It began with a mistake as these things do, the pasture gate was open – I was sending Red in – and Red and Fate both slipped before I saw her. She ran alongside of Red, I loved the way she moved, but then she got excited and started running on her own. I called Red back and she came back in with him.
If we are going to be near sheep with a border collie like this, with so much instinct and someone like me , who has learned a lot about training herding dogs, then we might as well learn something about it and make certain Fate knows how to behave around sheep. Herding is their destiny, but it does not keep them from being loving pets and companions – witness Red. Fate is a high intensity dog with a lot of instinct and if she gets in with the sheep – it seems inevitable – I don’t want her running them to exhaustion or worse.
It’s my job to show her how to live her safely and sanely.
We are developing alternatives for Fate and she is loving them, but she has some wonderful breeding and instincts and I just had to take her out on a long lede and see what she is like out there. I know I said I would never do it, but I just couldn’t help it. She is an amazing dog and she deserves every opportunity I can give her to live her life.
I walked her to the sheep, and started marking behaviors – “walk up” when approaching them steadily, and then, “sit” and “lie down” before she gets to go near them. She must always sit or lie down to get to move closer to them and she must be calm around them or she will be removed quickly from the pasture.
She did remarkably well – Maria and Scott Carrino were her and they were amazed, so was I. I got her to sit, then walk up slowly, and then repeated this a dozen times. Then I began teaching her a lie down. When she lay down naturally I praised her, sometimes I tapped my food on the lead a foot from her face and she got the hint and dropped down while I praised her.
She will not be off leash around the sheep for six months to a year, that is the discipline I have to adhere to, not until she is completely under control, has mastered her own excitement and proven that she can be calm around them and responsive to me, even in a herding fever. Then we will start work on marking her outruns and directionals. That will be long hard work, I think I will try and do it. Fate is doing beautifully, she is beginning to sell, knows her name well, comes when called, sits when asked. The lie down becomes more critical now.
One of my training values is to find something the dog loves, and then you have them. Border collies will do anything to work. She will have to sit down, lie down and stay for three minutes before she gets to do anything like work. That is easier said than done. But this will help focus her responses and will ultimately calm her, done right.
She did really well, I was quite amazed. She has all of the tools to work with the sheep, it is up to me not to mess it up.
Maria was laughing, she says one of the things she loves about me is that after saying a thousand times that Fate will not herd sheep, I just decided this morning that she should and perhaps will. I am glad Maria loves me for that, because that trait has driven many people in my life nuts. Stay tuned.