Friday, September 18, 2015

Summer happenings and Fall training.

Again, a lot has transpired since the last update.  Went to a few more shows with Ghost, but was pretty discouraged when the results were baffling again.  So, Ghost and I have been training for obedience and possibly rally.  He's a good boy, and loves working with me, but undoing his conformation training is proving to be difficult.  He gets the obedience part down very well, but can't get the idea that I don't want him to stack at rest any more, but to sit.  Everything else is going very well.  He's a smart boy and I'm sure it will click for him one day soon.
Heimy has become an integrated member of the pack, and has been getting along fine with all the other dogs.  He still has a little bit of resource guarding issues that we are working on, but they haven't caused any fights.  Even Moony seems to like him, and plays with him a lot.  We still don't let them roam freely together when we are not home, but it has been very encouraging that she has not even once seriously threatened him.  It's great to have peace in the house again.

I built another hen house (getting better at it each time), and this one will be much better suited for the upcoming winter.
I have panels for the sides and back that will be screwed in to place when it starts to get cold.  The back flap opens for easy removal of eggs and the front panel opens for ease of cleaning the coop.  You can also see our rooster.  This spring we plan on incubating some of the eggs to keep our flock sustainable.  We had issues this year with a bobcat that killed off 8 of our hens and two young turkeys, so we had to move the chicken yard back out front to deal with the predator.  Next spring we will try to move the chicken yard back to the side, and implement an electric wire around it at two levels to try to stop predators.  Moving the yard is a lot of work, but it is more healthy for the chickens to forage.

I ordered a new scooter from CTC Dog Sports, and a shorty harness from them.  Finally got to use them and really like them.  Here is Heimy's first run of the season.  It was pretty high humidity, so I wasn't pushing him.  Since it was only his 3rd time in harness I was also trying to be very encouraging.  He still has a lot of puppy in him. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=96t0G6A36kw

This was Princess' first run of the season and since she tends to run hot and because of the high humidity, we were taking it pretty easy as well. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0fKC1SuBTM

This season we hope to make more races (yeah every year we want to make more events, but hopefully this racing season we will have the opportunity to do more).