RAYLA

Rayla is my first homegrown keeper girl. She's a daughter of Yue, from our „Lost River B-litter“ with Ukiah. Hence her name, as Rayla means "ray/beam of moonlight" and Yue means "moon".

Rayla is special in many ways: specially cute, specially funny, specially playful, specially cuddly, specially witty, specially intelligent, specially fast and athletic – simply specially special. But sometimes she's also particularly demanding – which I have never had before with any of my dogs. Because unfortunately, Rayla did not inherit the inner peace and serenity of her mother, but rather the more difficult temperament of her father. They are all absolutely friendly towards people and animals, social and open-minded, but Rayla is (still) very receptive to "negative energy" and is quickly influenced and impressed by strange dogs or other things, whereas Yue has an endless stimulus threshold and frustration tolerance and always keeps cool. Rayla, on the other hand, is sometimes unsure when something seems strange to her or she gets excited/frustrated, for example if someone is passing by, while she's "stuck on the pot" (doing her business), and she doesn't see what's going on and cannot check immediately. Such situations sometimes stress her and then it can happen that she barks. While this is probably totally normal for any other dog owner, for me it's the opposite as our dogs (including all the Parson Russell Terriers, which make a total of 10 dogs I've raised before Rayla) are usually completely silent and may only breath out louder, if they are unsettled by something. Rayla seems to have this disposition from her father, because when Ukiah was imported from America at the age of 2, his vocal cords had been removed and lots of his offspring also shows this behavior. When Rayla is playing, or at home or in unfamiliar surroundings (hotel, holiday accommodation, exhibition, veterinarian, etc.), Rayla is just as calm and relaxed as the rest of the pack. However, we are still working on "not getting stressed", so she doesn't only stays calm in 9 out of 10 times, but always.

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All in all, Rayla gets on my nerves from time to time, but would probably be an absolute dream dog for everyone else, because she likes other dogs, animals and even the strangest people right away. She is incredibly loving and clever, loves to do obedience and sports and, despite of all of her power, she is extremely cuddly at the same time; which is actually atypical for females. Her uniquely funny habits like her love for music, playing and sleeping in the empty bathtub like it's a normal thing to do (even if we've just arrived at a hotel or vacation rental), or stealing my dirty laundry from the bathroom every evening and hiding it in the toy basket or sleeping on it, make her an extremely cute and cheerful companion – who it never gets boring with! And who I have embosomed, even if she steps out of line sometimes.

But I am also very proud of all the achievements that we have achieved together in a relatively short time, because Rayla not only collected many certificates and titles during her first show season, but also successfully passed the companion dog test at just 15 months and achieved four Trick Dog titles (up to Expert level) just 2 months later!

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