So the connection here is uploading videos ridiculously slow - It's taken 2 hrs per video. Argh!

But anyways, here are a couple videos from the other day. One of Kipp one of Kenzi.

Kipp on sheep

Kenzi on sheep


Most of the busting into sheep you see is my fault - if I had moved a big faster/hadn't put pressure on at the wrong time it would have been better. Moving backwards in a round pen behind an athletic Border Collie is a learning curve (and a great workout - wow, was I sore the next day!). Our best sessions of the day were the last ones, but no video of those (too dark anyway)

I really like working with Kipp. He is a handful and a half, and you got to stay on top of him, but he's got some really nice natural talent and won't quit. There's a lot to love about a dog like that

Kenzi was much more excitable this session than the previous one. Not a good thing, but it happens. I really want to see that tail go down and for her to be more serious when working, but I saw improvement each time so hopefully we're getting there. The last time I worked her that night I was able to stop her a couple times.

It was interesting after working both of them a couple time because t (he trainer told me that while Kipp was a lot more dog (and initially seemed to be much harder to work with), he also seemed to have more respect for me than Kenzi did. I thought about it for a minute and I think that's right. So I've got that project cut out for me with Kenzi.

Both of those were really interesting Mara. Are those your sheep?

Looks like sheep herding 101 ranks right up there with contact sports. That was some pretty fancy dodging you did, I’ll bet you were sore.

It's probably just me, but it seems like there's a lot of pressure the sheep go through in the beginning stages of a pup's training. Not a criticism (I'm in no position to do that) just an observation. And it's probably a really good thing in the herding world. That 14 week old border collie was adding quite a bit of stress to his situation too. Those seasoned dogs in the trials make it look like such a well choreographed dance that all seem to be enjoying.

Did Kenzie break that down or did you release her right away? Was that about trying to get her to work lower (like you see so many of them doing) or just to slow her down and listen to you? Quite a distraction in a pen full of sheep that she's just been chasing around.

A lot of border collie drive to control. You guys looked great!!

I was really interested in this video. We bought 5 sheep for the Pinker, and he loves to move them. The singling one out so you can chase it , actually herding it a little away from the pack and then chasing it back, is a thing he does occasionally, it seems to be a desire to extend the game.

I have trouble keeping the sheep from shooting ahead of me.
Also, my sheep have learned that IF they are right next to me, the dog isn't allowed to
push on them, therefore when they see me coming, they all run to me, which kind of eliminates the dog's job. How do you handle that? eg. I go out, say"here Pinker", and at least yesterday the sheep came quicker than the dog!

So I typed out a whole long post earlier this morning and my computer ate it...

Let's try again

CJ, you are absolutely correct that beginning work can be highly stressful to the sheep (and was in those videos). That's why IMO, when you decided to train in stockwork you owe it to the stock to learn the best that you can so you move past the highly stressful beginning stages quickly into the calmer handling stages. Done right it should become that well choreographed dance that looks smooth and easy.

And a good handler can do much better with dogs in the beginning stages. At least half of the chaos in those videos could have been eliminated by good handling skills.

The big reason for the videos was to show me what was going right and what was going wrong. A couple of big errors made by me were not moving faster and timing on corrections. Through moving faster I give the dogs a place to move the sheep to since their natural inclination is to hold them to the handler. As far as corrections go when the dog thinking about starting/starts to slice in too close to the sheep I need to move in and put pressure on them to get back out on the outside of the flight zone bubble of the sheep where they belong.

The trainer I went to told me that if he worked Kipp for 3-4 more days that he could most likely have him out in a larger field
working sheep. So from that rather chaotic scene to pretty nice control just through voice and body pressure. I think half of that is the handler, half is a dog that is keen and talented yet still willing to learn and work as a team player with the handler.

With Kenzi, I released her as soon as she did what I told her too. It's the beginning stages of control and the dogs learns that stopping doesn't end the work - they obey, they get to go back to the sheep. With Kipp I'll just look for a pause at first - put pressure on him til I get it, then release him to go back to work. I do want her to get more serious about it and see that tail go down, but right now she is still pretty excitable I'm kinda of thinking that will start to change as she learns. She'll go into the BC crouch if she's at a distance (only outside the pen right now) but get up close and she get a tad unsure and excited.

Betty - the slicing the sheep off in the videos was handler error. Pretty much at this point they slice them off because they're working too close and putting too much pressure on the sheep. If the dog is outside of the flight zone bubble for the sheep, they naturally flock together. Further on down the road that comes in handy for separating out sheep, but right now it's not what I want to see and it can lead to bad habits/training issues down the road if I don't make the dog widen out.

The sheep learn quickly that to escape the pressure that the dog is putting on them they need to get to the handler. To eliminate that I think you need to get your dog back out of their bubble so they move at a controlled pace. They'll move as quickly as the dogs pressure tells them to move. But before you can do that I'm guessing that you need to work close in with them for a while getting Pinker to widen out and work several feet away from the sheep and also stop/down when told. But this is just my guess. Sheep tend to be much flightier than cattle and so the dog needs to work father away from them. What size pen are you working in?

Thanks for posting the videos. Got my first Border Collie pup, can see she's going to need a job in life, not sure what it will be yet.

Well, we dont have too many options for pens just yet. Sheep live in a 24x12 outdoor run connected to 2 separated indoor 12x 24 pens -- or they are out grazing along the driveway, the lawn, around buildings. The sheep, in the day, are basically free.
I stopped "working" them with the dog in their "home" indoor/outdoor pens as it makes them nervous and I get so dizzy-- one day I was sick, walking backwards in circles. When sheep go out among the cattle or get too far away I send the dog after them, he brings them home and puts them in their yard each evening but it is not controlled.
Starting with cattle has made him quite aggressive. He gets pretty excited when the cows actually start moving due to his pressure. The sheep are new, and he is not bonded to them, he looks at them in a more "prey" mode. He will DOWN with the cattle but the sheep are too exciting, he will down indoors but not if chasing sheep outdoors. So interesting that the break-away is from too much pressure. Thanks for that!
A trainer would be good, haven't had a chance yet.
Sheep herding is really fun for both of us, the sheep are so non threatening and light compared to my cows. And the chores -- they take a dustpan to clean, the cattle need the LOADER!

12x24 is a bit small for any sort of training purpose - I can see why you got dizzy!! I've tried doing some work in the barnyard that's about 40x40 and that is really too small for my dogs to get comfortable working in.

I'm going to be putting round pen for training purposes. It will be about 70ft in diameter. I'll use t-posts and the 4ft combination panels (about 16 panels and 32 t-posts) It will give the dogs space to work the sheep and get a feel for what is correct pressure wise, but still small enough that I can control the whole situation, teach them to stop/down, etc.

Kipp is from cattle lines and he tries to get in and bite (hence the muzzle) but when he stays outside the bubble he works nice and responds nicely to me. Another interesting thing I learned is that once keen inexperienced dog gets inside that bubble, they're not listening to you any more. They're pretty much over threshold and they start reacting instead of thinking/working. I've just seen glimpses of it, but it's amazing how much calmer/self-controlled Kipp is when he's in the right spot just on the edge of that pressure bubble.

The distance of that bubble will change a bit depending on the the dog, how they're moving and the type of stock. Sometimes it's 5 ft away, sometimes it's 25-30ft away. So the round pen also gives the dog a chance to start to get a feel of where they should be in relation to the sheep.