MACh, OTCh, CT SuperCardi, VCD5
How “SuperCardi” was engineered:
After years of struggling to train my first Cardigan, I decided to genetically engineer my next dog. My original plan was to create an ‘enhanced’ version of the common Border Collie, but I realized nobody would be impressed by a super-fast, over-achieving BC. Thus, I began my plan to create, “SuperCardi”.
At first, I was simply going to use ‘genetic recombination’ to transplant the genetic code of a Border Collie into a developing Cardigan Corgi egg. Then, I got greedy and decided to implant not one, but TWO, Border Collie genomes into my Cardi embryo. Twice the intelligence in a pint-size package!
The first genetic contribution came from a BC who was so smart he knew how to drive a car; his code name was "SKY":
The second BC genome was contributed by a dog with the code
name, "Blink":
When implanted into a surrogate Cardigan mother, "SuperCardi" was created:
SuperCardis’ training actually began long before he was ever born. SuperCardi was subjected to pre-natal dog training (an audio tape recording of obedience and agility commands was placed near the pregnant belly of his surrogate mother such that the developing SuperCardi embryo was subjected to listening to the commands 24 hours a day, 7 days a week):
At 8 weeks of age, SuperCardis' intelligence was clearly apparent; he knew every AKC Open obedience exercise and most of the Utility ones as well. By 10 weeks he was doing 60 weave poles flawlessly.
SuperCardi was entered in his first obedience competitions at 6 months of age. He earned his CD, CDX and UD in 3 consecutive 3-day weekends.
When he was 9 months old, SuperCardi earned the coveted, “quintuple crown” of obedience, receiving his UDX, OTCh, High Combined, High-in-Trial and a perfect “200” score at a single trial:
Since we couldn’t compete in Agility until SuperCardi was 12 months old, we used the interim time to work on tracking. Because SuperCardi did so spectacularly well on his TD certification track (350 yards in 28 seconds flat), the AKC gave him special dispensation and he was allowed to try for his TD, TDX and VST titles at the same tracking test. He passed all three with no problem to earn his CT title at the tender age of 11 months.
The day after his 1-year birthday we attended our first agility trial. He progressed from Novice to Excellent B in less than a month; it took 20 additional trials to get his MACh (by the time he had his 20 double Q’s he had also earned a remarkable 3500 speed points). Because he was so fast, it was virtually impossible to get an agility photo of him that was in focus!
He had superstar status and was even pulling in lucrative endorsement deals:
Immediately after earning his MACh, something completely unexpected happened to SuperCardi. He began binge drinking. Soon I was attending trials with a drunken corgi who couldn't drag himself off of my show chair. At home, he was often found passed out in his dog bed.
He began stealing food and he started peeing on his weave poles.
A quick genetic analysis revealed the problem: the two border collie genomes were actually canceling each other out, leaving me with a Cardigan that had no genetic information whatsoever! No longer could SuperCardi retrieve dumbbells. No longer could he run an agility course without sniffing:
In a desperate attempt to regain the fame and recognition we had earned, I renamed him and put him back into the novice levels of competition, but the magic was gone. We failed time and time again. My SuperCardi experiment was over…I decided to rename SuperCardi, “Riley”…