Show Update

COBO was a blast!! It was so much fun meeting Laurie Bartolo, Jen and Leroy.

I arrived at 8:30 this morning just in time for the national anthem, for those who have never been to a dog show they always start the show off by playing the anthem and sometimes we even have the pleasure of someone singing it. There were  a lot of beautiful Chessie’s there and I even went over to watch the Newfie’s, well mostly I wanted to see Leroy and Jen. Leroy is even more handsome in person, he has the softest coat and he is one of my favorite colors, brown   Spent the whole day socializing and catching up with people I hadn’t seen in a while and then Laurie found me, well where else but in the Chessie isle. 

I took almost 200 pictures and here a few, well maybe more than a few

                                           Our friend Leroy, isn’t he gorgeous!

This is my other girl Searra, she is Cheyenne’s and Riva’s sister and according to her I was supposed to have brought her home to live with me not Cheyenne!

           This is the Veteran Bitch Sweepstakes class and Searra won today!!

Our friends Deb and Gunner, he loves his mom!

                                   The second dog is Reveler, the girl’s brother

This is our friends  Larry and Moose, he was Best of Breed and this is his Group 3 placement

                     Our friends Dave and Scout, they have had a rough day

Our friends Rick and Millet

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

                             Seara & Reveler, we hope you enjoyed the show!

What I’m up too

Well today’s post was going to be part 2 of Genetics 101 but the day got away from me and it is far from ready so instead I’m going to share what I am going to be doing tomorrow…DKC DOG SHOW AT COBO HALL, DETROIT! Yep I am excited, first because I will be meeting a couple of you there, Laurie Bartolo and Jen over at My Brown Newfies, I will also be meeting Jen’s dog Leroy, and second because this is the first time I will be going as a spectator. Although I do love to show my dogs at this venue I am looking forward to just hanging out and socializing with all my peeps and pups (I was dying to write that, lol). I plan on taking a ton of pictures to share with you all. This is a benched show, for those not familiar with that term it means that all the dogs are assigned a place on, well you guessed it a bench area. This is so when they are not in the ring the spectators can walk around and meet the various breeds. There are very few of these shows across the country and this is the only one in Michigan, this year marks 108th and 109th Detroit Kennel Club Show. Sunday is the Chesapeake Supported Show by our National Dog Club the American Chesapeake Club (ACC) so the entry of Chessie’s is pretty big.

 

On another note I talked with my friend Ellen last night, she said “I just had to call you to tell you how wonderful Bitsy is, she is exactly like you said, very sweet and loving, she is the best and we are so happy with her” Bitsy is the other female from Riva’s litter, Ellen went on to tell me that she was top in her beginner obedience class and she is now one of the top dogs in her intermediate obedience class. This call made my night, no my whole week!! This is the picture she sent me today, the big guy is Bitsy’s big brother Trail.

Wordless Wednesday ~ Did Someone Say Snow?

Puppy Photo Update

This is Bitsy and her new brother Trail. It took Trail a while to decide this jumping, nipping little squirt is really a whole lot of fun to play with.

This is Clyde and his new sister Ginger. He is doing a great job keeping her warm. He is really turning out nice, big solid handsome boy!

 

These photos made my day, I am so proud of their new families for taking such good care of my babies

We’ve Been Tagged

Yeah we’ve been tagged by 2 Brown Dawgs. What a nice surprise and oh how fun this will be, they have ten questions for us to answer so her goes…

1.  Describe yourself in 7 words.  (This is our moms opinion not necessarily ours.)

Cheyenne: mouthy, bossy, stubborn, clingy, smart, sweet, loving

Riva: sweet, energetic, bouncy, smiley, cuddly, loving, happy

Maia: sweet, loving, attentive, energetic, aloof, pretty, adoring

Titan: silly, fearless, loving, troublemaker, bouncy, energetic, blonde

2. What keeps you up at night?

Cheyenne: nothing

Riva: nothing

Maia: my brother

Titan: having to go potty

3. Who would you like to be?

Cheyenne: well myself of course!

Riva: ditto

Maia: my Aunt Cheyenne, so I could sleep on the bed

Titan: my dad so I could get those birds

4. What are you wearing right now?

Cheyenne: my fur coat

Riva: ditto

Maia: my brothers slobber

Titan: my birfday suit

5. What scares you?

Cheyenne: being left behind by my mom

Riva: the thought of being in trouble

Maia: card board boxes

Titan: nothing so far

6. The best and worst of blogging.

Cheyenne: we love reading about everyone’s adventures but we don’t like some of the secrets mom tells about us.

