Michelle Ainsworth & Daisy
Daisy is a Jack Russell cross Whippet, she was rescued as a five week old pup as she was going to be drowned.
At the time of Daisy’s birth, her mum was only a year old and already onto her second litter, and as the owners did not charge me for my little princess (who is still regularly threatened with the glue factory for lack of performance!) I offered to pay to get either mum spayed or dad neutered. This fell on deaf ears and I reported the owners to the RSPCA but was told that owners could do what they liked with their own dogs. As a result of Daisy’s mum’s fourth litter at two years old she sadly died.
Daisy’s introduction to agility was by complete accident. On the first weekend I had her I went to my parent’s house as normal, where she was introduced to the rest of the pack – 4 Black Labradors. Mum asked me where the puppy had gone as her dogs were having a mad half hour going in formation over her A-Frame. Easy answer Daisy had followed them and stopped at the apex to have a good look around, then carried on after her new friends.
We took Daisy to a club we used to belong to for some socialisation and to get her used to the noise agility creates. She watched the proceedings from her cat carrier on the bench and one evening did her nut because she could not join in and promptly made the cat carrier fall off the bench, where she continued to create a merry stink as she still could not get out and join in!
Her training was initially done by me but as I have very little interest in running dogs and she used to bite me, my mum Eileen Ainsworth (aka Dragon) willingly took over. I won Daisy out of Elementary in a standard class at Wirral in 2003, it was the first time she had run as a standard as she is a midi (now medium) .
Mum decided to run her in 2004 and went onto to win Novice Jumping at Shrewsbury 2004, Novice Jumping at Dashin’ Dogs 2005, Open Agility at Wyre in 2005 finally making her senior. At
Other achievements include Midi Primary Dog 2004 followed by Midi Novice Dog of the Year 2005 at EMDAC. She was Overall runner up in the inaugural Lurcher League and Best Rescue Lurcher 2005.
I am hugely proud of both Daisy my “Baggage” and my mum “The Dragon”.
They have proved a winning combination after a huge amount of training, most of which has been achieved through watching other handlers and lots of practise at home.
Michelle Ainsworth
