Outdoor Agility Season!!

OMG! It's here! And man are we excited about it! Well, Josie's excited and Wyatt is... well, it depends on the day, the temperature, his bio-rhythms and... me. Sigh. More on Wyatt in a minute.

Josie at the April USDAA trial in Farmington

We've taken part in three trials so far. If Josie's results are an indication, she and Suzie are on their way to a nice season. Josie is hitting her weaves more consistently (a bit of a problem area) and she is getting more comfortable running ahead of Suzie -- a must for a fast girl whose legs are almost as long as her handler's!

At this past weekend's AKC trial in South Jordan, Josie got more Qs than not and in just her second trial, she's a leg shy of moving up to Open in both Standard and Jumpers. (I note here that AKC Novice courses are ridiculously simple. My humble opinion anyway.) And the great thing about Josie is that she just loves agility.

Wyatt at the UKI Fun Trial ~ photo: Carol Clawson

Wyatt, on the other hand, probably won't miss agility at all when he's no longer running. The summer heat only adds to his occasional on-course apathy. Try as I do -- and if you've seen us run you know I am as much cheerleader as handler -- I'm starting to 'lose' him (his attention) with increasing frequency. Still, he got an Excellent standard leg this weekend and was oh-so-close in two Jumpers runs. So I think we'll run this summer and then Wyatt's gonna get a big ole 'Retired' sign on his kennel. Perhaps he'll pursue that modeling career he's always talking about.

That EXCELLENT photo of Wyatt above was taken by our friend Carol Clawson. As cute as "Mr. Never a Hair Out of Place" is, the photo illustrates one of the banes of our agility existence: contacts. W just loves to hang out on top of the A frame before frequently doing a leaping dismount.

And me? I had so much fun shooting agility last year that I'm just excited, almost giddy, to be able to photograph in good outdoor light again. At the same time, I'll almost certainly shoot fewer trials than last year. I will be at the local ASCA trial this weekend. It's a nice, relaxed venue and Robyn Garrett and Linda Hahn were very supportive last year in allowing me to shoot when I was still trying to figure out how to shoot these wonderful athletes we're so lucky to have in our lives! (And I'll be running with Wyatt.)

Here are a few photos from the April USDAA trial. I shot very little at this show as I was running Wyatt and, frankly, just wanted to relax and visit with friends... But a few turned out nice and kind of reinvigorated me for the upcoming season.

Cesar - airborn and with a tailwind

Indy

Lock-step. Can you see it?

Pushing through the chute

The Icebreaker

Deb Sussman and Perk

We spent Friday and Saturday at a herding trial in Deweyville at the Goring Ranch. If there is an actual Deweyville, my guess is the sheep population far outnumbers the humans. It's absolutely beautiful country with rolling hills as far as the eye can see. I imagine when things warm up and green up over the next month it'll be all the more beautiful.

Suzie ran Josie in the Novice class. On both days Josie's outrun and lift were pretty -- even if her outrun does sometimes take her into the next county, as people like to joke. After the lift on Friday the sheep split and it didn't end so well. Saturday was much better with handler and dog in control.

That's Josie above taking off on her outrun on Saturday. You can just see the sheep, blocked by Suzie and between the panels in the distance. If you're thinking that's not a great shot, I hear you. I get nervous for Suzie and sometimes don't think about the most simple things -- like moving left then composing the shot to better see the sheep. On this run I'd asked Eric, a good friend and herding buddy, to shoot video of Suzie's run. He got caught up in the moment too; he kept saying 'oh my god, I'm doing a horrible job' or something to that effect -- and Eric is very good with video and stills. I'm certain it's because he was trying to watch the run and kinda forgot he was shooting it.

But if you herd, and can remember when you first started, and how nervous you may have been, then this moment should resonate with you; you've waited all day, it's your turn, your heart may just be in your throat... then you send your dog and it's on!

Fortunately, Josie was 'on' on Saturday. Here she's completed her lift and is bringing the sheep to Suzie at the handler's post (that orange pylon in the first photo) just out of frame.

Behind the scenes at the set out...

Trials are well organized. Prior to being worked, sheep are held in pens, off in the distance from handlers, and are 'set out' in a specific place prior to each run. After a run the sheep are put into exhaust pens. After so many runs the sheep from the exhaust are brought back to the set out area to work again, which is what is happening in the above photo. On Friday the sheep had been driven over that hill in the background and had just blanketed it. It was visually very, very cool. But my camera was in the car and I missed it! I wasn't going to miss it again. Here I'd gone through the trouble of climbing on top of a horse trailer... but the sheep came in a different way! And I missed it. Again.

City Pet Club

Brutus

What to do on a snowy day in late April? Play catch up on a long overdue post, of course!

Last fall, thanks to an invitation by owner Jess Dear, we had the opportunity to shoot a series of portraits at City Pet Club. Thanks to the efforts of CPC manager Derek Abaroa, turnout for Pooch Portrait Day was pretty good.

One of my favorites was Brutus, Jess' weimaraner. (Brutus has since passed. I only met him once, at our session. He was a cooperative, well-behaved and good-looking boy!)

Of course, each dog was striking. Below are a few more. You can see a gallery of each of the dogs we shot here: CPC Gallery.

Sheba

Mickey

Gus

Sagan and Tycho

Kristie Rasmussen is a friend of over a decade. For friends who know us, Tycho and Digger were occasional teammates in Obedience competitions; we still have a photo of the pair on our mantle from a trial in Idaho Falls around 2004. I photographed one of Sagan's perfect 200 scores that same weekend.

