Rarities and Treasures in the Coyote Hills

SUMMARY: Native wildflower hike on Coyote Ridge via Kirby Landfill.

Last weekend, I rose early, left the poor dogs at home, and joined docents from the Santa Clara County Open Space Authority on a wildflower hike of about 5 miles round trip up about 700 feet to the top of Coyote Ridge (which apparently isn't an official name, just a convenient one).

Important backstory

Kirby landfill, CalTrans (responsible for U.S. Highway 101 through the Coyote Valley), the Open Space Authority, Hewlett-Packard (corporate owner of thousands of acres here, dunno why), and others have collaborated to preserve the serpentine grasslands of this area. Serpentinite is a kind of rock which, when erodes, makes for a nutrient-poor serpentine soil, in which numerous plants and animals (such as the red-legged frog) thrive--as long as the serpentine environment is preserved.

From Coyote Ridge, looking back down towards U.S. Highway 101 in the Coyote valley, Santa Cruz mountains behind. In the distance, notice the brilliant yellow carpet below the foothills--nonnative and very invasive mustard. Beautiful but problematic. Also, notice the deer--yeh. We'll get back to that.

One challenge is eradicating horribly invasive natives, such as the yellow star thistle, whose tall structures block light and steal nutrients from the smaller native and endemic plants. Furthermore, the exhaust from hundreds of thousands--millions?-- of cars passing on the freeway dumps more nitrogen into the nearby environment than most people put onto their lawns in any given year, making the nutrient-poor soils suddenly nutrient rich, which further invites nonnatives into the area.

The serpentine grasslands were originally filled with native and endemic bunch grasses and small, uncommon flowers, an even smaller portion of the latter which support the endangered and very rare Bay Checkerspot. This colorful butterfly now exists in small numbers in only in two small serpentine grassland areas--Coyote Ridge about 15 miles south from my house, and Edgewood Park about 40 minutes north--also right alongside a major freeway that runs between San Jose and San Francisco.

(Vocabulary: "Native" means that it was here originally; "endemic" means that it appears only in California.)

On Into the Hike

The road up which we hiked begins in the landfill property--odd juxtaposition: endangered flora and fauna with a landfill!--and is normally off limits to all but the cattle ranchers who maintain cattle in the area, landfill personnel, researchers, and other similar official type persons. Only a few times a year does the Open Space Authority take some of the general people up into the hills. This hike was limited to 20 people and it stunned me that even fewer than that showed up. What an experience and what a treasure--hoping not only for visions of wildflowers, but maybe even a rare glimpse of the legendary Bay Checkerspot! The docents (4 of them) almost outnumbered us mere muggles.

We started under chilly, overcast skies, which was of concern, because, for example, the California Poppy doesn't unfurl until 68 degrees (F), with similar limits for many other flowers, and if the flowers aren't open, the butterflies don't come out to play. Fortunately the sun soon came out and we had perfect weather for a hike. The hillsides had also been invigorated by unusual, heavy rains in the preceding couple of weeks.

We had barely started the hike when a flurry of wings from the wetlands beside us alerted us to a black-crowned night heron bursting from the nearby reeds and heading for a safer, more distant location. My camera wasn't set for birding, but I panned along and got some recognizable shots.

Not too far up the path, the docents stopped to point out a rare treat: The state grass (purple needlegrass), the state flower (California poppy), and the state rock (serpentinite) all together on the hillside. It wasn't 68 degrees yet, so the poppies remained furled, but that didn't last long.

Poppies are not endangered and were everywhere; their large flowers and brilliant color dominate the landscape, and they are gorgeous.

You could frame almost any scene on the entire hike with poppies, like this view back across the Coyote Valley.

The ponds are old quarries that have been filled with water and stocked with catch-and-release fish. The high peak is Loma Prieta, the tallest in the Santa Cruz coastal range, at (3,790 ft (1,155 m)). I'm not sure what this grass is.

Even the poppy seedpods are stunning in shape and color.

For the first half hour, a huge gyrating flock of seagulls, undoubtedly here because of the landfill (which is very well maintained, BTW, with no visible signs of garbage, just bare soil), hovered over us, following us up the hill for the first half hour or so. We tried to hike quickly to get away from them, but they stayed with us. Protect your heads!

Partway up the ridge, some eagle-eyed hiker with binoculars spotted a pair of deer in the scrub below us. What I saw was, well, see the first photo above, lower right corner. But with my 200mm lens, I zoomed in and was finally able to actually find them.

Some really rare treasures

We stopped regularly to admire various plants, and the natives, endemics, and endangered plants were there waiting for us.

The native, endemic white Mount Hamilton Thistle occurs in only a few documented locations. (I posted photos of it from Santa Teresa Park last year sometime; didn't realize how rare it was.)

The native, endemic San Francisco Wallflower is also endangered.

The native, endemic Santa Clara Dudleya, a succulent type plant, is also rare and occurs in only a few random places near here. It wasn't in bloom yet.

The native, endemic, and endangered Most Beautiful Jewel Flower (how's that for a name?!) also appears in only a few locations near here. And only 3 of the plants that we saw were in bloom. The blooms are about the diameter of a fingernail on a sparse stalk. Very unusual appearance.

Not-so-rare treasures

We also saw many other flowers that are not endangered or rare, although no butterflies yet.

Fremont Tidy Tips are endemic to California but they are fairly common.

Not sure what this species of Fiddleneck is (note the fiddle neck!), but they're also native but common.

Also not positive on the species of scorpionweed (so named because its flower stalk also curls much like the fiddleneck--or like a scorpion's tail) but it's native, and I caught a bee wallowing around on this patch.

Saw many instances of this gilia, and I like them because they're purple. Native and not uncommon.

No flower was too small to pass my notice, like this tiny native lotus:

But we had yet to see a butterfly anywhere, let alone a Bay Checkerspot. I kept hoping.

Along the spine of Coyote Ridge

We reached the top of the ridge finally and started scanning the hills on the far side for native Tule Elk. The Elk were hunted to near extinction nearly a century ago, but eventually a tiny pocket of survivors was found a hundred miles south of here and reintroduced in the late 1970s. Now the local herd numbers about 400. We did finally see some, but so far away that even zooming in with my lens and then blowing up the photo just reveals little tan spots.

