Let me start with Payton.
This weekend I realized Payton is literally vibrating before an agility run. I have never noticed it before, so maybe it is new behavior. We had twelve weaves only one time in four days. His stay was practically non-existent, including one run when he took off before I had even crossed the plane of the jump. He was almost an entirely different dog than he was two weekends ago. The only good thing is he drove to the table and jumped straight on, stayed on, AND sat each time I asked (although one time he did yell at me and I yelled back and THEN he sat.) The rest was disastrous and we are back to, I dunno, square -20. It is possible it's a result of being on dirt, because he did this in Springfield too (also dirt) after being good before and good after. Either way this is not good and I want to cry and there isn't a trainer anywhere near me that is talented enough to help me fix this without recommending I try zapping him with an e-collar so I have no idea what to do. And part of me thinks zapping him with an e-collar wouldn't be the worst thing since that will probably make him enjoy agility less and apparently I did too good of a job making him enjoy agility.
So on that happy note let me continue about Auggie.
Monday I took the dogs to the house to practice. Auggie was having a hard time getting over the 8" bars, even in the backyard where he is typically faster and a more confident jumper. I considered it might be because the ground was wet and muddy, so maybe he was slipping, but I also thought maybe he just can't do this anymore. After that I just knocked all the bars on the ground and ran him between the standards and he had such a blast with that.
I only entered him two days this year. Friday his standard run was great, fast for Auggie, although he didn't finish his weave poles and he knocked the triple at the end of the run. His jumpers run was slow but he didn't drop any bars, which was awesome.
Saturday he was really slow in standard. He also started having some UTI issues again on Thursday (of COURSE) so it was possible he wasn't feel very good, so I let the slowness go. Jumpers was next and he was slow again... so slow. And then he came around a corner and he crashed a jump, not a double or triple which happened with him a lot, but just a normal single bar jump. Not just knocked it. Crashed it. I made sure he was okay and we went to finish the course, but he came around the next jump. And I knew. So I said "come on old man!!" and ran to the end of the course and he came with me.
And Auggie jumped his last jump ever at an agility trial.
I made it all the way back to our crate space before I started to cry. I know he is retired already. I know this was just for fun. But he really can't physically do it anymore and it's not fair to ask him to do it, even for "fun." So he is done. I will never enter my best little dog in an agility trial ever again.
And it hurts so bad. I don't know why this is so much harder than when I retired him the first time. Maybe because when I did it the first time I knew he could still do it, I just didn't want to keep asking him to compete. And now I know he can't even do it anymore. And maybe I asked him to do it for longer than I should have.
so everything is terrible and I kind of want to quit.