Conner

Conner was my first Aussie, and in fact my first dog. He has done well in various
arenas including flyball, conformation, and obedience. Despite his "conformation"
bloodlines, he has even showen natural ablity in herding.

Conner was competing in flyball at just over a year of age. After competing for about
two years, Conner took a break from flyball to make some appearances in the breed
ring. In just seven months, he accumulated 9 points including two majors and multiple
BOB. Tragically, in March 2006, Conner became very ill with meningitis. He spent
several days in Iowa State University's ICU unable to even walk without losing his
balance and falling over. The neurologist, Dr. Karen Kline cared for him and he had
numerous tests done. To this day, we are still not sure what may have happened,
although our suspicions are some type of viral disease. With an initially very poor
prognosis, we were all devistated. However, much to everyone's suprise he made an
almost complete recovery. Unfortunately, the permanent nerve damage left Conner
with a very slight limp in the rear. We took him into the breed ring a few times to see if
he could compete, but after a year had acheived only one additional point. Conner was
retired from showing in February 2008.

Conner hasn't let his illness slow him down in other venues. He has gone on to achieve
his CD- on the one year aniversary of his illness- as well as his RN, RA, and RE. He is
now our resident couch potato and enjoys keeping the younger dogs in line.

Everyone who meets Conner instantly loves him. In fact, after he became ill, I had
people that I didn't even know coming up to me at shows and asking about him
because they had met and fallen in love with him. He is a very gentle Aussie. He is
always willing to please, making training a wonderful experience. He is very attentive
to people and their personalities and moods. He has wonderful conformation and
displayed effortless movement proir to his nerve damage.

Conner was lovingly shown in conformation by Steve Davidson of Arista Golden
Retrievers.