BH - done!

Yeay - we passed!

I'd say we passed with flying colors. :-) We missed a few things, but there's a reason the BH is not a scored title - it's either pass or fail. And we passed. (I'm going to keep saying that!)

The trial was at North Beach Schutzhund Club in North Myrtle Beach, SC. Because of the heat we have down here, the trial started at 7pm. The Schutzhund dogs went first in obedience, and we had 6 of those: 2 SchH1, 1 SchH2 and 3 SchH3. From our club, Carrie was trialing Sampson for SchH1, and Andre for SchH3 and Mike was trialing Nick for SchH3.

There were eight dogs entered for the BH, and Julie and I were teamed up for the first team. We got ready as the last SchH team was finishing up. This time I was more prepared for how to prepare - I took Kane out on the prong collar and after walking him for a bit, we did a few steps of heeling with corrections if I felt I did not have his attention. Then we "doodled" - meaning correct heel position, spins, sits, downs etc. Just little things that keep his attention on me and things that I can reward him for.
So we were all ready when they announced a 15 min break..... I feel we lost a little momentum there, but oh well.... :-)
Kane and I walked on the field and checked in with judge Mark Przybylski first, we were told we were doing the obedience part. So we set up for that.
The on-leash heeling went well, although I did not have Kane's attention as I usually do, but it wasn't bad. We did the group with no problems, and then the offleash heeling. In the motion exercises he downed on the sit out of motion (which he had started doing the night before, so not a huge surprise, I think it was nerves), but he did the down and recall perfectly.
We finished the obedience exercise and heeled over to the long down position on leash.
When I stopped, Kane layed down on his own, which he is not supposed to. I was supposed to take the leash off in the sit position, then tell him down. Then walk away.
Kane was perfect during the long down, as much as I obsessed about that. :-) I will stop obsessing now!

The traffic portion went very well also. No problem with the car, jogger or bicycles. They made me put him in a sit and a down in a group of people walking around and talking while I was out of sight. No problems there either. The tie-out was done with all dogs and then a puppy and an adult dog were walked by. No problems there either. :-)

All eight of the BHs passed which was very exciting - Kudos to my friends at Metrolina Schutzhund who also passed - Jenny, Jeff and Robbie - nice job!
In fact, all of the Schutzhund trial dogs also passed, making for a perfect trial - which is rare!

Now - on to the next thing. My club has a trial in late November, and we are shooting for getting our Schutzhund 1 title done at that time. Lots to do before then!

Sorry for the fuzzy pictures - it was dark and this was the best we could do! :-)