Pictures pictures pictures

Ok, so I finally broke down and got a new camera. I was getting tired of the mostly-blurry photos of shots that I didn't ask for! Not that I'm really complaining - my little point-and-click camera had great optical zoom and gave me some really nice pictures. And it's lasted me 5 years or so, which is excellent for any digital camera., let alone an inexpensive point-and-click.

Anyway, so I'm going crazy with this camera, getting too many pictures. Which means I pay for it later, because then I have to process all those pictures. Even after deleting the ones that were no good, I had over 200 today alone. Which took me a few hours to work on. So I'm going to have to figure out how to balance this - how do I get the max value out of my picture-taking without taking up my whole weekend on this! :) That, and I have to actually learn how to use the darn camera.

So the bouviers worked well today. Xen's tracking was especially good. I got to the training field late, but Fred had laid my track on time. So that meant that the track was two hours old, much longer than it needed to be. But Xen ran an excellent track - all nice corners and he only had a couple of problems. He really didn't want to down on the first article - not sure why. It was a large dowel-like article. So we worked on that a little bit. Then he had problems on the very last leg, after the corner - a little casting - but he did finish the track and find the article.

The obedience was also good. Today, like yesterday, was hot, so we just did the retrieve with Uzzi, which went well. Xen's obedience was also good. I think his flat retrieve could be a little faster, but the jump and climb were great. One of the things I am going to try to concentrate on from here on out is overcoming my own shortcomings. I need to put the July heat aside and bring his enthusiasm up. One example is that I need to be more energized between the flat retrieve and the jump, to improve Xen's heeling. I also need to be more enthusiastic and work more with play, since I want this dog to be strong and confident for the next few years.

Protection for both dogs was also good. Uzzi was just Uzzi - all heart. Xen's bites were good, his drive strong.

Carla and Fred brought out a few of their bouviers for protection too. It's possible she brought some out for obedience, but since I arrived late, I missed most of the obedience routines. But for protection, we got to see Tommy, Yankee, Doodle, Toro, Gypsy, Dre, and the new puppy Billy Bob. Billy is a really nice puppy - good looking and great drive. The rest of the bouviers also did good work. Probably my favorite routine was Tommy, who is retired (not that you could tell her that!) She is working to help train Steve in the protection work. In fact, after this one dog, I'm pretty sure Steve was completely spent. (Of course, that was after like 7 escapes and a few courage tests.) Tommy's a heavy strong female that likes to fight the decoy, so she's one of the hardest dogs to work at Dutch East.

Other than that, Toro also did very nice work today. He's a very serious dog, a brother of Xen, so he's fun to watch. Toro has a bark that comes from deep in his chest, and he's a lot like his father Macho. He's also very good looking - very solid structure.