One For the Books

I am pleased to say that Bess has officially competed in her very first skijoring race! Hooray for the snow coming through this year.;) I'm also very pleased to say that she did great!

Each of these races has a mandatory drivers meeting each morning. You don't make it to the meeting? You are disqualified. So Bess and I left the house about a quarter after 6am to head up to Mt. Hood. The roads were really icy around the house, which slowed us down a little bit. Once on the other side of the tunnel it was smooth sailing. The last time I did this race with Heffner, we showed up an hour before the driver's meeting and we were lucky enough to get one of the few remaining parking lots. This year, there weren't as many people competing and even showing up a half hour before the meeting started, there were plenty of parking spots to be had.

We found out the run order in the meeting. Recreational skijoring was to be almost the last class. Bummer! I kind of knew that though. Wishful thinking on my part. Unfortunately, I didn't realize just how long we were going to have to wait. I had decided to have Bess ride up in the cab of the truck with me. While the canopy is insulated, it really holds the heat better when there are two dogs generating heat in it. And Bess has been getting cold easier lately, so it just worked out better. Thankfully she rides really well in the cab. She pretty much lays down the whole time. I figured that with Bess and I inside the cab, it should hold heat better and keep her warm enough. I ended up having to turn the truck on a few times to keep it warm enough.

After about five and a half hours of waiting for our turn, I got Bess all geared up and I started walking her around the parking lot to warm her up and also to work on our On By command around other dogs. I bootied her up and put her Ruff Wear coat on over the top of her harness. It was a bit of a shame since her hot pink booties perfectly match her harness, but I knew she would get too cold otherwise. As we were walking around, people commented on how there was this girl that ran a different great dane at one of the previous races. I told them that was me, but Heffner wasn't competing this year. That's also when I ran into my skijoring mentor. And it's a damn good thing too! We chatted a little bit and then she asked me if I had picked up my race packet. I said yep. And then realized that I didn't have my bib on! You can't race without a bib number. And then she also reminded me that I still had my regular boots on and not my ski boots. D'oh! Can't very well put my skis on without the actual ski boots! I don't know what I was thinking! I had already set my skis and poles at the start gate and was so focused on getting Bess ready and keeping her warm that I guess I just spaced it.

Once it was our turn, our start actually went well. I wasn't sure how it was going to go. Bess was excited to be there, but I could also already tell that she was getting cold. I could either have a mostly energetic girl, or I could have the girl who will tuck her tail and look imploringly at me. No need to worry! She was off with a bounding start and even did a little play bound around me before taking of with a jerk on me. And we were off! It wasn't a record breaking pace, but it was a good one.:) She kept tension on the line the whole way. If she started to lag or look back at me for clarification (I got a little wobbly at some points and every time I made a noise, she would look back at me), I would just tell her to keep going and she did. She was great at passing other dogs head on (the course was a down and back loop). She did everything that I asked her to! It was amazing! Oh yeah, and she didn't kill me.:) It was an overall great run. We finished with a time of 23:05. For reference, I believe Heffner's last time on this same course was more than twice that. It makes a difference when you have a dog who likes to pull.

While we were running I also realized that I don't really have Bess conditioned for this. Yes, she can go pretty much all day off leash when we're out hiking around. And when we're out jogging in the evenings, it has yet to wear her out. I kind of equated her overall fitness with her being fit for skijoring, but I haven't specifically conditioned her for that. It's one thing to jog next to someone on easy terrain. It's a whole different story to be out in front of them hauling them along on a friction filled surface, going up and down hills. I felt a little guilty once I realized that I didn't fully prepare her. She did great and was still a super star! But I could have her better conditioned for this specific sport. And that's exactly what the plan is for the next race! Now that we've got a time to beat, I'd like to do that. Since Heffner isn't going to be going jogging with us for a while, I'll just hook Bess up to the skijoring belt, slap her harness on her, and we can get some light pulling practice in that way. It also means getting out and doing some scootering with her. I've got some great spots for it, I just need to set aside the time.

I also took a lot of video of the various teams, sports, and sights at the race. I'm going to work on putting them together tonight and should be able to post it tomorrow. And speaking of tomorrow. Bess was so great today and put up with a whole lot of waiting and getting cold (she was actually shivering after being cooled down and waiting in the truck while I packed up our gear). I want to end on a good run for the weekend and I decided not to go back tomorrow and race. I don't think she'd be thrilled about doing the whole process all over again and I definitely don't want her to think that snow or skijoring isn't fun! That, and I still have a whole lot of meat that needs bagging. It's taking forever to thaw enough for me to bag!

