In the past month or so Nikon has earned four additional titles: UKC Champion, Tracking 1, Family Obedience, and Protection Alert. Now he is SG U-CH Alta-Tollhaus Bono BH T1 FO PA CL1-R HIT CGC OFA. The latter three were earned in late November at an SDA trial in St. John’s. The Tracking 1 title is the same as a SchH1 track. The Family Obedience is their version of a BH, which includes the exact same heeling pattern, long down, and out of motion exercises as the BH and then three additional “practical” exercises. The Protection Alert is however not comparable to Schutzhund protection, it is more like personal protection. The PA exercises show that the dog is under control at all times, will alert on command, will alert on his own when threatened, will remain alerting (barking) until the handler recalls the dog, and will allow the decoy to touch the handler while sitting under control. The decoys wear bitesuits and put a lot of pressure on the dog. Nikon earned those three titles with ease even though we only had a week to prepare and he got once chance to do the PA routine before the trial. We were the only team entered in the trial that did not belong to the club hosting the trial. I enjoyed doing SDA obedience with Chopper and am glad to have a dog that is well-suited (pun intended) for that style of protection. Nikon is now doing more bitesuit training so we can do the rest of the SDA titles as trials are available (that is always the trouble with SDA!) and will do his Schutzhund titles when I am happy with his tracking, which is my weakness because I do not enjoy tracking and cannot teach the problem solving we are working on with the snow cover.

My 4-month old puppy Pan also got two First Place ribbons in Novice Puppy at the UKC show and earned his AKC STAR (pre-CGC test for puppies).

Nikon and Pan watching Coke escape

Pan’s STAR class (poodle, flat coated retriever, yorkiepoo, female GSD)

Nikon’s conformation awards minus the official UKC title which I have not yet received

Nikon at the show losing to Gavin, haha

Nikon eating a bone that Schumi didn’t want (Nikon thinks Schumi is crazy)

Accepting Nikon’s SDA titles

Herding sheep