News 2006

December 20.

Well, it´s been awhile. Not much new but still a whole bunch as usual since I only write news so seldom. First of all, Hófi is a year old...wow how time flies. She went for a nice run by the sea on her birthday and the silly goons all went into the ice cold water, they didn´t seem to mind that there was ice and frost on the ground. Oh and we saw a seal that was keeping an eye on us and being cute right by the shore. They all got some nice "birthday supper" which was an all natural moist dog food and then they got a chicken flavoured bone to chew on for desert. She got some lovely birthday greetings from her "family" both in Holland and Norway. She is still tiny and very fine boned, it looks like she will never be a big girl but she is a cute one and what a character. Too much character sometimes, I have never had a dog (Icelandic or otherwise) who chews as much as she does. I honestly don´t know how to manage it. She has chewed up two duvet comforters so far (so quickly that I didn´t realise what she was doing until the stuffing was all over the place) as well as chewing the water bowl in Birta´s cage when she was in there with her for a very short time one day. It´s so weird that she should have such a need to chew things, I have tried to give her chew toys but she only likes soft toys and when she gets to play with them they are chewed to bits in a few minutes. She also chewed a whole in my heating pad and I think it was connected at the time, I don´t even know exactly how or when she did that because I´ve seldom had her out of my sight. I have watched her and not realised what she was doing sometimes because it only takes her seconds to chew holes in material, she must be part field mouse!

Other news is that Doppa and Óðinn had a few successful matings so we are excited about that, the day after I removed the advertisement from my homepage. How funny is that, like I said, jinxed especially because she was supposed to be finished with her season by then. As soon as I remove the ad, bingo! So for the time being I am not going to put another ad until we know for sure whether she is pregnant or not.  If it is successful then the litter should be born around the middle of February for my birthday!

Birta is still not in season but we are waiting for that. Maybe I´ve jinxed that too with the ad! Now we are kind of hoping that she will either start no later than this month or won´t start until later in the spring because we are planning a move. We have made a tough decision, if we can we will be going to Norway for a few years so Rúnar can go to school. We had planned on Canada but with the difficulties of immigration and him not being able to get into the school he wanted to go to and the lack of possibility of student loans to the schools over there we thought it is easier and cheaper to go to Norway. From there it is also cheaper to travel to Canada so hopefully we can still go over for visits on a regular basis. So anyway if Birta doesn´t start until just before we leave then we will take her with us pregnant and let her have the puppies there. If she starts sooner then we will have to mate her and then wait until the puppies are gone. We have a bit of a waiting list for her so I certainly hope we get enough puppies to fill the wishes and hopefully no more than that because it seems very difficult to sell any puppies (no matter what breed) here in Iceland at the moment, there are just too many people importing and breeding dogs for such a small country. Since she is already going on 4 in March we can´t wait too much longer for her first litter, if we decided in a couple years that we will let her have another litter then we don´t want her to be too old. We also want to be able to show her in future to be able to get a title on her, but she is getting a bit old for that to work out too so we need to get her into shape for the show season next year.

Big news about the clicker training, the Icelandic Kennel Club has offered me a job as a teacher. We will hold the next weekend seminar in the middle of January and if there is enough need for it we will hold another one a couple weeks later or in the beginning of February. So I should be a bit busy during the next few months getting everything ready and then holding the courses. I am hoping that we get a lot of younger people so that the next few years we can have a real active clicker environment within the IKC. Rúnar is thinking about taking a course with Canis when we move to Norway so that will be great if he can train in the future as well, at the moment he is my assistant and I think he has a great talent for dog training. Wow, I can´t wait to be able to take part in obedience and agility trials in Norway. I think Hófi will be a fantastic agility dog and Rúnar wants to train her and compete because she is so quick it is unbelievable, she´ll kick butt over there, no doubt. Hehehe

We´re going to have a very quiet Christmas as usual, missing family tremendously and I really wish we all lived closer together. December is my least favourite time of year because I haven´t been with my family for so many years at Christmas that I don´t even remember when we shared the holidays together last.

November 25.

I had written some news a couple days ago as you see but didn´t publish it until now so please read that news first! We have been busy getting ready for the Clicker Challenge tomorrow, I´m so excited but just as nervous. Went into Kópavogur yesterday to pick up some prizes from our wonderful sponsors Dýrabær and Vilhjálmur Ólafsson. It´s the first time a challenge (we call them games since these are totally beginners that will be taking part) is held in Iceland and I am going to do a write up and take photos of it so I am nervous that it will work out. I´m not sure how many will come from our course, I´ve heard from a few of them and they are looking forward to it so I hope they all show up. I´m feeling a bit better but still stuffed up so I hope my judging tomorrow will not be too unfair, hehehe

I went to visit Einar and Keli yesterday to try to help them mate Doppa with Óðinn, it didn´t go too well. I hope it will work out for them she might have a couple days of possibility left or she may be over the best time already. I´m hoping she is like her mother and is ready late in her season. Oh well, if not maybe next time. I think that will be a very interesting combination and I look forward to seeing puppies from those two. Doppa is such a sweetheart, so much like her mother.

So the "joke" of the day is an email I got from Beggi about the show today. Yes dog shows are funny things!!!

I guess I don´t have to explain this photo much but here is what the diploma says, Töfra Heida 1 prize, 1 place winners class, Champion Certificate, Best Female, Best of Breed, 3rd place Best in SHOW (it was a hunting breed show). Hummm  Congratulations Beggi and Heiða, that´s what she should have did at Hamar! :-)

Just had to write a bit of news and I´ll write some more after the Challenge tomorrow, hopefully with some photos also. We are trying to put together a more detailed homepage with a clicker section as well and I think I will put the photos there.

November 23.

We had intended to go to Norway for the Nordic Dog show and then the weekend before our plans changed since we no longer had a place to stay. Well we decided the day before we were to leave that we would ask Rúnar´s aunt if we could stay with her, she lives a little farther away but we would just drive the distance to the show and of course she was happy to have us so we packed a suitcase and took off. The dogs stayed at home and we had Rúnar´s brother stay at our house for the weekend, it was a great thing since the dogs were so calm and unruffled when we came home. The trip was fine but I was starting to get a bit sick with a sore throat, stuffed up head and overall feeling lousy with aching bones on the day of the show. The results at the show were not as good as I´d hoped and sadly a few bad results I wasn´t counting on as well.

So the good news of the show, I showed Valdís and she was Best Veteran of Breed with a champion quality ribbon. She also was 3rd Best Female with champion quality and a reserve-cacib. She was to come back later in the day to compete in the Best in Show Veteran ring. 

Sad news of the day, our beautiful female Töfra Heiða whom Beggi showed was dismissed with a 0 prize. She has always done quite well at shows and the judge said that she would have possibly won if she wasn´t missing a tooth! She is a wonderful female with extraordinarily good temperament and so obedient. I am very happy with her and like many of the breeders, other judges and exhibitors said to us, you definitely do not stop showing her or not breed from her, she is new blood to Norway and many judges are not as strict when it comes to teeth. One judge mentioned that she should have only dropped one prize for that fault and possibly gotten a 1 without a champion point or a 2nd prize, not a 0 ! But judges are all different and there is no use crying over spilt milk I guess. I personally didn´t get a chance to check out her mouth myself but Beggi said he has never heard anything mentioned about her teeth before and he wasn´t aware that she was missing one. Anyway, that was the saddest happening of the day because we actually thought she might have been able to win her breed!

In the Icelandic sheepdog ring we had a few other setbacks as well. I showed Icetops Nói for my friend Liv and he is a Junior (turned 15 months the day after the show). He got a first prize, honour prize, competed in the open and got 1 place and champion point, then went on to be the Best male and Best of Opposite Sex. He was too young to receive the Cacib but he did gain 2 titles that day because of his age. Junior Nordic Winner 06 and Nordic Winner 06. He is the son of Hófi´s uncle. A sweet little guy although he does have some obvious faults in his front and his tail isn´t very well curled it was so nice to do so well with him.

As for Töfra Dofri Brosi well I only have him on video, no photos in the ring. He and the other Champion that were shown didn´t like each other whatsoever, possibly it was because there was a female in heat at ringside. Anyway, the judge put the other dog in first place and Dofri in second and said no champion quality ribbons for either of these dogs today because they are showing very bad behaviour in the ring. I have to agree with the judge this is nothing we want to see in the ring but it was a shame that he would act that way, I feel so guilty because I asked his owner if he acts like that alot in the ring and he said no. I fear it was because I showed him and he didn´t remember me and was very insecure. I feel so awful that I insisted on showing him. I also showed his daughter and she got a second prize, the nicest female in the ring at the time but she had no coat whatsoever, totally bald, such a shame. Just not my day for showing dogs.

Later in the day, since I felt even more lousy as the day went on I didn´t think I could run in the huge Best in Show ring without getting an asthma attack so I asked one of the Junior handlers who was there to compete for Iceland (they won 2nd place! in the Junior Handling competition) to please show Dísa. She was more than happy to do that since it was her very first time at a show out of the country it was a real treat for her to be able to show in the Best in Show ring. Needless to say there were an enormous number of dogs (winners from both days competed) and she did not place but it was a wonderful site to see how well she was shown and to be able to admire her in the big ring from the side lines.

November 13.

We just finished a busy and very fun weekend after a lot of stressful preparation work, that's why I haven't written in awhile. We held our first Clicker class here in Selfoss, this class was built up the way we felt we should have did with the first one. We live and learn! The seminar was on Saturday started at 11 am and finished at 5 pm we had a wonderful group of people show up and so many more than we expected, including our wonderful vet who we were especially happy to see. It seems Freyja was also happy to see her as while doing her "job" of picking winners in the lottery she all of a sudden went off in her direction. Of course Freyja did finish her job and did it well but it was so funny to see her nose go up in the air all of a sudden and then she walked under the table to her vet for just a second. I'm kicking myself today that we didn't take any photos or videos because I would have loved to have had some of it on tape.

Anyway, we had a great day Saturday with a few dogs helping us out, the youngest was an adorable 9 week old Icelandic Sheepdog puppy named Ingólfur. He was so sweet and worked so well that I think he could have sold anyone on Clicker training all by himself. We started out charging the clicker and eye contact, then he spontaneously sat so we took that and used it to our advantage :-) After a bit of that I took a step and as I predicted he followed so in a few minutes we had him at a perfect heel without a leash. Unbelievable performance from this little puppy and better than I had hoped. Then we took in a 6 month old Icelandic puppy and she too was fun to work with but so different. We charged the clicker, eye contact and then planned on doing the sit with her but she has been trained to stand for the show ring and was not about to offer me a sit, she was sure she was doing the right thing just standing there looking at me. It was cute actually...so we tried a different approach and starting the cup game. Again she just wanted to offer me the stand so I had to click her for any movement, so one step, click, another step click and then she started loosening up and offered me a bit more. She was coming along great with the cup and then suddenly she knocked it over and it made a noise, she jumped and everybody laughed at her. Of course this made her even more curious about that silly cup so we did it a few more times and then went to the mouse mat. Unfortunately there was a bit of distraction of people walking in and out just as we were demonstrating with this little female. She had a tough time but I was extremely happy with the great choices she made a couple times, she ran towards the kitchen to see the people, got half way there and came running back to put her front feet on the mat and looked at me. The people watching might not have seen the "choices" she took but they were laughing and talking about her and how amazing it was when she started putting her feet on the mat over and over and over again. Funny thing about her was that after the seminar was finished the outside door was open and she was loose so she came running back into the building and straight to me, her owner came behind her and said, well she certainly likes being around you and the clicker! LOL Apparently she showed off her whole routine as soon as she got home. Sweet little puppy.

We played a few timing games and there was laughter and a lot of clicking, like music to my ears! :-)

The third "victim" was a female in standing heat (yes, of course this is typical that she would time it this way) we charged the clicker, eye contact and then went to the target stick. She was two years old and a bit harder to get her to offer behaviours. She came around though and when I started getting her to back up her owner was really happy because he wants to teach her freestyle and realised that it wasn't going to be as hard as he thought. In all it was a wonderful day with a delicious lunch and lots of smiling people and happy dogs! They went home with a two part lesson, first charge the clicker and then do some eye contact training. 

The next day we met at the horse training centre and got to meet a bunch of great dogs, some were noisy and rambunctious when they got there and their owners were a bit sceptical. But after a few minutes of "calming" them you could almost hear a pin drop. WOW, it worked and then they were all ready to start, the dogs were totally focussed in just a few minutes. We had two people to each dog, one to be a tree with the lead while the owner concentrated on clicking and rewarding. These were mostly older puppies and a couple harder to handle older dogs. We worked on eye contact, sit, walking on loose leash, with a couple we just worked on them being calm and having all paws on the ground. It doesn't sound like much but we were very happy with the results and I hope the owners are as well. We had one Border Collie that was very upset around other dogs, barking lunging and pulling on the lead so hard that Rúnar needed to be the strong "tree" to hold him. In about 30 minutes he was so calm that he would be on loose lead and look at the other dogs and even listen to the others barking without being bothered. Of course he was being clicked a lot for that behaviour but he was choosing to do it so we were very pleased. And the neatest thing was it was an 11-12 year old girl that was clicking him in the end. What a wonderful thing to watch, she was just a natural and we are excited to see how well they will do. Unfortunately they had to leave early so he didn't get to do all the other exercises. We took some time to talk to them about how to continue loose leash walking at home and we look forward to seeing them all back in two weeks time to do a few challenges together that will be geared toward total beginners. We had a lot of fun and met some really fun dogs of all types.

All in all a great weekend and we already have a waiting list for the next class, who would have guessed. This course was just supposed to be to help out a few friends.   

October 28.

Hmmm it's been a while. I've been busy, finished my clicker class last Wednesday and have been organizing a new different class. I will be posting the advertisement tomorrow at the pet stores in the area and we looked at and booked the conference room today. The first class didn't go as well as I would have wanted because a couple of the dogs didn't show up at every class, I had set it up more like a normal class because I thought that's what was expected but then the owner's were so scared that we would "ruin" the training they already had for the show ring (I know I tried to explain that we wouldn't but they were not willing to take the chance) so I was very limited with what I could teach them at least until after the show was over, and results were very mixed. I did notice as well and got some feedback that more "show and tell" would have been useful since they felt they needed more visual help. I did do some demonstrations towards the end with their dogs but we were in a pet store/grooming center so the smells and sights were hard to compete with for their attention.

