I know, what does this have to do with training? A LOT

I do practical work a lot.. which means I send the dog far off and I go back to what I was doing.. I glance a few times to make sure the dog is on track.

Today my class had to do silent gathers... omg they wanted to whistle. The purpose of the excercise is to see where the raw dog needs support and where they don’t.. you see, we often hop aboard on the lift and start nagging (snatching the bridle for horse people) and creating nerves in our dogs. We feel the need to override their part of the deal (the gather). Dogs need to be responsible, they need to handle a portion of this work.

We first gathered heavy sheep, that were happy to come down straight with a lagger. The next group leaned hard on the dogs, some headed and took control, some followed the sheep where they wanted to drift.

Most dogs did better without the handler interjecting.. some showed the weakness and holes, some showed thoughtfulness and pace!

The lesson learned was the handlers got to watch, got to figure out in a real situation where the dog struggles and where the dog shines! If the dog is coming too fast, you’ll certainly know, too slow you’ll know.. learn to interject and learn to zip it. We all feel the need to offer help, sometimes we need to know when not to! Our nature is to over control, when sometimes we just need to step back in training and see that raw side. These dogs aren’t idiots, but we may be!

Once in a while we need to shut up and watch, weakness will show, strengths will shine! Don’t be scared.. send and you might just be surprised!