Last Months in New England, Road Trip 2009, Hell Puppy

Now that I have about two months left of my internship, I need to start making the most of my time here and enjoy more of what New England has to offer. There is still so much to see and not enough time to see it all. I am making a dent in my list of places to go this weekend, when I meet up with Carly for a long weekend in Cape Cod!

We are renting a beautiful condo on the beach and looking forward to a quiet weekend with lots of good food, movies, and exploring with the dogs. She has a French Bulldog and a German Shepherd. I will post photos when I get home on Monday night.

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The trip home is coming up soon, and of course I am taking the opportunity to make the drive into a fun road trip. On the way here we (and when I say we I mean mostly Ben) drove like maniacs. We drove as long as possible all day until our eye lids were too heavy to stay open, and then we passed out at any generic hotel that allowed dogs. We didnt see any sights or eat any remarkable food. We were on a mission to get to Northampton as soon as possible and get the 11 month internship started.

This trip is going to be another story. Not only because we will have an additional border collie and more stuff to put in my small SUV. We are going to plan it out so that we stop in fun cities across the country. Our stops will be based on places with good food, dog friendly, and beautiful scenery. This is our tentative plan. We are starting out in NYC and then heading straight to Narragansett, RI, one of the most lovely beach towns in the North East.


Next we will head north to the Wells, ME area. My family vacationed in this part of Maine most summers during my childhood. I remember absolutely loving everything about this place. We stayed at a hotel right on the beach and at that time I loved spending all day on the beach, building sand castles and swimming in the warm, calm water. I remember eating breakfast at a place that offered pancakes every filling option imaginable. I always got chocolate chip. We also rode a trolley, ate lobster, and played miniature golf. Every evening we would walk out on the beach when the tide was far out. I loved exploring the tide pools. I have not been back since I was 10 or so and look forward to sharing this wonderful place with Ben this summer.

Our next planned stop will be Burlington, VT. I have always wanted to check out this town as a potential place to live and am very excited to finally see it.

From here, our drive won't be quite as exciting. We will be making our way through the middle of the country, stopping in Cleveland, OH, Madison, WI, possibly Fargo, ND, Billings, MT and then Glacier National Park!!! I havent been to Glacier since I was 18 and it still holds the position of the number 1 most beautiful National Park in the country in my list in my head.

And then we will end our trip in Salem, OR for a reunion with our flyball team!!

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From what I have heard about Teals experience at puppy boot camp, we are in for a long road of training with our little puppy.

My commitment to training her will start with reading about and watching the Control Unleashed program. I also bought a few other books on dealing with reactive, fear aggressive dogs. I may also take Teal to see Leslie McDevitt (author of Control Unleashed). I will post on her progress when I get her back on April 19th. For now Indy and I are enjoying the peace.

Some Help From Sunset - Spring Gardening

This is the first year that Ben is planting the garden without me to obsessively
plan where each plant should be depending on what is near it, best time to harvest, varieties, etc....I can help with everything, so I figured I would post Sunsets "what to do in the garden in March". I'll post April tomorrow.

Plant now

Grow camellias Sunset climate zones 4–7: Some of the finest garden camellias are also some of the oldest. Try white ‘Alba Plena’ from 1792, a pink bloomer with white markings from 1831 called ‘Elegans’ (or Chandleri Elegans), the blush pink ‘Magnoliiflora’ from 1886, and an orangey rose-pink type called ‘Kumasaka’ that dates back to 1896.

Plant vegetables Start cool-season veggies: seedlings of broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, herbs, onion-family members (including chives), and Swiss chard; roots of asparagus and rhubarb; seeds of peas, radishes, and leaf crops such as spinach and Asian greens; and potato tubers.

Sow seeds of warm-season edibles such as cucumbers, eggplant, melons, peppers, squash, and tomatoes now so they’ll be ready to plant out in May.

Tidy up

Divide perennials Zones 4–7: This is the best time to divide summer- and fall-flowering perennials like asters, black-eyed Susan (Rudbeckia hirta), chry-san-themums, purple coneflower (Echinacea purpurea), and Shasta daisies. Zones 1–3: Divide in April. Wait until autumn to divide spring-flowering perennials.

