To finish up yesterday's report, Rhys did well. . .that is, up till we got to the A-frame. He didn't get very high up it and then kind of gave up. I ended up giving him a boost over. I figured it was better to have him complete it successfully and get whistled off then have him figure out that he could back off of it. He had a good time so that was fun. After waiting like 7 hours, his steam was running pretty low so it didn't surprise me.
Today, Rhys got another jumpers leg. He did a nice job. Didn't take time to stop and look at the crowd like yesterday, so he was only 3 seconds over time. I thought that was pretty nice. So that's leg number two. Crossing my fingers, we'll get that final leg next month and it would make him a Versatile Dog with the parent club. Then we can go back and work some more on the basics (i.e. weaves). I rushed him a bit on this, so most of the stuff is my fault for putting him in those situations without the confidence to complete them as accurately as they could be. But he's done quite well considering. Especially an improvement since last weekend too.
Riley. . .(sigh). Enough said. We just came off the standard course. Every thing was pretty good. She was a bit slow but that's kind of to be expected on the third day of a three day trial. Can't fault her for that. The only, teeny tiny little bobble in the whole course was a missed weave entrance. But that's enough to do us in. Sucks. I even went out of my way to give her an on-side entrance and she still didn't take it. Oh well. Another chance in jumpers coming up. It's gonna be pretty sad if we go 4 trials in a row with only 1 Q in a run. That sucks. As Karen said to me, we think she's doing it on purpose, just to irritate me. ;)

Well, I'm very pleased to announce that Rhys has earned his first leg in agility. By no means was it pretty, but he certainly has made progress since the last go round. In fact, thinking about it, he actually really did quite well. I'm very pleased with it. His speed was a little faster today. . .he was still over time but not nearly as much. And some of that was eaten up by admiring the photographer and also a stop to see what the heck all those people are staring at. ;) Course, we obviously have to work on weaves still. Let's see what he does in Standard. . .crossing my fingers on the A-frame. ;)
Oh Riley. . .why oh why, do you do this to me? ;) It's always something silly. We get through the tough part of the course only for her to blow something stupid. Yesterday in JWW, she missed the entrance to the weaves, while in Std. she got through a really tricky section, hit the weaves nicely only to run past the bloody A-frame. So far today, she got the tricky bits in Std. again only to miss the weave entrance. She gained speed after tunnel and hit the wrong side of the weave entrance. You fix one thing, she finds another way to NQ. :) She's been here almost 5 hours so I needed to wake her up a bit more before we went in to the ring than I did. Oh well. We'll give it another shot in JWW.

When we still had Champ, he and Riley would "co-hunt" for moles. They were quite a team. Champ would watch the ground and listen for the little buggers to move. Then he'd pounce on the correct spot and dig it up. It was amazing. That dog could move some dirt. Well, then once he got the mole, he didn't know what to do with it. Cue Riley. . .she'd take it and "dispatch" of it with a quick flick of her head. Done! Poor Riley can't really move much dirt so moles would escape her. She's got tiny little feet and it just doesn't work like having 100 pounds behind Champ's big paws so this was teamwork at it's best. It cracked me up. The tag teamed moles on a regular basis. Well, now that we no longer have Champ, mole hunting has been a fruitless endeavor for the little white dogs.
Last night, Riley and Rhys were scopeing out my mom's front yard. Riley is drawn to this one particular area and then just stops. She glances around and does the head-cocked, listening intently thing. Then all of a sudden she pounces and starts digging like mad. Well, she dug and dug and I had all but given up on her and was about to call her off, when all of a sudden she runs by me with this big ol honkin mole. Oh it was priceless. I swear this thing was almost as big as her head. . .well, at least half it's size. Flick, shake, flick, and done. Then she spit out a whole bunch of dirt and grass that she had to accumulate in the catching of it. Much praise was had for ridding us of the evil vermin. She did perfect earthdog form-minus the barking but I can live with that.
So why is she like the only terrier that will hunt above ground but not below? She is a "go to ground" breed. . .but apparently, she doesn't know that.

Well, I took Riley down to Kentucky for a weekend of trialing at a new facility. Much better than when they hosted this same trial before. . .outside. . .in Southern Indiana. . .in late May = way too hot and too long of a drive for that crap. ;) Anyways, indoor on astroturf was really nice.

Saturday were some good runs. Standard was clean and working really nicely until I didn't think she was committing to a tunnel very well. Riley is like the only terrier I know who doesn't really like to go to the tunnel. Who would have thought? So when she did go in, I said "Good job". Well, apparently, she was like "Oh really? Did I do a good job?" and popped right back out of the entrance to check and make sure that she was doing good. Dang it! Why can't I keep my mouth shut sometimes? So that was our only problem with that run. . .a stupid handler. We finally broke our streak of NQs in JWW with a Q on Saturday. Pshew! That one had really been annoying me so I'm glad we worked that out. Only 3 more Q's till MXJ. . .oddly, that title is coming so much slower than the MX. . .who'd have thunk it?
Sunday was a of a different story. I've noticed that very very rarely can Riley string two good days together. I think it's the excitement of the trial that puts her over the top. . .she knows what's happening the second day and builds up all this anticipation before she goes in. So anyways, in a freakish thing, she broke her start line in Standard, which I knew was going to happen as soon as I left cause duh, another handler error. . .didn't enforce it when I knew she was gonna blow it. So she jumped the first jump and then decided to blow off the a-frame. . .an odd occurence to be sure. Think she was just too excited. . .she just likes to flat out run & screw those things that get in her way. So then I was all flustered cause couldn't believe that just happened and ended up taking a pin-wheel twice. . .hey, it looked like a good idea at the time. ;) JWW was again not successful. She pulled around a jump and then botched her weaves.
Oh well. Another weekend to give it a try this weekend. Just hope it's not too hot (or monsoon-y like it was last year).