I've decided that I would like to hold a seminar this time in a much more neutral area with a few dogs to demonstrate with. I have made a plan to hold a 3 day course, first day a long all day seminar with demonstrations and practice sessions with the clicker (first with no dogs). I'm hoping the understanding of the theories and philosophy will be good enough after a long day (hopefully a fun one) of watching and listening to be able to teach their dogs on their own at home rather than having to hold a many week course. Next day I am planning to help the participants with their own dogs and see if they have understood the seminar. The last day will be two weeks after the seminar in order to give people a chance to play with their dogs and teach them basic skills before they come back. It will be set up like a type of "clicker challenge" with different fun games and team competitions. I will spend the next few weeks putting together the games and figuring out how I want to "judge" the winners. Most likely we will have team winners as well as individual winners. I am so looking forward to this and hope it will be lots of fun for those that take part. My main hope is that it will be a FUN experience for everyone including the dogs and less of an "obedience based" course in order to change people's ideas of what dog training should be all about. It may not be what people are used to and that should be my main goal this time. Another reason for the two week gap is that we will be taking a weekend trip in the meantime to Norway on the weekend of the Nordic Winner show so I can show Valdís and hopefully Töfra Dofri Brosi. I'm looking forward to that trip as well, it's been so long since I was in Norway and I will be staying with my friend Laila and her husband Tryggve. I haven't seen them in about 5 or 6 years. 

The reason I decided to start the clicker course right away was because I have a few people that want to start teaching freestyle dancing with their dogs so I want to give them a good base for that through understanding of the clicker. For my demonstrations I will use one 2 year old Icelandic female who is destined to dance in the future (her owner is a young teenage boy who is a dancer himself) and two small puppies, the first is around 5 months and the other will be 9 WEEKS old at the course (he will be my first "victim" :-) ). I am so excited to see how it will go, I love teaching really young puppies and it is always impressive to people who have never seen a clicker used to see results in such a young dog. My plan is to teach the little guy to walk a near perfect heel in maybe 10 minutes or so. I know it's possible because I have done it with my own puppies so I hope it works out. But of course it depends on how comfortable he feels in a new place, I may just start to click him for sitting or high five or something like that. We'll see. Boy, now I'm all excited and very very nervous all at the same time. We are hoping that this might be the first of many such seminars but in order for that to happen we will need to get enough participants together to pay for the conference room (they don't come cheap!) and it needs to be fun and a success so that others can see the results these new "clicker trainers" get.

Oh I was a bit surprised but I have been getting comments from people that were at the show about how well behaved and well shown Birta Freyja was. Some of those people were witness to her before or during our training sessions and so know how much progress she actually made. I am so happy to hear that people took notice and it makes me proud of little Birta and also gives me a bit of confidence that I can work through difficult behaviour problems with my trusty clicker :-)  Speaking of "Daddy´s girl", she has been going out for walks lately with Rúnar and he has come home smiling! Need I say more, she is definitely turning into a normal dog and even the neighbour has remarked at how different and calm she has become.

The weather has been so much colder lately and winter is here unfortunately, but the dogs love it and enjoy running around by the ocean. Poor little Hófi didn´t realise the other day that the water was so cold and she ran in and got her feet wet, boy did she run back out in a hurry too! Hehehe There was even ice around the shoreline and she needed to investigate that. She is a silly little girl, cute but a real character and so curious. Maybe we will set some newer photos in the photo album soon, depending on if we find the time.

October 09.

Bad news I just got a phone call, my little Tinna is dead, she apparently had cancer of the uterus about six months ago that was removed then last week she seemed very down and was limping and lost the spark to her eyes. So on Thursday her owners for the past 6 years (who are wonderful people and loved her like a daughter) asked the vet to please do everything they could to find out what was wrong. They found cancer in her bones so her owners said they would rather say goodbye to her than to have to watch her suffer. She fell asleep with her paws on her Daddy´s arm and looking into his eyes, he said it was the hardest thing he has ever had to go through. They were extremely sad when they phoned me tonight to tell me about her and well as always I can't hold back the tears myself when one of my little "babies" leaves the world. I am so glad though that she didn't have to suffer and I feel for her owners tremendously she was an unbelievably fun character who will be hard to forget. They are keeping her ashes and that makes me happy because it tells me she was much loved and had a wonderful life. I´ve long since decided to do the same with my dogs. They have decided they need a new puppy right away and they have found Tinna re-incarnated in my friend Stefanía´s litter. There is a little black puppy that I remember saying to Stefanía the day they were born that she reminded me of Tinna. How strange that seems now. Funny thing too is that it was Stefanía´s "grandbaby" as well because her dog Tryggur was the father of Tinna. They asked me if I saw a puppy in the litter that reminded me of Tinna so of course I said yes. So I believe they will be getting a new puppy in about a month and they hope she can also be called Tinna. They said there would never be another Tinna and that is probably true but this puppy is very similar in color and slightly related and they were happy to hear that. Töfra Tinna was Frigg´s older half sister, she was out of Hófi born in 1995 which only makes her a year younger than Freyja. With that in mind I can be even more thankful that Freyja is still in good health.

October 08.

What a day, it didn't start out as well as I hoped. Both Móa and Hetta got a first prize and of course I was happy with that, but so did all the German Shorthaired Pointers. Not a bad thing since all but three were "grandpuppies" of mine :-)  However they were the only females who didn't place in the open class and that was a bit sad since they both looked great. The judge was from Ireland so possibly she thought they were too big, since they are a little bigger than all the other ones. Hetta's son did very well and even placed in if I remember correctly 3rd or 4th Best puppy in show. I'll have to check to make sure, everything gets mixed up in my mind at shows especially when I'm stressed like today.

I worked all morning and then got off at lunch time, that way I could try to have Birta in the hall for awhile before she was supposed to go in the ring. I didn't believe how quickly she settled. I used an extra trick my friend Hafdís told me yesterday, she said it's always worked on her dogs when they are stressed. She said she massages their ears a bit firmly from bottom to top. I managed to keep her attention pretty much even though the dogs were walking past her in all directions then I saw her eyes were getting very red and bloodshot from the stress at times but she didn't lose control of herself. A little bit of barking that can definitely not be considered any  worse than all the other dogs there (both ISD's and other breeds!!!). There were only 3-4 Icelandics total that didn't bark at all of the 35 entries. So long story short, she amazed me, I still don't believe how good she was. I'm sitting here scratching my head thinking did this day really happen? When we entered the ring she seemed even more calm than she was outside the ring. We were lucky enough that she got to say hello to Orri (her training buddy) just before she went in the ring and another dog along the way was happy to "meet" her as well so she figured out they aren't all bad :-) She even wanted to play with the female behind her in the ring, she was the same age as Birta. So needless to say it has just helped me prove the fact to myself that her temperament is good. There were a few nasty dogs there that did want to pick a fight with every dog around them but not Freyja! She doesn't seem to be a "fighter" or aggressive in any way, just very insecure and excited.

Both Freyja and Birta were good examples of an Icelandic hairless dog today, hehehe especially Freyja. She is so bad that if you sneeze around her the air around her turns white with loose hairs. But I just couldn't not show her since she was top of the list for the top winning older Veteran of the Year.

Don't mind me I'm just walking around on a cloud over the both of them today (although I will admit Freyja was barking today a little bit and she never does that!! so I wasn't happy about that part). I'll get to the good news from the beginning. Birta competed in the open class and got a first prize, so I said to my friend in the ring that's all I need I'm happy to go home now don't need anything else for Birta :-Þ  Of course I just wanted to be able to show her without her having a barking fit. She ended up in 4th place and got a champion quality ribbon so she competed in the Best female class as well. There she was only in the 5th place but WOW.

Freyja competed as a champion and got 2 place and a champion quality ribbon. So Rúnar had to show her in the Best female class. Of course with her coat she didn't get anything else in that class. But her daughter beat her and well I couldn't be more pleased. She was the Best older Veteran of breed and competed in the Best in Show ring. And well, as you can see below, she was the Best Older Veteran in Show again.

Even without this win she would have won the top winning older Veteran of the Year because she did win her breed and had so many points already. So here she is below licking her chomps over the thought of going home and getting to taste a bit of her new bag of Hill's senior food. A big bouquet of flowers and huge trophy as the TOP WINNING OLDER VETERAN OF THE YEAR. Need I say it, WOW :-)

I figure this is her last show, I mean there's no harm in quitting while you're on top! On the other hand this brings us to the point that in February Frigg will be 10 so that means she could go to the March show as an Older Veteran, hmmmmm 

September 26.

I got a huge surprise visit on Sunday just before we left for Reykjavík. Out of the blue Keli and his family showed up with my "grandbabies" Doppa and Móa. It was such a pleasant surprise and they seemed happy to see me, especially Doppa and I haven't seen her for such a long time. She is getting so grey in her face and I probably wouldn't have recognized her if I'd just seen her somewhere because her face has changed so much with all the grey. They both look so healthy and happy and I was so glad to see them, I am lucky enough to be scheduled to be in the GSP ring at the show so I really and truly hope that Móa does well again.

We took Birta to show ring training on Sunday and of course she was overwhelmed with all the dogs and wasn't as quiet as I would have liked but on the other hand given her former state of mind and how much she has changed I was quite happy with her. She wasn't bad when she was inside the hall as long as the dogs were not moving or barking, but after about a half an hour she didn't mind the dogs running even straight at her but the barking still bothered her and she felt she needed to answer them and then lost control of herself. I am not sure if she will be quiet enough to be shown properly in October given the fact that the open class is a big class so she will need to be in the ring for a long time waiting and many ISD's bark when being shown. But just in case we can get some more progress I will try to take her to the last show ring training next week as well. The main change in her behaviour and the most important change in my mind is the fact that I can get her attention and calm her down now with only a little bit of effort or just calling her name. She used to be so stressed that her eyes were bloodshot and blank and there was no way to reach her no matter how much I tried, she would lash out in a fit of hysterical rage and it took the longest time for her to calm down afterwards.

I will admit I was a bit disappointed that she was barking and lunging a tiny bit but unfortunately for us earlier the same day the female Labrador across the road who always runs over here when her owners aren't watching and tries to attack my dogs, came and almost got a hold of Birta through the fence. Rúnar was furious and ran over to throw water at her to stop the fighting and growling but she is very clever and runs away as soon as we get close. After the training when I put her in the car her eyes were already calm and she showed no signs of internal stress this time. So I cannot lose sight of how bad Birta actually was before I started clicker training her and I refuse to let other people tell me that she is a terrible good for nothing dog and that they would have shot her a long time ago. That's one of the comments we got from a man with a German Shepherd who was so afraid his dog would bite the judge because she has a habit of biting people! It makes you wonder where people's priorities lie, is is better to have a dog that bites or dog that is only insecure and barks around other dogs but with a fantastic loving temperament!?! I so wish I had some video of Birta when she arrived with us, I am so proud of her progress but find myself bowing my head in shame when I get the dirty looks while training her. I shouldn't have to be ashamed that I will not put a choke chain on her and pick her up by the scruff of the neck and yell at her! Why won't anyone believe that that type of "training" is exactly why she is the way she is. Why should I need to explain myself for wanting to be kind to my "disabled (sight impaired)" dog and help her in a humane way. If nothing else I'm learning to close my eyes and ears to other people's comments. I can't help but think of one of my favourite sayings:  The more people I meet, the more I love my dogs.

On another note about Birta, I had talked about finally finding a male that I was looking forward to using on her, he is black tricolour and longhaired. He has a few litters and some of the puppies live in other countries, I haven't been so impressed with his offspring but I felt that the females he was used on where not the correct type for him and so I thought since he and Birta are so much alike in their type and conformation that I could have gotten wonderful puppies. Well, as always when I start getting excited about something fate takes over and changes all my plans. I heard back from his owner and it turns out he has become sterile, what a waste, he is only 5 years old! I had heard a rumour of this but it was confirmed when they tested him. Oh well I tend to think that there must be a reason for everything and since I was a little scared of some things in his line anyway I am sure it just wasn't meant to be. The vet thought that maybe after a year rest from breeding he could be back to normal, but then again this is a problem that tends to happen a lot in the Icelandic sheepdog, many dogs have become sterile at a very young age. One male that this happened with was a search and rescue dog many years ago. I'm wondering if it's stress related, could it be that because some ISD's internalize stress so much that it manifests itself in different problems like this? I wonder if there are any studies about sterility anywhere? So anyway, I've found a different dog that I have high hopes for the puppies from and was actually a dog I´ve always liked but didn't even think of before as a possible for Birta because I thought the inbreeding coefficient would be high but in actual fact it is one of the lowest I can find. He and Birta are very similar in type but he is shorthaired, however he does give both longhaired and black tri so I am excited to see if it will work out. His name shall be kept a secret until and if a litter results, I don't want to jinx anything.

Speaking of sad and maddening developments in the breed, here are a couple photos that prove why I used harsh words in my article and why I am so angry at the clubs and their stupid rules! Today Rúnar saw a gorgeous ISD coming out of the ship from Westmann Islands, he ran over and asked the owners all about him and took a couple photos with his mobile phone. Seems this gorgeous incredible dog that could easily beat many show dogs today has recently been neutered! He has a true "old fashioned" look to him and has extremely strong double dewclaws the likes of what is missing in the breed today, extra toes with bones and four extra pads. He has a true "lubbi" coat also of the type that is almost impossible to find today. And well the main and saddest thing was he is purebred but unregistered. He no doubt comes either from a farmer that can't be bothered eye testing or ex-raying his dogs and so cannot register his litters or out of the old lines that got split up when a group was formed outside the kennel club. They said they had his non official pedigree at home. Talk about kicking yourself, he would have been PERFECT for Birta Freyja!

September 18.

The past few days have been busy. Wednesday our clicker training class was postponed but instead I went on a house call in Reykjavík. After meeting the dogs involved in fighting and assessing the problem which is so similar to what we had the first few days with Hófi and knowing the one dog had just come out of quarantine the same time as Hófi it occurred to me that I wasn't fair enough on poor little Hófi. What dog wouldn't feel insecure coming out of a month long quarantine into a home of strange dogs and people. Funny how you can always see the signs and give advice to other people but not with your own dogs! :-) We got a new found understanding for our own dogs from that visit and our little house is now a very loving doggy home with four totally content happy dogs.

