Days Gone By

Zachary: "Around..."

Zachary: "... sit..."

Zachary: "Cookie!"

Dog Blog Post #2244

I Used To to do Rally Obedience with my first Golden Retriever, Beau.

Rally is a numbered course, marked by cones, which dog and handler pairs would walk briskly through, performing the indicated exercise at each station (e.g. sit, down, turns, etc.)

Done correctly, Rally felt like a dance.

And while Beau was completely indifferent to the activity itself, he loved being at the shows. People, dogs, noise, bustling activity - none of it phased him in the slightest. He greeted everyone, sniffed everything, and in return for several hours of socializing he granted me two minutes of his (mostly) undivided attention to finish a course.

We went to a grand total of five shows, failed once (my bad), earned Beau's Rally Novice title and generally had a wonderful time.

I started Zachary down the Rally path when he was old enough, and he was much more excited about both the training (ANY training) and the activity.

Alas, he clearly didn't enjoy being at the show one bit. I think it was all too overwhelming for a dog who wants to understand everything that's going on. I walked him around some, but ultimately didn't compete that day.

And thus ended his Rally career.

Henry... well.. Henry is Henry. He might well have been the best of all three, as he's smart enough to learn what he would need to learn, hungry enough to be motivated to learn it, and social enough to enjoy being at the shows.

But by the time he came around my interested had turned to photography, which is MUCH less work for me and way more rewarding for the boys.

Photography Assignment

Our Daily Challenge - Aug 23, 2016 - "I Used To"


Daily Dog Challenge 1758. "Days Gone By"

Henry: "?"

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