And The Crazy Reigns Supreme!

Today Bess and I headed up to Ridgefield, WA for an AKC agility trial. Standard and JWW were all that was offered. The trial started later than normal since it was a Friday and there were less people entered. It was hard for me to try and gauge when would be a good time to show up, so I picked a time and figured that regardless I would be able to watch some good runs. Before we actually headed out for the trial, I stopped off at some soccer fields to let Bess out to run for a while. We went running last night and she was full of piss and vinegar for the first half. That's when I figured we were going to be in for an interesting day today. I thought that taking her for a romp would help. I tossed out the idea of taking her on a little hike because I didn't want her injuring herself right before the trial. I ran her around for a good half hour. And I mean RAN! We did sprints back and forth and she loved every minute of it! I figured that should at least take the edge off, so off to the trial we went.

After much waiting and watching of some good runs, our first run was Open JWW. Since we have zero Open JWW legs, I decided that I was going to try out a few things that we had been working on in a trial setting. The plan was to do a lead out pivot between jumps 2 and 3 and then to do a rear cross over 9. Nothing fancy, but we have never done a pivot of any sort in a trial and my rear crosses with Bess have not been successful up to this point. I am thrilled to say that BOTH moves worked!! She totally nailed it! The down side is that once she started jumping she literally threw herself into it. Her jumping was quite chaotic. My friend Elane videoed us (I may have video later to share depending on how well the quality comes through) and I got to review it right after the run. Her jumping didn't look as out of control as it felt on the course, but she definitely was not really paying attention to how she was jumping. We also had a refusal on her weave entries, something that I have GOT to fix before Rose City in a week and a half. The end result was an NQ. However, I was actually thrilled with her run. We a couple of very successful maneuvers and even though she was a bit crazy, she held it together for the run.

Next up was Standard at the complete end of the day. They were running small to tall and they ran all of the Excellent levels classes first and worked their way back. We were one of the last few dogs to run. I made sure to jog Bess for several minutes, I warmed her up over the practice jumps, we worked on some focus games, and we just kept moving in general. She was nice and calm. Even though she was excited to go over the practice jumps, she kept it together and didn't go zooming off. When I put her in a stay at the start line, she held it. And then I released her. Once she went over the first jump, she got this total crazed look in her eyes. I knew that didn't bode well for me! We did make it through the course. However, there were a few of courses due to some zoomies. There was a wrong course when she decided to zip around and take the wrong end of the tunnel. Basically, she had a ball. Needless to say, the run was an NQ. ARG! And we only needed one more Novice Standard leg!! Standard is seriously going to be the death of me with Bess. I think the contacts and the table give her too much time to "rest" and get ready for take off.

Even though it was an NQ day, we did get plenty out of it and it was fun regardless. I didn't end up getting home until after 7pm. I got the truck unpacked, fed the dogs, and then spent a little time in the garage packing meat. Oh yeah, did I mention that it's a meat packing weekend? Oh what fun! I really had no choice though. The dogs didn't have enough food left to last beyond the weekend.

Tomorrow Bess and I are headed out for another fun event. It's going to be Bess' first skijoring race!! We're entered in the recreational skijoring division, which is a two mile course. It should be good for her because she can just go crazy and run. Lets just hope she pauses long enough to allow me to get back on my skis when I fall!

Hooray for Chiropractors!

Chiropractors are awesome! Everyone should go see one. Seriously. It is amazing what someone skilled in this field can accomplish and the amount of information that they can impart. Needless to say, Heffner's chiropractor appointment yesterday went great! I am incredibly happy with the results that we are seeing thus far. And even more, I'm thrilled to be actually doing something that is taking care of the underlying problem instead of just treating the symptoms. But I will start from the beginning with what prompted me to come to this point; aside from the acute lameness that we dealt with this past weekend.

When Heffner was a few months shy of two years old, he pinched a nerve in his neck while simply turning a circle on our old futon. It was awful. He couldn't raise his head and he was favoring his front right foot. He couldn't lay down. I took him in to see my vet, she realized it was something to do with his neck. She figured it was either a pinched nerve or a herniated disc. We were hoping for the former because the latter could possibly entail surgery. We decided to put him on some pain meds and anti inflammatories and see how he did. With the combination of the meds and much restricted exercise, the problem "went away."