So when Kristie asked me if I'd be willing to try a little something different with the pair, how could I resist? I'm something of a purist and, in all honesty, the idea of doing a composite like these didn't totally appeal to me at first. (Of course, I never mentioned this to Kristie!) But I'm really happy with how these turned out. And I believe Kristie is too.

Sagan

OTCH ASCA OTCH U-CDX Amberac's Star Tracker Sagan UDX3 TD RAE VER OM1 GRCA-OBHF ASCA-UDX

Tycho

U-CDX Halltree's Star Gazer Tycho UDT RAE GRCA-OBHF ASCA-UD

You know that saying, something about a well-rounded dog having titles on both ends? That's Tycho and Sagan. Both have more varied titles than I can get to in this short post. Both were awarded the GRCA Obedience Hall of Fame Award and both have two Dog World Awards.

In short, they're two very accomplished boys!

The final prints were done on canvas. Last week we took them straight from the printer to Alpine Art & Frame where, with the help of Kathy, one of their very knowledgeable staff, Kristie was able to quickly choose a frame appropriate for the dogs' coloration and the room where they'll live.

Of course, none of it would've been possible without Sagan and Tycho's cooperation at our shoot. So thank you, you pair of handsome young men!

MACH 4 Billie and MACH Forrest

I have non-agility friends who visit this page. One recently asked, "so, what's a MACH?" So maybe a little background is in order for this post:

MACH stands for Master Agility Champion. It's a title awarded when a dog and handler get 20 Double Qs (2 out of 2 qualifying runs in the same day) and amass a certain number of speed points (it's formulaic and I'm not going there because I don't fully understand it myself). It's a reward for consistency and it's a big deal. Some of us (like me and the dog sprawled out on the couch as I write this) can go a whole four day trial without a double Q.

A MACH 4 is the same x 4. That's 80 Double Qs and something like a gazillion speed points. I never knew such a thing existed until I met Billie, subject of this post.

A MACH 5 is a car driven by Speed Racer. [Ed. note: Speed was such a tool. The show totally should've been about Racer X. I mean, seriously.]

Now on to our story.

Anne & Forrest

Anne Ibach is one of the handful of people who work their butts off organizing and executing local AKC agility trials. She's done this for the last decade, far longer than I've been around the sport. She's also a wicked good handler. In March Anne's leaving us for Portland, where she's landed her "Dream Job" with Oregon Public Television.

Salt Lake's loss is definitely Portland's gain.

MACH4 Billie, MXF, PDIII Retired

Anne began training with Billie in 1999 after an invitation from Coleen Hawker, Bill's owner at the time (and another local agility pioneer). She and Bill took lessons with Monica Bush and after a whole two months of training they entered their first trial. "Five years, thousands of miles and dollars, and several bottles of thyroid pills later," she says, they earned their first MACH, becoming just the fourth dog in Utah to earn the title.

They weren't finished. I didn't ask about numbers 2 and 3 but Billie got her 4th MACH last July, at age 11. She's only the second dog in Utah to do so. With that last MACH, Bill dropped out of the circuit and into retirement.

Best I can tell Bill's a pretty laid-back cat; for the above photo we said 'Bill, you lay here.' And he held... and held... and held that pose. Easy to work with. So despite the accomplishments, Bill's no diva.

MACH Red Rock Run Forrest Run MXJ, MX, MXF, JE, MAD, RN, CGC

But it was only after Forrest got his MACH in October that we talked about getting together for a photo.

Anne and Forrest found each other in 2003, when Forrest was a four month old pup -- and only, Anne jokes, because she was not smart enough to know better. "Never buy a Jack Russell on impulse," she says.

They've had to work far harder to get Forrest to where he is today; for the first year of his life, Anne's convinced he viewed her as nothing more than an annoying weight on the other end of the leash preventing Forrest from being Forrest. But Anne decided Forrest would become an agility dog. Lots and lots and lots of hard work later, he is.

I kinda get the impression that because of how hard they've had to work, Forrest's MACH may just mean more than Billie's achievements.

Way to go, Forrest!

And Anne, doggone it, we miss you already!

How Josie Spent President's Day

Josie

We spent the day in Spanish Fork with Josie (our border collie, if you don't already know) doing what she and Suzie enjoy most. It had been several weeks since she had been on sheep but she worked surprisingly well for Suzie in the Big Field with good outruns and some nice drives.

And whether Suzie is communicating a little more convincingly or whether Josie has just decided she wants to listen, she was in control for almost the whole day. That's progress for this pair.

Of course, our friend Linda worked with Josie in the small pen (below) beforehand and probably helped Joie get some of that "Oh My God, Sheep!!" excitement out of her system.

Friends and strangers regularly tell us how sweet Josie is -- and she really is. But, above all else, she's a herding dog. The shot below is how not to behave but it happens. The sheep wasn't hurt (I promise) and that was the only gripping that went on.

Goodbye to Dexter

Dexter

(Over the Thanksgiving holiday.)

Dear Dexter,

We met just that one time. You came over with Ruth and Edie. Already well into your fight with cancer, were you in pain that day? If you were, I couldn't tell! No, you did everything we asked of you: You sat - patiently. And when we asked you to, you smiled that smile. You made me smile. And between us, I think we just may have made Ruth's day that day. Of course, you made Ruth's day every day for almost twelve years.

You're a special boy.

And you are missed.