End of October: Water Cress and Fescue and Ivy SDT

Continuing on our relentless streak of trialing, we headed down to Jan's beautiful TN farm for the Water Cress SDT the weekend following the Trifecta.  Gabe was up first in the PN and it was, shockingly, another RT as I left the post when he failed to lie down after the lift.  Sigh.

Liv and brother Deuce sneak in a quick romp.

Rae was up early the next morning in the Open.  It was cold and the sheep were surprisingly light and pressure-sensitive.  They certainly knew where the set-out was from the previous day, and ran hard toward the former site of the pens en route to the exhaust.  I don't really remember the details of our run, but there was plenty of handler error to put her in a difficult situation.  Sending her left into the pressure has caused her to get sticky on the way out in the past, and the dog ahead of me had trouble with her eye when sent left.  So I sent right, and Rae surprised me by coming in tight and pushing them off toward the pressure.  They had the head start and she never quite got ahold of them, though we fumbled around til some point on the cross-drive when I finally gave in to the reality that things weren't going well.  RT.

For various reasons, I didn't go back to the trial the second day of Open, but instead had a friend over to work dogs at the airport.

Christine and Tess and a sun cross

The following weekend, the last in October, I had Dad ride along with me out to OH for his first dog trial experience.  And, it was his birthday, too!  This was a new trial to me.  After a long trip across snowy WV mountains in the dark, we arrived very late Friday night at our cute little cabin rental. 

Ella needs to patrol the scene from the high ground.

Though I was up second from last with Rae in a very small, 25 dog class, we got up early in the morning to head out to the trial site.  A very pretty farm that was mostly flatt-ish with some gentle rolls.  It was a cold, frosty morning with a substantial fog delay.

Walking the cross-drive.

Five hair sheep, 2 ewes and 3 lambs were used on a narrow field with an off-course wooded ravine bordering the left side of the fetch.  The drive away was on an obtuse angle away from the post (yes, nerdy geometry usage) and the cross-drive was nearly parallel to the fetch.  The sheep were quite light and very few managed pens.  Rae ran out perfectly until about 2:00 where she hitched up and stuck.  Annoyed, I whistled her on.  She came around to lift them neatly when suddenly a lamb shot off for the ravine.  I bet she knew something was up while she was coming around on her outrun.  Throughout the course of the weekend, this happened to a few other dogs (some caused by the dog, some not), and I feel pretty certain Rae didn't cause this, seeing as she is very settling and kind to her sheep.  Anyway, the runs that I saw where a single ran for the ravine ended in DQs, but darn if Rae didn't outsmart and outmanuever the single to catch it, but she also muscled it back to the group and continued on.  We fought like crazy with the uncooperative lamb who wanted nothing to do with the other 4 and made a heck of a go out of it up through the turn to start the cross-drive.  The lamb saw the barn and took off in the exact opposite direction as the other 4.  Rae caught it and held it, but while fighting the lamb the others drifted so far away that there was no hope for us to put things back together, so I walked.  Many asked me if I was getting a re-run because the lamb was noticeably sick and not acting right; I didn't expect one since we did half the course.  We did get lots of compliments on our work, just not in the form of a score.  Really proud of Rae that run and what we accomplished!!

Rae is ready.

Lamb who kept leaving

For Sunday's run, our sheep were flighty as could be for the first part of the fetch.  Rae actually listened too well and when I flanked her hard to catch them, she ended up almost heading them.  That's what I get for practicing too much on loosening up her flanks on her occasional reluctance to flank on the fetch.  After missing the fetch panels I was so emotionally deflated that my brain pretty much shut down.  She was working really well but I managed to miss both panels at literally the last split second, it probably looked like I *tried* to miss them it was so ridiculous!  One got a little spastic at the Y-chute so we gave up on that and did a half-hearted split to put an end to a disappointing weekend.

Seemed promising

Take two.

Gabe was supposed to run PN, but the class was canceled due to the fog delay.  He wasn't allowed to run Ranch NC, so we headed home. 

The leaves were outstanding in the WV mountains.