Riva: ditto

Maia: what’s a blog

Titan: huh!

7. The last website I visited.

2 Brown Dawgs to get these questions

8. What is one thing I would change about myself.

Cheyenne: not a thing I am perfect!

Riva: I would come back when I am called, oh wait that’s what my mom would change

Maia: not a thing I am perfect!

Titan: I want to be like my dad!

9. Slankets yes or no.

Cheyenne: no way!

Riva: no way!

Maia: I go along with the big dogs

Titan: huh…

10. Tell us something about the dog that tagged you.

2 Brown Dawgs is a great blog with 2 big Chesapeake’s, Thunder and Storm and one little one, Freighter. They have the most amazing photos to share and tons of training information for us retrievers. Little Freighter just came to live with them a little while ago but they have known him his whole life and shared all the precious moments of him growing, well so far, he has a lot more growing to do yet. Thunder and Storm are great retrievers who just recently received some pretty great awards for their abilities.

Geesh that was much harder to do than we thought it would be, except for #10.

So now to pick 8 bloggers to tag, no pressure and if you have already been tagged just post a link to your post and answers.

Bassasblog

Collies of the Meadow

bongodogblog

The (mis)Adventures of Sage

Dusty Rose Chesapeakes

Laurie Bartolo

Vizsla Inspiration

rumpydog

 

HAVE FUN!!

Genetics 101

Well the seminar was fantastic! Claudia Orlandi did a wonderful presentation, and hands on demonstration. I think Cheyenne was disappointed though, she had a different idea on how we should have spent our afternoon  

Instead of just telling you about how good the seminar was I thought I would do a series on what I learned starting with the basics of genetics. I find the whole world of genes and how animals are put together absolutely fascinating, so here goes my first post of many, Genetics 101.

The father of genetics was Gregor Mendel through his work with plants and peas he discovered that traits don’t blend, you can find more information on him here.

Every dog has 78 chromosomes or 39 pairs in the cell of the nucleus, they are rod shaped structures. The 39th pair are the sex chromosomes and the other 38 pair are called autosomes; these determine things like the body structure and temperament. Along these chromosomes are the genes and they also come in pairs, one gene from each parent goes into making the puppy and the genes in each puppy of a litter are different.

Each pair of chromosomes are called homologous and the place a gene is located on the chromosome is called locus. There are dominant genes and recessive genes, when genes are the same either both dominant or both recessive they are called homozygous and are considered pure for a trait. Gene pairs that have one dominant and one recessive are called heterozygous, these are considered not pure. The dominant gene overrules the activity of the recessive gene.

Phenotype is the external appearance of the dog and genotype is the genetic make up of the dog. You can not tell by the phenotype what the genotype is because of the hidden recessive genes. So I will stop here  and show you a few pictures from our day…

 

 

 

 

 

 

                     Cheyenne being examined

Our friend Chemmy

 

 

 

 

 

Maybe the ducks are over there…what no ducks

Watching the dogs

                  Hey where did everyone go

Chemmy and her mom

              Cheyenne loves her Uncle Dave

 

So that’s it for today, stay tuned for more Genetics 101 in the weeks to come.

Wordless Wednesday ~ Playing With Mom

Wordless Wednesday~What are you doing up there?

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY

WISHING EVERYONE A VERY HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

Claudia Orlandi Seminar

This Saturday I am attending a seminar on breeding and anatomy; this is being presented by Claudia Orlandi, Ph.D.. She wrote the book “ABC’s of Dog Breeding” which is a home study program covering the genetics of breeding. I read and took the test in the back of the book a couple years ago, sent my test in to the AKC and received a completion certificate.

I have been waiting for a long time for her to come to Michigan again to give her seminar and now she is finally going to be here and not only will I get to hear her lecture on this book I will have the pleasure of hearing the lecture on the “Practical Canine Anatomy and Movement”

But wait it gets better, they have had such a large group of people register that they did not have enough dogs to use for the hands on anatomy section so they sent out an email requesting dogs. I thought about it and figured what the heck I will volunteer Cheyenne and great news they accepted my offer. So not only do I get to attend a seminar I have been waiting a long time for my beautiful Cheyenne gets to go with me. My friends over at Dusty Rose Chesapeakes will also be attending with one of their dogs, in fact it is because of them that I know about this book.

I love to learn all I can about the genetics and structure of dogs and I think you can never stop educating yourself. There is always something new to learn and in the long run it helps to make you a better breeder.