ur efforts to keep up with herding are limited
at present to an occasional work out with our trainer who lives in Mississippi who has goats and geese.
The herding instincts of Petey are quite different than Chloe. He will gather a group of goats or geese and is rather cautious in his approach.
Petey pays close attention to the position of "heads" and gathers the herd into a tight group and rarely scatters the group.
The very first time Petey worked with sheep he instinctively moved in wide arcs around the animals, which he continues to do today.
You may gather from this picture that Petey has a high degree of concentration, yet remains on his feet, rather than crouching, which is a trait of the Shetland Sheepdog in herding, because they are smaller than some of the herding breeds.
Chloe tends to split a group and then gather instinctively and then work with the groups driving them toward the required entry. She continues this trait and sharpens her skills with every visit to our trainers home.
Miss Chloe has identified which sheep to separate and now begins her work. She shows a strong eye tendency but her concentration is not as great as that of her brother.
Our trainer tells us that Chloe has consistently picked the dominant animal in each group she has worked, which is very unusual for a herding dog.
Herding is an interesting sport and very useful for a family who have small children. For that reason we brush up on herding skills for the handler and dog, because of our grandchildren who regularly visit our home.
The purpose of the herding trial program is to preserve and develop the herding skills inherent in the herding breeds and to demonstrate that they can perform the useful functions for which they were originally bred. The competitive trials offer something for every breed with three different livestock types - cattle, sheep or ducks.
A dog may start AKC Herding Competition at the beginning, intermediate or excellent levels. After a dog has earned the HX title, it may begin earning points for a Herding Championship title.
Although a dog with herding instincts living in an urban area may not have ready access to either small or large groups of cattle, sheep or ducks, a responsible owner will wish to preserve and enhance the breed instincts by regular participation in herding expercises.
© 2005-2009 Carolyn Lancaster