Yesterday,

We had our 1 year old male inside the house.
My fiance took him outside to go poddy. We do this all the time, but this time things went differently. He did his thing and then charged after some cows that were in sight hanging around the salt lick like always. She said all obedience flew out the window (normally he obeys her very well), this dog was not coming back. She ran after them as far as she could. He was last seen occasionally nipping at these cows and driving them towards the nieghbors (1 mile away) who is infamous for two things: 1- having about six pit bulls and 2- not knowing what a kennel is. She came back to the house and explained everything to me (she was in tears).

I didn't know what to expect when I caught up with him. I grabbed the Winchester, and we hopped in the jeep and set out torwards this nieghbors place. The dog and the cows were nowhere to be found. I decided I would head back to our homestead and use the 4-wheeler(atv) so that I could broaden my search. Pulling up to the house what do you think I saw.

Here was my dog. The little guy had twenty cows or so in tight around their salt lick. Which is at least as many that he started out with. He was running circles around them and they were going nowhere. There was no nipping going on now and the cows were relatively calm. It was the prettiest thing I ever saw.

The dog recalled to me no problem, and I have never seen him more proud of himself either.
He seemingly did what it normally takes me and another guy on atv's to do, and he seemed much better at it than me with no training at all. However, I did not see the nature of the previously mentioned nipping.

Questions;

Does anyone know of people who use mals for herding cattle?

Are there reasons that I should stick to using my atv's and a friend for round up? I don't even know what to look for in a herding dog but this looked pretty good to me. Lots of people in the neighborhood have cattle and "herding dogs" but come round up time, they're using atv's and/or horses, not their dogs. How tough is the training and where do I start?

It would be cool if it could be just me, my atv, and my cattle herding mal.

Email Ellen. This is her turf.

I don't see why not. In theory shouldn't good protection dogs (especially shepherds) also be able to do the best herding work. I think that the same drives that make 'em kick ass service dogs are the drives that they used to herd livestock long before anybody ever heard of a military or police K9.

Hey, does anybody know about herding dog selection. Is it any different than selection for a Schutzhund or protection prospect? I asked my grandfather about this and he said that very often people breeding working lines for police/sport/protection would search the local sheep farms for dogs to improve their lines. These dogs often, by natural selection, had very strong nerves and intense drives. That's just a story though. . .

I would like to see you do it Jason, it would kinda close the loop between herding and protection. Work that a lot of people see as two different things.

Hi Jason..

I have a malinois bitch that was a terrific herding dog.. she is 10 years young now.. but for many years she worked on sheep.

Jody

 Quote:

Originally posted by jason:
Does anyone know of people who use mals for herding cattle? How tough is the training and where do I star?

Peggy Richter herds cattle on open range somewhere in California. She is a herding judge and I believe also trains people. Her breed is the Belgian Sheepdog which is pretty close to the Mal <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" /> -- same roots, different coat <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused.gif" alt="" /> . Don't shoot me for my ignorance about when the stem branched into Terv, Mal, Belgian SD & Lakenois(?sp). You can contact her via email at <richter@RIDGENET.NET>

Also an excellent source of information on herding breeds, clubs, trainers & kinds of herding is this web site http://www.glassportal.com/herding/herding.htm

Go for it -- good luck.

Originally posted by Ellen:
Peggy Richter . . . . you can contact her via email at: richter@RIDGENET.NET<br />

Don't know why the email address didn't come up. See if it comes up now. If not email me privately & I'll give it to you.

 Quote:

Originally posted by VanCamp:
In theory shouldn't good protection dogs (especially shepherds) also be able to do the best herding work. I think that the same drives that make 'em kick ass service dogs are the drives that they used to herd livestock long before anybody ever heard of a military or police K9.

Person after my own heart <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> .

 Quote:

Originally posted by VanCamp:
Hey, does anybody know about herding dog selection. Is it any different than selection for a Schutzhund or protection prospect?

I don't know how people test for schutzhund prospects but I do have puppy tests and descriptions of actual tests on my web site in several of my articles for selecting a good GSD herding dog. My web address is http://www.german-shepherdherding.com and the articles are (1)The German Shepherd Herding Dog and (2)The Large Flock Herding Dog: Puppy Selection & Foundation Building.

The man I learned these tests from says that the test on a lamb(for a puppy) or the test on a ram(for a dog) will indicate whether the dog is suitable for protection training or not. He provided the border patrol with dogs when he had any that tested well but that didn't have what he wanted for top sheep herding work.

 Quote:

Originally posted by VanCamp:
I asked my grandfather about this and he said that very often people breeding working lines for police/sport/protection would search the local sheep farms for dogs to improve their lines. These dogs often, by natural selection, had very strong nerves and intense drives. That's just a story though.

It may be "just a story" today, but in your grandfather's time I'd bet the farm it was true <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/laugh.gif" alt="" /> . I was told the same thing by an old shepherd who learned his craft from an old shepherd who knew von Stephanitz.

Thanks everyone for the info and your words of encouragement.

Ellen,
In 1892 they seperated them into "long hair", "short hair" and "rough hair". It wasn't until around 1910 or so did they have ALL of the colors and names hammered out. Here is a link. http://www.belgiandogs.org/hisstandardone.htm

P.S. Special thanks for those great links/contacts Ellen!!