A New Zealand Koolie Connection

 
I’ve been doing agility for about 15 years now, I started with Welsh Springers, and did reasonably well with them, but I needed a breed that could run as fast as the borders, to win.  I find the Koolies are perfect for me. They have great drive, and love to work. I find them easy to train, my first boy Dice, who turns 4 in January 2012 runs at top level in agility here, although he has yet to come into his own at the senior level, partly due to my training not being as good as I would like. I’m still learning how to run herding dogs! He is doing some super work, and is so close to getting it right. There is a lot more tight work in our Senior classes than what I’ve seen in your Masters class.

Dice has all the drive I could want. He concentrates 100% on what we are doing, nothing else matters to him when we are doing agility, or playing ball or doing tricks. He has a repertoire of about 15 to 20 tricks, including a handstand, so you could say they’re very trainable.  He runs fast, but not flat stick stupid without thinking like some borders.

 

I also have two younger girls, Haze is 22 months. She has just started competing in agility, and so far has done well. She’s only done four shows, and has already picked up 2 X 3rd placings and a 5th place.  She’s been easy to train, has picked up what I want pretty quickly. Her confidence isn’t as high as I’d like yet but with the right handling she comes up with the goods.

She’s very agile, and has the ability to turn on a dime.  I believe when her confidence comes up she will be a good agility dog. Whether she will be a great one remains to be seen. I hope so. Watch this space...

 

Both of these two are from Tjukurpa Kennels, Kerrie Challenger. They are great dogs, so easy to live with. They have an off switch somewhere! When we are working they are go go go, give it all, and full steam ahead. Haze just about rips my arm off playing tug, and Dice will play ball for ages.  But when we are at home, or even at club/show and not doing anything, they are “off” relaxed, and cruisey, not bouncing off the end of the leash all the time, like some feral maniac, or fixating on and  barking at other dogs who are running agility the way I see so many dogs doing at agility.

They are very easy to live with at home, just hanging out most of the time. Sometimes they will bring me toys and ask for a game, or spend time running around with each other.

They are both very “Soft” dogs. They need careful upbeat, encouraging handling and training.

Dice’s only agility fault is a wide turning circle. Probably my fault for not training him to do tight turns as a youngster, I was more focussed on getting distance, coming from a history of running gundogs, who stuck very close to me.  Koolies don’t need that it would seem, having a natural tendency to cast out anyway!

 

Rio is my youngest, she’s just 9 months old, she’s the one I got from Allambie kennels, Jackie Hunter. She is a different kettle of fish, as they say. She has a different kind of background.

She is a bit less soft than the other two, but is very young, so has yet to show me how she will handle as an adult.  She is much more “on” all the time than the others, it takes her several hours to wind down in the morning. Where the others will lie down and relax after a while, she will still be up and trotting around all over the place, investigating every little bit of the orchard. She is also quicker to get up and going after a rest.

She is pretty good to live with around the house, settles down nicely like the others, now she has grown out of the puppy stage.

She’s more self willed than the others, and I can see some arguments with her in the future.  

 

Having said that, she is a super little dog, so strongly driven to do “stuff”, any stuff,  and just lives to work. She’s super quick to pick things up, (or maybe I’m just getting better at training) and seems to pick up some things by osmosis! She has strong herding tendencies, has a great cast, and if I did herding I think she would do well.

 

I am REALLY looking forward to running this girl in competition. She is going to be awesome. She’s only about 45cm tall, and I don’t think she’s going to grow much if any more. She runs like a blue streak and turns on a dime.

Penny and the Canine Crew
Sherry (RIP) Quinn, (the old gent) and Ashley, the Welsh Springers
and Dice – Tjukurpa Kool Gerema aka Tjukurpa Kool Dice (NZ) , Haze – Tjukurpa Haze aka Tjukurpa Coffee N Cream (NZ) and Rio – Allambie Eveready, the Koolies