We decided to meet Helma at the airport on Thursday and took Hófi and Frigg with us, just in case I wouldn't recognise Helma we were sure she would recognise Hófi. So Rúnar waited just outside the door with the dogs and I was inside watching for a face I had only seen on video and photos :-) I think her and her mother were pleasantly surprised and happy they didn't have to take the bus, and this gave us an extra little visit together. So from the airport we went to the guesthouse where Anekke and her daughter were staying. Then we took Anekke to see Skolli because he is Valli's father. Wow, he looks so good these days and I enjoyed seeing him and how much he has changed since I used him with Frigg. He was too happy to see Frigg and his great niece Hófi to be interested in us but none the less we got a good look at him. It is such a shame that a dog of his quality and family line hasn't been used more often but he hasn't had his eyes checked in the past 18 months so that means that no one will breed from him because of the new rules in the kennel club. Sad but true, he is 8 years old and only had 2 litters and he is from an extremely rare family line. His mother and grandmother are both dead, two years ago now so he's been alone in the home (there's a kitten to keep him company now though) so I unfortunately couldn't show Anekke the rest of the family. I would have liked to meet them all because I feel Hófi is very much like her great-grandmother from Thorvaldsstadir. We had also planned on going to see Ulfur but sadly there was no one home and despite me trying to phone many times over a few days I still haven't heard back from his owner so I wonder if Ulfur is still alive or not?!

Later that evening there was show training and I was planning on helping Stefanía with the instruction, so we decided to give Helma the opportunity to train Hófi for the show herself. It was great and the two of them were obviously connected by a strong bond, Hófi looked right at home.

Saturday morning we went to meet the bus of visitors at the sheep collecting pens and met a few other people I know. I was so happy to see Ellen from Norway and her son who is now very tall and I didn't recognise him, he was only a kid when I lived there, boy time flies.

The show was yesterday and Hófi showed very well, a little bit surprised at all the sights and smells but so calm and such an easy outgoing dog. Rúnar was so proud of her and said that he enjoyed having her at the end of the leash since a lot of people came over to see her, she is so cute that she draws attention to herself. The judgement was in tune with what I expected since she was so thin when she came out of quarantine (almost emaciated) and just now has been gaining some weight, so as the judge said she needs a lot of time to develop yet. I´m not sure she will ever grow to her true potential after the month of not eating enough but we will never know for sure if she would have had stronger bone but I'm not worried about showing her in future. I didn't buy her to be a show dog, I wanted a breeding female with bloodlines that are well worth preserving and so very rare but even if she doesn't turn out to be a breeding female she is a wonderful dog who carries with her precious memories of both her father and his owner, her mother Lotta and of my time in Norway. I was just so happy with how good my little baby was. We are so happy with her temperament and so very grateful to Helma for allowing us to have her and after meeting Helma and seeing the two of them together we realise just how lucky we are both with a wonderful breeder and a very special puppy.

I was planning on spending some more time talking to people after the show but because of the stress of working all day and me having to go home in between the show and the dinner my evening was a bit ruined and I didn't get to talk to many people at all. I did meet Margaret and Judy from USA both on Saturday and Sunday so that was very nice. Judy has one of my "grandbabies" out of Alfie so it's always nice to meet the people you have written to by email. I was however totally stressed and probably looked rude to those who I didn't get a chance to greet, I think I must have looked right through some people without knowing it, but I hope everyone knows that I didn't in any way mean to leave anybody out. The worst thing is to not know what people look like that you have written to over the internet so obviously I didn't recognise everyone. I managed to greet Ulla from Denmark who I met so many years ago at an ISIC meeting in Denmark and also at a show that Frigg got her Danish champion point at. Hans Ake and May Britt are always so nice to meet, Hans Ake comes to Iceland alot but it's been awhile since I saw May Britt. I hadn't met Arne and his wife for years either, talk about overwhelming to have so many people you want to talk to and not enough time to do it. So in all the weekend was fun but also a disappointment since I really didn't get to chat with anyone to the degree I would have wanted to. I´m thinking that having two students simultaneously in the ring is not such a good idea, I would have never thought it was a stressful as it turned out to be! I'd never done this before and to do that at this particular show ruined the whole day for me due to stress.

My little baby Töfra Stjarna was shown again and looked amazing for her age, it is so emotional to see her and how happy she is. Rúnar said she and Hófi were instantly friends at the show. I'm sorry I missed seeing that! She has outlived her mother now by a a little bit. Hófi Sr. died a week before her 15th birthday and Stjarna turned 15 in August. Helga has been a wonderful caring owner and I am thankful for the eventful life Stjarna has had. By the looks of how happy she seems to be in the ring it is a shame that she wasn't shown while she was young enough to have made a name for herself in the show ring. In any case she certainly has made a name for herself through her progeny and their progeny. Int IS Ch Hektor was honoured at the show for being the Icelandic sheepdog with the best results at shows of all time. 

We took the dogs for a walk on Saturday down to the ocean and they had a ball I hope Rúnar will be able to post some photos in the photo album soon. This of course meant that they all needed a bath when we got home :-)  Freyja is really blowing coat so I'm scared she is not going to do well at the show in October but that's life, for some reason my dogs always seem to loose their coat right before the shows.

September 10.

What good friends Birta and Hófi have become, it's so nice to see them together and she is feeling more and more at home now. I'm so glad she has such a calm temperament, it makes so much difference to not have to be on edge all the time. When I think of how bringing a female ISD into the home at her age with full-grown females already it amazes me just how easy a transition this has been. I just realised the other day that it has been totally problem free besides a couple insecurity fights (and I still have to watch her around food) but now all are so family oriented and they seem to understand that she is here to stay. I don't have to worry about trying to keep her busy since her and Birta have their play times during the day. In between she is so good, just sleeps or lays by our feet. She has gained some more weight finally and that cute little face melts us every time. She seems to be a lot more relaxed and sure of us these days! She's having a little problem with letting us know when she needs to go out and it's driving me crazy, she'll go in strange places like Freyja's bed, our bed, mats, a towel that happened to be on the floor in the bathroom (anything soft or of material) but I think her not asking to go out comes from the quarantine and we also figured out yesterday in the rainy windy stormy weather that she doesn't know what wind is! She refuses to go outside if the wind is really strong and it's raining sideways. We are teaching her that it's okay  to be out in the rain and wind because we decided to take her into town all by herself yesterday. It was really windy and a bit of light rain so we let her out up on the mountain (lots of crowberries there!) on the way home and trained her recall a little by hiding and clicking. We figured it's a bit of a serious problem that we need to fix ASAP. From the first day she came to us she hasn't wanted to come to us from the garden when we call, we need to walk in and leave the door open for her then she'll come in when she can't see us anymore. Very strange. So of course we have been concerned that she needs to have a recall that we can count on. We tried a bit of the clicking game recall the other day outside in the garden and it was going fine. Then a few days ago I got a total shock and realized this is more dangerous to her and us than we thought. The other day she was in heat and the dog next door (a male golden/Labrador mix) and neighbour came by after their walk to talk to me and pet the dogs and stood outside the fence. I told her she was in heat so he couldn't play with her today! Then I looked away for a second and she found a hole in the fence and ran to the male dog. The neighbour let out a gasp "oh my God how did you get out of there" and I looked, she was flirting with him and the neighbour grabbed him and tried to drag him away. I didn't have time to put on shoes just ran out the gate and tried to catch her. She is so quick and ran away straight across the road, it didn't matter how much I called her or tried to coax her she just ran farther down the street. I was in my stocking feet and ran down the street to try to coax her back to me and finally I managed to chase her back home. The neighbour had ran inside with the dog so that we wouldn't have an "accident". Talk about my heart going a mile a minute and I came back inside with her, my feet so sore from running on the small sharp stones of the road and thought, I can't do this again.

Anyway we took her for the walk by herself yesterday and she was great, at first she didn't get it but after a few clicks she was looking for us very interested in "playing" our recall game. Rúnar would hide and then call her and then I would run and hide and then call her, it was fine until one time I couldn't see her coming and then I stood up to see if I could see her and she ran from the other side of me straight into a small lava hole. We of course forgot that lava is new to her and she hasn't figured out yet how careful she has to be to not fall down into the cracks. She was so happy running to me and I was so glad to see that but when she jumped and landed in the small bushes (and lava) in front of me I got a shock. She of course got her click and was happy but I was worried she had hurt herself. She seemed to hold her back leg up but just a few minutes later she was fine and wanted to keep playing. Needless to say we gave up on that and started picking crowberries instead so she wouldn't be running around so much and she loves the berries and ate a bunch.

Other news these days that I wanted to write about a few days ago is that Birta Freyja is entered for the October show, yes I'm taking for granted that she will be ready by then. We have been training her specifically with one of my students at the clicker course and we had fantastic results last week. She has a dog that will stand still without a single bark no matter how much she lunges or barks it is immeasurable help especially since he is an ISD and they always seem to show more emotion with their own kind so for Birta to be able to practice with an ISD it makes a huge difference. I am so thankful to Linda for taking the extra time after classes to help me out. I actually watched as the behaviour was extinguished (in that situation) last week, it was an amazing breakthrough and I was just about to give up but thought I need to be more patient, I know this can work I've done it with other dogs, why not Birta? Then I took her to the show training the next day and she met her friend Orri again and it only took a few clicks for her to be able to walk right up to him without any problems. So we walked side by side behind the building to where all the other dogs were training and I just trained her outside the ring and although she was barking a lot especially at first I stood my ground. I used my clicker methods without regard to what anyone else thought and instead of feeling embarrassed I looked for the small signs of progress. And I definitely saw lots of progress although every time another dog barked she lost her concentration again for a second. She was fine while no dogs barked and while she was at a certain distance and the dogs were standing still but as soon as they start moving she starts barking. So that's our next course of action, having the "dummy dog" (sorry Orri, you know what I mean!) move instead of standing still. And I'm trying to click her for not barking when she hears barking from other dogs (lots of opportunity for that during the day here at home since many of the neighbours have barking dogs). I'm sure we'll be ready or at least she will be showable if we keep at it. Rúnar took her for a walk tonight (he couldn't do that before because she was too hyper) and said that she saw a dog tied out in a yard and she (I have been clicking her for eye contact when she sees dogs or people) looked at the dog and then looked at Rúnar. He rewarded her, then she looked at him again and she got more praise. So he said she passed by that dog without a single bark!!!! That would have NEVER happened a few months ago. I'm proud of her and I'm seeing a light at the end of the tunnel finally. I am sure that all the work and patience we have put into this will be worth it in the end. I always say that I'd rather "cure" the behaviour than put a bandage on it and have it come back possibly stronger than it was before. I'm sure the stories will be flying all over town after last show training session about the stupid woman who just stood there like an idiot while the dog went nuts and then shovelled treats in her dog for barking! Hehehe, I probably would have thought the same thing many years ago.

There was a small dog show last weekend for Terriers and we went to check to see how my student was doing with her "in the ring" training with another ring steward. We took Hófi with us and she came with us into the stands to watch and what a great experience, she is a wonderful companion. No problem what so ever, she was interested but never a bark at all even when a schnauzer decided she was something to lunge and bark at. We met some people I know that used to have an Icelandic dog (her great great great grandfather) and they were quite impressed with her temperament and thought she was cute. So far everyone who meets her thinks she is cute, small and fine boned but very cute and a wonderful temperament.

September 4.

Wow, it's been awhile since I've added news. I've been very busy with so many different things. I started a clicker training class once a week that is very interesting, I have four people attending with 5-6 dogs and they are all very different. I've also heard from the IKC since starting my class and apparently they do want me to hold courses for them and so the next new course will be held for the Icelandic Kennel Club, I'm a bit excited about that. I'd like to get started though and hope we can do that soon! I'm working on my books (have a few on the go, but none finished yet). I've been too busy to work on the books and I really wish I could have at least finished one before Christmas. Rúnar is taking some photos at the clicker class to use in one. I did finally post my article but so far haven't heard many comments on it. I'm sure there are many very angry at me at the moment for some of my statements but hopefully it will help the breed in the long run.

I finished a ring steward course yesterday and it was lots of fun. The junior's club of IKC helped me tremendously by getting a bunch of youngsters together with dogs and we held a few "fake" shows where my students got to try their hand at controlling the ring. The kids had all kinds of tricks up their sleeves and at times it was just hilarious to watch, I definitely felt sorry for the poor victims who had to try to steward for the first time but most did a really good job in spite of all the traps we set for them! I think most of us had a good day, the weather was awesome. Couldn't have ordered better weather for the day's events and I even got a little bit of a burn in my face. I was happy to see that we really have some good up and coming ring stewards so I won't have to work at EVERY single show anymore unless I want to once they have graduated. I will have a student in the ring at the DÍF show, so needless to say as usual I will be a bit too busy to actually talk to people at the show. I know there are a few friends of mine coming from Norway and other places and I really hope I get a chance to see them while they are here, the DÍF events will take most of their time.

Sadly Val will not be able to come this time and I was looking forward to seeing her again but I think personally with all that is going on that weekend we wouldn't have had much quality time anyway. I know she has a house full of puppies and if it was me I'd probably want to stay home and take care of my puppies as well. I even envy her to be able to have puppies, I'm so pissed off still at the fact that the kennel stay in June ruined the litter plans for Birta Freyja. Puppies would have been at a very fun age by now.

Birta Freyja and Hófi are pretty good friends now but Hófí seems to be very much a food guarder, and there have been a couple spats with Freyja over food. Freyja never has been a food guarder and doesn't understand such silly behaviour, she thinks that anything edible should be shared, she allows anyone to come eat from her dish and feels they should do the same. It did catch us off guard though how possessive Hófí is of food and when she jumped at Freyja, of course Freyja defended herself as best she could. Other than that, they are all good together. Hófí sleeps in a cage at night since I can't trust her. She always wakes me around 6 and I wish she would sleep just a little bit longer (at least until the alarm rings!). She gets to sleep in a little bit with me when Rúnar leaves in the morning and she loves not having to be in her cage then. Hófí is a good little girl most of the time :-) Although I did wake up this morning to her chewing a hole in my comforter! She does pee a bit on rugs and of all things I have NEVER experienced before, she peed on our bed one day when we weren't looking. She likes to find things to chew so I have to keep an eye on her all the time, oh the joy of puppyhood!!! Obviously the quarantine has left a few bad behaviours behind, hopefully she will grow out of them. One really funny thing is she inherited one of her great grandmother's traits, I had to laugh when I saw her do it the first time. She chews her nails, I loved the way Hófí used to do that, it meant I never had to worry about her nails being too long. Birta has gotten worse with her barking since Hófí came, I think it's because they are playing so much together and getting excited, but luckily Hófi doesn't bark much at all, I've very happy about that.

