Ellagant Full O Mischief CCD.... and rant warning

Well, we finally did it, we finally got there and I am absolutely over the moon! Ladies and gents, can we please have a round of applause for Leo aka "Ellagant Full O Mischief CCD" (and please take note of those three letters at the end *vbg*!!!).

Ok, it is very seldom that I like piccies with ME in it, but I just *love* this one of Leo and myself. It is one for the memory book ;). I am sure everyone that reads this has already heard the story coz, lets face it, I am VERY excited and have pretty much been shouting it off from the rooftops (hey, it isn't often that I brag!). But just for a basic re-cap, Leo and I gained our title in 5 trials, something I am proud of considering he is my first trialling dog and the only reason we failed the 2 others were due to the stays. A summary of our results:

5th August, 2006
VCA State Obedience Trial, KCC Park.
52 Entries CCD (approx 17 in each ring).
Judge: MR M KLECKA
Qualifying Score: 88 (out of total of 100).
Place: 2nd

29th October, 2006
Eastern Suburbs Obedience Trial (13 in the ring)
Judge: MRS L KLECKA
Qualifying Score: 92
Place: 2nd

17th March, 2007
Southern Obedience Dog Club (18 in ring ) AM Trial
Judge: MR R CARLSON
Qualifying Score: 89
Place: Equal 2nd, 3rd on countback.

CCD TITLE!!

PM Trial (18 in ring)
Judge: MR R CARLSON
Qualifying Score: 92
Place: Equal 1st, 2nd on countback

So each trial, we have placed, and passed well! I have another CCD trial on Sunday and one of our friends from Syd wants to watch so i'll still enter. Then we start Novice in April, and I think/ hope we are pretty much ready for that. At least Leo has shown me that he is confident once again in his stays (holding them while a dog sniffs his butt is no mean feat!) not to mention the relaxed demeanour he had while in the stay while his Mum was standing at the other end, heart pounding and madly trying to recite the words in her head to "Way back into love" from 'Music and Lyrics'! LOL!.

So, does Leo's great weekend end there? Nope! We went to the All Creatures Day for the RSPCA yesterday where Leo was to do an Agility Demo. He did this in fine style and was very confident and speedy through our very basic course. I was happy with this as you can imagine that it could be hard for a dog to concentrate when there is mounds of people standing around the arena making lots of noise and holding goodness knows what type of hot food in their hands :P. Since I was there with the flyball team, they invited me to also do a demo for flyball (again, we haven't really done this before). I agreed and we started with Leo doing a recall over the jumps to me.... no problemo Mum! Try placing a ball at the other end and recalling to me - 1st time - yep, but he dropped the ball, 2nd time - like a pro! Howz that! I was later told that they would love to have me on their team :P. I'm soo proud of my boy!

I had a bit of 'fun' if you could call it that as we also had to direct the 'celebrities' and thier dogs over the course. But of course, celebrities being celebrities don't really want to listen to you and were trying to force their dogs through things or you tell them to 'hold their dog by the collar/chest' so that it won't fall off and they don't listen - dog falls off :(. One guy told me to F*%$ off coz I wasn't helping ..... Grrr.... HATE celebs!

I also found out some interesting news from someone there... a worker at the RSPCA who had.... in the nicest way possible, a 'big mouth'..... LOL. I don't mean that in a bad way either. She saw Leo and came running up saying..."oooh Aussies".... oh I just love Aussies! She was patting him and commenting on how much he is like one of the Aussies they have in the centre. "WHAT" I say - you have an Aussie here?? She said yes, but it is an 'inspector's case. Well, all I said to her was - look I know you can't tell me anything coz it is an inspectors case and all, but if you ever need any assistance with fostering/re-homing etc,etc, please don't hesitate to contact the ASCV. She was quite pleased to hear that, but at the same time, probably thinking "oops, I hope I haven't said too much". She then called her friend over to show him "Leo" and said.... "doesn't he look like ANGEL"..... then all of a sudden it clicked. I *knew* the dog that was in there, and I *knew* why she was there.... I felt sick to the stomach. I don't want this dog to go back to her rightful owner by any means, but I just wish she didn't have to spend an extended amount of time in the shelter.... this is a dog that was with her owner pretty much 24/7, and is now stuck in the shelter.... but not only that - it brought memories to why she was there..... and i've tried sooo hard to block those memories OUT! What also amazed me was that NOBODY knows what an Aussie is.... I don't mind general public (but quite a few of them knew what aussies were), but people working for the RSPCA had NO IDEA!!! "Oh is that a Kelpie x"..... "Now I know that one (pointing to Kinta) is a BC"..... even an INSPECTOR had no idea what breed they were, which I think is disgusting.... no wonder so many dogs go through that are not properly identified.... not to mention, how many of these dogs are going to their new homes, where the new owners know absolutely nothing about the breed? Shouldnt' the workers/ inspectors do a little reading on the breeds first?? I mean really?!