At the top of the ridge, we found a research station--a fenced-in section of serpentine meadow to protect it from cattle, deer, and elk. Beyond the research station perched the observatories on distant Mount Hamilton, which somehow seemed appropriate. The flowers were more profuse and taller here than outside the fence.

Walking along the spine of the ridge, where John Muir walked, enjoyed the weather, and wrote about the meadows of wildflowers over a century ago, we found other native but more common species, such as the blue-eyed grass (purple and not a grass, go figure) and the Red Maids.

Also more Tidy Tips and many other flowers.

Entering Checkerspotland

We also started seeing many instances of the few key plants on which the Bay Checkerspot larvae or adults feed: Purple Sanicle, which is a native flower, appeared in small patches all across the meadows. (Flowerhead is about the size of standard clover, maybe a little smaller.)

California plantain, a widespread native, is also key--it's a tiny, tiny thing, only 3 or 4 inches tall from the ground, and with such tiny, subtle flowers that you'd normally never notice it.

And another Checkerspot favorite is Owl's Clover--another native that's not endangered but that I've never seen many of.

Most of the hike, I'd been lagging to take photos and then running to catch up. But, along the ridgeline road, the others took over with their binoculars searching for meadowlarks and elk, and I raced ahead to snap a photo of the front of the group for a change. As I turned around, out in front for the first time, suddenly a flittering shape caught my eye and I snapped my camera to my eye as this little guy landed on the road maybe 15 feet in front of me--and, YES, OH WOW, a Bay Checkerspot it is!

Denouement

After a long leisurely lunch atop the ridge, we descended, still enjoying the views and learning more about other native flowers, and turkey vultures and red-tailed hawks (below) circled lazily above us.

What a great day!

P.S. I took a whole lot more photos of these and other wildflowers and birds and posted them (with a bit more commentary) on my photo site here.

Miscellany Again

SUMMARY: Vibrating collar, newspaper fetching, face plants, Border Collies, excellent agility dogs.

My new vibrating collar arrived yesterday; I was so excited! Plugged it in for its 12-hour charge, tried to turn it on this morning, and it doesn't work per the instructions. Half an hour of trying to figure it out, then 20 minutes on the phone with support, and they're going to have to send me a replacement. Sigh. At least I'm getting a new one, but I so wanted to be able to play with it this weekend?

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Y'all probably know that Boost gets the paper from the driveway for me every morning. She loves it; so excited to charge out there, pounce on it (sometimes sliding and a little ripping, but I don't mind), grab it, and come running back in. Sometimes I get the Excited Bark before she goes out.

The other morning, as she was running back up the driveway, a squirrel ran right in front of her and off across the lawn! I saw those ears go up, the tail come up (the "wow, now THIS is REALLY INTERESTING" look) and she veered from her path about a meter or so (in this context, saying "about 2 feet" or "about a yard" both seemed to be ambiguous, hurray for metric), with me thinking, "uh oh", then she veered back in and continued running up the steps to deliver the paper! You go, Border Collie!

Tika was never that kind of dog.

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Speaking of Border Collies--Boost sometimes likes to sleep in her crate in the bedroom. I think when the nights are warmer, she goes there. She hasn't slept in it for a while, but the last two nights, she's gone right in there. Last night, as I climbed into bed, she stuck her head out, stepped out stretching, and I said, "Oh, look, a Border Collie!", trying to be funny, but she completely misunderstood: Went into alarm barking, looking around and at the door in particular. Took a while to convince her that SHE was the border collie I was talking about!

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Last night in class, I did a faceplant. Not doing actual agility, no, of course not. I had just snapped the leash back onto Boost to leave her at the sidelines, turned and stepped away, and somehow a loop of the leash caught my foot and slammed me face forward onto the ground. I've never had this happen before. Usually you *trip* over something--your foot catches and releases as you flail, trying to catch yourself. Nope, it was as if my foot had been suddenly nailed to the ground and the centripetal force slammed me down before I could even get my arms out. Hit my forehead, cheek, nose, glasses, chin, shoulders, hips. A little stunning but on the face of it (ha) almost undoubtedly less painful than landing on my knees or having my arms extended trying to catch myself. I'm quite proud of myself for being able to use centripetal in a sentence.

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Both dogs did great in class last night. Tika and I seemed to be communicating very well. Boost had one little sequence where she knocked 3 bars in a row and we stopped and regrouped. Mostly bars did not come down. And at the end, a tricky run with a couple of back-side-front-cross funny things we didn't get through, and I decided that was enough practicing failures and stopped that quickly. But mostly all really nice, including Boost sending to the weaves 10 feet on the far side of the dogwalk from me.

More false hope for actual Qs in the future.

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No agility again this weekend. I'm looking forward to it.

Silent World

SUMMARY: Tika's deafness--and vision.

I seem to be able to watch Tika's deafness increase week by week, almost day by day. Some developments:

Now sometimes she can't hear me if I say her name and she's in the same room, but usually she can if I say it loudly.

For a while, she's been lying in her bed periodically woofing once (that gets to be really annoying--about about every 3 to 8 seconds, "woof!"). I wonder whether she's hearing ringing in her ears. Or voices! Or she can't distinguish little random background noises from things she used to bark at. (Believe me, when she used to bark at things, there was no quiet single woof thing going on.) Oh, she still sometimes hears louder things and sounds off as usual. It's those inbetween things that are just odd.

No more barking when someone rings the doorbell or knocks on the door. :-( In fact, I used to never even have people get that far, because Tika would start barking before they got there.

No more barking when the mailperson comes every day. That used to be so handy if I had something I needed to mail and hadn't set it out. Not sure how long that's been going on; just one of those things that I became aware isn't happening any more.

This morning, Tika was lying with her back to me about halfway between me and my renter, about 10 feet away from each of us. I got up from my desk and opened the sliding door to the yard; no reaction. I said her name in my normal voice, no reaction. I yelled her name--she jumped up and went to the renter! Oh, my.

Today I ordered a vibrating collar so I can start train her to look for me in response to a vibration. I ordered a type with no shock option because I don't ever want there to be a mistake.

Also I've been wondering about her vision. Often lately when I toss a treat on the floor for her (to protect my fingers), she doesn't seem to see me toss it, and then sometimes can't find it when she does see me toss it.

Trying not to cry about it. She's always been such an active (and reactive) dog, and so good at finding things and letting me know what's going on. And physically she seems fine, still running like crazy in the back yard for her toy.

