My friend DSL in Virginia does the sport of Earthdog with her smooth fox terrier bitch Meggie. She and her club held their first earthdog tournament this past weekend. It was a rousing success! Read all about their great weekend here.
They had tents. Catered dinner. Box lunches. Sold Tshirts. Had a raffle AND a silent auction (check out the list of donated items on the right side of the club's website). Goodie bags and name tags for all handlers. Judge's gift baskets (Virginia themed of course).
They had about 200 entries! That's just amazing and shows how popular this sport is on the east coast.
And what is Earthdog, you ask? It's a sport just for the smaller terriers and their daschund cousins. There are varying levels of difficulty, but essentially the dogs have to find and negotiate a 9 inch by 9 inch tunnel until they find the rat within a set period of time. Tunnels are longer and more complicated at the higher levels with false entrances and exits and confusing turns. The sport is managed by AKC.
The rat is more or less safely enclosed in a cage, but once the dog finds it, the dog has to "work" the rat for a specified period of time, which can include barking, digging, and general underground mayhem. We have gate stewards in agility, earthdog has rat stewards who look after the rats!
Congrats to DSL and her club have such a successful trial!
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