What a stunning weekend to finish off the week with! We managed to keep a ship afloat while Vickie was down south, and it looks like she had a fabulous time. She’s back to work now- so make sure you treat her kindly while her system adjusts!

Tuesday marked the end of our movie poster competition- congratulations to Belle, who won with her 'Psycho' display, and over 200 likes! She went home beautiful and white on Wednesday- and less a whoooole lot of hair. It's spring time folks- now is the time to book your dog in for a deshed! Check how much coat Belle lost- and she's a short coated dog!

Mark joined Vickie down the line Thursday for the Fielding Jumpers Champ Show. Some awesome clear rounds over the weekend, with KC achieving her JAG title- Jumpers A Gold. This means her and Mark and collected over 70 clear rounds at the highest level at Jumpers Champs Shows! You may now address her as KCMEGO ADXA Gold JAG. She had 5 clear rounds out of 6 this weekend! Not to be outdone, the pocket rocket Steel also achieved 5 clear rounds, and nabbing a 3rd, 4th and 5th place. Mitch also pulled in a 4th place, well done team!

Meanwhile, I spent Saturday at a Rugby 7’s tournament and as usual, made it into a training opportunity. Taking your pet to the local sports game can be a fun experience... or it can also be an absolute nightmare. The difference is in the approach 😉

You really need to consider your dog before you do this- it saddens me to see the amount of stressed out dogs I see in locations like this. Your bombproof family dog might handle this with ease, but your nervous, high energy terrier might need a bit more careful of an approach.

My youngest dog Pika is a good example of a dog that needs a careful approach. I got her from the pound 6 months ago, and she can be a very sensitive dog. When things go right, they go RIGHT. But should they go wrong, she takes a while to recover from them.

We've had a bit of practice in these scenarios- she’s attended Rugby games on and off through the season.

There are a few different challenges at a sports game:

-Loud, yelling people. This can be really scary for a sensitive dog, they often take the yelling to heart.

-Loud whistles

-Mobs of people

-The ball being thrown at high speed… No Pika, that’s not your ball, and you cannot chase the humans carrying it!

So with this in mind, my approach on the weekend was:

I was prepared. I had favourite treats, a chew, toy and an appropriate leash (no flexis here). I gave Pika as much distance as she needed. We started off with a bit of distance between us and the sideline but progressed really quickly. I only asked her for behaviours she *knows*. While I might consider this a training session, only in the sense to ‘proof’ her existing behaviours. This is not the time to be teaching something new! She already has a pretty solid foundation on her ‘settle’, and this was a time to practise it.

We took breaks. We went off to sniff around the park and play with her ball. She wasn’t required to be performing a task for me every single second, that wasn’t the aim of the exercise. I wanted her to relax. She was allowed to explore her environment, and she earned a lot of treats for simply doing ‘nothing’!

I also had to be an advocate for my dog. While I was more than happy people and kids to come up and give her love (she loves people), I had to stop a few dogs from approaching. Not because she’s not great with dogs- the opposite really. She’s a total moron around other dogs. And the side of the rugby pitch is not the place I want to be dealing with dogs tangled in leads, and Pika potentially starting a very fun game of chase.

We were joined about ¾ of the way through by Sav’s puppy Pixie. And what a fun experience for her! Pixie is Pika’s little doppelganger (though not for long, at 4 months she is going to outgrow her very quickly!). Pixie coped really well with the environment- a perfect example of a well bred, stable dog that’s had an awesome upbringing. While she has been to agility events, a rugby tournament is a whole different ask. But her and Pika were far to busy trying to bait each other into a game to worry about the big loud men running around!

This might seem a little contradictory to what I’ve written above- but what’s important for Pixie is different than what is important to Pika.

This was Pixie’s first experience at a sports match- and although she loves me, I’m not her Ma! I wasn’t worried about perfect settled behaviours, I just wanted a fun, positive experience. Plenty of time to achieve those other behaviours later!

