Thursday, June 28, 2012

The Brews Brothers Help Feed Shelter Dogs



By writing this blog post, we have donated a 17 pound bag of dog food to shelter dogs!

Wanna do the same? Check out The Daily Corgi for details!

We love the Daily Corgi! Porter's fish herding video is on there today, and he was "Dog of the Day" way back on April 13, 2011. Stout will be "Dog of the Day" next week! So stay tuned!


At The Park With The Girls

The Brews Brothers went swimming last week with the girls from Agility on Stumps. With the heat lately, most of our walks have been at parks with creeks  :)

Dally says "Come on in, the water's nice!"



Still working on fetching sticks in the water.

Mesa isn't so sure about getting in...


Two tailed cardigan? Or two cardigans?

Uh, Dally? You got a little something on your face. And your neck. And the other side of your face...

See the duck on the rock?

A cardi-gator stalking his supper


Much easier prey than the duck.


I know Porter was in only one photo. He spent much of his park time with his head in a groundhog hole. Or running from hole to hole. He has a different agenda when we come to this park...  :)

Wednesday, June 27, 2012

A Weekend With The Nephews

My nephews finally got to meet Stout. It was also the first time they had been down to visit us in Kentucky.

A photo of the Brew Crew taken by Trevor.

Stout REALLY liked Gage.

A movie the boys made featuring Stout.

Stout & Gage ran free while we played disc golf.
Watch out, Porter!

Porter decided it was safest to take shelter in the bushes. See his butt over to the right?


Stout also got to experience the confusion of water balloons.




Monday, June 25, 2012

More Keeneland Photos

I've really enjoyed walking the dogs at Keeneland lately.

Why didn't I do this sooner? Oh, probably because I didn't have 2 dogs to photograph  :)  I'm getting tired of the same park backgrounds, looking for something a little different.



Look at Stout staying there! I didn't even tie to him to anything!
The little guy is finally learning to stay!


More staying from Stout!


They would fence off the entrance to the track if they didn't want you to make "corgi racing" photo-ops. Right?

It's not like I let them tear it up. Or actually race.

If anything, they helped by cleaning up some horse poo...

Friday, June 22, 2012

After The Herding Trial...


So what we do after a long, hot day at a herding trial? Well, if it is at Hado-Bar Farm, we stop by Jamison Creek Nature Preserve on our way back to the hotel!




It gives the dogs a chance to cool off and gives me some time to gather my thoughts and come up with a game plan for the following day  :)




While Porter always seems to be part terrier, I think Stout is part water retriever.
He will put his snout under the water to pick up large rocks...

Porter gets a second chance to practice his herding moves on some fishes.




Why did she throw my stick all the way out there?!



Stout was just a little bit tired afterwards  :)

This park, Jamison Creek Nature Preserve, is a little hidden gem. I couldn't find a website for it, and it isn't marked on Google maps either. I stumbled upon it (my GPS listed it) last year after a herding trial up there.

If you were my friend on Facebook back then, you will recall it was the one where the old people were about to have sex  :)  I don't blame them, it is a REALLY nice park...



Thursday, June 21, 2012

Cleveland Sheltie Club Herding Trial

Porter & I tried Started Sheep again at the Cleveland Sheltie Club's trial in Nova, OH on June 9-10. This is the same location that was successful for us at the Cardigan Specialty back in April. We were not as successful this time!  :)

 

Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009
He looks so young!

 

We did only sheep this time. I had entered this trial way before the Cardigan Specialty, so I had no idea how our duck herding there was going to go. I assumed it wouldn't go well and I didn't want to repeat the performance. Oh well!



Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009
Porter tended to run into my stick even then...


On Saturday, I excused us. The run started bad & I knew it was only going to get worse  :)

Porter wouldn't go to the cone, then he wouldn't lie down at the cone, then he left the cone before I sent him... His outrun was terrible, obviously.

But since he left before I sent him, I was already at the B cone which gave me a little headstart on the way to the C cone. The sheep actually lifted toward me, but I made my usual rookie mistake and let them go past me as I argued with Porter to lie down.