And she was beside herself with joy when a couple of my friends came to visit yesterday.

I'm still entering her in agility trials a couple of months out, waiting to see how all that goes.

Oh, mannnn...I'm now rattling treats in the treat jar two feet above her head, and not a reaction at all. (Boost, in the other room, jumped up and is now staring at me.)

Oh, Tika...

OK, she heard the clicker above her head, leaped to her feet! Big jackpot mostly because I was so glad to see that.

Visiting Parents

SUMMARY: A brief Cupertino interlude.

Last night, I sorted through about 600 slides to pick ones that I wanted to send out to be scanned in. And my slide viewer didn't light up. It's a pretty simple mechanical thing, enough so that even I knew how it was supposed to work, but it didn't. I replaced the batteries, no luck. I went shopping to get a new light bulb, replaced that, and it still didn't work. I fiddled around with the little metal pieces that conduct the current for a little while, and nothing, no light. Grrr.

Today, I had some things to drop off at my parents' house while I was in their neighborhood. So, as long as I was going, I took my slide viewer. After a little normal sort of conversation, I asked plaintively, "Daddy, can you fix my toy?"

While Dad was in the other room uttering various sounds and making interesting noises with my toy, I noticed that my mom was wearing her Girl Scout volunteer shirt and the color looked really nice on her. My mom was a girl scout or involved in scouting from when she was a little girl--many, many decades of scouting, and she was at a scouting event today, part of the organization's 100th anniversary year.

She says none of her photos look like her any more. I said I've noticed that lately about my own photos--the camera does weird things to my face so it doesn't look the way I *really* look any more. She said that's exactly how she feels.

Then dad came back into the room, and Lo! the slide viewer lit up! Thank goodness for Repair Hero Man!

On the way out, I stopped to take a photo I've been meaning to get for a while, cuz you don't see one of *these* locked to a pole in a shopping center every day.

All that, plus a morning spent with a friend whose father just died and an afternoon at the movies (Iron Lady) with another friend, then playing with the dogs and potting some flowers and random other household chores, and huh, it's past my bedtime and somehow I forgot to have dinner. Guess it's string cheese and crackers again and then goodnight.

Doggie Drugs and Magic Tongues

SUMMARY: How do they do that?

Boost is now back on her benadryl--one and a half small, bright pink tablets twice a day--for that itching that now seems to hit her every year.

Both dogs (and I) are now taking glucosamine, half a tablet for each of them twice a day.

I use little slices of cheese to wrap the stuff in and, although Tika scarfs things down so fast that she doesn't notice, Boost isn't fond of having weird crunchy things hidden in her cheese.

So what I do is, wrap the whole pink tablet in a piece of cheese, and after Boost takes it, quickly keep shoving small bits of cheese into her mouth and wait until she's done swallowing to be sure that she's not spitting anything out. Do the same thing with the half pink tablet and follow-on cheese. Done? Do the same with the big white half tablet and follow-on cheese. Done?

Boost looks at me, hoping for more, licks her lips, then spits out the big pink tablet and the small half a pink tablet.

Sheez!

Don't Use That Photo, It Looks Like I'm Giving Advice

SUMMARY: As one agility friend responded, "And...?"

Really, I'm always quiet and have nothing to say.

P.S. Huh, time for a haircut again.

Boost Two-On Two-Off Aframe Intensity

SUMMARY: Wordless Wednesday

(Thanks for the surprise photo, Diana Wilson.)

Mat Matters

SUMMARY: Goodbye to some old plastic friends, hello to the newest member.

Way way back in the ages dark, the first couple of years I did agility, my dogs just lay on the grass in an x-pen or in their crates on the grass. After a rainy trial or two, though, and a really dusty crating area after that, I finally saw the value in having one of those plastic rug-mats that everyone seems to have.

I bought the first one that looked vaguely purple.

In fact, it's red and blue, which is obvious up close, and the pattern is kind of hokey, it was only 6x8, but that was a good size for a couple of crates with no canopy, it looked vaguely purple and, well, it was available, which is always a key factor in my shopping decisions.

I sometimes saw people throwing away their decrepit mats, and I vowed that I'd always take good care of mine, fold it carefully, pack it carefully, and it would last forever. Well, that hokey ugly first mat has held up reasonably well for being, now, about 14 years old, but it is in fact disintegrating--little pieces falling off every time I open it; binding coming off and the edge raveling; parts are badly faded so doesn't even pretend to look purple any more; and, let's face it, the pattern is still stupid.

It folded up into a long bundle that was just thin enough to shove between the dog's crate and the side of the van if I worked at it, so it mostly stayed in the car for several years.

But the main reason it didn't die completely a long time ago is because about about a year after buying that mat, I found this one, which is so TOTALLY my colors and my kind of pattern:

Still only 6x8, but this one folded up into this handy-dandy size that sat in the window well next to the dog's crate, so no struggling to get it in place.

I kept using the original one, trying to save the newer one for later, but when I finally got a 10x10 canopy, I started using BOTH mats, overlapping, to try to fill more of the 10x10 area. Eventually I gave up on that idea--too much work, too many edges to trip over, so I've used just the teal/purple one most of the last many years, and it really is disintegrating now, broken along most of its seams and folds and held together by faith.

I knew its time was coming, so a couple of years back, I bought this one. I MEANT to get a full-sized one to match the canopy size, but, once again, this was what was easily available, and although a large purple/white checkerboard wasn't my first choice for a pattern,  at least it wasn't butt-ugly and it was genuinely purple, even though it was STILL barely more than 6x8. And, yeh, it was available. BUT about the 3rd or 4th time I used it, the whole edge started to unravel. That was disappointing.

It kept unraveling because I was too lazy to duct-tape it, so after a while I folded it up into its square and left it in the garage and continued using my deteriorating teal/purple one.

Finally, this weekend when packing my dearly beloved teal/purple mat, I ceased to think "the time is coming" and decided "the time is here", so I left it at home and reactivated the purple/white checkerboard, placing the frayed edge under the crates, and decided that eventually, soon, I'd just need to make the effort to really find a mat that fit all my needs.

On Saturday, while killing time between runs (see what happens when I'm not full-time at the score table?) I decided to browse quickly through the vendors, probably not buying anything because, after all, I have everything. And then this caught my eye.

It's really purple, matches my purple/black/teal crates, it has a subtle and not stupid pattern, it's very sturdy--even has grommets along the sides for staking down--and FINALLY it's a full 9x9! So, yep, it's now mine.

