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Talented teen and Corgi earn CT title
By Kim Campbell Thornton
July 6, 2009
Champion Tracker, that is. Kate Eldredge, 18, and Flash, an 11-year-old Pembroke Welsh Corgi, worked for an hour and 18 minutes in sweltering heat and high humidity to complete a grueling 670-yard track walked by a stranger over various surfaces such as grass, sand, dirt, gravel, asphalt, concrete or brick, according to Ed Presnall who, along with Mary Thompson of Maine, judged the effort.
Presnall reports that Kate became the youngest person ever to earn an AKC Variable Surface Tracking (VST) title and be awarded the CT title for earning the TD, TDX and VST titles. Tracking has been a dog sport for 15 years (and of course it’s an activity that has been in existence for much longer than that), but Kate and Flash are only the 203rd team to earn a CT title. Darcy and I attended one of Ed’s seminars a few years ago for people interested in giving tracking a try, and it’s tough. (Well, for us it was; YMMV.) But it was so fascinating to see Darcy “getting it” and to realize she really was following a track.
I’ve admired Kate for a long time–and I know Gina has too–ever since she had her first book published at age 14. Sigh. Besides being an award-winning writer, she’s also a successful dog handler. If I remember correctly, she and her Terv bitch Queezle took BOS at the AKC/Eukanuba show last year.
Kate will be a freshman at Cornell this fall, majoring in English. Her goal is to make a living as a writer in either fiction or nonfiction. I’m looking forward to reading her in the future.
Hope everyone had a fun Fourth. Poor Twyla does not do well with fireworks and a few random ones went off when we took them out for the evening’s last potty run. When we got inside, she ran and hid under my desk. It took crawling under there with her for a little talking and petting, followed by a play bow, to get her out. She seems fine now, though, and we don’t have to worry about it for another year. I was amazed at the number of people who had their dogs at the fireworks display in Laguna Beach. Every year I see “lost” or “found” signs for dogs on July 5, and this year was no exception: a “found” poster for a pretty little Japanese Chin was up in our neighborhood on Sunday. I hope it gets home.
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My granddaughter will be going to college this year, also. She is heading to California—one of those small colleges where the classes are smaller. She likes that.
Last two years, guess what. It seems the war is over. The fireworks quieted down somewhat and it does not sound like a war zone on July 4th, just a minor battle. It drove me just a little bit crazy, but I closed the windows tightly and sweated out the night with my husband and my two cats.
We have a whole year before we have to endure that again—yippee!
Comment by Colorado Transplant — July 6, 2009 @ 4:26 am
Yes, as I told her mom, Dr. Deb Eldredge, if I could have been guaranteed kids like hers (Kate’s brother Tom is a pip, too), I would have had them, for sure!
Comment by Gina Spadafori — July 6, 2009 @ 5:36 am
Talking about lost animals, one of my son’s cats escaped the house about 2 weeks ago even though she was an “inside” cat. She was about 5 yrs. old.
Even though my son lives far away, I feel terrible for the cat.
Cats to me are like snowflakes because they are here for such a relatively short time compared to humans and there are so many disasters waiting to happen to some of them.
However, I love cats in general and it is better to have a “snowflake” than an arid life!
Comment by Colorado Transplant — July 6, 2009 @ 6:00 am
What Gina said. I judged one of Tom’s stories in a contest a couple of years ago and it was a riot. Our niece Laura (who somehow turned 30 last year!) and her brother Sam also fell into that “if I coulda been guaranteed kids like them…” category. Besides being a world traveler, which she attributes to our influence, she and her husband Tyler are leaders in Indianapolis’s slow food/farmer’s market/small home farm movement.
Comment by Kim Thornton — July 6, 2009 @ 6:31 am
Tracking has been a competion sport in AKC and other venues a LOT longer than 15 years.
I dunno how long, but it was well-established in the 1970’s when I started training.
Maybe you mean that the VST thing has been around for fifteen years? That would be about right.
Comment by H. Houlahan — July 6, 2009 @ 7:20 am
Yes, I think you’re right about only the VST being around for 15 years. I remember when it was announced and I was still at DF then. Sorry for the confusion.
Comment by Kim Thornton — July 6, 2009 @ 7:39 am
I was lucky enough to visit with Kate and Deb Eldredge because the VST event was held in Wisconsin (they drove out from NY specifically for it, and it was held near my home). It was a hot and humid weekend filled with numerous unpleasant mosquitoes. Kate did a great job! I didn’t see the event because they had to be there at 5:30 am on Sunday and I don’t do mornings. We just hung out Saturday afternoon and walked the dogs.
In the photo, Kate is standing up and holding Flash’s leash. She also had Tia the Aussie. Her mom Deb has the two Tervs, Dani and Hokey. Neither Dani or Hokey passed, and Tia was just along for the ride.
Comment by Phyllis DeGioia — July 6, 2009 @ 7:59 am
This year for the fireworks, we accidentally found a great way to get the two dogs in the house through it all — the two out of the four who don’t think gunfire is almost the neatest sound ever (next to the sound of a duck quacking). Allergy season has been nasty this year for some reason and one of them keeps showing up with rashes that require the use of Benadryl. Turns out Benadryl makes fireworks very tolerable. :-)
Comment by Deanna — July 6, 2009 @ 3:30 pm