Del Val NAVHDA Training Clinic: Making Progress!

You gotta keep things interesting.....

Saturday Jim and I took the girls back down to the Colliers Mills WMA in NJ to train with the Del Val NAVHDA Chapter at one of their clinics. There are so many nice people there willing to help you achieve your goals with your dog. It's such a positive and fun atmosphere to train in. Saturday was a blast not only for the great training but the head of our group rescued some ill prepared and in my opinion slightly stoned teenagers from a watery sand pit and I got urinated on by a huge turtle. That's right.....I said I got urinated on by a huge turtle. I think it was a red eared slider but I'm not entirely sure. I wasn't to angry about it tho because I'm sure in some far off country its a sign of good luck and who can't use a little more good luck!? Good times people.  Good times.

George - Owned by Kathi Harrington

Anyway.....last weekend while I was vacationing in the snow laden mountains of Montana with my best friend Jen, Jim worked the girls in south jersey. I got to hear all about how well Cleo had done on her duck search and how Luna at 14 weeks had an exceptional track. I'm pretty sure he was just trying to make me jealous. So all his glowing feedback had me looking forward to this weekends training and I have to say that I wasn't disappointed at all.

Cleo on point

As usual we started off with fieldwork. Cleo had a good morning finding and staying steady on all her birds and much to my excitement she retrieved to hand without dropping or adjusting them on the way back to Jim. She also completed a duck drag tracking wonderfully and delivering the duck to hand. Success.

Luna on point

We also put some pigeons out for 15 week old Luna who excitedly pulled Jim to the bird field. When she was released it was apparent she wasn't just running through the field she was hunting and she even displayed some style. I think we have ourselves a little huntress. She found and pointed both birds.  We also did a small 20 yard track for her. She had no problems with it and quickly located the chukar and picked it up. It's a great feeling to know we are laying a great foundation for her.

Luna Lu with her chukar!

There were quite a few other dogs within our group. Below are some pics of those dogs in action.

Lilli the Drahthaar

Blackthorn's Bonnie

Lexi

Kathy Harrington & George

We also worked steady by the blind and duck searches during the waterwork portion of training. All the dogs did really well with it but if you ask me I think the star of the day was Kathi Harrington's George who did all of the UT exercises for the first time and knocked them out of the park.  He sure is one nice pup.

Handsome George

During steady by the blind Cleo did so-so walking at heel. She was rather distracted by a group of members setting up a second launcher for training for VC but in reality that's no excuse. She remained by the blind but did drop the duck the first time through. We worked with her and by the time we moved on she was no longer dropping the duck.

Cleo returning with the duck 

When it was time her duck search was pretty good. Apparently it was not quite as good as last week but she has progressed more in the last three training sessions than she did all of last year in terms of duck searches so we are super happy. We are moving in the right direction and it feels great.

Bonnie

George returning from his first duck search!

So turtle pee and all it was a great day of training! Check us out on facebook and like us for more updates: Adventures of a German Shorthaired Pointer.