In October we held a Sunday Funday, which included an introduction to the barn hunt, CGC testing and a cook-out.   We enlisted the help of an instructor and certified examiner to put on the clinic.  The dogs were given the instinct test to introduce them to the rats, followed by the opportunity to run a novice course.  While we had the help of a few experienced ratters, many were first timers.  In total, we had 27 dogs run the course for a total of 44 runs.  In addition to the Airedales, we also had a Giant Schnauzer, a Wire Fox Terrier, a Scottie and a German Shorthaired Pointer! 

Our instructor was also able to administer the Canine Good Citizen exam, and four out of four entries received their title as well. 

An interesting statistic from the day is that we entertained 24 current club members and 21 non-members and, by the end of the day, we had two new memberships.   As for the dogs, we had 20 member dogs and 11 non-member dogs in attendance. 

A highlight of our events is the result of an ATCA and ATCI member, Nancy McKenna, who creates awesome photo booth sets at our activities.  This event hosted an orange horse jump, multiple flowers, a black cat, pumpkins and a ghost.  Every attendee gets a card with their name on it and photos are then matched and emailed to the owners after the event and truly become keepsakes of the day.

We are also thankful those who manned the grills at the event to feed the hungry crowd.  We didn’t leave the dogs out of the food, there were goody bags for them as well.  We hope all had fun and learned a little too.