Beyond Adolescence - part 4

[SpanielsGalore]

Didn't realise we were that close to the end of part 3. 😂

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding rain!? Can you send it toward me, please? 😍

I didn't realise you had tortoises!!! Can we have a photo?

Whilst I do love a tortoise, I do have to agree that all attention should be on Rory. He's just a baby 😁

I've been trying, quite unsuccessfully, so far to teach DWS directional commands. All the others do it, but she's a lot slower to pick up more complex commands or indeed ones which put her away from her family. So I'll tell them all to go left and try and send her right, but she gets all confused and just runs around in circles chasing her tail. I think the brains might have skipped a generation...

I thought we had a breakthrough this morning as she went left when I held the others in place. Then I realised there was a cow pat on the ground and she'd only gone that way to roll in it. 😤

My two rotters managed to roll in something stinky yesterday evening just before we were heading out, quick flannel wash then an extra evening walk to the stream when we got back to have a proper rinse.

Hope they don't cotton on that rolling in things means extra trips to swim.

Counting down the days now to holidays. 6 more days at work

I had to wear trousers and a coat on today’s walk! My ‘phone telling me it’s currently 22 outside. Only a few days ago it was 33! Bring back summer!.(Although 33 was a tad hot, I admit).

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks I’ll get an up to date one after work, the poor tortoises are neglected when it comes to photos in favour of Rory!

Rory got his first full run back last night at fly ball. We were early and he was watching the more experienced dogs so I think he’s figured out what he’s meant to do 🥰.

Its just as well he had a good exercise last night as it’s majorly flooded here today 😵.

Well done Rory. Looking forward to seeing him at Crufts!

I know I moaned about the weather yesterday, but order has been restored. The sun is shining, washing out, and shorts on.

Apple orchards of Kent, and further down the hill, vineyards (not sure you can see them in the photo).

@Silverbirchleaf it rained the night before last, yesterday and last night. The garden is wet. My feet are cold and I slept like a baby listening to the rain 😍Best I've slept in months.

It's overcast and due to rain again here later...can't believe we're so close yet the weather is so different 😂DDog looking beautiful as always

@tizwozliz where are you off to? Hope the girls don't still stink...

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding ahh no! Was it all the rain overnight that caused the flood?

Glad to hear Rory had a good time at flyball! Does he get excited in between goes?

Once the season starts, DWS and I are going to start taking her to show gundog working days to get her her SGWC. We had to wait for her to hit the criteria to be able to do it, then it's been too hot to have her out and about so she's a bit behind where Twatdog was.

The evening dip did the trick until big pup rolled in the same thing again yesterday evening whilst I was at Hoopers with little pup so she had a proper bath

No more hoopers for us now as the evening sessions stop for the winter and my weekends are too busy.

Off to Denmark again, I'm doing a night swim in the canals in Copenhagen then we're heading off to Bornholm (Danish Island in the Baltic sea) for a few nights camping then back to the West Coast. Lots of driving, 4 or 5 ferry trips, hopefully some sunny but not overly hot weather. I'm not sure I know how to cope with rain any more.

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks I was a bit premature in my affirmations. It rained en route to agility this morning, one of those short, sharp showers, but was dry throughout the lesson. More overcast and cloudy now, but still warm.

Good lesson, and did a course of fifteen obstacles. It may have only been a couple of minutes running, but I was puffed out at the end. Mastered a tricky turn as well. Good fun.

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks we had absolutely torrential rain this morning, just as I had to set off for work. Some houses and businesses were flooded in the city where I work 😵.

He’s less excited and more laser focused, which is good!

I’m afraid I don’t know what SGWC is, or hoopers @tizwozliz but what interesting hobbies our dogs have!

Evening all! (Who's brave enough to admit they are old enough to get that reference?)

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks Grooming is not my forte. One of the reasons I went for working strain cockers over show ones.

I have found it quite difficult to train a dog to do something when the others are doing something different. K is better trained than P. She'll stop to the whistle, but it took a long time for her to not think 'sod it' and join in with whatever P was up to.
Can you call yours one at a time like the person in the video with the dozen or so labs?

