My everyday time is more or less in the sign of the companion animals – especially dogs. I am Marketing Manager  in a pharmaceutical company promoting veterinary products, my main hobby (my way of living) is kinology, and everything is driven by my basic subject – veterinary medicine. On the first week of my leave I attended the Rehabilitation & Physiotherapy course for companion animals in Wien.

Veterinärmedizinische Universität Wien looks like a small town. Dogs seem to be not only allowed but almost like a “must”. Boji was one of our “students in the rehabilitation class . During the lectures she jumped around playing with the parsons russell terrier Sugar owned by the lecturer and during the breaks she played in the nearby playground reserved especially for dogs. She even joined us at lunch in canteen.

There were 30 participants from around the world (Italy, Turkey, Spain, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Austria, Litvania, Thailand, Slovenia  ). We learned basics on Rehabilitation & Physiotherapy of companion animals. We enjoyed the practical part, which will be even more intense on the advanced course in September. Thermotherapy, hydrotherapy, electrotherapy, neurology and neurological examination of our “patients” and Boji, are only one small part of the wide world of rehabilitation and physiotherapy in which we will dive again in September.

I already practiced some massage, thermotherapy, therapeutic exercises and electrotherapy with Ajk and Kaya – of course under the supervision of our physiotherapist Kristina Porenta. Now, I am going to upgrade this knowledge and maybe by TENS and if winning the lottery maybe also underwater treadmill.

Photos!

My weekends this year are full of K9 events. On the first weekend of June I attended the seminar of Nikita Xever. Theoretical work with video clips has been mixed to practical exercises of Nikita and his wife Olga with the dog Aya. We also had some time for practice with our own dogs. I must say that I really like this method, which uses the dogs will to work and it is not based on the commands from the handler. Now I know a little bit more about it and I must say, that a lot of my question-marks vanished.  We are constantly learning new skills.

Unfortunately there are no photographs – I forgot to take some.

Kaya made it again! On the last competition she performed really great – it was her best performance ever – in RO competition. We made it to the 7th place and achieved 132 points.

My little girl Kaycha

I was disqualified with Ajk. Despite disqualification, I was really satisfied with his work. Not so good work at the start  finished in really great cooperative work. Unfortunately we were to slow and we exceeded the allowed 3 minutes.

PHOTOS!

Long working week ended with K9 working weekend. Saturday was in sign of the ERPS exercise (= exercise of  all SAR units of Slovenia), that took place on 5 workstations in Dolenjskem. In other words: waking up at 5 o’clock in the morning, “coffee” with other K9 SAR “maniacs” and work, work and work – with a lot of fun, of course.

Ajk as usually knew already the day before, that we are going somewhere the next morning. Therefore he followed every move of his beloved owner in order she doesn’t forget anything. This time I remembered to take his toy. He woke me up in the morning and jumped in the car with happiness on his white face.

The organisation of the exercise was great.

"parked"

Sleeping beauty

At the first stop, we had the task to search for the person suspected of committing suicide. Our team leader Robi delegated the parts of the route we had to search and we were looking for everything that could belong to the missing person. We found a hat and a shoe. On the second workstation we crossed “a big dangerous” river   and continued the walk towards our third stop, where we searched some ruins. Ajk found the missing person really fast. We left the other victims to other members of the SAR team. Next stop was the bar on the small sports airport, where we got some rest in the shadow. After refreshing with the cold drink, we continued to our last stop. We had to find 2 missing persons in  the steep slope. Since Ajk was the oldest SAR dog in the group, we got the easiest route for searching. Since I was delegated the middle route (the easiest one) I was responsible for coordination of the whole searching line. Together we searched the area and Ajk did a very good job. He was paing attention to every hint I gave him (I am not giving him orders since a long time ago – I don’t need it, since  I must say we have a really great relationship). At the stop for the needs of the coordination of the searching line, I heard him barking. He found the victim. After this last exercise we provided our empty and hungry stomachs some food.

HERE you can find some photographs!

Some of the photos are also stored on the SAR gallery!

Kaya - waiting to go

This weekend we had to do some K9 work again. Ajk, Kaya, me and my partner went together on the 2nd national RO competition. My wishes for the cloudy weather didn’t come through. So, we had a beautiful sunny day a little bit hot for an English bulldog and a veteran boxer.

I started today K9 work with Kaya. We were the last competitor team in the RO I class. Despite high temperatures and my skepticism, my girl surprised me with much better work than last time. She was still far away from the work on the trainings, but we achieved a great 8th place  .

Let's go!

We didn’t have so beautiful race with Ajk this time. It was my fault, since I wasn’t careful on his will to work. Because of this fact I was loosing his attention more and more during the race. Therefore he did some bad jumps & slalom. The result: unqualified. I was angry on myself, but I felt a little bit better when performing on the same course again unofficially with much better work.

Some PHOTOS (unfortunately not of very good quality).

Ajk

"Girlfriend" Ajša

Last weekend I attended with Ajk the first open national search and rescue competition held at Lokve. The competition took place for three days. We didn’t compete, but I had the task of helping in the search area. Our presence on this competition came out as very useful also in the real search that took place in the  Thursday night. Ajk showed the great will to work again. He was very motivated and  he didn’t show any fatigue during whole time of searching. I am really proud of him.