Then of course there were those that claimed "oh your poor babies had their tails docked".... I got sick of saying "No, they are NOT docked but a natural bobbed breed".... to which most people replied "Thank God for that"! Ok, so i'm not the biggest advocate for Tail docking, but I am dead-set against puppy farming and BYB. I would rather breeders be allowed to dock/remove dew claws if BYB and puppy farmers were banned. Yet, I can't help this inkling feeling that despite all of RSPCA's publicity, they don't really care about those matters.... they don't care how the dog was produced... all they care about is that they are able to keep their tails? What makes me even more frustrated is the fact that breeders of other traditionally docked breeds are coming out and saying that their breeds are 'naturally bobbed' also. Which makes people skeptical to believe Aussies are. I mean, I was just reading in Dogs Life that the boxer, in the late 1990s was crossed to the natural bobbed CORGI to pass on the NBT gene. They then went o on to say that through that 1 cross they have been able to get NBT boxers..... I mean... really!? Firstly a Corgi x Boxer is NOT going to look like a p/b BOXER and secondly, they would never be allowed to be shown (not being pedigree).... 3rdly, ONE cross is producing a whole multitude of NBT's..... sorry, but I just don't buy it! Also, you can't have a NBT with all bob and all tail - there has to be in-betweens, like in the aussies - 1/2 tails 1/4 tails etc... I mean, sure not all in the one litter - thats genetics, but across t he board.... Maybe i've been spending too much time in the 'pedigree dog world' but I don't feel the way I once did to shelters any more.... I don't feel that they *are* out there for the benefits of the individual dogs etc, etc. They don't care where they go to once they leave the shelter.... they *still* don't provide education in regards to the breeds that are offered.... in some instances, people going to a shelter are going in just as blind as those buying from a BYB or pet shop..... Maybe it is Leo's Story that has brought this out for me? I dunno, but I just feel that there is an underlying 'what we don't know won't hurt us' attitude with the shelters. Having said that, I do feel that the VAAT is probably the best shelter out there as they have been on task with Monash organising a suitable re-homing system, whereby they actually spend individual time with the dogs to make them better pets and more likely to be re-homed. They actually have a very low return rate (99% of the dogs are kept, once re-homed).

On another sad note, as most of you know, I am a frequent (perhaps too frequent *g*!) visitor of Dogzonline. Well, over the past few months there has been a really touching thread about a Poodle breeder who gave one of her pups to a family in Adelaide who had a 7yr old daughter that was dying. Her wish was to have a poodle. The family was willing to look after the poodle after she was gone, and so, the breeder gave her pup to them. I followed the story and was amazed and this lady's generosity. This is about the 3rd time she has done this, or something similar. A few weeks ago, someone started another thread saying that Page (the 7yr old girl) was very sick. She died early last week. I don't even know these people or those involved, but it just seems to cruel that someone so young can die yet, sooo many people who don't even deserve to breathe this air are alive and destroying other peoples lives.... I dunno, it just made me feel really bitter and soo sorry for the family who have lost their little girl. Doesn't help that the same day I read about a girls therapy dog that was killed, nay murdered and then sent back to her.....

Sorry about the twisted blog, but there have just been so many weird stories and things that have been happening this week!!! LOL!

On a nicer note..... I am running a "cutest dog" contest.... which got a much bigger response than I thought....so here are the "Finalists' and let me just say, some of them are pretty darned cute!