Her first REAL Demo day!

It has been a month since my last post about Raezor.  She has been doing so so well!  But I haven't taken a camera out with me to get new pictures.  I will try to rectify that!

A couple of weeks ago we went to another county to do a demo for their 4 H group. It was her first real demo ... her first chance to show off ... and she was awesome

She walked on the agility equipment as if it had been built just for her.

She sat, mostly patiently, waiting for all the discussion to be over with.  Then she had to watch 3 other dogs do demos.  Other dogs that were more experienced and were losing their minds watching everyone else work.  

But then it was her turn.  You couldn't have ordered better conditions with the wind to get a scent cone.

The grass was just high enough that all one had to do was lay down and they would disappear from view. If you click on the photos your computer should make them bigger.  Raezor is to the  right to the subject in the  top photo, and at the subject in the next photo. You can just barely make out the blue the boy was wearing.

I missed Raezor actually giving Kristi her alert, but here she is showing Kristi back to the boy.

 For her first demo, Raezor did remarkably well.  She saw it as another opportunity to work and took it as such.


Even since then, we have worked Raezor and continue to see improvement.  She is definitely teaching us that her learning style is 'it sticks when I figure it out, not when you make me do it.' 
We had been in a slight struggle with the "I love the subject" issue... the SUBJECT was THE best reward you could give her!  She wanted to stay with them, whether they responded to her or not, and just kiss kiss kiss over and over and over and over. While working on this, we accidentally set up a problem that, because of the way she found the subject, she couldn't get to them because of berry vines.  She didn't waste any time with the subject and ran right back to Kristi.  When they came back to the subject, she then found the route in that avoided the berry vines, and a party ensued.  It must have meant something to her because last weekend she found a woman she is dearly in love with, left after a short confirmatory it is YOU, and went right back to Kristi for the alert.  We are hoping this lesson sticks!


We did a water cadaver problem with her that day too.... she who has tried all to walk on, over around or just in general keep from getting into the water, discovered that something she gets rewarded for can be IN the water.... we were all laughing so hard, tears rolling down our faces, as she, while standing in water up to her chest, stuck her head into the water MULTIPLE times trying to get to the item... then began pawing it, trying to bring it to shore.... I think we may have taught her that water is FUN!


She is 11 months old.  Kristi has been working her since Sept 2010 - 7 months into training and she has got this game down, almost solid.  


Day by day, she and Kristi are getting there. 


Now, we're off to train!! (and yes, I am bringing my camera!)