@Silverbirchleaf I had to laugh at your need for a coat at 22°. That would be shorts and t-shirt weather up here. If it ever gets that hot. I had my heating on last night.

My hallway is finally finished. Monday and Tuesday were spent painting and yesterday the carpenter came to fit the dado rail. It's not my best decorating job, but I am pleased with how it looks overall.
I'm going to have a few days rest and then decorate the parts of the landing I can reach.

The carpenter also fixed batons to the garden wall so I can put stock fencing up to keep K in the garden. So whilst he was doing the rail, I spent hours cutting down bushes. My god, I ache all over today!

I've had to make a Red Velvet cake to make me feel better. 😂

Hello everyone! We finally had rain too! Not loads but enough to make me happy! It was 22 degrees here a couple of days ago but felt no cooler to me because of the humidity!

DS is now back. I took him and Pablo to Cannock Chase again today, despite it being forecast showers all afternoon I thought I would chance it. It turns out fortune favours the brave as not only did it stay dry but there was barely a soul in sight

@tizwozliz stops for winter!? But it's not even autumn yet...

That sounds so lovely. I am incredibly jealous. Copenhagan was one of the few places I really wanted to be posted to when I was younger...I mean I got Rome instead, so not all bad. But Denmark is stunning. I just googled Bornholm and it looks even more beautiful than the rest of Denmark😍

@Silverbirchleaf sounds like you got lucky! It didn't rain here in the end either, but it threatened it for most of the day...

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding it's the 'Show Gundog Working Certificate.' It's for show strain gun dogs to prove their ability to 'work' as they were originally bred to do 😂It's one of the ways we show-dog owners try and make our dogs seem a bit less pointless when compared to their working line counterparts! I get all of mine qualified - partly for breeding purposes, so I can continue to prove my dogs are widely 'useable' and also partly because it's good for their very teeny tiny brains.

@SpanielsGalore seen it, but not when it came out 😀

I can! Only again, not DWS. She's got the looks, bless her, but not the brains. She very much follows K's line of thinking in that she'll do something, but if one of the others is doing something else she wants to do what they're doing. She's a follower, not a thinker. Twatdog picked it up fastest, but then I suppose he had to have one redeeming quality...

Ohh can we have photos of the cake? Glad to hear your decorating is (mostly) going well! Can't wait to see the finished result.

@VanGoSunflowers Ohh isn't he a handsome boy. I assume DS was delighted to be reunited with his little pal?

DDogs and I are about to head out for our evening walk. They didn't get one last night as I toddled off to bed at about 7. Then I slept through to 9am this morning. DH took them out this morning and at lunch, but judging by the way they've been staring at me hopefully...it was not up to standard.

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks Yes he is delighted to have him back and I am once again being shunned at bedtime in favour of a spot on DS’ bed. Pablo is very intensely concentrating on a sandwich crust in that picture 😂

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks oh fab! I didn’t know that was a thing!

One dog groomed. Four to go.

Amazing walk this morning. Was only 13 here so the middle three and I did 5 miles whilst DDs and DH took DWS and Hen for an amble around Knole. Nothing better than a cold, crisp, morning walk followed by an apple crumble muffin and a latte.

@Idstillratherbepaddleboarding it is fab! It’s a good way of making sure your dog is still fit for purpose - don’t want them ending up like GSDs or Daschunds are 🙁

@VanGoSunflowers Pablo does know who feeds him, right?! 😂

Hope you’ve got a tough hoover!