Patrol for slugs Kill European black slugs (these are mostly brown, but sometimes white or black) when you find them, since they love tender seedlings. Don’t kill banana slugs (usually yellow or yellow with black spots, sometimes green or white, up to 10 inches long), since these natives are most interested in mushrooms, dead plants, and leaf litter. Leopard slugs (gray with black spots) are omnivores ― which is bad when they’re eating your lettuce, but good when they’re devouring European slugs.

Planted peas on March 29th

This is the first installment of our garden journal for 2009. I planted Cascadia snap peas from Territorial Seed Company last Sunday. They are supposed to take two months to mature, and I hope they do before it gets too warm. If it gets too warm the shells become tough. I think it should be fine as long as they are done by the first of June. I will post some picture once they sprout in 6-14 days. Nothing like fresh peas right off the vine- besides fresh almost anything else. But hey, peas are pretty good too.

Adjusting to Teal & Puppy Boot Camp

Some of the time Indy and Teal wrestle and tug together (Teal always wins). Its fun to watch them play nicely together.





Last night Indy must have decided that she needed a break from Teals antics. Hopefully this does not become a regular thing. As I write this Teal is successfully stealing a chew toy from Indy. Life for Indy is going to be different and obviously introducing a new dog always brings changes, but its still kind of sad for Indy. Im working on teaching Teal to back off when appropriate. Its only been a few days, so we will see how their relationship develops.

Here is a few of the dogs that Teal will be spending next weekend with at Mary's house AKA "puppy boot camp".

Teal's Flyball Journal

I am going to try posting weekly on Teal's progress with flyball training.

Today we had a "green dog" practice with the puppies and new dogs, perfect for Teal. It was Teals first practice here in Massachusetts. Ben has been frustrated because Teal is extremely focused on other dogs and getting her attention is difficult during practice. Today I was reminded of this right away when I took her out for recalls to the tug, she ran right past me, around the baby gates and into the other lane to the other dogs. She is obviously not ready to tug in public, especially when other dogs are running at the same time.

I tried to work with her along the sides of the lanes and rewarded her with treats when she focused on me. The point of this is to break her cycle of obsessing over the running dogs. Anytime she started obsessing and would not pay attention at all, I removed her from the situation (put her in her crate or outside).

I was feeling pretty frustrated with her, and it does not help that I keep comparing her to Indy, who picked up the game almost instantly. And then Sue (Canine Mutiny Captain) came to the rescue. She is an excellent trainer. She gave me a bag of cooked hamburger meat and a clicker. We put Teal on a long lead and after letting her smell the meat, Sue restrained her, I ran away and she came right to me! From there I ran back toward Sue and Teal followed. This was happening while other dogs were racing in the other lane.....a first for Teal!

After realizing that hamburger works, we did some work on the shoot. Sue showed me how to snap her off. There was an exciting moment when she looked over at the other lane, thought about herding other dogs, and then decided she would prefer to work for meat.

It was a good day for Teal. We have one week in between the next two tournaments, so hopefully we will have another "green" dog practice. I would love to have her running over puppy jumps and using the box by the time I turn her back over to Ben in July, but that might be a long shot. Either way, I am making a commitment to stop comparing her to Indy and let her progress at her own pace.

Flyball Practice - Ari

Here is an old photo Ari at flyball practice. He is now mostly retired and he doesn't mind one bit.

Winter is Finally Over & Making Progress with Puppy Training

I officially survived a New England winter. There were certainly some depressing points. When the thought of going outside at 5 pm after working gave me chills. The evenings are very dark, bone chilling cold and there is no sign of life.

I entertained Indigo inside most of the time with new tricks and flyball drills. Im working on teaching to to pretend she is injured with a limping trick and a headache trick.

The past few days have been a different story. Its been warm, clear and sunny. I am elated to wake up to singing birds and see the crocuses blooming. The streets of downtown have populated again by musicians, people with dogs and strollers, and the quirky students from the 5 colleges.

Socializing Teal with Kids

It was great to have Ben here for some of these nice days. Hopefully he will remember this place as fondly as I do and will consider moving here someday. We did not have a lot of time to take a long trip so we went to a town called Turners Falls, MA. There was a nice grassy area near the Connecticut river to let the dogs run, but the town itself was mostly desolate and sad.