It's also HUGE compared to the others. No sticking it alongside the crates; it's going to take up obvious space in MUTT MVR. The price we pay for a well-furnished agility home away from home.

The two oldest ones are now headed for the landfill. I hate tossing things if there's a chance they can be reused or recycled in some way, but I haven't come up with anywhere for them to go, so out they go. So long, and thanks for all the memories.

Haven't decided yet about the purple and white one--might duct-tape that edge after all and use it for indoor trials where a smaller mat is more practical--although that also usually means dust and dirt, and all those large white squares--gah. Can decide later. But for now--my new Mat and I are looking forward to our next trial and his very first use with the Taj MuttHall clan.

Salmagundi

SUMMARY: View and invasives, shoes, chairs, ribbons, peeps, oh my.

I forgot to mention yesterday (really?! with all that text I didn't mention something?!) that, although USDAA is now too cheap to supply team or grand prix Qualifying and placement ribbons, medals, or pins any more, Haute Dawgs did provide some. May I present our extra-long, extra-large ribbons for: Performance Team 2nd Place, Performance Grand Prix 4th Place, and Perf. Tournament Master Platinum:

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I hate shopping for shoes; it's hard to find something that looks like I want to wear them, and when I do, they usually don't fit. I was happy, as I reported two weeks ago, when I was able to quickly find a new pair of agility shoes very quickly in the third store I went into.

However, my normal everyday shoes were also a disaster--actually the uppers were fine, but the manufacturer I've been wearing for several years has greatly cheapened the shoes and both, although fairly new, had holes in the soles already. I dropped in to REI with my agility/movies friend (Sparkle's Human Mom) after seeing Hunger Games last week, and while I browsed for everyday shoes, she scoured the discount rack and found a pair of agility shoes that looked pretty good. She tried them on, thought they were OK, but thought they'd fit me better (she wears a  slightly larger size). So, while waiting for the Shoe Person to bring me my shoes, I tried them on. Wow! They were instantly comfortable, and so LIGHT! I felt barefoot yet more stable and secure! How could I resist half price on a perfect pair of shoes? And so they came home with me.

I switched between the pairs this weekend, and all went well with both. Happy agility camper--er, runner.

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I also hate shopping for office chairs. My first real office chair I happened on by accident after shopping and shopping--it was on clearance at some random store, but 7 or 8 years ago its hydraulic lift stopped lifting, so I was left sitting about 10 inches above the floor and raising my hands over my head to get to the keyboard. I looked and looked for one I liked, finally found a decent one at one of those resellers of used office furniture. But its arms started wiggling fairly quickly and required constant tightening, then one of the bolts broke, then another one stripped out about a year ago, then the last one's hole stripped out, and I was left with an armless chair as reported earlier. In agility, as Jim Basic says, "armless is harmless," but in office chairs, especially with my back and knees, I need those arms.

I lucked out--in March, Office Depot was having a mongo chair sale, all of them at great discounts. I went on over and looked at about 3 dozen chairs. Exactly one was even close to what I wanted, and it actually felt pretty good. Would've liked it upholstered rather than just mesh, but comfortable, supportive,  fully adjustable, and available without spending weeks at dozens of stores were high on my list of key features, so I ordered one and it arrived last week. Some assembly was required, and although I bruised my hand, torqued my thumb, and got a blood blister on my palm trying to "press the casters into the holes at the end of each leg," for the most part it went smoothly.

Anyone need a perfectly good office chair with no arms? Or think they can figure out how to attach the arms? It's yours. (See link to previous post for photo.)
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About a week ago: A stunning crystal-clear day after wind and a little rain, looking west at Mount Hamilton (if you click this photo to see a larger version, you can just make out the observatory); the field is still mostly green:

This morning, looking south across the same field--guess the mustard and oxalis have decided that it's finally really spring. They make even the neighbor's beautiful purple lilacs fizzle. The yellow fields are something else to see, but they are highly invasive nonnatives that crowd out native plants. Oh, and it's been warmish with no rain for several days, so although these hills are much closer than Mount Ham, you can tell the difference in the air quality.

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Wait--how long have these peeps been on this shelf anyway?

And a Shorter Summary of the USDAA Trial

SUMMARY: Qs, titles, and like that.

Well, as I've said before, Boost might not be much at agility, but she sure knows how to do worker raffles. I put in a mere 12 tickets with her name on them on Thursday and won two items, no tickets on Friday because I wasn't working all that much and felt like I'd already gotten my share, five tickets on Saturday (I was handed a handful but gave most of them back for the same reason) and won two items. Go, Boost.

For the weekend:

Tika:

• 9 Qs out of 18, so 50%. Not terrible but still below long-term average. 
• Qs:  (All in Performance) DAM Team, 1 out of four team individual events ( Snooker) , Steeplechase, Grand Prix, 2 out of 2 Jumpers, 1 out of 3 Standard, 0 out of 2 Snooker, 1 out of 2 Gamblers, 1 out of 2 Relays
• Titles completed: Relay Gold (35 Qs), Pf Tournament Platinum (50 combined DAM, Steeplechase, and Grand Prix with at least 10 of each).
• Titles close to: One more for Pf Jumpers Gold.
• Titles not making rapid progress on: 4 more for Pf Standard Gold, 7 more for Pf Snooker Gold (quite a come-down from Top Ten two years ago, huh?)
• 1st in Standard and Gamblers; 2nd in Jumpers, Team Gamblers, Steeplechase Rd 1, Steeplechase Rd 2, and Team overall; 3rd in Team Snooker, Team Standard. and Pairs Relay; 4th in Jumpers, team Jumpers and Grand Prix, out of between 3 and 10 dogs.

Boost:

• 3 Qs out of 18. 
• Qs: (all in Champion/Masters) DAM Team, 1 out of 4 team individual events ( Gamblers), neither Grand Prix nor Steeplechase,  1 out of 2 relay, 0 out of 2 jumpers, 0 out of 3 standard, 0 out of 2 snooker, 0 out of 2 gamblers.
• Titles close to: 1 more for Gambler Master bronze, 1 any tournament for Tournament Silver.
• Titles not making any progress on: 2 Super-Qs for  Snooker Master plus Snooker Master Champion plus Snooker Master Bronze; 2 Jumpers for  Jumpers Master.

