07.09.10
Posted in News at 19:17 by nikki
I’m back. I know unbelievable an update two days in a row.
Well, the car broke down on Rúnar’s way home from work yesterday so he needed a ride today and got his brother-in-law to drive him to the store after work to get some stuff to try to fix it. Fingers crossed. We really need a car on Sunday to get to Reykjavík and being we live pretty much in the middle of nowhere we even need a car to get to the grocery store or anywhere for that matter.
I heard news today that I thought I’d share in keeping with the news of AKC shows this past week. A couple friends did great at the shows this week and today they finished their Championships. Congratulations to Jo-Ann and Penny with your new AKC Champions, the 1st AKC Champions. Jo-Ann’s German import Kaffi was the 1st BOB last weekend as she entered the first show on the East Coast after the ISD was able to compete and today he got his last points. Penny’s Stella is the 1st American Bred AKC Champion which must be a very proud moment. Congratulations to her breeder Margret Gimblin.
News on TV tonight. I see they have a new use for all the volcanic ash here in Iceland, they have started making a new type of concrete which they say is really good. It looks nice, a dark “ash” grey. 
Can’t think of much more at the moment.
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07.08.10
Posted in News at 18:32 by nikki
I’ve just been overwhelmed the past little while, sorry about the lack of updates. Lots going on and not all will be mentioned because no doubt I’ll forget something, but where to start? If my shoulders (I have a pinched nerve in my neck/shoulders) don’t give out I’ll try to write about as much as I can.
The weekend was HUGE in terms of events and news, both on the home front and abroad.
We had our clicker course last weekend and it was our first attempt at a “crash course” meaning that we had 3 days in a row, Friday evening went to the lecture and timing games then Saturday and Sunday we had 2 hours (3 dogs at a time for about 10 min. at a time) of training time. It was very difficult to know how to start since the facility we are in was so full of flies that we couldn’t use the room we usually do for the slide show, so we were cramped into the front room, then the girl that works there got into a car accident just down the road so just before we were ready to start friends of hers brought her dog to stay at the daycare until someone could pick him up. He had been in the car too so was quite stressed and in a bit of shock and didn’t like strangers so we were stuck with a dog we didn’t know from Adam that we were a bit worried about and was barking in his cage and we couldn’t even take him out of the cage because he would growl and nip. We luckily have an assistant who has a car with no windows that he could be in for a bit outside while we started the lecture, with half our mind on the dog, and so when he was calmed down a bit she was able to talk to him, get him out of his crate and bring him in on leash and sit with him until his owners showed up. Thankfully no one was seriously injured and it turned out okay but talk about stress being added to stress of starting with a new group of people including a couple professionals.
Saturday we got there and had to hold the class outside in the sun because of all the flies in the house, at the same time a few 100 meters away at the end of the yard was a horse competition going on with loud speaker announcements, music and everything. Needless to say the dogs are not all used to seeing so many horses so close up and we had to kind of jump ahead in the exercises without wanting to, because instead of them starting attention training without distractions we had lots of distractions! Not quite the best way to start a class but they did okay except that I ended up holding most the class because Rúnar was inside being sick to his stomach with a really bad migraine. I had stomach pains and Rúnar being sick didn’t help calm that. I tell ya, thankfully our assistant had an ibufen for Rúnar so he managed to come back out for the last little bit of the class. Sunday well I don’t know, started out we almost didn’t make it there because the car was overheating, it’s started losing water again so we had to stop once on the way to add a couple liters of water and then cross our fingers that we got there on time, we had to have the windows open and the heat on fullblast to try to cool down the car up the steep mountain road, so by the time we got there we were feeling car sick from the heat and windblown. I wonder what our students must think?! Hehe I can just imagine.
We were all pooped before we started, students, dogs and teachers. Hehe I think it’s fair to say that next time we will need to have one day in between the two hands-on classes to rest the dogs and catch our breath. Boy do we need to find a nice indoor facility that we can have all the dogs in without external disturbances like horse competitions. Hehe Of course I forgot how much each trip into Reykjavík takes out of me in terms of the vertigo I get from the drive so one day in between is also crucial for me too as well as a new car with better shocks might help. Lottery tickets are purchased every week here.
