WC Title!

Voodoo did fantastic at the Working Certificate test today and came home with his very first title!  We had a very wet test thanks to the rain, but he showed no reaction to running/swimming through a curtain of falling water or being soaked even on the land retrieve  🙂  Video: https://vimeo.com/185172451

He was the first dog for the land retrieve (after the example dog), but there was plenty of scent in the area of the bird fall because loose bird feathers were spread around and a dead bird was dragged on the ground in the area. Unfortunately, he got a black pidgeon and so there wasn’t the visual aid like there would be with a white pidgeon. He practically ran over the fallen bird on his go out, but that means that in spite of having to go up a slight hill to get to it, he maintained a straight line. He was thrown off by the scent in the area and looked in a wider area before returning to the drop area and finding it. And he ran straight back to me and delivered it to my hands.

After everyone did the land portion, the water portion was set up and it started raining harder as you can see in the video. He was more than ready to get the bird when we walked up this time. I made the mistake of releasing him when the shot went off rather than waiting for the bird to hit the water, but the Judge thankfully didn’t seem to mind the one second timing faux pax. He swam out directly to the bird and brought it back in an almost straight line and delivered it to my hands.  I was trying to help him to the 2 foot wide section of the bank that was a bit more gradual and he did find it on the first retrieve, but scrambled up a steeper part of the bank on the second retrieve.

Of course, after we were done, the sun came out 🙂

I’m VERY happy with how well he did!  Now if I could just find a trial offering the next level, that is held on a weekend I’m available, and not half a state or more away, we’ll be all set!

In this photo, the two white dots in the upper left corner were 2 swans in the pond where we were doing the water retrieve. Thankfully they stayed at the far end, but one dog did notice them and think about trying to retrieve them 🙂 And Voodoo saw them when we first started walking around the area and sat down to watch them. Thankfully, after about a minute, he decided they weren’t all that interesting.

Here he is posing with his prize after the test. He really wanted to do another retrieve, not sit still and pose. But he’s good about humoring me  🙂

Posing with his pretty ribbon

The 6 dogs that qualified and got their WC title today!