Part of Red’s job – any working dog’s job – is safety, maintaining some law and order on unruly and impulsive animals. Sheep, like some presidential candidates, do not have much impulse control. When we open the pasture gates, they tend to rush them, and if we are not careful, we can be injured or knocked down. Lots of people with sheep have had serious knee injuries from being run into.

One of Red’s main functions is to keep the sheep away from the gate while we are opening them. Real sheep work on farms is not neat and pretty like the herding trials. It can get messy and unpredictable, lots of contact in close quarters. I took a video of this this morning, so you can get a feel for keeping order here, one of the many things Red excels at. Come and see.