We were pleasantly surprised to see one of our 1 yr old GSP grandpuppies Spori as a student, we had no idea he was coming, we did know one GSP was enrolled but that dog didn’t show up, we had forgot to ask what type of dog this person had. It was awesome to use him to explain the exercises because he pulled so hard on the leash that he could pull a full grown person clear across the parking lot. He definitely got the strength of his grandma Valdís, she loved to pull Beggi on skis and on a bike. The only way to control him was to have him on a prong collar or so the owner had been told. The hunters still tend to use harsher methods in general (I think in part so they don’t get shown up by their macho buddies LOL) so this poor girl who really wanted to learn clicker training and had read quite a bit about it was given the advice that the breed needed to be on a prong collar. It’s not unusual that GSP owners use this type of collar because they are such an incredibly strong dog. I will admit that IF you are going to go for that type of training then I would personally much rather see a dog with a prong collar than a regular choke chain, given the fact that the prongs cause less physical damage to the dogs. We explained however that while he was in our classes the prong was NOT to be used and we would show her how to do it another way. We always give people the option of using a gentle leader or harness at home until the dogs are trained but usually they get results very quickly and don’t need them.
I had taken a few of the other dogs to show one of the ways we teach loose leash walking without a clicker for those who are not quite comfortable with the clicker yet. It’s a be a statue type training and Rúnar had to have Spori for the first walk politely on leash lesson because I wouldn’t have been strong enough to hold him. I’m sure people were quite skeptical that this “wild child” could ever walk nicely on a loose lead and we LOVE having dogs like that to train because the result is so dramatic. So after digging his feet in the gravel a few times to hold his ground Rúnar got a bit of progress. Sunday we explained one of the other many ways and the way we like to train it ourselves using a clicker and Rúnar started clicking him for loose leash and eye contact. After a few minutes of clicker training he had him so well behaved on the leash that we actually had a dog giving eye contact to a smiling owner when she took over training. She even got a click ticket for digging her feet firmly into the ground once to be a statue instead of pulling on the lead when he was momentarily distracted by the horses. Spori quickly realized though that his behaviour could bring about good consequences and I’m sure he is going to love clicker training just as much as his grandmother did. By the end of Sunday he was walking on leash like a pro thanks to his owner’s good timing and willingness to try something new.
We have a great group of people and a wide variety of dogs which is fun. Spori is our first GSP at the course since Rúnar graduated. There is a really nice looking Icelandic Sheepdog there too, I don’t remember seeing him at shows but if he starts coming then look out. He has nice size and a beautiful wide triangular masculine head, beautiful coat and colouring. We’re thinking he’s a good one for future consideration maybe. Here are a few photos we took of some of the dogs. I just noticed that as we tend to focus on the positive it seems we always forget to take photos of the dogs misbehaving! Hehe
Maybe you’ll notice the horses in the background. Maybe we did get a photo or two of a dog pulling, here Rúnar is being a distraction and they are getting clicked for loose leash OR eye contact with owner.
Other happenings on the weekend were: As of June 30th the ISD received full recognition in AKC shows and events as a member of the herding group. So a bunch of dogs got out to the shows on the very first weekend, they were quite well represented for their first weekend in the ring! Congratulations to all who took part, to the breeders and the owners and to all the members and BOD of ISAA that has worked so hard to get the breed recognized and under the FCI standard (reworded slightly for AKC). I am so pleased and proud to say that our little Icelandic immigrant to Seattle district Int Ch Töfra Kelikátur (he is a champion in UKC) was the very first ISD in history to place in the herding group at an AKC show. He got a group 4th. He was the second to become Best of Breed (nationally) and the first to be Best of Breed on the West Coast. I’m hoping to get some photos of him taken at the show to share but here is one I got of him stacked. He does resemble his mom a bit and we are so proud of him and Scotti who did us this huge honour of giving of her time to take him out to the shows.
A good friend of ours was at the same show and was BOS the first day then BOB the next and had the very first GROUP 1st and competed with her bitch Pineridge Kolperla in the Best in Show ring. No placement there but MAN what an accomplishment on their very first weekend. Congratulations Donna and Terry as well as her breeder Jill Fike in Canada.
You can see more about the Icelandic Sheepdog in America on the ISAA website. I ecourage anyone who is interested in the breed to contact the club for information and check out their list of breeders. I also encourage all breeders to be careful who they sell their puppies to as now we’re in the big leagues and not everyone is just looking to preserve the breed.
I think maybe on that same note it might be in order to mention that it has come to our attention lately that the infamous puppy farm in Iceland (Dalsmynni) who have managed to acquire many dogs of different breeds from most likely unsuspecting breeders in USA has now acquired at least 5 dogs in Iceland with intention to start breeding Icelandic sheepdogs. They have their own registering body called Ishundar (in some cases have given false pedigrees) that has no health test requirements and is recognized by UCI in Germany through DHL in Denmark, they have a logo on their website (which I am not going to link to as I don’t condone their organization) to give the impression they are recognized by FCI. It is the logo of something called Federación Canina Internacional F.C.I. and is practically identical in looks to the FCI logo except for the colour and the periods between the letters. You can see a message from FCI here. We strongly urge people to be careful when purchasing a puppy from Iceland or anywhere for that matter that they do not help to keep puppy farms in business.
