The Summer Slump

It has finally happened here in Texas, the high pressure, high heat cap has settled over us. We have quite a few days of 100+ heat both behind us and ahead of us. The low at night is in the 80s. And some days the humidity is almost unbearable.

This is always the hardest part of Summer. Even with good AC,  the house is never quite cool enough to your liking, the pool is warm, you sweat at the idea of stepping outside and when you do step outside you are drenched in a short time. You guzzle water and try to conserve energy. The dogs sleep, sit in their wading pool and dig craters in their yard when they go outside. Being dogs in general, and collies specifically, they really do seem to take it better than us humans (who are forever complaining and wishing we had it better!) do.

The flower baskets on the front porch have just about succumbed to the heat, but the little garden plot is stubbornly hanging on and is still giving us tomatoes and peppers.

These are the dog days of Summer, the final countdown month until Fall. We are just concentrating on staying cool and surviving right now. 

Training with the collies has slowed way, way down. Even at night, inside, we only do short sessions. Everyone just feels tired.

But sometimes I see the light slant just right in the late afternoon and realize that it won't be long before Fall, we just have to hang tight. As we have done year after year.

In an effort to do something new for August, I signed up to audit a course from Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. I applied for a scholarship (only for the Bronze level) since money is extremely tight and was one of the winners for this cycle of classes. Big surprise! We are auditing the Obedience Skillbuilding 1 Class. Refresher for us? Probably in a lot of ways but we either weren't ready or interested for the other classes, and I have a couple of dogs here who know nothing about scenting or pot pivots and it will get us up and moving this month.

The Class will be covering:

• Handler skills - the better we are at marking, reward placement, etc, the smoother training will go. 
• Looking at how laying a solid foundation helps in a variety of different dog sports. 
• Nose Targeting
• Paw Targeting
• Chin Targeting - something I've never done before
• Pivot Platform - haven't been doing this near as much as I should
• Positions - Tuck Sit/Fold Back Down/Kick Back Stand
• Wrapping - this concept is new to me
• Take It/Hold
• Jumping - Oh dear, this means digging my old set of jumps out of storage - or an excuse to make new ones!
•  Scent Discrimination - finally I can put all of these mint tins to good use!

I have three dogs at varying stages of training and all could benefit by something being taught in this course. I've already rounded up the items needed for the class and they are now happily sitting out where I can see them. No excuses now.

I found a picture of the dog that started it all, my Novice A dog who got me hooked onto obedience and just doing thing with my dogs. Thanks for everything, D!

My Novice A Dog: CH Dickon CD RA CGC