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks oh he knows he just seems to think he can away with shunning me (which technically he can!)
That looks like a lot of fur! I brush Pablo outside but his fur is dark and doesn’t stick to anything so I can pretend it’s not there 😂

Took both boys for a hike in the Malvern hills yesterday which was bliss. Encountered the naughtiest Labrador I have ever witnessed on this mornings walk! He came barrelling out of nowhere, off lead, and was so boisterous that he made Pablo at his worst look like the best behaved dog to have ever lived. At first I couldn’t tell if he was trying to play or if he was being aggressive he was that bad. He made a beeline straight for Pablo who of course got all excited and it took everything to try and get his focus back on me. Other lab was clearly a mature dog but a fat show line one and the owner thought the whole thing was hilarious and kept saying “ooh they look like brothers don’t they” whilst his cockapoo (who weirdly was on a lead) was lunging and barking his head off. The whole thing made me a bit cross I must admit. Owner didn’t attempt to control his Lab who was running around like a total lunatic and kept coming after Pablo.

I walked away thinking I feel bad for ever referring to my boy as ‘boisterous’!

@Silverbirchleaf I have one of those big Shark ones that you plug in so it's a proper old school one. First I use a scraper on the carpet and gather up as much as I can as well as most of the carpet! Once I'd done all five it was about one bin bags worth of fur. 😳Admittedly I'd not done it for a few weeks as it's been too hot for me to face doing it

@VanGoSunflowers I can't believe you bit your tongue! I'd definitely have snapped. I don't have an issue with a dog being boisterous or naughty as long as the owner is actually trying. Someone making an effort goes a long way to how I respond. Tbh though, if that lab carries on like that it's almost certainly going to get attacked.

Did you manage to wrangle Pablo back under control easily enough?

I don't want to alarm anyone...but I had a jumper on earlier😆Loving this slightly crisper weather. Not necessarily cold, but crisp. Makes for perfect walks.

I’ve just put a cardi on… . Not sure when I last wore a second layer. Nice not to be all sweaty after a walk though.

Maybe you could knit a jumper with all that fur.

@VanGoSunflowers How frustrating. As Hungry says, you don’t mind a boisterous dog if the owner has control over it, or is monitoring its behaviour.

Was in Deal today and a chihuahua snapped at a black lab with the owner being oblivious. What makes it worst is that the lab was a guide dog! (Deal was beautiful today).

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks I did walk away muttering ‘control your bloody dog’. He flew at Pablo out of nowhere so I was completely taken by surprise! To be fair to Pablo, although he obviously reacted initially I did manage to get him out of there sharpish with a firm ‘this way’
You are correct his dog is bound to get attacked eventually. I would never let mine off the lead ever if he behaved that way. I had a light jacket on for my morning walk. I’m probably going to annoy a lot of people by saying this but I am beyond excited for Autumn!

@Silverbirchleaf poor lab. I do usually find it’s the smaller dogs that bark and snap around here. Pablo really doesn’t like small dogs at all! Anything smaller than a Spaniel and he will ignore them. Although there were a couple of whippets going for him the other morning until they turned on each other (both with the same owner) it sounded really nasty. You can see why I’ve put so much effort in to trying to train some neutrality in to him with the sort of dogs there are in my area!

@SpanielsGalore How is the decorating going?

@Silverbirchleaf it would be a very itchy jumper!

Tbh I have sometimes wondered if I am allergic to them. Not seriously but just a bit. Whenever their seasonal shed happens my eyes get really itchy.

@VanGoSunflowers Oh that's so good of Pablo. What a good boy 😍He's definitely growing up! I bet four months ago you wouldn't have thought he'd be that quick to disengage.

I find small dogs to be the worst as well for being snappy. I do honestly think it's usually because their owners think that because it's small it's harmless...

Hope everyone had a lovely morning! Was so chilly here that I wore my coat again. I am already starting to miss the sun though, even though I have been whinging about it for weeks now. DWS and I had a bit of a disagreement this morning as she got a bit overstimulated on her walk (I think because it is so much cooler and she now has all this manic puppy energy that was being kept at bay by the heat) and was being a right little twat. Kept prancing backwards away from me when I tried to put her lead on and barking in a 'isn't this fun' way. It was not fun.

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks Just looked it up and DofDG ran until 1976. Didn't realise it went on so long. But explains why I remember my Grandma watching it.

