The Spaniel Annals
working and living with performance spaniels
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about
I’m a retired English instructor, now devoted full-time to training, showing and enjoying my spaniels in many sports.
- agility
- Behavior
- competition
- conditioning
- dockdiving
- dual champion
- English Cocker
- English Springer Spaniel
- Fetch!
- field work
- Freestyle
- Gordon Setters
- heeling
- heeling journal
- Irish Water Spaniel
- match
- mental preparation
- new freestyle behaviors
- puppy training
- rally obedience
- retrieve
- scent work
- TEAM
- tracking
- training
- Uncategorized
- Utility obedience
Month: March 2025
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Blending choreography and cued behaviors in freestyle is harder than it looks! Below is the current opening to Brian’s freestyle routine to the music of “Arrival of the Birds” by the Cinematic Orchestra. The routine thus presents a bird theme. In this opening, Brian should be backing away from my wings into a “nest,” and…
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Kerrie and Brian had run-throughs of their obedience routines last weekend, and I’ve posted excerpts of Kerrie’s run below. She’s made excellent progress in terms of focused heeling for longer periods, and is not lacking for joy in the ring. All good! Things to work on are: continued focus work on her about turns and…
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Training the utility scent discrimination exercise is a long process, starting in puppyhood and involving many moments of seemingly 1 step forward and 2 steps back. In the end, Brian must find my scented article of either wood or leather in a “pile” of 8 similar articles, several feet away from me in the obedience…