August 11.

The BIG day, Hófi has come home. She is a real sweetie and luckily for us still a bit of a puppy both in her size and the way she acts. I was sad to miss out on her puppyhood but I know she had a wonderful family in Holland who no doubt miss her a lot and now I can see myself why. She is very lovable and I've only known her a few hours so far. She is the spitting image of her grandmother Frigg except a bit smaller. I can see so much of her father in her as well and from what I do know of her mother as a puppy and also from seeing videos and photos of her grown up I would say she is a little bit of both parents :-) I love her ears and sweet little face, she is a bit gangly at the moment but I'm sure she will be a real beauty given some time to fill out. All in all I am very happy with my little "grandbaby".

We took Frigg to the quarantine station with us so she could get to know her little granddaughter on the long drive home. It turned out to be the smartest thing we could have done because they immediately clicked, it was as if Frigg knew she was a part of her. They were so good in the car that we almost forgot they were there and they definitely deserved a little run on the way home. We let them out in our crow berry place and took some photos of the two of them together. Just a short stop because Hófi has no muscles after her month in quarantine but they had a really good time. Rúnar's birthday is on Monday so Hófi is in a sense his birthday present and I got some really sweet photos of the two of them because Hófi immediately decided she was a Daddy's girl.

We had a little bit of trouble with Freyja meeting her because of course she was a strange dog in her garden and then after she had met her then we let Birta out alone to meet her. Birta and Freyja were alone at home in their crates for around 6 hours so it wasn't at all surprising that they were a bit stressed as soon as we let them out. Maybe in after thought it wasn't the smartest thing to do but it's all right now. Birta came running out to see me so happy that I was home and Hófi was behind the wall so she didn't see her. As soon as Birta jumped off the porch to talk to me Hófi came running and jumped at her on her blind side. Birta was a bit shocked and needless to say it started a slight scuffle, Rúnar stopped them so no one would be hurt and then we let them cool off a couple seconds. They were a bit careful with each other for a little while, they showed some calming signals and then after supper Birta figured out that all Hófi wanted to do was play with her. Since Birta never had any siblings and my dogs were not playful (too old to enjoy such childish behavior, hehehe) she doesn't really have the dog language skills she should. But Hófi has a great temperament and Birta has always been very submissive herself with other dogs she's been able to meet so they have decided that having a new "sister" isn't such a bad thing after all. We got a video of them playing for the first time and it's in the video gallery along with the video of Birta being clicker trained at the mall from a little while back.

Here are a few pictures from today

August 7.

A couple things have happened since last time. My favourite little dog star Eddie (real name Moose) from Frasier died of old age a little while ago. He is probably the clicker trained dog that has been the greatest inspiration for how I wanted to train my dogs. I'm sure he is very much missed. Another tragedy a bit closer to home and definitely devastating in the life of someone I know personally is the news I heard last Thursday. LINK  The owner of this farm that burnt to the ground, killing 30 cows (some calves) and her whole collection of Icelandic chickens (she is a breeder of this rare species) is one of the "original" breeders of the Icelandic sheepdog. I say original meaning one of the first breeders, not that she has had that many litters but the litters she did have are a foundation bloodline to many of the dogs alive today. She bred Kátur frá Húsatóftum who was Skonsa frá Kolsholti's father, Skonsa was Hófi's mother.

We went to visit Kiddi and Svanhildur and the little one last week (she was 2 days old), she is so tiny and cute, must get that from her mother (Muhahahah, just kidding Kiddi!) and Bína and their other dog Dimma seemed very happy with the new addition. Thought this was a nice photo of me with her.

We finally have some half decent weather, a day here and a day there in between rainy days. It is getting much colder though and sadly summer is over even though it never really arrived. We went crow berry picking again yesterday and true to Frigg's nature I picked one while she ate three :-) Freyja was being a real Hoover too, she really loved the walk and of course waited for me every time I stopped to pick berries. Silly doggies, I would stop and they would come over and lay right on top of the berries that I was planning on picking then they'd start their vacuuming so I only got a couple. LOL  Lots of fun! Rúnar got some awesome photos of course since he wasn't picking berries and was a bit bored I guess. After our walk we took the dogs home and then went to Rúnar's family's cottage for a short visit, I know Rúnar would have loved to stay a bit longer but I wasn't feeling so good. It was very nice to see his grandfather out and about and the cottage is really coming along with all the building and fixing the guys are doing. I'm sure it will be great in the near future.

We forgot the camera the other day when we took the dogs down to the ocean, but it was so funny Birta loves running around in water but is not too keen on trying to swim. On the other hand Frigg is like her mother, water crazy and she almost got Birta out far enough to swim. I hope we can go back to the water again soon and maybe I'll take some cookies that float to get her out a bit farther. From what I saw on the videos I've gotten of Hófi I would say that Birta will probably learn to swim quickly around her, she seems to have inherited her great grandmother's love of water as well. I hope the weather is nice when she gets out of quarantine I'd love to be able to give her a few minutes of freedom in Icelandic nature as a welcome home present. So today is Monday and Hófí gets out of "prison" on Thursday!!! WOW, this is not sinking in yet, three days from now! Unbelievable how time flies.

Rúnar has been working a lot lately and unfortunately the videos of Birta training a while back along with the article I've been meaning to post for the longest time and some photos of Valdís´ litters all have to wait until he gets some free time and since the weather has been so good we haven't been home much when he does have time off.

Few new photos in the photo album

July 30.

Where to start, Kiddi and Svanhildur had a baby girl yesterday so now Bína has a little human sister I'm sure she will be so happy with that :-) Congratulations you guys!

We had a nice walk with the dogs today and took some photos. Lucky Frigg and Freyja the crow berries were ripe and they just had a grand old time eating them. Birta didn't like them, she spit them out when I offered them to her. Rúnar got a funny series of photos, he was trying to take a close up of the crow berries, thought it would make a nice photo and all of a sudden in the lens Frigg decided she had to see what he was doing and YUMMY bye bye berries :-)

There are a few new photos in the photo album

Hófi is doing well in the quarantine, the owner says she is happy all the time and it's not having any effect on her mood at all. I'm so glad she has such a good temperament, I must thank Helma again for picking the right puppy for us, I'm sure it makes all the difference that she has good nerves not to mention the wonderful upbringing she had while she lived in Holland. Only about 12 more days until she gets out and comes home, that is going to be very strange for all of us!

July 22.

I've been following Zeta's progress the past few weeks and I am sad to say that she had some troubles with the birth of her puppies the 19th and 20th she had two male puppies with the same colouring as their Dad Nero but unfortunately one was born dead and the other was taken the next day by caesarean in Akureyri and only lived 4 hours due to the difficulties during labour. It was extremely sad for the owners and I wish I could have been out east to help so that maybe the one might have lived. In a way I am glad I moved away from the isolation of the country but I do so feel for those who have no choice but to trust the vets that work there (usually not specialized in small animals) and hope that nothing will go wrong.

More news in the dog world, the new board of the HRFÍ (Icelandic Kennel Club) has appointed a new show committee and I was voted the vice president of that committee. I'm not sure if it's a position that will be much fun to hold since I'm sure it's quite thankless as most volunteer work is. A date has been made for my next course, I will hold a course in September for those interested in becoming ringstewards. I was also asked if I might think about teaching clicker training for the HRFÍ school, I had thought about opening my own school and had advertised a little bit but it seems that there might be a chance that I will teach for HRFÍ instead, they have a good training facility so it would be much easier for me and that way the course will be recognized by the community towards dog licenses. Which seems to make a lot of difference to most people as to deciding where they want to take a dog training course. They have not offered clicker training before so I'm hoping they will see this as a possibility to give people a choice of training. I'm just waiting for a decision from the board, if not then I might hold a couple courses anyway, but only during the fall and winter. At the moment I'm using all my free time to write my book (started it a couple years ago but put it on the shelf and gave up, now I'm trying to get my mind back in gear for writing) so hopefully I can finish it some day.

Kind of cool if it was under different circumstances, my mom has become a "celebrity" :-) she was on the TV talking about her heart condition. It seems she has been part of a study in Toronto, so hopefully they will figure out a way to help her more than they have been able to. Here is a link, she is on the video at the right hand side of the article. I'm quite proud of her it takes guts to be on TV :-) 

July 14.

I know many have been waiting for news of Hófí, YES she arrived on the 11th safe and sound! I am very excited but of course will not be able to see her until the 12 of August so it feels like she is not here yet. But when I knew she was on the plane I was anxious to know how her trip went so I phoned right away that day and she was safe. What a relief. Now I feel so sorry for her being in the quarantine and I wonder if she thinks she did something wrong to have to be there. I hope the time will go quickly and that she will have lots of cuddles while she is there so that she at least feels like someone loves her. I phoned again today to check on her and she is still doing well, she is said to have an amazingly calm and unstressed nature, doesn't bark or whine, eats well and is just very easy to have around. The quarantine owner is happy with her, says she should have no problem getting through the next few weeks because she has such a good temperament. I got her school diplomas in the mail today and that was so fun to see, she was an amazing student, especially in the puppy class. Got nice ribbons with her diplomas so I'll have to find a nice frame for them.

Well, obviously I've been busy and that's why I haven't been writing much lately despite the amazing news of Hófí's arrival. I´m more amazed with Birta everyday. She is just about ready to be trained with other dogs. I just took her down to the middle of town where there is a celebration going on and the music and noise was really loud, we even had a stunt plane flying right over our house for about 15 minutes or so and no problem with that she was so cute just watched it fly over with extreme interest. When I walked down by the crowds she was very excited to look in that direction but never lost her concentration for a second. I even got quite a few clicks in for a totally natural "show stance" that was awesome if I can catch it again I'll put a cue to it for use in the future.

It was so unlike the little lost and scared scatterbrain I took into our home in December, I remember her barking hysterically and not being able to get her attention let alone eye contact and concentration to learn. I really wish I had of taken videos of her when I got her, people who see her now don't realise the difference. Now all we have to do is find a dog and owner that is willing to let us use them as "bait" to train her around. Frigg and Freyja are also great, Freyja of course loves the fact that I'm clicker training Birta so intensely at the moment because that means she tries to get some "click time" as well.

We will possibly put some new videos of Birta in the gallery tomorrow. I forgot to mention where the last photos were placed, they are in the Icelandic sheepdog file under Our dogs, and then July photos. If you haven't looked at them yet, now you know where to find them in the photo gallery.

July 8.

Finally the rain and cold stopped long enough to take the dogs for a walk up on the mountains :-) It ALMOST felt like summer today, we took a bunch of photos so decided to put a few of them into the photo gallery. Freyja is back to her usual self pretty much, I think it was the trophy that did it, hehehe

Have spent the last few days training Birta Freyja on lead (with clicker of course) around the neighbourhood, getting used to the traffic and other dogs, to different distractions like at the vets office, outside the vets office around the horses and horse trailers, at the shopping mall at high tourist season. She has really improved more than I thought she had and it surprised me to see how calm and collected she has become or at least when she has an insecurity fit (barking at other dogs) she is much quicker to un-react. I actually think a dog show is not impossible in the near future. Look out here we come...I HOPE :-) 

June 30.

Took all the dogs for their "check-up ultrasound" yesterday to make sure the abortion needles had worked. Freyja also had an ultrasound and luckily she is empty so doesn't need to have the needle, we were pretty sure she wasn't anyway because she seemed to be at high time after we got home. Luckily they are all fine so now we will just have to wait for Birta to come into heat again so we can mate her. It's a great loss to us to have to wait yet another season but what can you do and the vet said they should come into heat much sooner after the shots they got.

Finally we can start to count down, time has flown lately. Hófí will be coming to Iceland in less than two weeks, on July 11th so we are getting quite excited about that. She will be in quarantine for 4 weeks so will be out in time for the DÍF specialty show in September. Hopefully she will have grown into herself a bit by then and not as much of a puppy in her looks. She will be too old then to take part in the puppy class so will be in the junior class and will be quality judged. I can't wait to see her and I know that she will be so much like Frigg, even in the photos I can see that.

June 27.

Took a few pictures today in the beautiful weather.  Decided to put their critiques from last weekends dog show below their photos.  ENJOY!

Excellent type. Nice looking champion bitch. Good head and expression. Dark but little bit round eyes. Excellent bones. Well angulated. Well bodied. Not in best coat condition. Moves very well. Real good condition when I know she is 12. 

Best Senior Veteran of Breed, 3rd Best Female, Best Senior Veteran in Show - Judge: Liz-Beth C. Liljeqvist, Sweden

Veteran in top condition. Good head, bite and expression. Good bones and well angulated in front, enough in the rear. Well carried tail. Well bodied and moves very well.

Best Veteran of Breed, 4th Best Female - Judge: Liz-Beth C. Liljeqvist, Sweden

Just because she is so darn CUTE!!!

Töfra Fields of Gold Móa - Best Female of Breed, Champion point, Best of Opposite Sex

June 26.

WOW what a day yesterday!!!! Now I haven't kept everyone totally up to date on the developments and some of the developments I didn't know were going to happen myself until the very last minute...so here goes from the beginning. This could be a bit long, but bear with me it's got a happy ending. Unfortunately we have no photos because we forgot the camera, but we are a bit superstitious about having a camera along and showing a dog. Seems every time we remember the camera nothing happens, or they do badly and when the camera is at home they really shine! I will buy some photographs from the professional photographer that was working and hopefully can post a couple in the near future for the "archives".

Freyja was getting better and the test results finally came back, the kennel cough test was negative. The vet said it was possible that the titters (I think that's what you call it, when your body starts making antibodies for something) hadn't started to show up in the blood yet since we took it so early in her illness. We don't know how long she had been coughing before we picked her up and we took her the day after we got back for her blood test. The vet said we could take another blood test to make sure but in her opinion based on how contagious it is and neither Frigg nor Birta had gotten the same symptoms it was most likely something else. We could come to take a lung ex-ray if we liked to see if we could find something there. I think I did mention in my news before that she had a sound in her lungs (high up in the chest) when she went for her check up and at the other vet's when we went straight from the kennel. Long story short, Freyja started to get better for a day or so and we decided that taking her for an ex-ray would probably be a waste of money since she was doing so much better and hardly coughing at all anymore. We thought she must be getting over it. So I thought okay that's neat we can take her to the show as well as Frigg since the blood test was negative and she is not coughing anymore. Silly girl, on Friday evening she got worse again and then she woke me up at 4 in the morning with a bad cough, and I had to wake up around 7 to go to the show to work all day. Her fate was sealed, I couldn't take her to the show I thought.