Then in December of 2009 I noticed that he was standing funny and moving a little off. I blogged about it a little bit. I took him straight to see a specialist because I also was hoping to get a performance evaluation based on his conformation. I didn't really get that, but Heffner was diagnosed with an iliopsoas strain. The treatment? More meds and restricted exercise so that it could magically go away.

And now we're up to this past weekend when Heffner appeared to pinch a nerve on the left side of his neck with almost all of the same symptoms that he had several years ago, though he was in less pain this time around. How did he pinch this nerve? By simply walking across the backyard to the back door after being let out to potty. Weird.

Ever since he first pinched that nerve a few years back, I've felt that something just wasn't quite right. I've tried massage and I've tried acupuncture, wondering if someone would find this intangible thing that was wrong with my dog. While there were specific problem areas that were found, the overall cause wasn't really determined. And it's just been gnawing at me. I knew something wasn't quite right and I figured it was staring me in the face. And it was. When there is something structurally wrong with your dog, what should you do? Go and see someone who deals with problems of the skeletal system. And who would that be? A freaking chiropractor!

I swear that these professionals are under appreciated for all the good that they do. The reality is that life throws all sorts of things at you and your body does a variety of things to accommodate and deal with these stressors. In that process, things tend to get a little out of whack. If the system isn't put back to rights, a variety of problems can spring up "out of the blue." Hence the "random" lameness that I experienced this past weekend. And naturally, the only way to fix the problem is to treat what's actually causing it, and not just the symptoms.

My problem was that I wasn't asking the right questions. Okay, my dog has a strained iliopsoas. But WHY is this muscle strained? Okay, he pinched a nerve in his neck while calmly walking across the lawn. But WHY did the nerve get pinched? I wasn't ever going to find a solution by simply treating the manifestation of the deeper problem. As a matter of fact, I was letting things get worse by not going after the root of the problem. Thankfully, we are now on the right path. And I know this, because all the little nagging things that bothered me, have already shown slight improvements.

Back to Heffner's appointment! The chiropractor that we saw was Dr. Sandra Johnson DC, CAC. I found her via two methods. A friend that I trust recommended her to me and I also looked her up through the AVCA web site. I emailed her ahead of time, because I was planning on attending one of her drop in sessions. I wanted to let her know kind of what had happened and to just kind of prep her ahead of time. By about Monday night, Heffner was back to his normal self. No sign of lameness what so ever. And he was starting to show how pent up he was, since I had completely restricted his exercise. By Tuesday afternoon, he was full of it and keeping the dogs from playing and him from doing any sort of racing around the house was a CHORE. I had resolved to keep him "quiet" until our appointment so that he didn't potentially tweak anything else.

When we got to Pup-A-Razzi on Wednesday, she was just finishing up a dog, so I timed it perfect! They had blocked off one of their "rings" for her use so that she could see the dogs moving and would have plenty of room to work. Immediately she picked up on the major problem with Heffner's movement. She told me that he was throwing his right hip really badly. I had always thought that Heffner "swayed" more than was warranted when he walked, but I also thought that maybe it had to do with the fact that he often paces when he walks. Though, when I would compare him to Bess, during one of the few times that she would pace while walking, she didn't "sway" nearly as much as he did.

Once she saw that, she started physically putting her hands on him so that she could tell what exactly was out of alignment and how much. Well..........pretty much his entire spine was out. His neck wasn't too bad, his left shoulder was worse than his right (makes sense since that was the leg he was favoring a few days prior), his back needed work, and I think his pelvis was the worst. His pelvis was really the root of the lameness problems that I had been seeing. Why was his iliopsoas strained? Because his right pelvis (it was the right iliopsoas that was the problem before) was locked and under rotated by an inch and a half. I have absolutely no reference to how bad that is, but it's apparently rather bad. She worked on that area for a while and when she finally got the right pelvis to unlock, Heffner felt it and wasn't too thrilled. He still behaved himself, but he did wip his head around and give her the stink eye!

After that she worked on the left shoulder. The left shoulder was out because the right pelvis was so screwed up. Essentially the legs that are kitty corner to each other work together to help support the body and create correct movement. When the right hip isn't pushing off enough and is additionally torqued out of position, it puts a lot of strain on the left shoulder to do more pulling and compensate when the dog is moving. That's why he tweaked his left shoulder "out of the blue." All of this made so much sense! And did I mention that she was finding all these older problem areas without me even telling her that he had issues there until after she pointed them out to me? The only problem I told her about was the most recent shoulder issue. That also really impressed me.

