Satchmo passes another exam!

Satchmo and 8 others took their Foundation test at the Southwest Dog Training and Behaviour Centre yesterday. The exercises include things like a stay amongst chickens, walk and wait, formal recall etc. The tricky bit is that you can't use any extra commands. Satch lost 1 point for raising his head off the floor during the lie flat; and 2 x 1/4 points in the formal recall, for sitting slightly at an angle and finishing a bit wide. Nonetheless, he did really well. All the dogs passed, even the ones that were having real problems only a few days ago. V v proud as always.

Serious stuff

Serious post this time. A few weeks ago, I thought I was going to lose Max. He's 13 yrs and 3 months and that's old for a dobe, but he's been so fit I've always kidded myself he'll go on for ever. Anyway, he'd been quite a couch potato since I've not been going out to work, especially when there was a cold, wet spell. I'd noticed he'd lost muscle tone on his back end. I had a couple of days when I couldn't walk them much and I then came down one morning to find a lake of pee and Max losing his back end every few secs. Poor lad couldn't make it to the door, but peed across the doormat and then couldn't cock his leg. Big panic and off to vet. Transpired he'd presumably both got lazy and stiff and also been leaving it too long to go for a pee, so he had a urinary infection. Anti-inflammatory eased the stiffness; antibiotics cured the infection; and 3 walks a day, rain or shine, built the muscle tone back. I shall learn that lesson and not let it happen again. Coddling him is obviously riskier than sending him out in bad weather.