Had a totally fantastic day today !
Gabriella and I took Kodi & Rhea to Kent for some field training, we arrived at a common surrounded by some fantastic woodland, on a cold crispy winters afternoon. We had already discussed what we had hoped to achieve with our dogs and our long term aims so could quickly set about a constructive assessment/training session.
Kodi was the first to be worked and after a brief run to blow away the journey’s cobwebs we began with his retrieves. I was first asked to demonstrate a simple retrieve for assessment, heel work/walking was assessed simply as we went along, as was general obedience such as recalls, waits, direction etc.
Having gained an idea of our level of work and obedience we then proceeded through a series of retrieves to assertain what Kodi and I did and didn’t understand. I couldn’t have been more pleased with him! We did seen retrieves, blind retrieves, memory retrieves, dummies were hidden in tree trunks, over tree trunks, up tree trunks, under leaf piles and each time Kodi waited nicely, looked to me for a command then hunted and found each and every one and delivered them back to me. Presentation of the retrieve still left something to be desired but with some help from our trainer it improved throughout our session and we have some good advice for homework. I very was pleased to hear just how much our trainer liked Kodi and how he worked today and i came away with lots of good advice, tips and tricks for moving forward with him.
Next was Rhea’s turn, our instructor was already aware that Gabriella is a complete novice and that Rhea is only a year old with not too much training under her belt so it was back out of the forest and into the higher ground to work on quartering which went well. Rhea was bidable as always and really listening to Gabriella and turning neatly at each indication from her. Gabriella then demonstrated a retrieve with Rhea so that she could be advised on what could be worked on until our next session and we called it a day.
Very much looking forward to our next session now.
