Off Leash Canyon

"Off Leash Canyon" is Zephyr's favorite place to go hiking because, as the name suggests, he gets to run off leash.


I don't really know what the real name of the canyon is but it leads in to Kelly Canyon. Off Leash is about a 5 minute drive from our house, which is also nice.


It is a beautiful little canyon that is green and full of flowers in the summer, has nice canyon walls that make it unattractive for deer and that Zephyr won't run out of, and is almost always devoid of humans. I would say that we see people there maybe 20% of the time and they have always been very nice.


So, Zephyr gets to run free and fast in the canyon.


And, believe it or not, Zephyr is great off leash (unless he sees a dog, human, or deer, which is why we hike here). He generally doesn't like us to be out of his sight too long and will wait or come check in, and he responds to a recall by turning and running up to me.



The only bummer is we can't hike here during the winter because of snow. We're taking advantage of the nice fall weather a lot lately.

What a cute butt!

Caron

Lure Coursing Fun

The last two weekends we have gone lure coursing! Zephyr loves it! Last weekend we went to Black Canyon City at the Krazy Horse Ranch. Zephyr finished his JC on Saturday and went on to two great runs on Sunday. YAAA!


This is a video of his second run. He looks like a small dot but I think you can see that he is really following the lure well.

This weekend we went to New Mexico for a trial outside of Albuquerque, in Stanley. Unfortunately things didn't go as well. On his first run a dog came up from behind and got a bit grumpy at Zephyr. Zephyr was startled and turned around and gave the other dog the business. He did continue to run the course though. The other dog was excused for the day. Then on his second run a dog came from behind again and bumped him. Not on purpose or aggressively but it startled him again. After this he was concerned about the other dogs and was looking over at the other dogs and even moving out to let them pass. Needless to say I feel really bad because I want this to be fun for him. He still loves to run and had a great practice run. So, I think we will take a break from coursing for a few weeks. Maybe we'll do a practice in early November and then a trial in late November. The rule for everything we do is "it has to be fun".

Caron

CGC Test Pictures

I just got some pictures of our Canine Good Citizen (CGC) test from a friend.

This is me returning after walking away. Look at that focus! And I might say, what a handsome boy.Don't I look just fine and happy? Who cares if my mom is gone?

Okay, that's enough. You can come back now. Now! Now!

On another topic. This morning we had an agility lesson with Monica, we won the lesson from the raffle at the Performance Day along with a set of tunnel snuggers. It was great! Zephyr was a little distracted and goofy at first. But then he seemed to calm down and get into it. He was able to do the tire no problem, something he hadn't had much practice with. Then sequence in a straight line jump, tire, jump. He did so well we progressed to learning the pinwheel and "out". He did run off some but it was generally easy to get him and refocus. YEAH!

Caron