Hi all! I have been pretty quiet at here for a while but I though I should properly introduce last summers addition to my family.
Last spring I was actually looking for a getting a shikoku and were considering a kai. But then I got this really good offer with this shiba pup and in the end went for shiba again. Mainly because I have been having really bad luck and with this shiba the health questions were looking really good. (Especially comparing to importing from japan. I really appreciate the health screening of parents and family).
We have been doing a lot groundwork for dog sport activities and being a puppy. She have turned out really well at least for now. We have started training obedience tasks and showing stuff. I also plan to start agility with her when she is older. And everything that seems interesting :D
So here she is: Navi the 10month old shiba inu.
Here she is with Ganon (my 6years old shiba) Few pictures from last november:
7month old training showing stuff (she is really good with that, even though I like other doggy sports more)
And of course there has to be atleast one puppy picture :) Training recall
Navi has her own blog of her life and training. I put there some obedience instructions too. Journey of Navi
And here is a short video of training recall, heeling & retrieve. Not perfect yet but she is only 10months and I think this is looking good to keep training! Video
^ Exactly! Thats one reason of doing that blog. I hope that I'm able to make more of training videos with her (and Ganon). And finding other people training with their shibas too. I try to concentrate on more how-to-do rather than can't-do-with-a-shiba.
I do mostly agility with my Shibas. We also do Rally, Nosework, Barn Hunt, Lure Coursing and some competition obedience when we have time. This is a short clip of my boy Koji practicing some basic commands at a friend's place.
All the commands are with verbal commands only (no body movement or ques on my part). He went from "sit" to "stand" to "drop" to "sit" again and then I released him and he came forward and I asked him to "drop" again. It is a "moving drop", meaning he "dropped" immediately after I told him while he was in motion coming toward me. He then held his "drop" position under distraction. I threw a string cheese to the side and the cat got it (not intended), so I threw another one closer to him and he still held his "drop/down" position until I gave him the verbal release. No treats were shown to him while he performed and he got the string cheese in the end as reward and verbal praise from me.
Navi is so cute! ("Hey! Listen!" Sorry, her name makes me happy).
I think I will take a look at your blog and try some of your tips with my Hokkaido.
P.S. Ganon is cute, too. :)
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
^ Navi thinks her main purpose is to be cute! Unfortunately I want to do a little more different things with her so she has to learn to other things beside being cute ;) And I really have to think more about my way of naming my dogs.. Navi is a bit more vocal than an average shiba (less than other breeds though) and she used to do those high pitch barks when she was waiting her turn or playing or.. It was as annoying as that "Hey! Listen!"... Never saw that coming when I named her. But she has gotten a lot better :)
If you have some questions or need more help with something in that blog feel free to ask :)
Koji looks so happy to work! Lucky cat to get the cheese. Ganon knows those too. But luckily the FCI obedience rules let's you to use voice&hand signal with that exercise (not in others though). Here is Ganon training them last summer: Training And here doing then in a practise trial: Distance control The thing is to get the dog to keep his back legs at the same point. In the first video Ganon moves them switching stand-sit and in the second video a lot more... But Ganon seems to be pretty awesome now that I have Navi who can't do that at all yet :P
Here is update of our training. It's getting better! (but still so many things to train). Navi is now having super fun when playing the obedience games with me :D
Navi had her first official dog show a week ago. She did really well and got a good review. She also got her first certificate (CAC) and placed best of breed :D
Congratulations to you and Navi! :) I'm glad she did well.
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
Thanks! That was really amazing. Story goes that yesterday was international dog show at rovaniemi. Navi got best of breed & CAC again. And got second place at Group!! :D I was a bit lost when we got picked in top 6 at group judging. I was thinking "and now I do what? Okay others go there and I see what they do and see from that.." Looks like it worked because soon I noticed there is only 4 dogs left. And then placing started. And we werent picked until judge had to decide group winner and it was like there weren't so much difference :D great to get placed with a breed that doesn't normally place in groups and ofcourse because showing is still a pretty new thing to me :D
Seems like I will update Navis post every half a year ;) But looking great! I think Navi has grown up now. Right now she is in full coat and her cheeks are huge ;D
Back to what has happened after last update. We were in the world dog show at the end of the summer but it wasn't very successful. Navi was already over her best coat and lets just say that there were so much competition! It was great to see over hundred shibas in one place from all over the world :D
Last week thursday I finally decided to ask if they have any free spots in one of local agility clubs and actually someone had decided to leave her spot open that day! So after a long hiatus from agility we started again friday :D That was lucky. Now we can train weekly for several months.
