Our Beagle adventures
We’re not long back from our regular pool party at Allers Farm Kennels with buddies from the Glasgow Dog Training Club. It’s been a couple of months due to our recent move so it was great to be back. The puppies had a blast as always.
And I’ve just had great news from Sue Rose. The next lure coursing event has finally been organised for Sunday 31st January. Anyone interested in going can get full details from Sue and Kevin’s blog:
Beanie and I have just got back from our first Heelwork to Music class. We went to a workshop a year or so ago and Beanie really seemed to enjoy it. We’ve signed up for a six week course with the same teacher (Heather Smith) and the plan is to take Beanie to the class one week and Biggles the next.
Here’s a video of our teacher Heather with her dog Skye at crufts:
Beanie was very good. It all got too exciting for her once or twice and she wandered off to raid the coats and bags that had been left on the chairs around the hall. But for most of the hour long class she didn’t take her eyes off me (or more accurately, my treat bag!). She learned all the tricks very quickly and enjoyed every minute of the class.
Paul and Biggles took the opportunity to have a boys’ night in, so sadly no photographs of the evenings shenanigans. Maybe next week!
It was all very well having a white Christmas, but we’re now well into January and the the frozen white stuff is still showing no signs of departing.
You wouldn’t want to go using the hand rail on our deck..
At least not without thick gloves..
And the burn that runs by the back of our garden is still frozen over, though some intrepid critters have punched a hole through to the running water below
The brass monkeys might have been wise to stay indoors today, but monkeys of the cheeky variety had good reason to venture outside. It started when Parcel Force finally dropped off a package that the UK Customs Grinches had been holding for us since before Christmas:
We paid a lot for Customs to delay our parcel
I just hope we weren’t charged for the services of a sniffer dog…
…’cos our two are always happy to do that for free
Although even a thorough sniffing left Biggles a bit puzzled
Yep our portable lure coursing kit – from Grimner Greyhounds in the States – was finally here. The kit comes with a battery, control switch, four pulleys and about 300 yards of line. It’s amazing how all that fits into such a tiny box.
Needless to say we had to go out into the garden and give it a try despite the freezing conditions. We didn’t have any deer or rabbit skin to use as the lure, or any of Kevin Rose’s tripe juice, but it turns out that a Tesco value tea towel liberally smothered with the contents of a tin of sardines does just as well.
OK, it was just a short straight line run but still it’s enough to declare a successful test, and Beanie & Biggles both loved it. It’s also worth noting that the sacrifice of the tea towel didn’t hamper our kitchen activities in the least; we have a cache of ’em because the Biggly Boy has a thing about them. Stealing a phrase from the fashion world, you might say that the tea towel is the “new” sock as far as Biggles is concerned.
So, we’ve got our own working lure. All we need now is for the weather to warm up a bit so we can have a few sessions on the beach, though judging by the freezing conditions late this afternoon, that’s not going to happen any time soon!
Yes, that really is chunks of ice getting washed in by the tide!