She worked on Heff for over half an hour. When she was done, she had me walk him around some more to see how he was moving. His movement was already better. He wasn't swaying nearly as much when he walked. When he stood, he didn't cock his right rear foot outwards. And his topline was noticeably flatter after she adjusted his back. And he's not even fully back to correct alignment yet!:)

So the good news is that Heffner can be fixed. It's going to take multiple sessions, but it will happen! The first three or four adjustments are probably going to be about a week apart. For the first 48 hours after each adjustment, he isn't allowed to do any exercising. He can go out to go potty and that's it. If we aren't going to be around to supervise the dogs, they are separated. Heffner gets barricaded in the media room so that he's not tempted to go up and down the stairs. After each set of 48 hours with zero exercise, his allowable exercise is to be cut to 50% what's normal for him with some modifications to allow the adjustments to fully take hold. He's pretty much allowed to go on walks and work obedience exercises and that's it. There won't be any ball work, no jogging, and most importantly, no agility. The goal is to not let his body feel at all fatigued because then it will drift back to the incorrect alignment due to muscle memory.

Heffner's agility "career" is also a little uncertain. His body has adapted to being out of alignment for a few years now and that is going to be hard to combat with the rigors of agility. Even after this more intense period of chiropractic adjustments, he'll be getting routine checkups. As will Bess. This year will be a defining year for him. He turns five on the 23rd of this month. It's an age that I otherwise wouldn't think too much of, but all things considered, it's become a significant age. If I can't keep him sound while running agility this year, then he will be retired from agility. It's kind of sad, but I'd rather have many more good years with him than fewer that are plagued by injuries.

Phew! That was a long one! Now that I've gotten that all out, I need to go and exorcise Bess (and no, that most certainly is NOT a typo!). She is having a really hard time not being able to rough house with Heffner and being separated from him during the day. That combined with getting zero exercise yesterday because I went to our obedience club meeting, means that Bess. Is. Losing. Her. Mind. This does not bode well for the agility trial tomorrow. And speaking of that, it's an AKC trial so I better get that toe nail polish off!! I'm sure I'll have plenty to report tomorrow!

Blogger Tuesday

So far so good! It's a new year and I'm staying on "schedule.":) Granted, it is only the fourth day of the year, but I'm going to overlook that for now.;) It is definitely high time that I get back to doing my Blog of the Week posts and I'm going to kick that off with It's a Berner-ful Life! This is a blog about the live of two beautiful bernese mountain dogs. Both dogs are involved in a variety of performance sports including obedience, agility, and drafting. Their mom does a wonderful job of taking pictures of them and includes some seriously breath taking pictures that so perfectly capture the beauty of her dogs. You should head on over and check them out!

On a side note, for those of you have been following Blogging Dante, would you mind popping over and just leaving a well wishing comment on the last post? For those who don't know what's been going on, just read her last post. That's a big life change and it can be especially hard getting through the holidays after something like that. I don't know how they're all doing, but I'm hoping that everyone is well and getting along with life. I just bet that it would feel really good for her to get some well wishes and know that people are still thinking of them.

New Addition....

he he he.....had you thinking that I was getting a puppy didn't I?>:o) No puppy on the horizon, but I am going to be adding to the monthly roster of topics that I want to touch on. The new category is DVDs! We gradually accumulate some, are interested in others, unsure of some, and a lot of times want to know if a DVD is worth spending the money on. I figured that I would give my two cents on some of the DVDs that we've accumulated so far and maybe others will comment and give other recommendations of chime in with their takes on the DVDs. To start the year off, my pick for DVD of the month for January is Amy Stevens' Yoga 4 Dogs.
Now that the weather is quite cold outside and we're usually at work doing the actual hours of day light, we tend to turn to finding different ways to exercise our dogs indoors. When I read a little blurb about this DVD I was a little skeptical, but it wasn't so expensive that I thought I would regret it if it wasn't quite what I was hoping for.

Well, I'll save you the waste of money and say don't bother getting this DVD. You're much better off getting a DVD for humans and then figuring out how to incorporate your dog if you can. What most surprised me is that I expected a DVD that had good examples of the exercises and working with the dog. With the ability to edit videos and do multiple takes, I expected essentially flawless examples. Not really the case. The golden that she uses actually got up and went completely off camera a few times and she just carried on with the human yoga moves. The moves are also very basic that she demonstrates. The involvement of the dog is basically having the dog laying down next to you with you occasionally petting them. Call me crazy, but if that's how dogs do yoga, then my guys do that every day while I'm at work!


