Shepherds Bog

Pip is a young dog I have that I got last year from a breeder/ trainer that I know. He's now getting to the point where he is improving slightly every day and his training is coming along very nicely. He's always had a great out run, but has enough eye that the sheep suck him in and it makes him really stylish when he works. Pip has always been a tougher dog to train because he is so natural when it comes to work. I know that sounds strange, but when you need your dog to cover in an off-balance situation, they don't generally want to go there. So I have to take the time to really work on that. The best way to work on it is just with driving. We walked all the way around the practice field with him just keeping behind the sheep. I'm not flanking him or asking for precision work, I just want him to naturally cover on his own so he knows how to keep a straight line. So far this has worked very well and is beginning to cross drive as well. I have really high hopes for him.

Trey, as I have mentioned earlier is having issues with his outrun so we worked on that yesterday. He is a softer dog so it doesn't take much correction for him to get the picture. After a couple of outruns he was covering very nicely and lifting the sheep correctly. He's a complete night and day difference from Pip so training comes a bit easier.

After training, Louie worked a couple of his young dogs and it's amazing to see the huge difference that can be seen in young dogs from the same litter. A friend of ours, whose dog Louie is training is fast, keen, wants to cover and is a really strong dog. Louie's bitch fly on the other hand just wants to split the sheep, stay tight and is more worried about the chase than anything. Louie's just going to work her a little and hope she matures over the winter to begin training next spring.

All in all it was a good training session for everyone.

Last Friday I went to the Ettrick Trial located at Jack and Kathy Knox place. This is one of the best trials to go to in the fall. The field is a great hill course and one where you can really spot the holes in your dog, if you have any.

It was a cold, windy day on the trial field. The handlers sent their dog out on the top of a hill with the sheep located on another hill. This is where most dogs have had problem. It's easy for them to lose the sheep and if you don't have a bend out whistle trained (like I didn't) it becomes easy for your dog to come in to early and lift the sheep almost sideways. Most runs where like this. The dogs would get sucked in by the valley, come in flat on the top and not cover that well.

A few handlers did fairly well of course. My friend Wyatt, was running his young dog Victor and this dog runs wide. He brought them steady down the fetch, through the ditch and around the post with little problems. His drive went pretty good making both drive panels, but a little high on his cross drive. With these Cheviot hoggs, the hardest part is penning. That's where he times out on. Aled Owen (who judged the previous trial) basically said that once our points were lost on the pen he would just call us off.

I ran at mid day and it had warmed up slightly, but still windy. I sent Trey to the left and he was running out good and just has he started to go up the second hill he started to turn in. I whistled a flank and he kicked out a little, but I could see the sheep shifting to the right of me and had to whistle him around to cover. As soon as he went around and I got him right he brought the sheep back straight down the fetch line and to the post. As we started out drive, it was actually going very well all the way to the first drive panel. Then I lost it on the cross drive. I over flanked and brought the sheep back towards me and had a hard time getting them back on line. My cross drive ended up being very zig zaggy and I ended up missing the second drive panel. Then just as I was making my way to the pen, Trey got the sheep there to me, but I spent so much time on the cross drive I ran out of time.

I stuck around for a while until my wife called and said I could either stay out there in the cold or come home to a very warm bed .

So I have no idea how I ended up other than I was 7th or 8th when I left.

Got up bright and early Saturday morning at 3:30 a.m. to get ready for the dog trial. My wife decided to join me this time and she was regretting having to get up so early. Left our house at 4:30 to go and pick up the dogs and Louie who was coming with us. We got everything loaded and were on our way for the 2.5 hour drive into the Kansas Flint Hills. When we got there the ground was soaked from the morning dew and it was ~40°F that morning.

We got there early enough to get our names on the running order for that day. To my surprise our judge for the day was none other that Aled Owen (http://www.aled-owen-sheepdogs.co.uk/index.asp). A International and World Sheepdog trial winner numerous times.

The morning started out with Jack Knox running his dog Jim.

He had the best run all day dropping 18 points. The sheep were running very heavy and with 25 open runs only 3 managed to get scores. The sheep either wanted to bolt back to the set out or head to the woods that lined the field. With a 425 yd outrun, the dogs would lose site of the sheep as they were on top of a little hill. Most proved difficult to lift as the dogs had a hard time getting adequate distance behind the sheep generally bumping them at the top of the outrun. The fetch, if you dog was able to get behind them good enough had it's own set of obstacles. Half way down the fetch the sheep did not want to go through a high area of grass and most had to be worked around this which was big enough to take the sheep way off line, so points where lost.

After the open runs, it was time for the Pro-Novice runs. Which after the open runs, everyone was not looking forward to it. Luckily though, Aled got out of the truck and we re-set the course to make it more enjoyable for the set out crew, dogs and handlers. However, it was still a challenge as the sheep were behaving quite badly. Only 2 handlers had scores out of the 15 that ran. Unfortunately, I wasn't one of them.

Here's Trey and I at the post.

He left quite early when I was telling him to look and halfway down the field he crossed over and never truly got a good handle on his sheep and the bolted back to the exhaust and my run was over.

At least Louie had a score in his run and he ended up winning his class with his bitch Tess.