Saturday was a good day at the show, a long tiring day but a very good day since my student was wonderful and I was very proud of him. I even got him to work with me in the Group ring afterwards and he although I could see was quite unsure of himself and a bit nervous (it was his very first time) did not disappoint me. I gave him a recommendation and that meant he could work alone in the ring on Sunday. We had a very nice judge to work for, Annika Ulltveit-Moe from Sweden, and I looked forward to seeing what she would think of him on his own.

I came home Saturday evening and Rúnar and Freyja had been laying on the couch most of the day, Rúnar with a migraine and Freyja was keeping him company. That evening I said to Freyja, you know if you keep coughing you won't be able to go to the show tomorrow. I know she LOVES dog shows and is a pretty smart girl, I'm sure she knew what I was talking about :-) hehehe

Sunday morning we got up early, Freyja had slept through the night and not a peep from her. All the dogs had to stay in the car while we showed Frigg so I said to Rúnar if she isn't coughing we'll take our chances and take her in to see if she can take the stress, if not take her back out to the car and we won't show her. Since we know it isn't contagious the only thing I was worried about was that she would make herself sicker if she was stressed and that she might cough and cough in the ring, which wouldn't be very good at all. So I went to work in my ring, writing critiques for the judge so I could keep an eye on and be there to support my student as the steward, it was pretty strange to not be the one "in charge" but fun at the same time. I got my friend Helga to take over for me while I went into the other ring (for a judge I hadn't worked for) to show Frigg. Rúnar had both girls inside and said that Freyja hadn't made a peep at all that morning, she was sitting by his side just as happy and proud as could be to be there, when I walked up to them she started wagging her tail as if to say, see I got to come too. You gotta love her!

I started by taking Freyja into the Champion class, she got 1st place and a champion quality ribbon, to be able to compete in the Best female competition. The judge didn't seem to mind the shaven spot on Freyja's leg and was quite impressed at her age. Then it was Frigg's turn in the younger veteran class and she got a 1st prize, 1st place, champion quality ribbon to compete in the Best female class as well. I didn't expect either of them to do well in the Best female, I mean they are 12 (Freyja had her left leg shaved from the blood test a couple weeks ago, I feel it spoiled her overall appearance) and 9 and all the other females were young and in good shape. Freyja also competed in the older veteran class and was in 1st place with a champion quality ribbon and Best older veteran of breed since there was no male to compete with. Needless to say, I couldn't show them both myself in the Best female class so this meant that poor Rúnar had no choice but to take one of them into the ring. HEHEHE sneaky me, I love it when a plan comes together! Now Rúnar's been bitten by the show bug because he figured out that it wasn't all that bad, and kind of fun even. You don't even care about all the people watching he said surprised, that was what he was most scared of and why he had always said no to even trying to show a dog. I let him take Freyja because she is a born show dog so you don't need to do anything with her, she knows exactly what to do and when to do it. However Rúnar had her on his right side to start with and the judge said please put your dog on the left side so I can see her, hehe oops. I thought it was cute. The judge was really impressed with Freyja and both Frigg and Freyja stayed in the ring when she sent some younger ones out, Freyja placed 3rd and Frigg 4th Best female. I will post their critiques on a separate page.

Frigg needed to go back in to compete with a male dog for the best younger veteran of breed and since it was a longhaired slightly younger male I was just happy that Freyja was going to the show finals. That's good enough for one day I thought. I should know by now that when you don't expect things is when they happen. Frigg won the Best younger veteran of breed, so we had to bring them both back to the finals later in the day!

I went back to work and then luckily my ring was beside the German shorthaired pointer ring and I was able to watch most of what was happening there. I saw the judge was very tough and some left with 2nd prize so when it got to my two females in the intermediate class I was very nervous. Two of my "grandpuppies" out of Töfra Turkey's Nightmare Primuz were shown in the junior class and both received a 1st prize and prize of honour. Kiddi was showing Bína himself for the first time and I couldn't believe how well shown she was, it was wonderful to watch, sadly though she had broken a nail just before coming to the show so both me and Kiddi were afraid she might limp in the ring. Töfra Fields of Gold Móa got 1st prize and 1st place with a prize of honour, Töfra Bína the Dream Catcher got a 1st prize and 2nd place. I was very happy with that result but Móa went on to beat all the competition in the open class and got a Champion point, won Best female and then took the Best of Opposite Sex. Awesome day. And it wasn't even finished yet!

The big moment arrived, Rúnar had been waiting with Freyja and Frigg (and Birta in the car) many hours to take part in the Best in Show finals. He'd spent the whole day at the show taking care of them, giving them water, letting them out and walking around a bit with Birta outside (she wasn't entered in the show this time). So I worked through the group placings and then I went to join Rúnar who had brought them both in and was sitting in the waiting area. We took them outside for a few minutes and then we went and sat down to wait some more. To our amazement Freyja hadn't coughed a single cough ALL DAY. It really was amazing how quickly she had recovered when a dog show was her incentive :-) Long story short again...Frigg went in first and didn't place, there were a lot of dogs in the younger competition and many at least 2 years younger than she is. I often find that at their age even one year can make a big difference in how good they look. Frigg will be able to take part in the older veteran class next spring. Freyja on the other hand had set her goal a lot higher. She showed like a true Champion (except a bit slower and aged) and won the BEST IN SHOW OLDER VETERAN!

I couldn't believe it, I can't wait to see what my face looked like on the photographs. Her trophy and rosette are in the living room by the TV so we can admire it, and now she is top of the list over Older veteran of the year and only the October show left to count points. So either she needs to go to that as well or hope that the second place dog doesn't show then, I am so excited. It would be an awesome end to her 12 year old show career to go out with such a title.

June 20.

Since I've been writing such depressing news lately I thought maybe it's about time for a bit of a happy note! An exciting development in Canada for my grandbabies offspring. Last weekend there was a show in Kingston, Ontario and the second Icelandic to become a Champion in Canada was a grandbaby of Frigg, Ch. Belglen Runa of Greenstone (out of Töfra Ljósálfur). Wonderful news indeed and I was so happy to hear that little Rúna (I have a soft spot for her, cause she reminds me of her Daddy) did so well. Even more exciting was a few weekends ago at a show in Ottawa the historical First Canadian Champion Icelandic was also a grandbaby of Frigg, Greenstone Ajay (out of Töfra Dalla Hektorsdóttir). If I remember correctly Rúna has a total of 12 points and Ajay 17! Their owner and breeder of Ajay graciously allowed me to post their photos here, I think they both look wonderful. I must admit I'm always partial to the short coat, you need a well built dog to look good with a short coat. Rúna is still young but what a promising female she is! Congratulations to Rúna's breeder Sharon  http://schaefrs.sasktelwebsite.net/belglen.html and a big Congratulations to Valerie at Greenstone Kennels, you do us all PROUD. Keep up the good work for the breed in Canada and hold on to that wonderful handler too :-)

Photos by permission of Greenstone Kennels.  Left: Ch. Greenstone Ajay     -      Right: Ch. Belglen Runa of Greenstone

I´d also like to use this opportunity to send Sharon my deepest condolences on the loss of Rúna's brother Belglen Reifur, such a terrible tragedy for such a sweet looking boy. I'm sorry I never got to meet him. My heart goes out to you and his family.

Nothing to report on Freyja today, she's still about the same and no results from the vet yet. The summer dog show in Iceland is next weekend and by the looks of it neither Freyja nor Frigg will be able to go. This really makes me angry as I was so looking forward to this particular show because I had entered them both in the younger and older veteran classes and I haven't shown Frigg in years. But I will be working all weekend anyway and with a student in the ring so I won't have much time to think about how they could have done.

June 16.

Rainy day today but the sun has appeared from behind the clouds for us. I wanted to post to let my friends and family know what's going on so they don't worry unnecessarily. Freyja started her new drugs last night and at 12 midnight we gave her the cough suppressant Codein, it took a little while and a bit of coughing afterwards but to our amazement she has gotten better in only one day. Luckily for us she slept a whole 5 hours before she woke me up with a coughing fit, unfortunately she coughed non-stop despite all my attempts to calm her down for about 30 minutes, which is longer than her fits were lasting before she got the new drugs, so I was a bit concerned last night, but luckily for the neighbour the coughing was quite low key and is less "physical" so is much easier on Freyja herself. She is still coughing but the screaming is down to a bear minimum (hardly does it anymore now), she mostly slept all day today because of the drugs, still no fever and is eating her food and able to walk around and even jump onto the sofa without coughing each step. I called the vet but the results were not ready yet, she was happy to hear that the new drugs were helping and when I asked if I should up the dose of Codein so Freyja will sleep longer during the night she wasn't too keen on drugging Freyja too much if it isn't necessary, since she was better today she probably will be better tonight because she's had lots of rest today for her body to gain strength and the new antibiotics are at work now. She calculated Freyja's weight again and the amount we are already giving her and felt that a little bit more would be okay if I thought she needed it but that it wasn't nice to have Freyja sleeping due to drugs 24 hours a day. I totally agree with her because I am as most my family and friends know, someone who would much rather use natural methods than drugs anyway.

I was actually quite happy to hear a vet actually concerned about the animal's well being and quality of life. But I know that she has always been very friendly and my dogs especially Freyja (despite how many blood tests and other prodding she has had to undergo) love to visit her at the vet's office so we trust her in her judgement as well as our dog's judge of character. I want to take this opportunity to thank Dr. Ásdís Linda Sverrisdóttir who works at the Dýralæknastöð Suðurlands for putting up with us, I know it hasn't been easy. We're not out of the woods yet with Freyja but however this story ends, Ásdís has been very professional and thorough in her work, she listens and doesn't dismiss our concerns as petty, she has the guts to look at possibilities even though other vets deny the present of such diseases in Iceland, and last but not least she doesn't give up and for that we can be extremely grateful to her. When we spoke about possibly having to put Freyja down yesterday she wanted to change the approach and it does seem to have made a difference. Ásdís is also the person who treated Freyja around Christmas when we also thought she was on her last legs. So again Thank you Dr. Ásdís!

June 15.

Another long sleepless night last night, Freyja had very bad coughing fits and her cough has changed into a bringing up motion with a screaming sound that almost sounds like a grown man choking. I wonder what the neighbour is thinking during the night, and it's unbelievable that such a loud noise can come out of her little body. I would finally dose off and then be woken by her screaming cough, over and over again. I don't know how much sleep Rúnar got because when she starts coughing it seems she has a hard time stopping again and I need to pick her up and calm her down, it works for a little while but when I put her back down she starts up again. He was really tired at work today and since he is working in a dangerous environment this is not a good thing. It got us to thinking seriously about possibly having to let her go rather than let her suffer anymore. We feel so bad each time she coughs and we feel she is hurting and that's why the screaming sound. She seems to not be able to move much lately let alone have quality of life, each time she stands up to move to a different spot she starts coughing. The vet said the screaming sound is probably that her throat is so sore now from all the strain of the past week (and possibly more) and she has also stopped eating the last two days so it could be her throat is too sore to eat even. It has been terrible but lately during the night I wonder if she'll still be here in the morning. Today was also tough because she started coughing any time she moved and I videoed her coughing and took it to the vets office to show her. You see every time we take Freyja to the vets (took her yesterday to let the vet listen to her lungs and heart, she found nothing), she is fine! It's so typical, so we thought maybe the vet didn't realise how serious her fits are, she commented yesterday that she sounded as if she was getting much better compared to the last time she saw her. She doesn't have a fever either so it's hard for the vet to imagine that she is that bad when Freyja is so happy to see her and looks the picture of health while we're there. Well, we decided we had to give her another chance and we got some new drugs for her, stronger antibiotics along with a cough suppressing drug they use to help with kennel cough. Real expensive stuff that we really can't afford but we want to try everything possible for Freyja's sake. So far we haven't gotten the blood test results back but the vet has decided to treat it as if it is kennel cough, we figured it can't hurt at this point. We really hope the results come back tomorrow though, the vet is going to phone to see if she can get them over the phone (the blood went to Sweden, the lab here in Iceland wouldn't know what to look for I guess!!) and will let us know. I have managed to feed her a small amount of food by hand if it is wet for awhile so it's soft, but when Freyja doesn't eat than there is definitely something wrong! Frigg and Birta were very worried about her this morning, they kept a very close eye on her all day and I took some photos, they licked her face, Frigg laid her head on Freyja and Birta came running and watched her closely each time she started coughing and laid down beside her, they haven't acted like that before so it scared me a bit.

So now we wait to see what the night will be like since she is always worst at night. I really and truly hope she will get better, I can't imagine having to put my baby down. She's been through so much during her life I can't believe that she might be leaving us on account of a stupid cough she picked up at a boarding kennel. That would be just too unfair.

Some good news, Birta's former owners had a baby girl today 17 merkur (don't know exactly what that is in lbs), mother and baby are doing fine. Congratulations Dæja and Balli!

June 12.

Not too much new, Freyja is making us wonder, she seems to be coughing less at a time and quiet for longer periods BUT the coughing is much more intense and she puts her whole body into it more, almost as if she is trying to bring up but can't. She is still eating well and has no fever so that is good at least, and she walks around more and seems happier between bouts. I got a call from the kennel today and he asked me how much the bill for the "abortion needle" cost, I told him that everything wasn't finished yet Freyja still needed some medical attention and an ultrasound to see if she needs the needle or not. He said he had only agreed to pay for the abortion needle and since he didn't feel a need to call a vet for Freyja while she was there that it was not his matter! We are so surprised that they didn't hear the coughing and we recorded it when we got home so will no doubt let him listen to the recording if he denies her having been sick. I however have heard from another dog owner up North who had the same problem with her Boxer female (only 3 years old) around Easter after she came out of the same boarding kennel. She said she had just though that the dog had caught a cold since it had been cold and she didn't have her coat that she usually wears around in the winter. Her daughter had decided to pick the dog up early and keep her for her until she got home and she was sick when her daughter picked her up. I asked her the symptoms and she explained it as a horrible sounding cough, like she was choking or trying to bring up and she also cried at the strain of the cough (like Freyja does), her vet treated the dog and she got better but it took quite awhile. She is not sure if she just got better through time or if it was the drugs she was given because she said she never really saw any drastic changes after she got the drugs, it just kind of gradually got better. Now this really makes me think, even if it does turn out to not be kennel cough then there definitely is a contagious disease at this boarding kennel and that is a serious matter in my mind.