Overall, I was disappointed in the video and didn't find it worth while at all. I've got regular yoga DVDs that I'm sure I could look over and figure out where to possibly fit my dogs in, if at all.


Small Heffner update. He's doing much better and he's going to see a certified canine chiropractor on Wednesday and we'll go from there!

Book of the Month

In an attempt to keep my brain from spinning down a currently unproductive road, I'm getting back into the swing of things on the blog. Therefore, my pick for Book of the Month for January is "The Dog in Action" by McDowell Lyon. Conformation should be of concern to everyone who shares their life with a dog. The better you understand why the dog should be built a certain way, the better you can understand when things aren't working properly or what pursuits your dog is most suited for. Conformation is of concern for those who breed and show in this venue. But I think that it should be of special concern to those who compete in any performance event. The better you understand the areas where your dog could potentially break down, the more prepared you are to combat it, build up areas that need it, and avoid any unnecessary movements or exercises.

The dog's conformation is gone over from the tip of their nose to the tip of their tail. Ever wondered why your breed standard called for cat feet versus a hare foot? Ever wonder what the ideal should angulation was and why (though admittedly I have read other works that argue this author's view)? Wonder why a slightly sloping pastern is generally preferred over a straight one? All these questions and then some are covered in this book. I found it really interesting to read and I feel that it gave me a better understanding of some of my dogs flaws and where I need to be watching out.

The only draw back that I saw in this book were the illustrations. On the whole they were pretty helpful. However, there were a few where I felt the illustrations didn't adequately describe what they were supposed to be describing. There were a few where comparisons were being drawn between a correct form of something and an incorrect form of something and I felt that the drawings were so similar that there wasn't a very obvious contrast between the two. The descriptions are pretty good, but there were a few instances where a really obvious illustration that showed the differences would have helped a whole lot more.

Overall, I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in why a dog is built the way they are. It's a good read and not too dry considering the subject.

As a Heffner update, he's not a whole lot better. There are moments where he seems fine, but generally he's still pretty uncomfortable and I'll be calling my vet tomorrow to make an appointment for him.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!!! Here comes 2011! Adam and I spent the night in Portland ringing in the new year with some friends of ours. We had things set up with my wonderful in-laws to let the pooches out later in the evening and then again this morning, so that we wouldn't have to worry. We enjoyed ourselves, even though we spent some time walking around the city in the frigid weather.

Remember how optimistic I was yesterday in my goals post? I felt good because this year, I was on better footing with both dogs than I was at this time last year when Heffner was recovering from his iliopsoas strain. Wellllll, I spoke a little too soon. I have a feeling that it's nothing major and I'm taking precautionary steps to hopefully make sure that it doesn't bloom into anything, but Heffner tweaked something this morning when we got home. I let the dogs out to potty and then did something in the house. When I let them back in, Heffner was greatly favoring his front left leg. I figured he tweaked something and that it was just going to take a minute or two for it to resolve. Well it didn't, and he was acting like he was in a fair bit of pain. After both dogs ate, I gave him some buffered aspirin and got them both settled down for a little chillage. I was hoping that the aspirin combined with the down time would get everything back to rights. Not so much. By late this afternoon he was still favoring the leg. I massaged the whole shoulder and neck area and put a heating pad on the area for a while. It seemed to helped loosen things up a bit and he doesn't seem to be in as much pain. I'm continuing on with the heating pad while we're chilling and watching a movie right now. Hopefully by the morning things will be considerably better. Regardless, he's not going to be going on the little hike that I had planned on.:(

On the up side, I got to go play with some other doggies today!:) Adam's aunt Kathy got the go ahead to get a vizsla puppy (their vizsla, Phoebe, passed away from leukemia this past year) as her Christmas present. Talk about a great present! She did some research on reputable breeders and found what she was looking for. I was lucky enough that she asked me to go along and give my opinion of the breeder and the pregnant bitch. She picked very well and I really like the breeders that's she going with. The dogs are also awesome! If I weren't so sold on great danes, I would be hard pressed not to try and convince Adam that we needed a puppy from this litter! I just LOVED the sire and dam! I'm also excited because she has decided to get a show puppy! Which means that her puppy will be hitting the conformation ring later this summer! It was a great way to spend the afternoon and I'm really excited for her to get her puppy!