#nacsw

Miss Dolly earned her NW2 title with an overall 2nd place finish for fastest total time, and a 1st place finish in containers…! (There were 4 NW2 titles earned out of a total of 27 teams.) The judges also recognized our two container searches and our one interior searches as pronounced.

We are very thankful to our judges, CO, hosts, and volunteers.

Dolly is…

AKC: RA FDC BCAT CGC TKI (with 3 “points” in AKC agility, iykyk 😆)

We were entered in the L1I on Saturday morning. Mud seemed a little off the evening before (maybe ate something he shouldn't have in the backyard? maybe some painkillers I had him on since we did agility earlier in the week?) and that morning it felt like there was a little less zest than usual.

He really struggled in the carpeted rooms and was scavenging. Went to the 30 second warning on both (mind you, the times were all like 1:30-2mins). He left a hide after working the object pretty hard. He took me on a trip around the rest of the area, got the 30 second call, he went back over to where he had really worked before. I figured I had nothing to lose and said "alert" and got my first ever "where?", which I don't blame them lol, but I was correct about the object. I was talking to another handler who had 2 dogs (one FEO) and her dog that was early in the run order had a very clean picture, but in the later search her dog really struggled too. Mud was late into the run order. So like it sounds like it got tougher and he wasn't the only dog leaving it, but it's unusual for Mud. I guess there was just A LOT of pooling in the searches by the time Mud ran them.

Despite that, he still managed to title! My confidence for the NW3 the following day was not boosted tho.

On Sunday, we had our first try at NW3. I wasn't sure I was prepared for this level when I entered, but we have so few local opportunities, I figured I should advantage of it before I might possibly be caring for another dog. I had volunteered at a show back in October, which did give me a much better idea of what to expect. It was less scary, but still, lol. We hadn't been practicing much at all. Mud was acting more like his usual self in the morning, which made me feel much better about the day.

During the briefing the CO (also our instructor lol) mentioned the average number of attempts to earn the NW3 Elite is 12-15. That took some pressure off, though of course, I still wanted to title. Before the show, I decided to have a couple of smaller goals on hand. I wanted to pass one search and I wanted to call finish before the 30 second warning after Mud had done at least one pass of the search area.

I called finish on all but one of the searches before the 30 second warning. That was the vehicle search and it had gotten windy. This was tough so we actually were working a hide as it did seem like there was another after he found the first one. That was tough conditions, not me wasting time looking for a hide that wasn't there. He found it seconds after their call and I called finish as soon as that happened. I also am thinking I may start running vehicles in a harness. Mud wanted to go up so he basically got a collar correction and I felt really bad. I didn't want someone's vehicle scratched, tho!

The main other "huh?" moment we had was a false alert from him in the second container search. Apparently there was no distraction in it either, so that's bizarre. It must have had some odor blowing on it. Mud has gotten so good at nailing a container on the first pass that my policy was going to be one pass and call finish. That's basically what I did on both searches, but Mud decided to whip around at the end of the second search and alert on like...the second to last box in the row. Since he hadn't hit it on the first pass, I was suss. He eventually moved on after a bit of a staring contest and me thinking about if I should call it or not. He went back over to the hot box and did the most like...pouty alert I've seen him do, lol. He laid down and loudly hit the box with his face. Called finish after that.

The second search we did that day (Interior 1) had 3 hides, which we found them all, so I was like, well, I know I passed at least one search. The others were all mysteries, but I felt pretty good based on how Mud had worked. He was much, much, more happy/confident through the searches than the day before. He's such a good dog. He doesn't typically false/fringe/whatever. You have to wait for him to source and fully settle on a point for his indication, but it is worth it because you know he's got it. I really wasn't worried about "no"s in anything but containers. That's the only place I'll sometimes get false alerts, either on distractions or just because he wants to throw out a behavior.

After the speech in the morning about teams needing lots of attempts to finish NW3 Elite and that you don't really WANT to breeze through the level because you'll be overwhelmed in Elite, Mud ended up titling! 😂 We were overall second place and placed third in the combined Interior searches. Only Mud and first place team had perfect scores for the day. A few others finished titles since they had another leg. No clue if we'll be able to repeat this next time we try, but who knows. Maybe this will give me the courage to move him into Masters AKC next time we ever show in that venue.

Oh and Mud's personally most important accomplishment of the day was that he found 3 tennis balls at the trial site. (There is a tennis court lol) This photo only has 2 of his treasures, but he found a third one before his last search deep in a bush. He is a goober.

This pot of gold(en), passed his NW2 today!

Mud earned his NW1 today! Pronounced in all four elements. Placed 3rd in Exterior and Containers.

Maybe I'll say more when I get videos? IDK.