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Cricket was
born on September 24, 2000, in a litter of 10. Her registered
name is Von Stone’s Night Sounds, CGC, RN, WAC, ATT. From the
beginning, Cricket was the bravest little girl in the world.
She has no fear, even biting the end of a vacuum cleaner hose
while it’s sucking her tongue up the tube.
When Cricket
was young, we thought she was very pretty. We’d started
studying the Doberman standard at that point and thought she fit
it pretty well. Neil, who’d never even been to a dog show, let
alone in the conformation ring, took her in for the first time
about one day after she’d gone out of season. We learned:
never combine an inexperienced dog handler with a bitch barely
out of season. They were excused from the ring from their very
first show because Cricket sat down every time the judge went
near her rear. Lesson one learned.
However,
because of our naiveté about showing dogs, we met “dog show
people,” who were willing to help us out and attempt to teach us
the ropes. Our biggest mentor at that point was Vicki Harris,
who was then president of the Doberman Pinscher Club of the
Rocky Mountain Area. (See Greeter’s story) Vicki took two
bumbling newbies and taught them the ropes. She also kindly
showed Cricket for us in 36 shows, managing to bring in one
point and five Reserves. It finally sunk in that Cricket was
not a conformation Doberman. By showing Cricket, we learned
about light eyes, round eyes and pacing. Personally, we think
we’d rather read about these attributes than learn them in the
conformation ring, but we gave it a shot.
We learned,
however, that Cricket had her own wonderful abilities. She is
eager to please and has a perfect Doberman temperament. She
will try anything. She has passed -- with flying colors -- both
the UDC and DPCA temperament tests. She loves agility and has a
Rally Novice title and two legs of her Rally Advanced title.
We’re working on getting her CD and planning for a U-CD. She
loves showing in the ring, and we may bring her out in Veterans
in a year or so. Maybe she can pull off a second win!
Cricket is
also hypothyroid and is on estrogen for incontinence. Her EKG’s
have always been normal but she did have about 200 PVC’s per
24-hour period per a Holter monitor, so we watch her very
carefully and test yearly. In February 2007 Cricket was
diagnosed with CAH and copper toxicosis and is working hard with
her beloved vet, Dr. John Vickers, to calm the tide of these
diseases. Please keep her in your prayers. |