Poor DWS. Fortunately, she won't have to rely too heavily on brains. It's often better that way round anyway. My sprocker was far too clever for my his own good.
DD described K as book smart, not street smart. 😂 If you teach her something, she can do it. But if she has to problem solve, forget it.

@VanGoSunflowers Sorry you had an encounter with a twat and his rude dog. And how insulting to say Pablo looked like his brother! That would have annoyed me more than the behaviour, I think.

Decorating has ground to a halt. Hallway and stairs are finished. I can do two and a half of the upstairs landing walls. But I need help to do the one and a half walls over the stairs. Or hire stair ladders from somewhere if that's a thing.

It's a lovely sunny day here, so I walked the dogs without a coat. My phone tells me it's only 17°, but it feels hot.

I'm going to take K to the vets this week. Hopefully there's nothing wrong with her and it will put my mind at rest. She's alright(ish) on walks. But at home she is quiet and lethargic. I have several theories.

1. She's ill.
2. She has something stuck in her throat again. She's had a couple of coughing episodes, but she was quiet before those.
3. Switching her to the same low fat diet as P has depleted her energy stores. Google says a healthy dog needs 10 - 15% and she's on 8%. It hasn't affected P, but all dogs are different. She's had chicken wings for breakfast for the last two days to increase her fat content.
4. She's getting older, maturing and calming down. But that doesn't usually happen for another 10 years with spaniels. 😂

I know I over think things, but DS visited yesterday and he commented on her not being her usual self.

@SpanielsGalore Ohh poor K! But I suppose at least she has some smarts...unlike mine 😂

I'm sure you can hire stairladders! Or buy a cheapo used set from Ebay?

I imagine 17 feels hotter for you as you've not had the sort of heat we've had down south. It's 19 here and I'm in a jumper!!! Although admittedly I do have all the doors open so the dogs can come in and out.

Ahh it's better to be safe than sorry with dogs. Sorry that your girl are determined to make you spend most of your free time at the vets though 🙁How old is K now? Could it also be the heat if it's been a bit warmer? Mine are always really slow and lethargic when it gets hot...

DWS is smarming around me after her awful behaviour yesterday. But it'll take more than a bit of toe sucking and puppy dog eyes for me to forgive her...

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks you are correct! 4 months ago I thought I was stuck with a teenage delinquent for life 😂 it’s funny when it’s your first dog, you don’t quite trust the process because you have never been through it and you can just never imagine your dog actually listening to you and then one day, you let your guard down and let him have some off lead freedom and he recalls away from other dogs and you almost burst with pride and relief 😂 it sounds like you’re in the trenches a little with DWS now? But obviously this ain’t your first rodeo! How old is she now I forget? What can she do to make you forgive her?

@SpanielsGalore I hope the vets give you the all clear for K and it’s theory number 4. Although you do seem very tuned in to your dogs so if you think something isn’t quite right then you’re probably correct (although I obviously I hope you aren’t!)

@TheHungryHungryLandsharks It's 19° here too, but I wore shorts and t-shirt to walk the dogs and a sun dress to town. 😂 My phone says it feels like 25°.

K will be 2 years old at the end of September. I did wonder about the heat, but it's really not been that warm up here. I've had the heating on in the evenings some days. It's probably just me overthinking things and she's fine.

I hope you've forgiven DWS now. I'm not sure toe sulking would persuade me though.

@VanGoSunflowers Glad Pablo is growing out of his teenage delinquent phase. It's a brilliant feeling when they surprise you by recalling away from something. Even better if someone else witnesses it. 😂

Thank you. K is booked in at the vets on Thursday. They've put it down as 'general check up as she's quiet'. 🙈 I did say she could put 'paranoid owner' in brackets afterwards. It's just little out of character things really. Like usually when I am gardening, she's outside with me pottering about and attacking the mower. Last week, she stayed inside sleeping. And the other evening, she flushed a hare on the golf course and she couldn't be arsed to chase it. She ran a few metres and then gave up, despite being right on its heels. Usually I wouldn't see her for dust. Probably nothing wrong with her and she's just growing up and calming down.

How is this a comfortable sleeping position?