Connecticut River

Unity Park

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We made the decision to have Teal stay with me. She will have her own personal dog walker everyday for a 1/2 hr walk. I have been taking Teal and Indigo to the dog park everyday and rewarding Teal for good behavior when interacting with other dogs. Today she only went crazy on one dog, who gladly reminded her that she is only a tiny puppy and needs to learn her manners. She also bravely ran up to an English Mastiff, who, with one paw smack had her pinned.

I am beginning to feel better about her progress with car chasing as well. We sat on a street corner and worked on "leave it", which she learned quickly. Now we just need figure out how to get her to stop herding cars while she is in the back of my car.

She has an excellent recall for a puppy her age and learns new things much faster than Indigo does. I just signed her up for Level 1 Obedience class and she will be spending a weekend with a friend with lots of training experience and 11 dogs.

More Pictures From Gettysburg

Flyball in Gettysburg: It wasn't just Indigo and I this time.

Ben flew into Newark late on Thursday night with a special travel companion. After a crazy, stressful morning of scrambling to find a new dog sitter, Ben decided that the only real option was to bring Teal with him on his visit.

I originally thought that this would be a reasonable idea since he was going to bring her in June anyway for our road trip back to the West Coast. We figured he could just leave her here until then. I guess our best decisions are not made a the last minute. It is great to spend time with her, but there are various reasons why having a puppy in my apartment is not going to work very well.

We haven't made a final decision about where Teal will spend the next few months. We will see how she does this week and then figure it out.

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Ben, Indigo, Teal and I drove 3 hours from Newark to Gettysburg for some out-of-region flyball. We arrived on Friday afternoon and met up with the Canine Mutiny crew to watch a Civil War movie and walk through a museum. Leashed dogs were allowed on the battlefield so a few of us took a nice long walk. Ben and a group of our flyball friends went to on a haunted ghost tour. I was way too tired.









We had just enough time to get unpacked and get to the flyball facility for single dog racing. We had a goal for Indigo to beat 3.94 seconds. We got her all amped up and she ran two 3.8's over 7" jumps! Her best was 3.86. She had her official personal best time the next day when she ran 3.90 as start dog over 10" jumps. Her team keeps getting more comfortable racing together and our passes are getting better. The team broke the club record again with a 16.70 seconds. We didn't stick around to see where we placed, but it definitley wasn't last this time!

Sue and Stingray the borderjack

Slingshot the borderjack

In addition to single dog racing, the hosting club offered a lane for practice. We bought Teal 5 minutes of practice time and she managed to focus for about 2 minutes. We were happy with that considering it was her first flyball tournament experience. Amanda gave us a mesh tug to use with her to get her attention with cheese when other dogs are around. She made some great progress overall with all her issues this weekend.







Ben had fun running Indigo when she was start dog. He also ran Selma, a black and white border collie that belongs to Kerry and Dave. I ran Amanda's dog Chase all weekend. It was one of those flyball tournaments that does not involve a lot of sitting around. With only 8 of us and two teams, we all had to be doing something! It was lots of fun and definitely worth the 6 hr drive back to Massachusetts.

I will post updates later this week about Teals training progress. In between dog training, hopefully Ben and I will have some time to tour the area before he leaves on Saturday.



Indigo was very unsure about Teal since she is not sure how to interact with other dogs. Teal has snapped at Indigo, but has also tried to play with her. Today Indigo gave in and they played like crazy. It was very sweet.

More Pictures of Teal

We got Teal's pedigree in the mail today so I took a couple pictures. We let her spell her name and she made a few mistakes, but still did a pretty good job. We would have just used Igniteds Passing With Flying Colors, but Flying Colors is a kennel name and it cannot appear in a dog's name anywhere. Well Teal sure showed them. Hopefully she will be a champion in the show ring one day so someone has to say her name out loud. At least Joy will have to say it when she gets her flyball awards.




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Here are a few newer pics of Teal. We went out in the field again on March 14th. She had a blast, but it was rainy this time. She got wet, but we got warm in the car driving between my sites. She was much braver this time about running through the brush and you can see that she hit her right eye a little. I took another pic once we got home so no one is worried that her eye is damaged. She is back to normal now.