We also trained a little more obedience at it started to look better. Right now I have some motivation problems with combo obedience+Navi (Navi is motivated. I'm not).
Then I decided to enter Navi one more show before we take a break until she turns 2yo. That show was finnish Voittaja (=winner) show.
She really suprised me by winning all the females and getting the BOS! And a nice title Voittaja-14 ;)
Navi is so beautiful. :) It's awesome all the things you do with her. And Ganon handsome also (love him!). Does he do agility, too?
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
Thanks you! It's easy to try new things with Navi. She is not the smartest but she is really easy shiba (friendly to other dogs and doesn't get provoked, well behaving and listens well).
Unfortunately Ganon has really bad hips so no agility with him :( But he would love it! He's more active shiba and it was really sad to found out that agility it's not an option for him. He has done a lot of obedience which he also likes.
Oh, poor Ganon. I'm glad he likes to do obedience.
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
Our agility training is improving. We took part in "training-trial" at march. There were no all obstacles so we did great :D (teeter totter & weave poles are still in training). We actually won this class:
Navi also had her first obedience trial this spring. We got enough points for first prize. Only thing we had problems was sitting on command.. Lol. I'm so happy she didn't have any problems with the trial environment or me being nervous. There is also video of this but it's pretty boring.
Oh. And the most important thing. Navi had her x-rays & health checks done and they are looking really good! Looks like we can keep doing all the things :D Eyes: Clear Knees: 0/0 x-rays: Hips: B/B Elbows: 0/0 We also took pictures of the whole back. It has been only a few years possible to get official back results from finnish kennel club. There has not been any problems but I though it's not a bad idea to took them while the dog is already sleeping on the table. And my dogs live a fairly active life. Results of back: lumbosacral transitional vertebra: LTV0 (normal) (Means the bones of back in the hips are normally formed). spondylosis: SP0 (free) vertebral anomaly: VA0 (normal) (all the bones of the back are normal and there is no any missing or extra ones).
Then there is this heelwork to music competition we took part with Ganon. I have had some interest at this sport but there was no courses near me so I decided to check it out by entering us into the event ;) I quess we did something right.
Ganon and Navi! They're both amazing, but I find Ganon's heeling to music to be particularly charming. :)
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
A little update. We participated at weekend training of HTM&freestyle. Now I actually more knowledge what I should be doing in that sport. Sadly Ganons back legs have been a little worse so we haven't been doing HTM.
But Navi has actulally done a lot :D
We had obedience trial. It was a too hot day but we actually did good job. We actually got placed 3 out of 19!
Navi had probably last conformation show for this year (heavy shedding started) and she got her last certificate and is now Finnish Champion!
Laslty but not least we had another obedience trial. We needed one more result with over 160points to got the beginner title, but I didn't really believe this was the trial to get that because this was regional trial (once a year thing). Yup. It went a bit better than I though ;)
Now we probably have to keep training now and then before we can progress to next class. Right now I'm waiting that our next agility class would start. I got a lot of inspiration while trying to find good agility videos of shibas :)
I'm sorry to hear that Ganon's back legs have been having some trouble. Poor guy. :( But I'm happy to hear all of your good news. Navi and Ganon are amazing. I find you and your dogs to be very inspiring. :)
1 Human + 1 Hokkaido RIP Amy (Border Collie)
“Anyone can love a thing because. That's as easy as putting a penny in your pocket. But to love something despite. To know the flaws and love them too. That is rare and pure and perfect.” --Patrick Rothfuss, A Wise Man's Fear
"Life before death. Strength before weakness. Journey before destination." --Brandon Sanderson, the First Ideal from The Stormlight Archive.
Thank you all! Ganon&Navi have done great work this year. I hope we can get into new things in future too :D It's always great to hear if someone finds my dogs to be inspiring. Never too many people doing things with their dogs.
@OtakuBenny My camera is 8 years old Nikon D40... I really hope to have new one someday. Everybody else seem to have way better ones. (although I really like this one. But it's getting outdated). Here are some more pictures if interested.
I'm happy if you find some of the blog content to be interesting :) lately updates have been mainly in finnish because there have not been many visitors from other countries. But I will still make some posts/guides in english too probably. Like the health statistics summary at the end of the year. (There are going to be a bit different results as overal this year).