PHOTOS!

This was my biggest dilemma…

Ajk is not young anymore. He is still very fit, but I am trying to look after his health as much as I can. That’s why I was in the big dilemma of bringing him with me to the search & rescue exercise. His cheerful nature and energy was decisive. It turned out that my decision was correct. I know Ajk and his limits really well now and I didn’t forced him too much – not even in one moment.

I almost missed my colleagues in the morning. Ajk has been eagerly waiting for “action” from evening before, when he saw me packing. Well, I forgot his toy, but fortunately there was a “soul” who gave us a sock, that I used then as a toy.

After meeting on Ljubelj, we split into groups and started the walk “toward the sun”. I was fighting the steep way with my exceedingly heavy backpack. You could find almost everything in it (including the climbing set).  Ajk was pulling hardly when he was not supposed to, and when a little help in going up the hill was needed, he walked really nice by my side.

On the steep slope

Our first stop was on the steep slope, where we started to search for the first couple of “victims”. When Ajk found the first “victim” I decided to leave the second one to the next rescue team (dog & handler).  Although he had still a lot of energy to search, I knew we would have  a lot of SAR work to do that day.

Next stop was right under the slope covered with snow. We did a fast search and then moved on for searching on the snow (the third stop). For the first time in my & Ajk’s life we searched in snow. Our team leader explained me to move and work as in the real situation. I was not sure we would prove successful, but Ajk performed great and in the minutes he found the “victim”  lying on the snow.

Yeeeeeah! Found!

We skipped the work in our last stop. I decided, that Ajk had enough that day, although he still showed a lot of energy to work. We concluded the day among the friends and went home.

I am really glad that I managed to “dose” Ajk the right amount of work.  Later that day he was looking great and not very tired.

Many thanks to Jože for beautiful photos! Here you can find some of his  photos and a couple of mine.

The week has passed into the weekend without noticing it – at least as concerns the time of getting up in the morning. Yesterday I enjoyed very much the  seminar for instructors with Metoda Mikuž Bračković as a lecturer. Today I woke up into rainy morning. After my necessary  morning tea we “packed” Ajk & Kaya into the car and went to first 2009 national rally obedience competition.

If some years ago someone asked me about my opinion on competitions,  I would certainly had told him that the competitions are not compatible with my personality. How things change … Since the time I changed the way of working in obedience field,  every competition represents to me the way of assessment of our progress.  Video shooting is the most helpful tool in assessment of our work. In this way I can objectively judge current performance and compare it to the previous. My main objective in working with my dogs is that they show pleasure to work. Further objectives differ from dog to dog.

We are happy

I had big problems with Ajk showing stress on trainings and  exams some years ago. The main reason of this stress was connected to the type of work that wasn’t suitable for his character. The difference in our performance some years ago and present performance is huge. Today obedience performance showed progress again. Ajk was focused on me most of the performance and even in the moment of distraction, it was very easy to get him focused on me again. We also improved in speed and precision of the performance of individual exercises. The most important thing in today performance is the will to work that Ajk showed. I am very proud on my 10-y old Ajk also because achieving the “points of excellence in work”. With 3 times achieving these points in a year, the competitor gets the “certificate of excellence”.

Kaya is very a very timorous “girl”. She gets stressed in every situation out of her ordinary everyday situations. When we will achieve relaxed attitude in different environments, we will pass to the next level. I take this as my project in working with this extraordinary bulldog girl   . Our result in todays competition is 12th place and first point for the national championship.

I congratulate all the competitors in today’s RO competition!

Here you can find some immages.

Here you can see video clip from our performans.

On Saturday 28th March our K9 organised SAR exams.

Beside administrative work me & Ajk also performed in obedience. There was a SAR couple missing and we took their part. For both of us it showed out as a good obedience training. We did some “classic obedience” work after a long time of doing mainly Rally-O. Some elements from RO just couldn’t  stay hidden – elements that in “classic” obedience work call “double commands (spoken commands combined with body language).  Nevertheless I was very satisfied with our performance. Mr Ajk, showed a great will and happiness to work. Here you can see some parts of our performance.

After the exams, we celebrated the results of some of our colleagues on tea, coffee and other more caloric drinks (hot chocolate -  mmm). Congratulations to all!

I finished my day in Kamniška Bistrica satisfied.

My first post is here!

King & queen of the evening

I ended my working day on Friday 27th March in company of search & rescue friends from SAR team Tolmin. After ending my work tasks I visited “Pupa” and Ajša in veterinary clinic in Tolmin. We all had fun. Ajk & Kaya were discovering the secrets of the pet shop located at the reception of veterinary clinic. After discovering all the secrets in the pet shop, we moved to SAR camp.

SAR friends from Tolmin welcomed me with boiled wine. Then it was time for obedience training. First I watched  the performance of obedience of the SAR team Tolmin and then it was my turn Mr. Ajk & Kaya.  After a short break and nice talk, we went into the woods for search training. The evening ended with nice talk and a little bit late. Next morning I was supposed to be on the SAR exams as a part of the organisation team. You can imagine the difficulties in waking up.

You can see some images here.