Try

My youngest dog this year is Try.

My Try

Try is part of my continuing obsession with the Don X Gin line.  Try's Father, Wendy Schmaltz's Ky, is another one from that cross.  As I have mentioned before, Ky is the same way bred as my Mikey, Louanne Twa's Gus (2013 Western Canadian Nursery Champion) and Scott's Alice- the 2013 USBCHA Nursery Champion.  Their mother, Gin was the 2010 All Around Stockdog and their father, Don is the 2013 USBCHA National Champion and a son of 3 time USBCHA National Champion, Star.

Wendy Schmaltz's Ky(behind) and son,Try in front, watch a trial

 Try's mother is a bitch named Gem who goes back to Dave Claypool's Calgary Stampede winner, Glen - a son of Norm Close's CV Joe, the 2005 Canadian Champion.  She also goes back to Lola Chaffin's Import, Queen and Jim Chaffin's Import, Roy, who passed his ears down to Try and, it's hoped, what's between them too.

Jim Chaffin's Imp. Roy, Try's great grandfather who gifted Try with his ear genes!- photo by Michelle Prescott Guderian

Scott and I have an agreement that since I don't sell any of the dogs that become mine, I have to wait until they are 2 years old before I pick them so we can be sure they are good workers.  It doesn't seem to be happening that way though.  My plan had been for us to get Try as a pup and then, if he turned out, keep him for myself when he was two.  Without any prompting, (I swear!) Scott gifted Try to me when he was just 8 weeks old.  Not long after, knowing that what a pup does on sheep at that age means nothing, I took Try to them to see what would happen.  He never hesitated and went right to work!

Try's first time on sheep at 3 months old

This Winter, I started Try's training.  He's immature in mind (off stock he's a dork!) and body and although he's a large dog, he's still very round and squishy like a pup.  Nonetheless, I've taken his training slowly and didn't put alot of pressure on him at the first.  I've been rewarded for that by his confidence really coming along and he's pushing back on me now.

Try working this Spring

I'm going to run him this year but I have needed to continuously remind myself that he doesn't need to be good enough to win yet.  He's only 18 months old and has another nursery year next year.  It is important that I take his first trialing year as easy on him as his first Winter training has been.  That means I will need to walk away from the post alot (sometimes RUN) and I am fully expecting to not finish a course for a while. My original plan was to only run him in the Eastern Pro-Novice classes (150yrd outrun, fetch, one short leg drive and pen) but there seems to be a lack of those classes this year so I am going to run him in Nursery but take it easy on him and just make sure he stops, open flanks and doesn't grip!  However, on the more difficult Bluegrass field, I will only be running him in Pro-Novice.  He won't be ready mentally to go to the Nursery finals this year in Colorado so it doesn't matter if he gets any legs in his trials.

Try

Try has been alot of fun to train this year and I hope his season of "intro to trialing" will be just as fun so that he can be a competitive nursery dog next year.  He is a hesitant outrunner, but a nice open flanking dog with a good amount of forward (that can sometimes break into chasing on the fetch! bad dog) and a good driving dog. When he gives his sheep some space, he reads them very well- a trait I often see on the Don x Gin side of his lines and I believe when he is broke he will do a good job babysitting me in a trial. He seems to have gotten his gripping tendencies under control but they can crop back up if he is uncertain how to react in a new situation.  Keeping him calm and his flanks open and his stops controlled will be the plan for this year.
His first trial will be at Lee Lumb's Stirling Acres, on her flat field with broke katahdins, in the nursery class.  It should be the perfect place to introduce him to trialing - in 10 days!