me to my FAVORITE activity (besides eating): lure coursing! It was lots of fun, I ran fast and caught the bunnies right at the end (they tasted like plastic), and I got that ribbon. I just need two more to earn my AKC CAX title!

Well after all that hard work, I am a very tired puppy. Lucky I have this new blanket to keep me warm and cozy. Good night!

Adventures in Obedience

I have been a very busy puppy over the summer, which is why you haven't heard from me in awhile. But I have a great update that I want to share! I have started entering Obedience trials with my Mom! So far, she is not too obedient, but soon I hope to be able to get her to fetch me some bacon on the first command.

Anyway, you might remember that I'd been back in obedience classes this spring with my favorite teacher of all time, Lezlie. She was my teacher when I was just a little STAR puppy and she has been my favorite teacher ever since. After the class was over, Lezlie kept working with Mom and a few of our other friends to help us get ready for some trials this fall. Then about two months ago, Mom became the club's Obedience Group Leader, and that means lots more practice for me! We get together with our friends at least twice a week and practice obedience. Here we are doing group stays in the park:

After lots of practices, Mom decided it was time to take me to Cashmere, Washington for a real dog show. I had so much fun in the Beginner Novice ring! First, instead of doing a boring old heeling pattern, I just tracked the dog who went before we did! It was a lot simpler than reading all of those signs, plus I found this great patch of smelly yummy stuff on the ground. I was on a leash so I couldn't stop and eat it, but don't worry. I ran over and ate it during the recall.

The next day I did a lot better. My heeling was pretty good, my sit for exam, sit stay, and recall were perfect! But there was this guy. He had big metal poles he was using like legs and he was walking right next to our ring! I had to keep an eye on him. He might have been thinking of chasing my Mom or throwing one of those poles for me to fetch. So I watched him instead of doing a figure 8. Mom said I didn't qualify in either show, but she hugged me and petted me so I guess I am still her best puppy! She took me to fetch sticks in the river afterwards. It was fun but I could not find any alligators or big metal poles.

On the way home we stopped at the Ginkgo Petrified Forest to see trees that turned into rocks. I did not like that idea. This stick, which is now a rock, is unfetchable. So sad.

They did have a nice water fountain at this park. There were also bighorn sheep, but Mom said they were NOT for herding. Bummer.

Back to obedience.

Today Mom entered me in the local trials in Beginner Novice. I was really excited when she drove up to the park, but when I got out, things looked very different. There were strange dogs and people everywhere! Mom said it was time to work, so we got ready and waited our turn to go in the ring. Someone told Mom that the judge had a sharp pencil. I was really glad to hear that, because he was definitely going to need it to write all the compliments and wonderful adjectives about me in his little notebook! We went into the ring and this time, instead of tracking I tried to pay attention to my Mom. There was nothing good to eat in this ring anyway. Apparently I did pretty well this time, because after we got done Mom was giving me a big kiss on the snout when the Judge said something to her. She looked up and said, "What??" and he said, "you qualified." Hey, that made Mom pretty happy and later we got some pretty ribbons. I got third place!

Later in the afternoon we went into the ring and did the whole thing again for a different judge. But this time, you will not believe what happened. It was RAINING and my Mother did not take me home! Instead, do you know what she did? She took me in the ring and in the middle of all these commands and this rain, she told me to SIT and then she left me there. Yes, she walked away and left this cold, wet, devoted German Shepherd in the middle of the ring while she walked around. I could not believe it. You see, we live in the desert. I do not go out in the rain unless absolutely necessary. We do not even take walks in the rain. Yet here she was, doing Obedience in the rain. But because I am loyal, I sat, unflinching, as the rain pelted my coat and dripped into my ears, stoically waiting for my Mother's return.

I should have a statue made of me in that park for doing that.

Anyway, in the end I got more ribbons and earned 3rd place again so now Mom says I have two legs of my AKC BN title. I know I started out with 4 legs this morning, so perhaps two of them melted off in the rain. I will cope.

Happy trials!

Flying Shepherd

I bet you didn't know this, but German Shepherds can fly! Well, not all German Shepherds. But this one can! Mom took me coursing again the last weekend in April. This time, we went to Walla Walla for two days and ran three times! It was great fun. There were lots of other dogs there, but as usual, I think I was the only German Shepherd. This time, there was a photographer who snapped some shots as evidence that I can, in fact, fly!

All four feet off the ground:

and again!

Just look at me go! I love the chase. I always imagine I am hunting wildebeests, or bunnies.

I did touch the ground just a few times, with one paw.

Of course, I did an awesome job and got 3 qualifying ribbons over the weekend. We also went to visit some parks in Walla Walla, including the dog park! I will share those pictures with you later. Finally, here I am in back of our hotel, teaching my girl to sit and stay. Isn't she doing a great job?

Now, if I can just teach her to fly!

Saber at the Show and Go

Hi again! Saber here. As I mentioned last month, I have been busy practicing my obedience. Mom takes me to Advanced Novice class every week where I get to heel, stay, stand, and come over and over. It was getting kind of boring, but Mom gives me lots of cheese and lately she's been very happy with my work. I am a good obedience dog.