The End of a Four--no, Three-Day Weekend

SUMMARY: Some items accomplished, some not.

I have so much to say that it's hard to know where to start. But I want to be concise, too. Been thinking about it for 24 hours now, and my list gets longer, not shorter. I guess I just need to plunge in and blather on. It's just going to be long. Skim and read as the mood strikes you, or just look at the happy photos.

We had some successes and some--well, failures--of one sort or another.

Weather and Camping Out

The weather wasn't bad at all; mostly pretty good agility weather, actually. Every day started with frost on the grass but warmed fairly quickly. Thursday afternoon warmed up enough that, if you were running a dog and in the sun, you wanted to take off your fleece, but the chilly wind made you put it back on quickly as soon as you stopped moving or went into the shade. After we were done for the day, the beautiful puffy white clouds turned into dark ominous clouds and, despite the no-rain forecast, we had maybe half an hour of off-and-on light showers, which made for this:

I was pretty wiped and a little queasy after the usual 4-a.m. rousing and drive out, 6 runs with each dog, and so on. Went out to dinner with friends, which was fun and tasty, but by the time the meal was over, I was drooping so badly that I decided I couldn't face 45 minutes of setting up MUTT MVR for sleeping, so investigated the Best Western where a bunch of others were staying.

They had only some rooms available by 9:30 p.m.: Suites starting at $125 a night and smoking rooms at $85. Plus taxes and $15 pet fee. Since I wanted only to sleep, shower, and leave, the suite seemed stupid. I waffled over the smoking room, though--I've had some pretty bad nights in smoky rooms. The more I waffled, the more she lowered the price, till I paid $70/night plus taxes and the pet fee. So $100 I hadn't budgeted for, but better than the original quote.

The room wasn't too horrible--I've spent  nights in nonsmoking rooms that I thought were as bad. It was spacious, had a comfortable king-sized bed, and all the faucets and lights worked.

Felt much better Friday morning. Still frost in the morning, but warmed up more than Thursday. I set up MUTT MVR and slept VERY soundly Friday night after a spontaneous potluck with generous friends, to which I had nothing to contribute since I'd planned on going out to eat.

Saturday started with frost again, but warmed up even more to shirtsleeve weather by midday. By dinnertime, though, when we had pizza brought in for our Bay Team quarterly meeting at 6:00, the chill crept in again. So--hold that point in the calendar--

Tika

Tika seemed pretty happy and healthy most of the time. She did her "hug" stretch before almost every run, where she puts her front feet up on my chest and stretches everything out. If she's hurtin', she won't do that. The last couple of runs on Saturday, she didn't do it right away or fully at first, and I thought, hmmm... but then she did it fully.

We definitely connected better than under the arena at Santa Rosa, but still had enough miscues and oddities that made me more and more aware that I can't expect her to do what she's always done.  I can point to most of them as a hearing and/or vision issue (I'm still not positive one way or the other about the latter). It's frustrating to assume that she'll just do the things she's always done and then she doesn't.

Like Saturday's gamble, which I thought was a complete gimmee for her, and she sent out beautifully but then on the turn to the Aframe, while I yelled "climb! climb!", she just kept coming towards me, not very fast, looking at me uncertainly. It made me sad, and then she didn't grab my shoes afterwards, either, so she wasn't feeling her cheery best. That's just one example.

Sure, we were never perfect in USDAA, but had held a pretty constant 65% Q average for a few years, and that average is just dropping. She Qed 4 out of 6 on Thursday, 3 out of 6 on Friday, and 2 out of 6 on Saturday, so we weren't getting any better with experience. So--hold that point in the calendar--

Tika Performance Team

What also made me sad was that she had four very nice runs in the DAM individual events. I was pleased with all of them, and yet she earned a Q in only one. Part of the problem was that there were only 6 dogs in her height class, so we combined with the 16" dogs. Between Chaps in our height and Epic and Heath in 16" (and a couple of other really awesome younger performance 16" dogs as well), between them usually having not only among the highest scores in Performance but in Championship, too, Tika's very good scores didn't Q. (Individual Qs are based on being within 15% of the average of the top 3.) What was really frustrating was that her scores *would* have been Qing in any of the Championship classes!

So I could pass it off as bad luck that there were only 6 in our class rather than 7 or that all the best Performance dogs happened to be there that weekend, but still, she's not usually had problems Qing in Team individual events before. And, in 5 of the last 11 team events, we have had to combine Tika's height with the 16", so there's every expectation that this experience could happen again.

Chaps had his usual consistently high scores, so as a team we were doing really well.

The club split team into 2 days, which makes me nuts, especially when it's such an important Q (our Platinum Tournament), so I had to sleep on the stress of hoping that we'd finally get that last Team Q needed for that title, after December's disaster, and the next team not until July.

After the first class on Thursday, Chaps and Tika were in 3rd place out of 18 teams. After next class, we moved into 1st place and stayed there after the 3rd and 4th classes, too--but, going into the relay on Friday afternoon, we were a mere 5 points (or 5 seconds) out of about 700 beyond both the 2nd and 3rd place teams--so close out of all those points! We couldn't slack off at all if we wanted to hold our 1st place.

But to me, at that moment, THE most important thing was not Eing so that we would Q. At that point, we probably would've still Qed if either of us had Eed in the relay, but not certain about that--it's a huge penalty in the relay.

One of the two teams had a refusal on the weaves and had to redo, so that moved took them out of contention for the top two spots. Chaps had a clean first half. I wanted to lead out rather than run off the line with Tika to avoid any possible off course or faults, so I walked calmly and quietly to position before releasing Tika. She had a really nice run, but that calm leadout cost us--with our final total score of 896.61 points for the 5 runs, we were 1.5 points (seconds) exactly *behind* the other team. So--

2nd place out of 18 Performance team, which I'm quite pleased about, considering how good & fast the other teams were.

And, most importantly, Tika's Performance platinum tournament! Thank goodness that's out of the way! More fun than that--that was also Chap's Performance gold tournament title! What a combo!

And a relief that last December's disaster was just a fluke due to Tika's hearing in the Santa Rosa arena.

No more team? Less agility?

Still, I'm thinking that if she can't Q in the individual events, there's no reason for me to be running her in team any more. Except that I promised our old partner Brenn to do July team for old time's sake, since Brenn's arthritis seems to have eased a bit.