Lots to do but I don't feel much like doing much at the moment. I finished a brochure for my Mom for her Congestive Heart Failure support group, that was fun and I liked to be able to help her. I'm so glad she has something to keep her busy and she enjoys helping others, I just wish her health was better I'm very worried about her. I'm still working on my "destruction of the breed" article with some second thoughts as to whether I should post it or not, but I think I will. I know the breeder who loaned me photos from Finland is probably anxious to hear what it's about. It's just my opinions and if some don't like it then that is just how it is. I know those that know me well will understand where I'm coming from as most already know the info I am writing about because we often talk about these things amongst us. Some of my friends and acquaintances care immensely about the breed like me while some I know are just breeding to be popular. I doubt that my article will be anything new to my friends and hopefully those I care about will not take it as an insult. I just get so emotional about the breed sometimes and need to get out my frustrations about what I see around me. I hope it will bring about a wider view and get more trying to breed for the breed specific traits. It's pretty much ready, I have to add a few photos but when Rúnar has the time I think we can post it. I know he will be tired today and probably all of this week unfortunately.

The weather is depressing rain and windy as always, definitely feel sorry for Rúnar working outside in this crap. I have to catch myself in that thought though because despite the negative things I have to thank God for what I do have, it can be taken away so quickly. A friend of mine had to say goodbye to her oldest dog (almost 15 yrs old, born the same year as Stjarna) and a young puppy today so my heart goes out to her it must be a sad sad day. 

June 10.

We are back from a wonderful visit to Canada, being with my family again felt like I was just there yesterday. Nothing ever changes, everybody looks the same maybe a few more grey hairs but comforting to go HOME for a couple weeks. It's funny how time flies but it always feels like it's standing still in matters of age. However I got a shock to see how the girls are growing like weeds and I remember when they were tiny. Dad arranged a nice birthday BBQ for Mandy with whole turkeys broiled on a spit, it was awesome, I didn't know turkey could be BBQed it sure was good. We went to visit Nana and took a few photos, she's still hanging in there and looked pretty good. She didn't know any of us but it was nice to see her and we had a few laughs. It was fun to go together with Mandy, Tim and the girls since it's less of a shock and you don't take it so personally when she doesn't know any of us :-)

We had pretty nice weather while we were down up to 36 degrees one day and both of us got burnt badly on our shoulders, neck and face, it was unbelievable how quickly it happened. We've peeled already but the first few days at Dad's afterwards were murder, it's been years since I have been burnt and had forgotten how much it hurts and how hard it is to sleep with a bad burn. Needless to say we miss the nice sunny weather, since coming home it's been raining and windy. The plane almost blew off the runway on landing, home sweet home!

Now for the unbelievable ending to our trip! We went to the kennel to pick up the dogs, we had warned them when we left that they looked like they should start their season soon but probably not until we got back but to keep an eye on them and please call if something came up, we gave them our own number and a local number at Rúnar's mother's. When I went in to pick them up the first thing I saw was Freyja by herself in a cage with fecal matter and urine on the floor. Okay I thought it's early morning they just opened the hotel and have yet to clean all the stalls after the nights happenings. But when I let her out of the cage she greeted me and then went to the next room coughing, excitement I thought! I went back in to get Birta and Frigg because the girl went to let them in from outside, where I found out a bunch of other dogs were as well. Birta ran in and then a female ISD that she thought was Frigg, I said that's not Frigg and she said oh, there are two the same. I was extremely insulted because that female was not a good specimen and the two of them are very different both in colour and structure. Then I thought well I´ll just have to go get her then, there was too much noise in the kennel for me to be able to call her. I walked to the door and looked out (the upper part opens separately) and what do you think I see...Frigg was tied to a black and white bastard. I screamed and said what is going on here! OMG! All I could do was wait until they were untied, it was a long frustrating and stressful 10-15 minutes (it felt like forever), the longer we waited the angrier we got and the more we felt like punching someone. The proprietor came at that moment (it was a young girl that was looking after them when we got there) and was of course not happy either with what he saw, there was nothing we could do what's done is done. It was hard to bite our lip and walk out having paid the fees before we went in to watch this happen. Instead of arguing about the fees both Rúnar and I decided we needed to walk away or we could do something we regretted. We did however get a promise that the proprietor would pay the vet bills, little did we know they would be a lot higher than one "morning after pill". We thought afterwards that it was a good thing we saw it happen because otherwise we might have not known a thing and a couple months down the road would have had three litters of puppies on our hands to deal with not to mention the troubles that two very old females could have with delivery. 

We'd been anxiously waiting for Birta to come into heat so we could mate her and we'd picked out the male and were all excited to have finally made up our mind to use her once. So when I saw that Frigg was obviously in heat I looked at the other two and of course as always they all came into heat together. We argued the fact to the proprietor that if Frigg has been mated how do we know they all haven't been. He assured us they hadn't but we are not willing to take that chance. We went directly to the vet and explained the problem, the vet took a blood test that we got the results from right away in order for us to know where in her season Birta was since we weren't sure if she'd been bred or not. We explained to the vet that we had thought of mating Birta this season but now we couldn't. She said sure you can, just get the puppies DNA tested it's 100% accurate. Well, needless to say that's not something I would feel comfortable doing so we took both Frigg and Birta to get a shot to abort, just in case. The blood test had shown that Birta was on precisely the right time to be mated, so since she was in the same enclosure with Frigg and all the other dogs it was not worth taking the chance of waiting with treatment. Frigg is just too old to have puppies (besides I have no longing to bring mixed breed puppies into the world) and Birta will be mated next season so I don't want her to have to go through birth of puppies two seasons in a row. The needle for Freyja will have to wait, she will be going in for an ultrasound in a couple weeks to see if she needs the needle or not, she didn't seem to be as far gone in her season and besides she first needs to regain her health. And that brings me to the worst surprise of the whole ordeal.

The trip to the vet's office was a noisy one, only for the fact that Freyja was coughing and coughing with an extreme dry cough and almost choking. She really scared us a few times. She was put on  antibiotics and the sound of her hacking is horrible it often ends in a cry from her. She gets coughing fits and the first vet thought it was possibly her heart, but that was checked before Christmas and was fine. I took her to another vet the next day and asked that a blood test be taken to look for kennel cough. The vets say there is no such thing as kennel cough in Iceland and that's why we have no vaccines against it, but I beg to differ, my girlfriend just lost her dog in quarantine from a serious case of kennel cough. Many others were also sick at the quarantine station and who knows maybe a couple of the ones that weren't treated for it that were there at the same time just happened to pass it on when they were released. Reykjavik is a small place compared to many places and a lot of dogs are taken to dog parks to play together. Icelanders wouldn't know what a cough could mean in a dog so I feel quite certain that there is a possibility that this might be kennel cough in Freyja. That of course ruins our plans of going to the show in a couple weeks. So needless to say I am furious at the kennel and will without a doubt use a different kennel for my dogs in the future.   

May 21.

Yesterday we took Birta Freyja to the eye test, and as I had suspected her beginning in life has caused a small problem, I knew cataracts could develop from the use of artificial puppy milk (I've heard of that being a cause if used the first two days of life). The vet is from Denmark and he is a specialist in eye diseases in dogs, he comes to Iceland 2-3 times a year so we don't get many chances to take the dogs for exams. I had been intending to take Birta last time but she didn't live with me then so I'd been waiting for this test since all dogs have to have eye exams if we plan on breeding from them and well, I have been contemplating one litter from Birta Freyja due to her awesome temperament (character and good nature) as well as good looks. I was of course not happy when the specialist found a cataract on Birta's right eye, but it was a relief when he explained to me that the type of cataract he found is in a different place in the eye and of a different type than hereditary cataracts. He explained it looked like it was trauma induced at a very young age and when I told him that she was born dead and never had mother's milk, he said her being born dead and having a lack of oxygen would be a probable cause and would be his guess as to the trauma involved. He was totally certain that it isn't hereditary (marked it on her test results) and said that I can breed from her if I wish without having to worry about it. So although it is upsetting to think of her possibly being vision impaired on one eye, either now or later down the road it is of course a good thing that it isn't hereditary as there were others that were diagnosed with hereditary cataracts at the same test.

That being said it gave me a clearer picture of her and her problems, and I will admit there have been times (especially when she came to visit out East when we had Tíbrá) when I wondered if she couldn't see well enough and if it was causing her insecurity. There have been times that she would walk into items and she often walks in circles even when walking on lead, she would run around me and look into my eyes. She uses her nose extremely well so I'm sure she has developed her sense of smell if she is indeed lacking in sight in one eye. It would also explain why she barks hysterically when she sees dogs in a distance but as soon as she gets to greet them up close she is fine. So out of this bad news, we can look at it as a positive turning point, we now know that she has special needs or in any case will most likely have some special needs as she gets older and we can better suit her environment to help her. Obviously clicker training is and has always been the best way to train her so she receives rewards for her own movements and behaviours and I will most certainly continue with that. It's just too bad her former owners didn't have this valuable information, it could possibly have saved a lot of frustration for both her and them. Since receiving the news yesterday we have been watching her behaviour and I am happy to say she has a lot more sympathy and understanding on our part now so I think it's safe to say that we will love and care for her with a lot more patience and the question as to whether she should find a new home or be put down is definitely not on the agenda, at least as long as we trust ourselves to provide for her.

On our way to Reykjavik we stopped with the dogs on a stretch of land up on the mountain where there were trees and a lava field, it was a beautiful place to take photos so there were a few taken and we will try to post them in the photo album soon. As usual Birta stole the show with her gorgeous photogenic nature and we got some really nice ones of her. They all enjoyed it a lot and we have decided to take them for another nice run tomorrow on our way to Reykjavik. Then Tuesday it's off to the kennel, for a two week stay.

The general meeting of HRFÍ was held today and the members of the BOD were re-elected, I'm looking forward to continue working with them on show matters. It seems they are all very open minded and many great changes have been made but I think many more are on the horizon. Met a lot of people I haven't seen for awhile and when the meeting was finished we went to look at "the grandchildren" out of Töfra Grouse Look Out Hetta. German Pointer puppies are just SO sweet and I will admit I miss not having one around the house. Hetta was so proud and she looked and acted so much like her mother Valdís it made me miss her a bit. The puppies are growing fast and are 5 weeks old now, time flies. I really hope they all find good homes with people who know how promising these puppies are and make their breeder and parents proud and of course their "grandparents" too :-) . This morning I got a call about another mating out of one of my dogs Töfra Duck Out of Luck Nero, so I will add that to the litters page soon. Hopefully the mating will result in puppies, only time will tell.

May 17.

Spent part of the day watching the festivities in Norway on the Norwegian channel NRK1, wish I could have been there, but I don't have a national costume so I wouldn't have fit in :-) Was at a meeting last night to listen to the candidates for the election at the general meeting of HRFÍ on Sunday. We've had to drive to Reykjavík a lot lately, was at a meeting a couple days ago and now we have to go again tomorrow to a funeral for Rúnar's great aunt and than Saturday to the eye test with Birta Freyja, Sunday it's the general meeting and next Tuesday we have to take the dogs to the kennel and drive to the airport. Wouldn't you know it we hardly used to go anywhere but as soon as the gas prices skyrocket we suddenly need to be in Reykjavík almost every day! So my nerves are of course shot these days by the thought of the long flight to Canada next Tuesday and I'm always scared of flying, but at the same time I'm excited to be able to see the family and be there for my sisters birthday on June 4. I'm nervous about how Birta will be in a kennel for 2 weeks but I'm crossing my fingers that it might indeed be exactly what she needs to be able to calm down in the presence of other dogs. I don't envy the kennel owner, he's gonna have his work cut out for him...but he's such a nice guy that I'm sure he will win her over quickly. She loves playing with other dogs and is fine when off lead but she turns into a Jekyll and Hyde when the leash goes on. She won't be on lead in the kennel so maybe she won't do so bad after all, at least I hope they will all be fine.

Freyja has been a bit strange the past few days again a bit similar to how she was around Christmas (then she was also left in a kennel for 2 weeks a few weeks earlier) she just finished another course of antibiotics and her tongue is very light, just like last time when she was anaemic. The sad thing is there is nothing we can do for her, it's most likely her age starting to catch up on her and well that means it's with heavy heart and a very worried mind that I will leave her in the kennel next week. We'll be back in time for her 12th birthday so I'm hoping she will perk up and be her old self again by then and for many more years to come.

I'm going to enter Freyja and Frigg in the show in June along with Bína, and Kiddi has decided to show her himself this time. I'm looking forward to seeing how Bína will do with her Daddy handling. Freyja is in first place on the Older Veteran of the year list so I'm hoping we can keep that spot until October when the top winning dog is awarded a trophy.

Still working on my latest article about the ISD that I had planned on posting a while ago, but lately I've been pretty much sidetracked with writing a draft of the rules for the education and authorization of ringstewards in Iceland as well as additions to the show rules, I'm using the Norwegian rules as a base. I'm getting very excited about the future of shows, and I'm hoping that the new BOD of the Icelandic Kennel club will agree to hold more shows even unofficial ones as well as obedience competitions that may lead to obedience championships. I'm hoping to try to show the importance of getting people to work with their dogs towards an obtainable goal, it gives people incentive if they know they can gain something from all the work they put into it. Sadly what I dreaded when the ban on the importation of Dobermans and Rottweilers to Iceland was lifted (I have nothing against these breeds, just know how uninformed the Icelandic population is about special traits and training methods) is starting to become a reality, a Doberman bit four young guys at a party the other day and the poor dog was put to sleep. The owner was well known with the police and unfortunately the dog was placed with an owner like that. He was bred by the puppy mill here but none the less it's sad to see how dogs suffer for the stupidity of breeders and owners.

May 7.