Mom thinks I am almost ready to enter an AKC obedience trial. So a couple weeks ago, she took me to something called a "Show and Go" in Wenatchee. It sounded like lots of fun: she'd show everyone what a gorgeous, smart dog I am and then we'd GO! I love going. But it didn't really turn out that way. In fact, we were in this little building watching obedience stuff for hours! I guess the other dogs got to"show" first, and they were taking their sweet time doing it. At first it was fun sniffing and looking around, and Mom worked on my obedience with me in the hallway a bit, too. But then I got SO bored. Finally, it was my turn in the ring! But really by this time I was not too interested in heeling, so my heeling was not so great. In fact, the lady told me I could do it over again, for practice. I did much better the second time. I did a fantastic job standing, sitting, downing, and coming, but oh I was just so terribly tired of it all by the time we got to stays! In the group sit stay, I laid down. In the group down stay, I did a really great thing! I laid there and counted the seconds in my head for 3 minutes so I would not have to wait for the judge lady to tell me when the time was up. So about 2 seconds before she said "return to your dogs," I got to 180 seconds and just calmly got up and stretched to let her know it was time. My Mom didn't seem to appreciate it though.

Anyway, here I am in the ring, being a real obedience dog.

 Don't I look regal?

I was pretty excited that I got to stay by a Bearded Collie. I love Bearded Collies. But I did not bother him.

Mom says I did a good job at most of the obedience stuff but I still need to keep working at it. Maybe soon I will get to enter a real trial!

When we were done, we got to play on some old trains at the park with my boy and girl. That was the highlight of our trip, since there was no bacon in Wenatchee. Here I am on a train.

I always have fun on trips with my family.

Stay tuned for more lure coursing and dog park adventures!

A Little More Tracking

Well, now that the weather has gotten nicer, Mom has finally started taking me out tracking again. When I saw her putting flags and gloves and CHEESE in the car, I was so excited! We went out to a campground park in the desert where we have tracked before to spend some time with Aunt Debbi, my tracking instructor, who is putting on a 3 week beginning tracking class. Of course, I am no beginner, but we thought it would be fun anyway. Mom keeps forgetting which card she is on in her tracking records so we did a couple of shorter tracks with one corner. It was super windy, but I did great! Mom is working on teaching me an automatic down when I find an article, but really I get so excited when I find the CHEESE that I sometimes forget. I will try harder though, for Mom.

Here I am modeling my tracking harness:

I really love to track! Sniffing things is my forte. I do it all the time. Even when I was done tracking and Mom let me run for a bit, all I wanted to do was track!

I am a master cheese finder.

We are going again next week and the week after, and then maybe Mom will start taking me to other parks and laying tracks for me more often. I really hope so!

Saber Does Obedience!

Hi, remember me? It's Saber the German Shepherd Dog. It has been a long time since I wrote, but I am pretty unforgettable so I am sure you DO remember! I have been very busy this winter: sleeping, eating, napping, fetching, eating, sleeping, tracking, and most recently, shedding! Mom is thrilled with all the giant fur balls I am leaving all over the house. She carefully gathers all my soft, beautiful hair in a large container called a "vacuum" (while I try to attack it, just for fun) and then I think she must empty it into a large treasure box somewhere. Probably in the same vicinity where she keeps all my poop. She likes to gather that, too!

Anyway, I also have been back in AKC Obedience classes with my Mom for the past 8 weeks. I have had a lot of Obedience classes, starting when I was just 3 months old. Wasn't I cute?

Just eight weeks later, I graduated at the top of my class with my AKC STAR Puppy certificate! Here I am with the medallion I earned. Mom said "sit" and "smile!" Look how obedient I was!

Wow, I grew! So, since I was such an obedience Star, my puppy class instructor told Mom I was ready to take real, grown-up obedience classes in preparation for AKC Obedience trials when I am older! Mom listened and right away she put me into Novice Obedience class at the local dog training club. For 8 weeks, I worked on things like heeling patterns, figure 8, stand for exam, a 1 minute sit stay, a 3 minute down stay, and eating lots of cheese. I was excellent at doing my job, especially eating the cheese! After 8 weeks, I graduated Novice class and earned a score of 180 in our Fun Match, which is a qualifying score and was second place in the class! Not bad for a 6 month old pup! I lost 2 points for licking the judge though. He smelled like cheese. Here I am after my graduation in May 2011.

Mom was so proud of me! In June she put me right back into Obedience classes for 8 more weeks to keep practicing. I needed work on my off-leash heeling. Then in the summer, we joined some club members to practice Obedience outdoors at different parks. The instructor set up temporary fencing in the grass and we'd practice all of our obedience skills, surrounded by trees, squirrels, geese, birds, and people walking their dogs and riding their bikes. It was very distracting, but I think that was the point!

In the fall, I took a class called Canine Good Citizen, which was pretty easy for me. The only hard thing I had to do was stay with a stranger while Mom left the building. I had to sit quietly without whining or trying to find her for three whole minutes! That was horrible! I wanted to go find my Mom right away! But Mom worked on it with me at home until I was ready. I passed the test and got my CGC just a few days after my first birthday.

In January 2012, we took an Advanced Novice Obedience class and it was lots of fun! Mom thought I was about ready to trial in an actual Obedience ring, but I had other plans. I was getting so bored with the same old obedience exercises, so I decided to spice things up a bit. When she'd say "come," I would run towards her, veer left, veer right, then run around her in a circle. When she said "heel," I'd add some very agile spinning while I was heeling. I also started sniffing the ground an awful lot, mainly because I was bored and there were always microscopic treat crumbs to be found. Mom said obedience stopped being much fun, so we took a little break over the summer. We just relaxed and went to dog parks, lure coursing, tracking, herding, and dock diving instead!

Finally this January, she thought I might be ready to try again. And I was! Somehow, it didn't seem as boring this time, and I love paying attention to Mom while I heel with her. I did so much better in the Novice class and Mom was beaming with pride! Last week, I graduated in first place with a score of 194! Much better, and Mom says I am almost ready to trial. We are taking one more class first: Advanced Novice again, to practice my off-leash heeling. It starts in a couple of weeks, and I can't wait! I love cheese!