I continue to think that if I don't get him to listen to me then, he's not going to listen for the entire run... This has been proven many times that it just doesn't matter  :)  He's not going to listen then because he needs to cover the sheep escaping. Which makes him right & me wrong.

Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009
He's been doing his signature "lie down" for a long time!


I went ahead and exhauseted the sheep. As I was headed toward the gate, the judge stopped me & commended me for excusing myself  :)  I'm still debating whether this is truly a compliment!

She did warn me though that it would probably be best if I just took him off the course instead of letting him exhaust the sheep. Point well taken, she was exactly right. It was kind of a reward...


Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009


The next day I was prepared! I had a plan, not just for the run, but leading up to the run as well. I had thought about my mental game a lot in the hotel that night  :)

And we had the best run we've ever had!

We didn't qualify, but as you see on the score sheet below, we were rocking! Until we failed...  :)

Only 1 point off on the OLF? It was the best one he's ever had :)



As my friend Lisa says, I "got into Porter's head" before we entered the gate. He marched out to the cone with me, lied down quietly, and waited for me to send him. And since he did, I was able to position myself to cue a nice wide outrun (not a "border collie" outrun by any means, but a respectable corgi outrun).

He did push the sheep past me on the way to the cone, but instead of arguing with him, I just jogged with the sheep and let him keep them to me. We lost them after our turn around the cone. But that happens almost everytime  :)

So I took that opportunity to lie him down on our way to retrieve them. After he fetched them to me, I took another moment to have him hold them to me on the fence. I made him lie down. I made him "get out." Then we headed for the Y.

The Y, Z, and Runway went great, only a couple 1/2 points off. But after the runway is where I made my fatal rookie mistake that got us disqualified...




Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009
"Sheeeep!"


We lost the sheep to the exhaust somewhere between the runway & the center panels. Did I make the "4"? I honestly don't remember. Did I send Porter to cover the escape? I really don't remember. But at that time, I thought the answer to both was "no."

So we retrieved them from the exhaust and headed back to the "4." This was actually one of the better fetches we've had, we didn't use the fence, but went across the pen. We hit the "4," turned, Porter over-flanked and we lost them to the exhaust again. We took them back up to the "5" then exhausted them.

I felt really good. So did Porter, he even went to the grain pan for a reward on our way out :)

So why does it say we were disqualified above on the sheet? Well, the judge counted our first escape  on the center panels as an attempt. So I disqualified myself by going back to redo it :(  We basically got double points off.
I was really upset with myself. Another rookie mistake. The judge even said in her briefing that we could ask her while we were on course if something counted as an attempt. But I didn't ask. Because I knew it wasn't!  :)  See, the same thing had happened to us before. But I hadn't redone the obstacle that previous time and we were disqualified because we didn't redo it.

So this time I was not going to let that happen again! But I missed one key point: this had been an attempt. Oops.
I really need some sort of herding strategy class  :)  I just keep making these dumb rookie mistakes!



Photo from our very first herding trial: AHBA in November 2009
I have learned since then that this is not the way you exhaust sheep! Another rookie mistake  :)
How did I even open that gate?

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Breading Cats

John began a new hobby today: breading cats!



He started with Zero and a tortilla. Tortilla kittehs are a little more rare.

For more info on breading cats, click on the following photos of inbread cats:




To bread your own cat, check out this tutorial.



No "Muskrat Love" Here...

It all started as a normal day at the park...


Porter was busy herding fishes in the creek.



As our attention turned to Stout, Porter wandered to the other side of the creek & went into "hunting mode."



Suddenly we heard a splash and looked over just in time to see Porter grab a muskrat from it's den in the bank. He chomped it twice and laid it down... dead.



Of course, just like most of his kills, he couldn't just leave it there.


So he carried it up the stream, with Stout following right behind.

When we told him he would not be bringing it home for supper, he decided to bury it in the bushes next to the stream. I assured him it would probably still be there next time we came. Ugh.