What a weekend this has been. The field trial is over now and I can certainly say I was extremely proud this time (I am most times!), although Móa did not do as well yesterday (maybe I jinxed it by writing about her the other day) she has only been to a few trials and has received 3 first prizes in the Young dogs class as well as being Best Young dog of the day once. An outcome for the record books no doubt. Now she will move on to the Open class (age 2 years and older) and I have high hopes for her there as well. She was a clicker puppy (as was the whole litter) and to my knowledge is still trained with positive methods, her owner Keli has a talent for training a gundog and he is sharing his expertise with Bína's owner Kiddi, whenever he gets the chance. I think Beggi can be very proud of his "students". Needless to say I was mildly surprised when I got the news yesterday that this time it was Töfra Bína the Dreamcatcher that received a first prize at the trial :-) I admit I thought it was a joke since this was only her and Kiddi's second time EVER at a trial so I couldn't be prouder of either of them. I do remember though that Móa got a first prize at her very first trial so something is obviously in their genes! :-)

I received an update with photos of Hófi today which is always exciting, I love to see how she is changing and I'm sure I'm going to get her mixed up with her grandmother Frigg when she arrives. They seem to have the same colouring, they both love water, are very smart and easily trained and have a very similar look so I'm very happy with that. I received her "report card" from puppy school the other day and well she is a genius :-)  I can hardly wait to meet her and see what a well trained puppy she is, her breeder is wonderful and I'm so grateful for all her work. It's unbelievable how fast they grow and it won't be long now until she joins us in Iceland. Photos have been added to the photo album, both from today and from earlier dates. 

May 5.

Another good day at the field trial, today Töfra Fields of Gold Móa did it again. First prize with the unbelievable good fortune of finding 7 birds and the awesome results of 6656 444 a near perfect score (6666 444 is a perfect score). She is competing again tomorrow as far as I know but I just had to include this news since I'm extremely proud of her and her owner Keli. Móa is on the list of top winning dogs at field trials in Iceland for 2006 and she was also on the list last year. Look at this beautiful girl:

Some news I totally forgot to mention last time and I'm surprised at myself for forgetting is a lecture Rúnar and I attended last weekend. One of my all time favourite authors and dog trainer the ethologist Lars Falt from Sweden came to hold a lecture for the mental test team here and he agreed to an open lecture for other interested dog people. Of course I told Rúnar this was something we couldn't miss and I'm glad we went. I will admit nothing new was said at the lecture that I hadn't already read in his book but I do know that Rúnar learnt a bit as well as many others. I wish more had attended because I've often thought how much the mentality of dog people needs to change here in Iceland so more will see the importance of training with positive methods. I saw the strange looks on some of the faces when he spoke of how wrong most books and ideas of the real structure of the wolf pack and their roles are, since they are built on wolves in captivity and not the true wolf pack as a family. It was a wonderful chance to meet a true legend in the studies of wolves and dogs who specializes in dog language and pack behaviour of wolves as well as specialized training like drug sniffing, rescue dogs etc.  

May 2.

Töfra Bína the Dreamcatcher has been very busy with her owner Kiddi lately and it seems she has surprised him with her God given talents for hunting. Kiddi has never owned a hunting dog before so the natural stand is very new to him and I think Bína has made her "Daddy" proud. He has sent me a few photos of her and I just have to share a couple. I´m proud of Kiddi for taking the time to train her and I´m glad Bína is finally getting a vent for her instincts.

The weather was gorgeous yesterday and we went for a nice walk with the dogs in the mountain and then down to the seashore where Birta Freyja showed us that she LOVES water :-) We unfortunately couldn't take any photos because the battery in the camera was finished but we got a couple on the mountain. Birta is just too cute even these days when she looks a bit funny since she is out of coat.

Great news from Norway today Beggi phoned to tell me that Töfra Dofri Brosi became a Norwegian Champion at his last show (I think it was this past weekend). He apparently looks just like his grandfather Ás and has the temperament of his mother, easy to teach and calm but in a continually happy mood. I wish his owner Sverre Congratulations with his new Champion!

April 16.

Happy Easter to all! Well, this weekend has been very quiet and we got quite a bit done on the website. The dewclaw theory is added finally but in many parts because they do have a bit of download time so I thought maybe readers would appreciate being able to read it in smaller parts.

A new video of Freyja was added and the story behind this video is that about a week ago I took Birta Freyja out to train in the street in front of our house and of course Frigg and Freyja watched with longing eyes and also wanted "a turn". They love to learn and practice their obedience and I have deprived them of that for years now, I felt so bad training Birta and them only getting to watch from the yard. So I decided to give them a turn and ended with Freyja. Now keep in mind that there are no obedience trials here (only bronze once a year) so I haven't taken Freyja through the exercises since before I left Norway way back in 2001. I didn't know that Rúnar had been taking some photos of us while we were practicing, then he said now do a recall and I'll take a video instead. You may be able to hear me say to him on the video that I doubt if she'll do it right (it had been so long), she just saw a CAT! But I'm sure you will agree with me when I say WOW I was amazed when I actually saw the video myself, she really doesn't forget maybe she's part elephant :-) I just think it's a great recall for an old girl (going on 12, she used to be faster of course) and thought I'd post it for fun.

Töfra Grouse Look Out Hetta had her puppies on Good Friday and I was happy to hear that all 7 are healthy and the birth went very well and was over in less than 4 hours. 

April 2.

I debated about whether or not to write the stories of all my litters because by being honest it can sometimes start rumours but honesty is one of my main "character traits" so I can't change that. I tend to lay all my cards on the table and let people accept me for who I am or not at all. So whether too much info is good or bad others will have to debate over. I often find it strange when other breeders seemingly always have "perfect litters". Life should be so wonderful. I think it is good to warn future breeders of the risks and of what CAN happen so that they are prepared in case they are as unlucky as I have been to experience some of the rare problems during whelping. I do consider myself  lucky in a sense for all the life experiences because when the textbook litters are born it is such a joy that I feel even more blessed than had I never known the sorrow of loss.

  We took the dogs down to the seashore today, the weather was gorgeous, sun was shining and clear blue sky. It was a bit cold and windy but nothing like it has been the past few weeks. There was a dog parade in Reykjavík for the insurance company VísAgria and we had thought of going to see all the breed booths and Rúnar had taken the day off to do that with me. But with the weather the way it was we wanted to spend time with the dogs. Rúnar has been working so much lately, and despite our not going to the festival I feel it was a day well spent and I think the dogs agree :-)

April 1.

I got some news today that I thought might be an April fool's joke but it wasn't. Two of my puppies went to a field trial in beautiful weather, the one Töfra Bína the Dream Catcher was at her very first trial and I'm sure she did well but was quite tired, she was training a lot the past few days and isn't used to all that exercise. The other one Töfra Fields of Gold Móa has done well at trials before and today she kept true to herself. She got a first prize (the only one in the trial to get a 1st prize) and was the Top dog of the day in the young dog's class. Congratulations Keli, you are a wonderful trainer. I'm so proud of her!

March 27.

Well a bit happened since last time I wrote. I used to write a bit on a group chat list for Icelandic Sheepdogs in USA. I spent alot of time on comments and letters and I just realised during the past week or so that that time would be better spent writing things for my own website. I was obviously prioritizing incorrectly and now I think I will have some time to also write my friends emails etc a bit more often, at least I hope so. Of course I will continue to follow the CISC chat list but I will limit my time to be able to do more for my own dogs and kennel! My passion for ISD's is of course intense and therefore I thought why not share my ideas and theories so others can see what I've been working on during the years and also what I've experienced through my breeding career. So I have a couple things ready to post, I just have to wait for Rúnar to find the time to put them up on the site. Poor Rúnar has to work long days and then come home and do my website, I'm so computer illiterate it's ridiculous :-) I think he is doing a fantastic job, maybe I'm biased though :-)

So hopefully in the next few days I will be starting out with my theory on the inheritance of dewclaws with charts and drawings done by myself. This theory I will post is from 1996 but since then I have continued to do charts, which I will include as well. The reason I decided to post the theory is because built on my newer charts and experiences in my breeding as well as the population in the whole, my theory seems to have been correct even though I didn't have all that much info on the dogs back then. After that I'm gonna try to work on an English version of my ideas as to what color genes are present in our breed. If you have anything you'd like to see on my homepage or want me to comment on, then by all means either send me a line in my guestbook or send an email.

Lots of other news, Töfra Hvutti Valtýr had puppies in Holland. I've posted his and other expected litters out of dogs from me on my puppies page, I thought since some people don't have websites that wouldn't it be neat to post their litters on mine. I'm always proud of my grandpuppies and great grandpuppies all over the world.

Well, I have to go watch one of my favourite shows now, Survivor...

March 16.

Yesterday we had a little bit of a special walk with the dogs by the seashore, partly because we weren't sure how today would go. Took Freyja to the vets today to get her teeth cleaned, I just couldn't put it off anymore. Wow am I ever happy with the vet I have now. Maybe moving here to Stokkseyri was a good idea for the dogs :-)  The vet assured me that she would use gas instead of the intravenous to put Freyja to sleep and that she would monitor her well during the procedure. She is the one who knows Freyja from Christmas time and so she knew all about her illness. She said the gas was the better choice because of Freyja age and that way she would waken up much quicker. We had to leave her there and the vet said she'd call when it was finished. She phoned me up and said, well Freyja is wide awake already and barking like crazy, then she giggled. Everything went well of course. She took a blood test while she was at it to see how her system was now after her ordeal at Christmas time. At that time her blood count was dangerously low and her thyroid was also borderline which they thought might be due to the steroids she was given to try to bring up the blood count in a hurry. Today she had a slightly lowered blood count but everything else was fine. She felt it wasn't low enough to worry about and now that her teeth are cleaned it is possible that the immune system will get back to normal. She had some inflammation of the gums that would cause her system to work harder so she got some antibiotics. Guess who is looking and feeling 5 years younger tonight? Freyja my little miracle girl, I'm so happy today went well for her.

Another wonderful happening today. We took Birta Freyja all by herself to train outside the big mall at Selfoss. This was the first attempt to train her in a stressful situation. For those who know her or have read a bit about her in my news since she arrived she has had a stress related barking problems and that is the main reason why her owners gave up on her. Other trainers misunderstood her problem and kept telling the owner to get tougher with her. I tried to explain that she needed understanding and more security but it's hard to stand on the sidelines and give advice when the owner is the one who has to live with her and has no dog knowledge whatsoever. They went to a dog school because I lived too far away to help them and she just seemed to get worse. So Birta's problem is in my opinion a type of insecurity brought on from lack of socialization, the fact that she was an only puppy in a litter so had no siblings to interact with and bad experiences on the lead in stressful situations. She has calmed down so much at home and today she surprised me even more than I expected possible. We parked behind the building and slowly we walked toward the traffic, clicking each positive quiet moment. She was a bit stressed and barky the first couple minutes when we approached all the people and cars but with the help of my trusty clicker and a variety of goodies in my pocket she totally turned around. We ended our exercise with her and I standing right at the door as all the people went in and came out and after her barking and wanting to jump up and talk to everyone (she loves people) when we got there her attention had changed completely to me. I had started out our exercise by making her lie down each time she barked, that is what I use to give them something else to think about and the act of lying down also calms a dog because it is such a submissive position and is a typical calming signal amongst them naturally. Well, a couple times and that was all that was needed, she started barking and immediately went into the down on her own initiative. I loved it! She would bark one single bark, then calmed herself down and looked at me for her click, each time being quiet for longer and longer. No matter how many times I experience the magic through the years, clicker training never ceases to amaze me. It's simplicity and sheer speed of learning. Well, there's definitely hope for Birta that's for sure :-)

March 6.

Yesterday Freyja was shown at the big Spring show, and as I thought she didn't do that well. Since she was sick at Christmas and needed two courses of medication her teeth have become extremely dark and in need of cleaning. I didn't think it was a good idea to get them cleaned because I don't have the equipment to do that anymore and at her age anaesthetic might be difficult on her system and feared maybe she might not wake up again. So I was a bit upset I hadn't gotten them cleaned when the judge didn't want to give her an honour prize just because of her teeth and her coat. The judge was a very strict judge and I was told a lot of dogs were sent out of the ring with second prize ribbons. I was busy working in a different ring and just finished in time to see the Champion class and then show Freyja in her class. Of course I knew her coat was in bad condition so could have expected to do much worse. When looking at the video Rúnar took of her, she actually didn't look that bad, she showed very well as usual she liked being there. It was so funny to see her looking at all the different breeds of dogs, she seemed so interested and surprised to see the strange looking ones, she is so cute sometimes. So in spite of her not getting to take part in the finals, I can be quite happy that she did get a first prize and first place in her class! I just hope she will be well enough to compete at the Summer show so we can try to raise her score on the Veteran of the Year list (this show gave no points to her). I'll see if I can purchase the tooth scraper like I used to have and clean her teeth myself, I always used to do that. My dogs are very good that way, they don't mind me scraping their teeth since I've taught them to lie down on the couch and be completely still while I do that. I'm quite sure though that she wouldn't be that good at the vet's office, but maybe I should let them try without anaesthetic just to see.

Kersins Tíbrá Töfradís did very well at the show, as I figured she would. She was a promising puppy or I wouldn't have taken her when she was young. Her breeder Helga is of course so happy to have her back and I'm glad she has her although sometimes we do miss her and need I say we really wish she was ours when she does well at the shows :-)  It was so cute to see how happy she was to see Rúnar (she was a "daddy's girl" like Birta), she climbed up into his arms and her whole body wiggled, licking his face like crazy. What a sweetie, Rúnar misses her a lot.

One very good development yesterday, all the dogs were in the car at the show and Rúnar went out every once in awhile to let them out. And to his amazement Birta Freyja was quite calm, she barked a bit but nothing like she did the last time she was at show grounds. Then after the show was over I went out to the car and we took all the dogs out, of course by then all the other dogs had left but none the less there were horses running past us and people and cars and Birta wasn't in any distress or discomfort at the stress. We decided to take her into the building where everyone was busy taking down the booths, and she just loved meeting all the people. I was so happy this means that she is coming around and if I start to work with her in busy places and around other dogs then she should be okay for the next show. At least it would be something to aim towards. Hopefully she can take over from where her mom left off when it comes to the show ring.

I got a few more new photos of Hófí and I think it's time to set up a page just for her. I hear she is doing well, her vaccinations went fine and she is being socialized in all different types of situations and distractions, meeting all kinds of animals big and small, meeting people in wheelchairs and many other good lessons she's learning. I'm so happy that she is lucky enough to have a good start in life with her wonderful Dutch breeder. I met the quarantine owner at the show (another good friend of mine) and she is all excited to meet Hófí later this summer since she herself used to own a grandson of Hófí Sr's named Snælukku Kátur. He was a wonderful dog who is greatly missed.

