The Maryland field trial I attended a week ago

I am late with this post, but it is better to write now than never. I am not going to make it to a lot of trials this spring, and the last weekend in Maryland was my first trial of the season.
Because my knee is not 100% yet, I took only two dogs with me - Paika and Ellie.

For Paika it was the second weekend of trialling ever (her first was last fall). On Saturday she did well and she placed 2nd in a stake of 42 open bitches. On Sunday she did not place. I could see that she had trouble with too much scent as in some areas of the field there were just too many rabbits. Here at home we don't have many rabbits now and when she gets one going there is a very low chance running into another one. At the Maryland Beagle Club grounds there are a lot of rabbits, but a dachshund is expected to follow only one rabbit, the one that was tally-hoed. I could see that for Paika it was hard to ignore the scent of other rabbits. It will come with experience.

For those who are not familiar with field trials for dachshunds I recommend checking out the website http://www.dfwdachshund.com/ Click at the top on "field trial". Read "What is a Field Trial" and see videos by following links placed under the picture.

In Maryland the stakes were big, and the total entry on Saturday was 108. Can you imagine 108 dachshunds - 18 open dogs, 42 open bitches and 48 field champions? All in various sizes, coats and colors. Anyway, it was a long day.

The Absolute Winner of the trial on Saturday was a standard longhair dachshund "Reggie" (FC Sunlight’s Reliant Rex v Bakum)  owned by Michael Nothstein, Phyllis Meseroll and Karin Boyd.

Mike Nothstein with Truman, Reggie's uncle (?)

I took a lot of pictures and they all (185) can be seen at click here.

It was good to see friends after a long winter break.  Also I enjoyed seeing Lykke, who is our Joeri's daughter. She is bred/owned by Laurel Whistance-Smith from Canada.

Lykke von Löwenherz (FC Joeri vom Nonnenschlag x FC FC Diamant Lily von Löwenherz)

Interestingly, Lykke's sister, Greta owned by "Skip" Charles Richter from Wisconsin, attended on the same weekend a trial in Roscoe, IL, and placed 1st on Saturday and 2nd on Sunday in the open bitch stake. This was Greta and Skip's first trial ever. Skip sent me two pictures taken at the awards ceremony.

Greta von Löwenherz (FC Joeri vom Nonnenschlag x FC FC Diamant Lily von Löwenherz) with her owner Skip

When I was coming back home on Sunday night, I ran into a horrendous hail storm on Hwy 81. It was followed by an hour long downpour. I have not seen anything like that in quite a while. I had to stop and spend a night at a nearby motel. The picture shows how it looked like from the inside of the car.