We had our moments--she placed 2nd in Round 1 Steeplechase even though it had 2 sets of weaves and she looked so slow!, and placed 2nd in the final round also, which ALSO had 2 sets of weaves, but she misread a rear cross (or I was too far behind--I'd been worried about that spot before we ran) and we missed 1st place by 0.5 seconds. But that's because one of the very fast younger dogs scratched, another popped out of the weaves, and Chaps scratched, so just by not Eing we'd have been guaranteed at least 3rd.

She Qed easily in both regular Jumpers rounds, although only placing 4th of 7 and 2nd of 5.

And she won Thursday's Standard and Friday's Gamblers.

But our failures when we didn't Q seemed much larger and much more different than what we'd failed on in the past. Much puzzlement on my part on how to manage this deafened dog and much puzzlement on her part as to why I'm not telling her what she needs to know.

So I'm thinking that we're closer than I thought to not doing much agility.

Boost

On the up side:

• Weaves: We did 20 sets in 18 runs, including Friday's gamble, two in Thursday's Snooker, two sets in Steeplechase, several situations where I wanted to move far away laterally, several challenging entrances, and so on, and she nailed almost every entry and stayed in almost all. Exceptions: Coming out of a chute to a right turn to the weaves, I called her hard and overcalled her; tried a challenging serp in Team Relay and she cut behind me; and then, jeez, the easiest ones: back to back weaves in a gamblers *opening*, where I did NOT cut away and was right with her, she popped out twice in a row(!) but then got them both the next 2 tries. Those great, fast, accurate weaves made me very happy.
• She did all her contacts beautifully! No coming off the side, no leaving early! Yowza!
• Table in standard: Thursday's and Friday's were fast downs and she stayed down; Saturday's was a fast down, one elbow came up briefly but went back down when I reminded her. That's excellent, also.
• Serpentines: I dared two or three since we've been practicing them, and she actually came in! Must keep working on it, though, as they weren't completely smooth.
• Team: Wow, she did not E or crap out on any one of her five team events, which has got to be a first for her! She even earned a Q in the gamblers, and she hardly ever Qs in team events. Furthermore, none of her teammates (Jersey and Rift) Eed or crapped out in anything, either, and much to our delight and amazement, we finished 4th of 20 teams! That's the highest I've ever placed in Championship team (although Tika has placed in the top 3 several times in Performance team). Yowza.
  

Not so good:

• Bars. It wasn't a bar-knocking frenzy, but they came down at a fairly regular rate. I might count later, but I'd guess at least 10 bars out of 18 runs.
• Refusals and runouts. Sigh. Sigh. Sigh. Lots.

What we really needed:

• Jumpers: Thursday--knocked the 2nd bar, came in past a jump after a tunnel (I might have called too hard but she just skimmed the edge of it so it would've almost been easier to take it); didn't go forward to a jump that I really needed her to, so Eed on refusals. Friday (team jumpers), two refusals that were mostly my fault--I checked out on a front cross and tried a rear which is her nemesis and she just stopped, then another when I briefly forgot the course. (But she kept up all her bars.) Saturday: I think one bar down, one refusal that I fixed, and another on a rear cross where she just kept looking at me until she was right in front of the jump and stopped. I made her just jump it and then walked off.
• Snooker: Thursday (team): not too bad, got through 7-7-7-3 in the opening and through 5 in the closing but I missed a front cross again and when I tried to rear she ran past the next jump. Friday: Ran past the first red when I tried a lead-out pivot, so bobbling to get back to it. Couldn't have asked for a smoother course on which to do three 7s except that she chose *this* time to go completely straight instead of curving slightly to follow me (and for a change I was way ahead of her, so no excuse!) and went off course right away. Saturday: A twisty ugly course that the smoothest thing I could find with hopes of a superQ involved 10 front crosses. She ran past a couple of jumps anyway that I had to go back and get--mangled our way through the opening four reds and obstacles, but when we had to go around one jump she started paying more attention to me than to the obstacles and we futzed out on several stupid attempts at the next two jumps.

Health

My knee was holding up OK, but feeling worse gradually. I iced it only once--seemed like there was never time when it was convenient to spend 15 minutes doing it. My own speed and agility in the ring is DEFINITELY helped by making sure that I can jog and sprint before I get the dog out to compete, but it was taking more and more steps of each for me to loosen up as the weekend went on. And I still get winded when there's a lot of running.

 By the time I walked the last regular class on Saturday--Jumpers--my legs were so tired that I walked it only a couple of times and then peeled off so I'd have enough energy left to actually run it. Walking the Steeplechase finals (for Tika) after that, I really didn't even want to be walking, I was that tired.  Now hold that point in time...

Friday evening, vet Cindi massaged Tika and Boost--she's worked on them before, so knows them a bit--because I was still concerned about the limps I'd seen the last couple of weeks from Boost, and although tika seemed OK, she's just older and arthritic.  Another $130 that I hadn't budgeted for, didn't know she was going to be there but was glad to be able to use her servies.

Sure enough, she identified Boost's right hip socket as being sore. NOthing that she'd recommend not running Boost, but enough to keep an eye on and maybe do less of everything that we usually do for a while to rest it. And Tika's left side was pretty tight and resisting; her toes were quite stiff but loosened up with the massage (and she showed me how to work on them).

Then by midday Saturday I was detecting a very slight limp on some occasions with Boost, so it was coming and going almost imperceptibly. For that last Jumpers run, Tika started out very slowly on the first four obstacles,  and I thought she was done, but she picked up. I warmed her up a lot more for her final Steeplechase and she looked ok, but oh, she's SOOOO stiff in the weaves these days!

And we arrive at Saturday evening

Everything just added up to this point in time, late afternoon Saturday--overly tired physically, a little discouraged, wondering whether my dogs had reached their saturation point, regretting having entered Sunday also.

Sure, there was another Jumpers and another Snooker, which was the whole reason I entered Sunday, but our performances had been so crapped in all three tries at each so far, there was no reason to think that Sunday would suddenly be THE jumpers and THE snooker we'd been waiting for.

So, late that afternoon, I decided that we were done. It was a great relief once I made the decision, and it gave me the energy to spend 90 minutes packing everything up after the Bay Team meeting, although I wasn't glad to finish packing and then driving the 2 hours home after dark.