My new student ring steward did a great job, of course it's hard to step into the ring and be totally confident the first time and I only let him practice with a few breeds this time but I'm already looking forward to watching him work as a student again in June. Then is when the real test begins :-) And since it's official now it's okay to mention that one of the reasons I'm so happy he did a good job is because it's my friend Thorsteinn from Sunnusteinn kennel, a fellow ISD breeder. So now he has a few jobs ahead of him as a student and if the judges like his working style, by the end of next year he could be authorized. Pure co-incidence it was an ISD owner that was accepted as the first student under this new improved teaching system in Iceland. Way to go Steini!!!

 February 28.

Unbelievable weather here in Iceland, it feels like Summer already. Wow! Unfortunately we will most likely get frost on the weekend. We're going to Reykjavík to the dog show and have to go over the mountains, so we'll have to leave early and give ourselves some extra time. I'll be working as usual but I managed to get put into the ring with a different judge and someone is going to step in for me while the Icelandic is shown (not the whole breed but the veteran class) so I will be able to show Freyja myself. I don't think I've shown her myself since I left Norway (2001) oops I'm getting nervous now. I always hate getting other people to show her because she is a born show dog and when her and I are in the ring she knows exactly what she is supposed to do. Others don't know the right cues (even though you tell people, it is so easy to forget when under stress) and I often wonder if she could do better if I would have shown her. Anyway, me showing or not I doubt that this show will give good results, she is looking like an Icelandic Hairless dog these days. Totally out of coat, seems my dogs always pick the best time to shed. Typical as well is the fact that this time I decided to save some money and only entered her in the Older Veterans Class and not in the Champion Class, that means that she will be evaluated and given a quality ribbon. Which means I have to cross my fingers that this judge doesn't let the bad coat affect her outcome. Oh well, the good thing is that it isn't important how she places, this is just something that she loves to do. She has always loved showing, so this will be a fun day out for her no matter what. I'm just glad she's still here.

More exciting news is that after giving a written test last weekend I passed one of my students. This means that I will be in the ring with my first student ring steward, I'm looking forward to working with him and so hope he proves to be ready to take on the challenge. I kind of pushed him to take the test right away when I saw his potential. I'm sure he'll do just fine :-) I'll be holding another test sometime after the show, I'm not sure how many are actually ready for it, but we'll see how things go. It's exciting to be able to finally educate more people to work at the shows and today there really is a need for it since we've gone from 2 rings to 4 (last show there were 3 for the first time) and are forced to use people that are not very experienced just to be able to man this show. Now we just have to get more people interested in writing for the judge so that we don't have problems manning the rings like this time.

February 18.

The weather was so nice today, it felt like spring! That of course meant that I got an urge to set up my new play set of agility equipment. It's just a few simple things that came in a box, easy to set up and take down, not proper equipment but hey, it's something to do on a nice day. I've thought about building some equipment but so far it's still just a thought (I'm a procrastinator) and where I live there is no chance of agility practice (only one place to practice and that's in Reykjavík once a week). We still don't have agility competitions here so I don't see any reason to train, it's so sad . When I started the dog sport division of the Icelandic Kennel Club with my friend Agnes (who lives in Sweden now) over a decade ago we had a lot of fun and lived for agility practice. We even competed in an online competition once with an American Club. We set up the same course, picked names from a hat to compete with as a partner and then we took the times of each dog and added the outcomes together. So there were in actual fact teams consisting of Americans and Icelanders competing together but in two different countries. It was incredible fun and I am so glad I was able to take part. Hófí was a star back then, ran the course faster than most (sometimes the fastest time) and with so much precision. I miss her when I think of what a wonderful dog she was and how easy it was to train her. Her daughter Frigg of course is a bit like her but has certain differences that make her unique, Frigg is more cautious in training, she is a bit scared of heights (the plank and see saw are not so popular with her). Yes, it can be fun to remember the good times but it makes me mad that such simple things like being able to train agility isn't possible in Iceland.

Anyway, I figured since Birta has never seen agility equipment before it might be neat to introduce her to them just for some fun. I didn't expect her to figure things out right away but then again she is her mother's daughter and Freyja LOVES agility, always has. I just introduced Birta to the target stick a few days ago, she was actually clicker trained slightly as a tiny puppy in my home but when she left then the training changed  and she doesn't seem to have learned all that much in general. I was amazed that after just a few days of introducing the target stick that she actually followed it like a pro over the jump and poles. I had to put some photos up so everyone who is interested in seeing them can, Rúnar got a few really good action shots!

Incredibly enough Freyja did her best and she knew all the cues even though it´s been 7 years since her and Frigg have been anywhere near agility equipment. Wow, time flies!!! I just couldn´t believe how happy my little Freyja was to be able to play with the stupid jump and tunnels. I mean she´s going on 12 years old this summer and I thought she was a goner before Xmas. What a girl, I just love her to bits :-)

Temporary photogallery

February 15.

Here I am another year older, shhhhh, I guess we can keep it a secret. Older and wiser they always say, but then what do they know, right?

Thought it was time to write a bit of news, not that there is much to tell, but then again. Let me think, the DÍF show was a day with tears of joy (it's always nice to see an "extremely" elderly dog shown, but when it's one of your own it gets a bit emotional). Töfra Stjarna couldn't have been a better advertisement for my kennel. This is the second time she has made me cry at a show, the first time was when her and her owner received an award as service dog of the year for their work in an Old Age Home experiment. She was a wonderful representative of the breed, even at her high age of 14 years and she was so happy to be there. Apart from that of the 80 dogs shown, 39 (40 including her) were direct descendants of her and that was incredible to see. One of the most famous descendants of hers is her grandson Ch. Hektor and he is now quite famous. The Best of Show and Best of Opposite Sex were both descendants of hers so I couldn't have been more proud of that sweet little black tri "puppy" named Stjarna (she has in a sense lived up to her name) that I have regretted not keeping all of these years. It was a long day for the dogs taking part and extremely cold for everyone there including the judge, this was the first time a show has been held this time of year and I guess you can say it had it's good points (the dogs were all in their best coats) and it had it's bad points (extreme snow storm and slippery roads that caused a few of the dogs to not show), not to mention the heat wasn't working in the hall so the cold was awful, causing many including me to be sick the following week. There are photos of the show on DÍF´s homepage.  Stjarna was nr.80. The Norwegian judge was impressed with her and her critique was outstanding, he wanted to give her a champion quality ribbon but alas after a whole day of standing on the freezing cold floor of the horse stables (where the show was held), poor Stjarna was a bit stiff in her movement. Needless to say her owner and myself were ecstatic that she did as well as she did, Best Older Veteran in Show with a prize of honour.

I didn't show Töfra Birta Freyja at the DÍF show, two reasons for that. One I was working at the show and thus cannot show her myself so it meant she would have to be shown by Rúnar (who has never stepped into the show ring, let alone shown a difficult dog). The other reason was that she was really being difficult around all the dogs outside, so stressed, insecure and barking. I didn't think she was ready and being a clicker trainer it goes against my beliefs to take a dog into a situation that it's not likely to succeed in. I'm hoping that I can show her myself in future, just needs a bit more exposure and training to calm her down in the presence of other dogs. I don't know why she experiences extreme insecurity or what caused the over the top behaviour of hers while on leash, but she is fine off leash. So something connected to being on the lead causes her tremendous stress around other dogs. I'm ashamed to say I haven't been spending any time on the poor girl training even though I know it shouldn't take long to fix with clicker training. I've been busy with other things and she has just been a couch potato for the past few months since I got her. I'm sure I will fix it because she is a wonderful dog and so much calmer in general now than she used to be just from cutting down on everyday stress and no more rope pulling (that's the first thing that was cut out of her agenda). Everyday I am more and more in awe of Birta´s shear beauty and charisma so showing has to be in her future! She's not getting any younger and dogs lose their edge in the show ring after a few years so I have to get crackin´ if I'm gonna make something of her.

Speaking of training, my lovely little Hófí is in puppy training in Holland at the moment and everything is going well I've been told. She is supposed to be a smart girl and quick to learn so obviously takes after her grandmother Frigg. Today brought about a new development in Hófí´s future, she will now be co-owned by myself and my good friend Valerie Sharp at Greenstone Kennels in Canada. Hófí will be living with me and registered to me but Valerie has future rights to a puppy out of Hófí and a male that we will be deciding on together. It is very exciting to know that little Hófí may also do some good in future in my homeland of Canada. Hófí II has relatives living there already and I'm always happy to see that although the original Hófí (frá Kolsholti) wasn't able to have puppies while I was living there, she still managed to have descendants registered in the CKC. I was sad when I left Canada without being able to contribute to the gene pool, little did I know that it was destined to be anyway but at a later date and with a newer generation. Funny thing fate!

New photos arrived and I'm sure Helma (her breeder at Kennel fra Olafsfjordur) won't mind me sharing! So here she is at 3 months of age. She seems to take after her mother a lot and by the look on her face in most photos is a bit of an attention seeker :-) Pretty girl.

Hólmfrídur frá Ólafsfjordur with her mother Töfra Ljósbrá Lotta (age 5 years) 

                    Hófí with her mother and brother Lagsi frá Ólafsfjordur (somebody is tired :-) )                        

I guess the last bit of news which isn't really kennel news but none the less, I held a seminar/course for ring stewards last weekend and it was lots of fun. It was the first time I've been asked to do something like that and it seemed to go over pretty well. There has been a great need for this since there are so few people qualified to work in the show ring here in Iceland. The participants appear to be just as interested in continuing (if not more so) as they were when we started the course so I guess it wasn't all that bad. We will continue with some more evening practice sessions and a final test to see who graduates on to the next level (being in the ring with the ring steward then judge, for practical exams) but I for one am looking forward to being able to sit outside the ring every once in awhile in future instead of always being tied up working and that will give me a chance to show my own dogs more too. I've really not been able to show now for many years, it is one factor why Frigg never achieved her Icelandic title and now she is too old to impress the judges enough. It's about time I get back into the swing of things and of course I'm especially looking forward to showing Hófí when she arrives.

I guess that's all the news I can remember at the moment, I'll try to update more often so it's not as much to read at a time.

January 16.

The puppy test is finished and the verdict is in...our new puppy will be called Hólmfrídur frá Ólafsfjördur. She isn't the same colour as her great grandmother but there is something special about her that screams out I'm Hófí. I'm so excited and extremely happy that this little female is the one for me, she caught my eye from the moment I saw her newborn photos. It's so funny, they do seem to pick their owner, one way or another, somehow she did even though I live so many miles away. Once again the unexplainable power of dogs! Many thanks to Helma her breeder for allowing me to have her and keeping her for me, and a special thanks to Anita as well for taking the time to be there to observe the puppy test for me.

Here she is seen at 6 weeks old. Irresistibly sweet :-)

Another adorable photo of her with her siblings, 7 weeks old (one little male isn't quite visible unfortunately but he is just as cute as the others!).

January 09.

Well, time flies and they are already 6 weeks old and now I am getting more and more anxious to bring my new addition home! I've been watching her development from afar and have to admit I am still not certain which puppy is mine, but in a week or so the temperament tests will be done and I'll have a better idea as to which puppy is best suited for my family. Sadly it's going to be another half a year or so until she comes home because of the new quarantine rules here in Iceland (they have to be older now than they used to but instead the quarantine is much shorter). I know however that she will be well looked after in her home country of Holland.

For those that didn't know I will be importing a female grand puppy /great great grand puppy from the breeder at "fra Olafsfjordur". This is an extremely promising litter, partially for the fact that they are all gorgeous :-) but mostly because of the bloodlines involved. The litter is out of Töfra Ljósbrá Lotta (Dilkur´s Fylkir/Töfra Frigg) and my all time favourite dog in Norway (who I've known personally since the time he was a young puppy) Icetops Sámur (a great grandson of Töfra Stjarna). Sámur is out of Skessu-Salka who is in the extremely rare family group O (sister to Skessu-Skolli father of my litter in 2002). This family group only has a total of 4-5 individuals alive today plus first generation progeny like my litter and a few other litters in Iceland and Sweden. Sámur´s father Icetops Ulrik lives in Sweden out of Norwegian parents. I know most of those dogs well also but Ulrik´s father Porry (who died in Oct. 2004) is another one of my favourite dogs. I'm so excited and just wanted to share a few photos with everyone. 

January 03

The new homepage is coming along well. Hoping to get some ideas from "visitors" as to what they would like to see on the page.

If I think of the events of last year it's funny how fate plays a role in everything, giving Tíbrá back to Helga was difficult but as fate would have it Birta Freyja suddenly needed a new home at the end of last year. And only having Freyja and Frigg made it possible for me to give her a place in my life again.

A new year has started and my dogs are all doing well. Stayed home during the holidays to watch over the dogs and it was really nice just chilling out and taking it easy for a whole week. Freyja had been quite sick and we thought we were losing her before Christmas but miraculously she is pretty much back to her normal self. She is however still a bit anaemic (they thought at first that she had become allergic to her own blood, but that proved wrong) so we are not quite sure yet what is causing it, could be a tumour so we cross our fingers that it may just be her age rather than something serious. The next few weeks should give us a better idea of what's going on with her. Maybe Freyja perked up because she likes having her daughter back and wants to hang around awhile longer to spend some time with her :-)

Birta Freyja is such a good dog, so cuddly, unbelievable that she almost was put to sleep because her former owner couldn't find a home for her. Don't know yet if I'll look for a home for her later on or not, she is so much like her mother and wonderful to have around. She is beautiful, sweet, calm and easy to teach, definitely not the stressed out individual that she used to be. Because she has been so good I decided to register her for the coming show on January 14th, I don't know how she will behave at the show, she is not as insecure on lead as she used to be but when she meets so many dogs at the same time and many barking I'm sure she will start her antics again. She barks when she is afraid but hopefully this new found calmness and trust in the person at the other end of the leash at home and around the neighbourhood will bring with it a new Birta at the show too. I think she feels quite at home here and the three of them are getting along as if they've always lived together.

I mated Frigg and she was to whelp in December, I was planning on keeping a puppy but unfortunately she had none. It's just as well, I was a bit worried about how she would do at her age. Only bad thing is that now she seems to have a false pregnancy (swelling milk glands), we are almost certain that she re-absorbed the puppies while I left them at the dog kennel for 3 weeks during our trip to Canada.

I hope we can get the photo gallery up and running soon, we've taken allot of wonderful photos of the dogs lately and I'd like to share them. Please come back and take a peek soon, no doubt some changes and additions will be made over the next few days. Oh, and please sign my guestbook so I know you've been "visiting". Tell me what you think and what can be improved. Thanks for looking in. 

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