May 3, 2011: Bad Dogs!

Kele and Pixie are in the doghouse. Kelvin had 7 chicks that he was going to use in some lessons with his school kids, and Kele and Pixie ate them! The little devils were caught red-handed! Kelvin is not happy!!!The next day, this pair were caught standing on a bottle of Combinex which gave them just enough elevation to get their heads into a bag of puppy food. You'd think we didn't feed them enough. Perhaps these two young lasses need a job to keep them occupied. They are starting to get really naughty.

We have had fabulous weather here in Wales. So much so that we have an early season drought. One of our streams has completely dried up and the training field is bone dry. While it is great for training, we are starting to worry about water for the stock.

It is absolutely gorgeous trialling weather, though. When the sun is out, people get out of their cars and trucks to have a cup of tea, a yarn and a few laughs. Most days we are huddled in our vehicles trying to keep out of the elements so this is a nice departure from the norm.

Last Saturday was the big season opener - the Llangadog Trial. Over 90 competitors and a who's who of South Wales triallists in attendance. This was the very first trial we ran in Wales when we moved here in 2008. This is what I wrote in our blog way back then:

"It was a bit nerve-racking competing amongst these people for the first time but sometimes one just has to hold one's nose and jump. And jump we did."

Funny thing is, 3 years on and it is no less nerve racking and we're still holding our noses and jumping! I ran Meg and managed to squeak into 4th place despite an error at the pen (I seem to be picking up where I left off last year - darn!). Sioux also ran; her first time at the event. An uncharacteristic error on the outrun and me sleeping at the post saw a less than perfect start to the run...and another error at the pen saw us out of the money. Kelvin running Bee for the first time at this trial had a good run and finished one point ahead of Sioux and narrowly beaten out of 6th place on the OLF rule. Three dogs running well.... a satisfying day! Thank you Meg for making sure I did not have to cook Kelvin dinner...but we'd better pull up our socks with Bee nipping at our heels. It was a close call!

Monday we headed off to Jeff and Helen Hudd's place - Wauntysswg. Don't try to say that after a few beers. This is a well-organized trial; this year being no exception. The shedding ring was the smallest ring I have ever seen...but yet ever so nicely marked with white paint (surplus from Jeff's house painting adventure). Who was it who decided the ring should be 40 FEET in diameter and not 40 yards? The amazing thing is, some of the best handlers actually managed to shed IN the ring! Richard Millichap's shed was superb and all 4 sheep were in the ring when he took the shed. Impressive! Sioux managed to eek out a 4th place finish despite...you guessed it...a bad pen. We did manage to stuff those sheep in the pen with 1 second to spare but it wasn't pretty. Meg and I could not get the sheep in the pen - or should I say, we had them in the pen and couldn't keep them in. Don't ask...but it was all my fault. The penning bogey has well and truly descended upon me. Bee and Kelvin had yet another good performance and when Kelvin learns Bee's whistles, they are going to be dangerous!

On the farm, a couple of our new gates have finally been installed and we managed to get the truck up the hill to deliver more gates and gate posts ready for installation. My war on thistles has started for yet another year. Without a quad bike, this is going to be a brutal year walking the spray pack up the hill. I don't even want to think about it. The new shed has been finished. Since we have not yet had a house warming party, perhaps we should just have a shed warming party instead. There's certainly plenty of room.

Today I finally managed to don my running shoes and start yet another come back from the realms of unfitness. I have been reading about some research that says "One in five of us has inherited 'unfitness genes' that mean no matter how often we pound the treadmill, we'll still be out of puff." I tried explaining that to my dogs this morning while on the run but they would have nothing of it. Oh well, I'd better keep pounding.

I'm still working on the photos from South Africa. They're coming! Promise. I have posted a few on facebook... I'm a bit behind and I have to catch up on work things first before I can catch up on 'play' things. Till next week, happy trialling.