Startled my renter, coming in just before 11 p.m.--can't remember when the last time was that I came home early from a trial, but I think it's been years and years. Pottied the dogs and went straight to bed. Didn't regret at all not being there today. Oh, well--except that one other friend who's been trying forever to get a Super-Q got it today. So, well, MAYBE that WOULD have been THE Snooker... But probably not.

Being at home and in my own bed is a nice feeling, and the stress, thrills, spills, and chills of competition are a nice thing to get a break from. Remind me if I ever try to sign up for 4 days of agility again that I've been down this path several times and should know better.

Boost's Mom at AKC Nationals

SUMMARY: Tala is looking good.

At 11 and a half, Tala is around Tika's age.

Dang bar.



Looks like she was around 30th-40th out of 230 dogs in the rounds where she ran clean, and 53rd after 3 rounds even with the bar down. Pretty good for an old girl competing against a zillion top-notch youngsters.

And I might as well mention some siblings.

Boost's full sister (but 4 years younger), Tcam, also competing in the 20" class of 230 dogs, finished 5th in Round 1! (I'll have to find out what their faults were in the other two classes.)

Boost's littermate Derby, competing in the 24" class of about 90 dogs, finished 2nd in Round 2 and 1st in Round 3! Don't know what the fault was in Round 1. Placed 3rd in the challenger round, which wasn't quite enough to get them into the finals.

Let's Hear It for Veteran Dogs and Mixed Breeds

SUMMARY: I forgot to mention the AKC National Championships.

As you all undoubtedly know, they took place last weekend in Reno.

Because it was so close, tons and tons of people I know made sure that they qualified and then went ahead and entered. Fun seeing so many Bay Teamers do well in the early rounds and a whole 13 Bay Team dogs made it to the finals. You can see the list here on our Bay Team site.

I just wanted to mention some things, now that Tika is officially old (due to her hardness of hearing) at 11 years old and I'm thinking about stuff like this):

• Apollo, who competes against Tika in USDAA Performance 22" whenever they do USDAA--and who is a year and a half younger--and sometimes beats us and sometimes vice versa--took 2nd in the finals in the tallest Preferred class. That's pretty cool. (And  other coolness, his handler did this while taking two other dogs to the finals as well, placing 2nd in regular 26" and then, with a dog who isn't even hers (although they've been competing together for a few months while his mom heals from an injury), made it to the finals there, too.)
• Former classmates Ash and Luka, who have so many national (and international) championships racked up together that one starts to think, they can't possibly do it again, can they? and, how old is Luka anyway? And one looks it up and finds that she's nine and a half, and, yes, they won the 16" National title once again. So, in a world where a 7-year-old dog is considered a veteran, she beat dogs half her age. What a team.
• Current classmates Stacey and Roo, the completely good-looking tall mixed breed, also made it to the finals. How very cool that finally non-AKC breeds and mixes are allowed to compete.

Four-Day Agility Extravadogaganza

SUMMARY: Hopes and fears for the coming weekend.

It's time for the annual four-day insanity of agility. Why anyone wants to schedule multiple-day trials when there isn't a weekend or holiday is beyond me. And yet, I go.

In this case, because I really want to get Tika's last DAM Team Q for her (Performance) Platinum Tournament title, and this time, Team's five events are run across two days--Thursday and Friday.

In several past years, I entered only three of the days, but this time (a) I want to get as many Qs as I can with Tika before we really can't do agility any more and (b) there are additional Jumpers and Snookers on Sunday, and of course I'm hoping against hope that I can pick up Boost's Jumpers Qs and SuperQs.

So, there it is, need to stay all four days.

The weather looks like it'll be good. That's very, very, good, because it was at this 4-day trial in 2006 when it poured for several days before, leaving us walking through ankle-deep mud and ponds on the fields, and my knee swelled up like a grapefruit, and later that year I ended up with knee surgery. We're hoping to avoid a repeat.

Note to self: Need to take lots of ice and ice the knee regularly.

My hopes are:

• Tika's increasing deafness won't be as much of a handicap outdoors.
• Boost and I will somehow click and get Jumpers Qs and Snooker SuperQs. 
• Tika and I and our teammates will all click and get that last Team Q so I can stop fretting about it.
• Tika's body will hold up through 4 days and 22 runs. She's been looking good in the yard here, did some really fast table-downs yesterday that I haven't seen in a while. On the other hand, in class last week, she started out super fast and ended up obviously slower.
• Boost's body will hold up through 4 days and 22 runs. She's been coming up stiff lately after workouts. I can't figure it out myself and I probably ought to have her looked at. But she looks like me: Stiff when she first stands up and for several steps, and then loosens up and is perfectly normal walking and running.
• My knee and energy level will hold up.

I'm now kind of regretting entering everyone in everything. It's too late to scratch and get my money back, but I always have the option of scratching runs while we're there if it looks like it needs to be done. Hate to toss the entry fees like that, though.

Although--I've kinda been tossing entry fees for years trying to get Qs with Boost, so it's not like I'm unfamiliar with the concept.

Team:

• Tika is teamed with oft-mentioned Chaps this time--also, we're doing both Pairs runs together. So it seemed appropriate to have a team name of "Use Chapstik Every Day".  Are you just so jealous of our creativity?
• Boost is teamed with Jersey (who lives just a few blocks from us and I think we've teamed before) and another dog/person whom I don't know who are coming in from out of state--thus our "Western Alliance" team name.

I'll be sleeping in MUTT MVR for all three nights. So I really do hope the weather holds up. In fact, it might get to be almost too warm on Sunday. Well... 72F, which seems warm compared to, say, winter. If it's bright and sunny, could feel very hot running.

Ennyhoo-- not sure whether I'll post again before I go, and I don't think there's wifi there on site, so this might be it until Sunday night or Monday.

Needy Knee

SUMMARY: A morning at the physical therapy department.

I attended a two-hour knee clinic this morning. The physical therapists evaluated each of us briefly. Both of my knees bend equally well, which is good. The right knee failed another test, though: Lie flat on your back. Tighten the front thigh muscle. This is supposed to make your leg completely straight--result on my good knee was that my heel lifted about an inch off the surface. My bad leg--not a flicker of movement in my foot. So that muscle is very much weaker and/or knee has stiffened into an unstraight position.

Next, they talked about all the various symptoms of various knee problems. I scored well (as in having most of the symptoms) of both arthritis and patella issues. Bah.

And they talked about posture, alignment, and stuff like that.

Lastly came the explanations and testing of the various exercises.

