Where did my weekend go? Seems as if I was just anticipating the second of two 3-day weekends and now all I can see ahead of me is a busy 4-day work week. Obedience class tonight, on Tuesday an evening trip to Owatonna to meet old friends Lisen & Jerry for dinner and pick up Puppy Eddie for the upcoming dog shows. Fish club meeting on Thursday, and dog shows this weekend. I'm not showing anyone this weekend, but most of the entry will be Argus kids, including Pauli. I'm stewarding both days (see below), probably starting rings at 8:00 AM. Dal judging is late both days, so hopefully my rings will be done in time to watch the Dals. 1900 dogs entered and only 6 Dals. We obviously need more Dals and Dal exhibitors around here!
Breed (conformation) judges often judge up to 175 dogs in a single day, and it's important to keep things running smoothly so they can stay on schedule. 25 dogs an hour plus time for pictures makes for a busy day. Stewards give out the arm bands, get the exhibitors in and out of the ring, in their correct classes and in a timely fashion, put out the ribbons, mark their catalogs (but only the judge can mark the official Judges Book), move the tables in and out of the ring for examining small breeds, call for clean up if needed (especially in Cocker Spaniels for some reason), and answer exhibitor questions. Some judges are great fun to steward for, while others are anything but. My favorite judges on the panel happen to be the ones who are judging Dals and the Group, so unfortunately I can't steward for them this weekend.
New Years Resolutions this year included eating better and wasting less. I already blew spending less time on Facebook!
As I was looking at puppy pictures posted to Facebook, I wondered if this might be a bad thing. One would hope that if a well known breeder is posting puppy pictures, they would be good pictures. Some are awful pictures of poor quality pups, but others are terrible pictures of what might actually be nice puppies. Why would you post pictures where a puppy is standing out at the elbow with crooked front legs and cowhocks? If you don't know what pups should look like, you shouldn't be posting pictures - actually, you should not even be breeding a litter. Posting pictures of gross structural faults is anything but educational, and they encourage newcomers to assume that is perfectly OK. It is in pets, but certainly not in show dogs.
That Pet Peeve is right up there with calling any mixed breed dog with freckles a Dalmatian cross, or worse yet a Dalmatian. Dals are not speckled, they are spotted. Purebred Dals have distinct spots, not fuzzy freckles. They may have some small markings mixed in, but they are basically SPOTTED. Dal crosses have smaller indistinct spots, but many other breeds can produce those same markings. The small indistinct spots are found in many breeds and are called ticking. A dog with ticking is not necessarily part Dalmatian. It may be part Pointer, Springer, Cattledog/Kelpie/Blue Heeler, part Pitbull, Boxer, Beagle or Terrier. Ticking is does NOT necessarily come from Dalmatians.
Pleased with the success, I spent about two hours catching one of the female Labidochromis caerulis "Yellow Labs" who was also holding eggs/fry. She was incredibly hard to catch and I had to take all the furnishing out of the tank to catch her, but now she's in a small tank by herself and will hopefully be successful too.
1 comment:
Most raw meat with ground up bone that comes in "chubs" has organ meat in it, hearts, liver, gizzards, (which are muscle, not organs). From what I've read, Dals are not to have organ meats. So, is it best to grind my own meat without the organs and also feed the raw pieces of meat on the bone, or occasionally give them organ meats? Also, can you say other kinds of meat that you give your dogs other than turkey and chicken? Thanks, Jen
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