Ok folks, that's my novel done for the week. I'm off to bury myself in Uni assignments! Chat soon :)

Well crikey- a week of all seasons to start off October with a bang! With some cold and very wet moments, we were pleased to see the sun come out on Thursday. I was stuck indoors at Uni for most of the week, but can’t say I was too sad about that, peeking at some of the weather that was had!

Vickie waved us goodbye Thursday and headed off down south for a well-deserved break. In true Dogs Galore style, her holiday has been filled with all thing’s dogs - of course!

Perfect timing to test out the new car crates , Vickie took main crew away with her (Trigger, Wheedle, Alaska and Cilla).

After a stopover in Otaki to visit friends, and a lesson with the amazing Charlotte Rundgren from Dynamic K9’s, it was southward bound for the crew!

First trip on the ferry for Alaska, who was far more interested in her stuffed kong than the fact she was travelling to a new Island. The weekend brought the ‘Top of the South’ National NZ Dog show! Of course, always time for some agility (with Wheedle picking up a cool 2nd place in a Snooker round).

Last we heard from Vickie was that she was roaming the town of Murchison with her partner in crime Bruce- watch out South Island!

Sav and I spent Saturday at Hybrid Dog Training, attending workshops. Consent was the big theme of the weekend- it is not just for people! The idea of having a dog give consent to a procedure may sound odd to some folk, but it’s been a hot topic in the dog training world over the past year or two.

You see, animals can’t tell us in words that they are uncomfortable- we must look for other signs. Smaller, more subtle changes in behaviour to tell us when we are getting close to (or crossing) that invisible threshold.

Even better, we can deliberately structure our training sessions to include clear yes/no opportunities. Incorporating “start button” behaviours into our training sessions lets us do just that: involving the animal in the learning process, providing clear choices, making sure all of our training sessions (especially those including stressful or scary things) are deposits instead of deductions, AND making the training process faster and more efficient. I definitely look forward to having more lessons with Kelly!

At last, but not least, while the boss is away, I have taken the opportunity to start giving away free things! (Shh, nobody tell her!). Head on over to our Facebook page, and vote for your favourite ‘movie poster’!

Have an excellent week everyone! Lauren.

And just like that- Winter is well and truly over (could somebody tell that to the weather!?), daylight saving has finally come and we're into October!

Last week was a busy week for the team- along with some pretty atrocious weather, we had a staff training session on Friday to brush up on our handling skills.

On wet weather days, we make use of our garage (mainly for the little guys) and our wet weather areas (concrete & wood chip) for the big guys. We have a lot of dogs come to the property, so it's important to manage the grounds well to make sure they're not turned to mud! Our new shed balcony's are working well for the lighter showers- they enable us to get the dogs out of the rain when it blows through! Although wet days can look pretty miserable, the dogs couldn't care less. They still get to see their friends, and it's a great opportunity for practicing group obedience skills (like groups sits, and gate manners!)

Our staff training went well, and everyone obliged to my 9AM request on their weekend- which I was very thankful for as I had to shoot off to uni afterwards. We strive to stay up to date on latest handling techniques, to make sure you and your dog are getting the best service possible at Dogs Galore.

The weekend brought daylight saving (yay!) and an agility competition in Hamilton for Vickie, Mark, Sav and myself. Vickie brought home the goods with Trigger, placing 3rd and 5th in two of her senior runs, with another 3rd in an Intermediate. Sav had some cool runs with a client dog Murphy- he's still very new at this whole agility thing, and is showing some flash skills! I was lucky enough to borrow Mitch (one of Marks dog), as my own dog is out with injury. We made it around with a few miscommunications, but had an absolute blast!

Sunday brought the Annual Pirongia Craft Fair, did anyone else attend?

Talk to you next week! :)

Pixie Pup learning about life at agility! (Sav's newest addition)

Waiting out the rain in one of our sheds!

Murphy (Client Schnauzer) at agility on the weekend

Sav & Murphy (Client Schnauzer)

Mitch spent the weekend with Lauren and her crew!