Trying to think. I’m sure there was more, of course not as interesting stuff maybe. Rúnar has been working late again this whole week so you see it only lasted a week that he got to work his “regular hours”. Huh, I might have known. The stress of the weekend of being alone in their cages for so long and not getting any time with us or exercise took a bit of a toll on the dogs emotional state and they were a bit wound up on Monday while Rúnar was at work. We’ve had teenagers working out front on the road picking weeds and cleaning up as well as a big crane fixing the road and all kinds of other outside stressors that have made us all a bit nervous and cranky lately. Yes I need calm and quiet surroundings (I’m a hermit living in a busy neighbourhood!!) or I get cranky and anxious and the dogs certainly know that. Anyway we had a scuffle between all four bitches on Monday. Mine are pretty good at always getting along and that’s why when something happens it is quite scary and stressful.
It’s not uncommon and not only in spitz breeds (I’ve seen it in Irish Setters as well, a group fight of 8…can you imagine?!) if two start the others will join in and that’s what happened here, little Klói was smart enough to stay clear so I could put him outside. Mine are not dog on dog aggressive or bossy by nature but Skella is a bit anxious and can let the smallest thing upset her if she is stressed. Usually the others will just ignore her. They were under the dining room table so no one had any “escape route” from the situation, I got Skella into her cage quickly so there were no physical injuries besides a scratch on Birta’s ear and one on Frigg’s face. Thank goodness for bite inhibition, I only wish Skella also had some since she has done damage when she got into a scuffle with Birta not too long ago before she started her heat. It does seem to be more likely they have disagreements when hormones are high like around their season, just before or right after, they usually are pretty good while they are in heat but of course best when there are no hormones in play. I can still honestly say (knock on wood that will continue) that fights can be counted on one hand but of course as is often the case for anxiety ridden people like me it sounded worse than it actually was and I often make it worse with my own excited over the top behaviour. It takes me some time to breath deep and calm down once my adrenalin shoots up, could be because of the missing kidney I don’t know. I called Rúnar at work just after lunch and he was allowed to quit early and come home at 4:30 (his usual time) meaning that instead of getting Friday off at 4 he’ll most likely have to work late then instead. DOH! So again, a three day course is not all that great for our own dogs either when they don’t get any exercise in between.
Yesterday I had another small blood vessel or vein burst in my one foot, this time on my toes but I still have a pain under my foot at the same place it burst once before. Klói helped me by laying his healing head on it. He is so sweet. I think it was all the standing on the weekend as well as I have bruises all over my legs from the course. Yes, the dogs are there to learn so of course many have a jumping up behaviour that we need to work on. Just give then a couple more classes and they’ll be great! I’m not complaining, just wish they had shorter nails. Hehe I’ll be so happy when I see their improvements and so that’s why I’m quite content to have bruises on my legs after the first class, it too makes the success more obvious when you can see it in “black and blue” (or is it supposed to be white?).
I really must start taking my vitamins…now if I could just stop being anxious about it and do it!
I called my Dad the other day after talking to my mom. She informed me that he was not in the best of health. It always hits me hard when I hear about my Dad having health problems, he’s my hero, he never lets on about himself and shows more concern for my Mom and my stepmom Donna. I certainly didn’t inherit my anxiety from him, he’s so “no worries” in his outlook of life. Of course he didn’t want to admit it right away until I told him I’d heard about it. So apparently he had another heart attack a few weeks ago on the golf course, which he is not supposed to be doing without a cart. I cannot explain how much such news bothers me to be so far away and not be able to spend time with my family before they are gone. I’ve been thinking of my Nana so much lately and how I want to see her again, I refuse to let myself believe she is gone forever. I realize that even the people I tend to believe are invincible like my mom and dad aren’t and I pray every day that they will both live forever so I will one day be able to make it over to spend some years together with them. Money really is a curse, when you have a lack of it that causes such regret and unhappiness. Why can’t the world be an even smaller place, without the need for money, without wealth and poverty?
I guess with the hot water being turned off today and me not being able to take a bath or wash the dishes it bought me some time on the computer instead to update. Aha, I found a positive. ;-Þ Or maybe I found a couple, we finally have some sunshine and BLUE skies…yippee!
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