Different Dog, Different Personality

Like last week, I brought Peg to train along with Rodeo. This time I drove out to Caroline’s house north of town, which is on a nice piece of property. She has chickens and a couple of pastures that are just crying out for sheep, but are empty for the time being.

As we drove southward on I5, the outside temperature, according to the readout on the car’s dash, rose from 70 degrees to over 80. I found Brian relaxing in the shade with Doc, Miggy, and Raven, along with a new arrival named Bell. “Meet the princess!” Brian announced. Bell is a two-year old, very dainty and with pricked ears, with tons of cuteness and charisma. Brian bought her some time ago but she lives with a friend of his, and Brian suspects she’s there to stay. It works out because his friend only lives 5 minutes away from him so he can train her easily.  

Same as last week, I split training between Rodeo and Peg, taking turns tying them to the fence in the shade. We began with some outrun work with Rodeo.

Training with Peg

Today was the first day training with Caroline’s dog Peg. I met Caroline and Peg a couple of weeks ago when Brian was working with Peg in advance of entering her in the Highland Games trial. She’s a 5-year old, mostly black border collie with light brown eyes.

After a quick lunch at Rudy’s Pizza, I met Caroline in Bellingham and picked up Peg for the drive to Smoky Point. Happily, she and Rodeo got on well in the back seat of the car – she sat quietly while he lunged from one side of the car to the other at passing cars and signposts.

I split time at the lesson with both dogs, switching from one to the other. I started with a short sting with Peg in the round pen just to make sure that she’d work with me. She was a little tight at the top, but not bad, and we quickly went into the open field.

Roy and Rodeo, a Study in Opposites

Today we had a menagerie. My friend Mike wanted to come along and watch, so we carpooled from Bellingham. Sonya met us in Burlington with her dog Roy, and we drove the rest of the way to Smoky Point with Sonya in the backseat between the two dogs. She and I had decided to do a double lesson.

We had a two-hour lesson, splitting time between Sonya working with Roy and me working with Rodeo.

A birthday

Happy Birthday to Diane Pagel's Tess, a grand old sheepdog. She looked good this weekend at the Highland Games. She turned 12 today.

Highland Games trial

On Saturday, Ivy and I loaded Rodeo into the car and drove to Mount Vernon for this year’s Highland Games. There’s always great food, music, culture, and sporting events (and beer!), but I was really there for the arena-style sheepherding trial that they hold every year.

a Holy S#@%! Moment

I went on a Friday this week both to get a second lesson in, and to watch Andy and his dog Sookie, who were having an 11 am lesson. They were working in the upper portion of the split field. Brian and Andy were standing with dogs at the southern end of the field, in the shade provided some second-growth trees.

It was a very hot day, in the mid to upper 80s, and the sun was directly overhead, beating down on handlers, dogs, and sheep. To keep everyone safe, we worked in short segments, retreated to the shade, dunked dogs in the nearby water trough, and rotated the sheep.

Questions... and an answer

At this week's lesson, we started talking about how Rodeo was progressing and I asked Brian how long it might take to be able to run in open. He hemmed and hawed a bit, and I said, “In a year?” He hemmed and hawed some more and made it clear he didn’t think so. 

“He’s got some question marks about him,” he said.