I now have about 10 minutes of exercises to do every day, and an appointment to come back in two weeks to see whether I've improved.

More Miscellany

SUMMARY: Shoes, class, serpentines, spring, flowers, wind...

Because most of our class this week is off in Reno for the AKC Nationals, there were only three of us in attendance. So I ran both Merle Girls every run. And we got more runs in, or at least more detailed work on each of the runs, because there were only 4 dogs instead of 7 or 8 or so.

You know some people say, "I don't know which dog I'll be running" when referring to a single dog? Like I used to with Remington--the fast, eager dog, or the turned off dog? Well, my dogs I think don't know what handler they're going to get. Sometimes I poop out in class just running the normal number of runs with the equivalent of only one dog. Sometimes I can run both dogs a whole lot more and still feel like I'm moving and [relatively] agile. That's how I felt tonight. I dunno why. It can vary not only from week to week, but day to day.

Boost still can't do straight-on serpentines, even though we worked on them some this week. We talked in class a little bit about starting from square one, which was a good review. Now I have 6 days in which to fix it before the 4-dayer. Heh. Well, we'll work on it.

Tika started fast and excited, but slowed down fairly quickly, and, yes, is not doing some things that in the old days I could always count on her to do. And then, poof!, just like that, she's running and then she's sniffing the ground with a little displacement/stress action going on. Ah, well, learning to handle "which dog do I have" with Tika is such a change from her normal consistent self through most of her agility career.

I wore my brand-new, actually *shiny* shoes in class tonight.

You think it was time?

I dunno, those Ditas and an identical pair lasted me collectively at least 10 years. That was large amounts of money well spent. If this new 40-buck pair from Big 5 lasts me half as long, I'll be happy.

Meanwhile, speaking of shopping, you really should never let me into the garden center when spring's around the corner. I'm just sayin'.

Although, whoa, I'm rethinking how to decorate my dog's crates in MUTTMVR. This looks pretty good!

But spring is fickle this time of year--March is trying hard to circumvent those old saws and go OUT like a lion:

And speaking of lions--it's not every auto body shop (getting estimates on fixing MUTT MVR's owie) whose lobby contains two life-sized lion guardians.

Roar.

Training Notes

SUMMARY: Because I do want to improve things.

I don't have anything like a formal list of what to work on or formal tracking sheet showing how much I've done. I'm doing only about 5 minutes a day with each dog--but that's a whole lot more than I had been doing for months.

In the last week, I've worked on:

• One-jump serps.  Interesting that, when I had moved the dogs far enough away from the jump that they were alongside the teeter, they both did u-turns from a sit-stay to the teeter instead of coming to the jump for the serp. I didn't videotape it, so not sure what the deal was there.
• Lateral lead-outs (boost only).
• Just running over jumps (and into tunnels because that's the only way to keep up the speed in this small yard), especially with Boost to just keep her going. And for  me, both behind and ahead and practicing saying "go" or "hup"  or "through" while the dog is NOT directly over a jump.
• When playing (tossing a toy) for Boost, making her go over jumps first to try to increase the value of going over jumps.
• Bar-knocking drills with Boost, with tossed treats and with toy.
• Table-down drills mostly with Tika, mostly with food but some toys.
• Weave entries from 90-degree angle and steeper.
• Just with Boost, weave entries when I'm way ahead of her. How come she continues to be able to do them just fine here but not in competition? Grumble.
• Practicing standing up straight while I'm running (not bending at all), really concentrating on using my arm and body position to indicate obstacles, especially with Tika, who is sometimes having trouble with that now even here in my smaller yard. 
• Warming myself up by jogging and running until I can run full out without my knee complaining. It really becomes so stiff so quickly these days; I can't rely on it loosening up in the first few running steps any more.

Just a week away from a mongo four-day USDAA trial. I'd like to feel confident that I'm not throwing away my time and money for four whole days in a row.

Once again we're going to try to get Tika's final Team Q to complete her Performance Platinum Tournament. In retrospect, our disaster in December was at that covered Santa Rosa arena where I finally realized this month that there's so much ambient noise that she couldn't hear me, even though her hearing wasn't as bad then as it is now. This time it's outdoors, and I'm hoping that she'll be able to hear me better.

And--like a broken record--I'd really really like to get some Jumpers Qs and SuperQs with Boost. Just sayin'.  So. Another week in which to practice.

I should really make a list and check things off as I work on them.

I should.

Uncanny Coincidences

SUMMARY: Lincoln and Taj MuttHall.

I've been doing a little research and I've discovered that there are many uncanny similarities between Taj MuttHall and Abraham Lincoln.

• Abe is one syllable; Taj is one syllable. Lincoln is two syllables; MuttHall is two syllables. OoooooOOOO!
• Abe had a son named Tad; Human Mom has a site named Taj.
• Lincoln failed in all attempts to be elected to the U.S. Senate; Taj MuttHall has also never been elected to the U.S. Senate.
• Lincoln married Mary, Taj MuttHall is merely merry.
• If you rearrange the letters in Abraham Lincoln, they spell "Oh Man! Brain call," and if that doesn't apply to Taj MuttHall, I don't know what does!
• Abraham Lincoln was a mere 56 years old when he was shot in a theater.
  Taj MuttHall Human Mom is a mere 56 years old and has tickets to the theater for tomorrow night. I hope there aren't any uncanny further coincidences occurring at that venue. I can assure you that I will not drive there in a Ford.

Then And Now

SUMMARY: In honor of National Puppy Day.

March 23 is National Puppy Day (at least per this organization). In honor of puppies, a look back.

Tika

Tika at 9 months from the rescue site and Tika today.


Over the years, I've thought that she has looked more and more wolflike and less and less Aussie-like. Now I can really see why--the ears no longer tip over nicely; her colors have faded and merged considerably through the years; her coat has become fuller.

Update April 12,2012: A friend who hadn't seen us in a couple of years stopped by today and said that Tika's coat looks so much paler than she remembers. Maybe that fading is a recent, age-related thing after all.

Boost

Boost at maybe 6 weeks (before I adopted her) and a year ago.

I loved the very light gray as a puppy, but she has darkened considerably, as her mother also did. When she was younger, her left ear was distinctly gray compared to her black right ear, but now it's not nearly so obvious.

Puppies are so darned cute! But you sure can't use them to judge what the dogs will look like when they're all growed up.