Reba practices

interesting!

Hi, Berny, thanks!

Reba must be tired after all that running! =D

Well, she's a young border collie, so probably not. Lol! Thank you, Sami.

Relationship between subordinates and boss :-)

Right! The dog says "yes sir" to the man. The sheep say "yes ma'm" to the dog. ;-b

What a lovely video...........Reba seems to doing well and enjoying herself!

She loves it and does better each time. Thank you, Keith, glad you enjoyed it!

A splendid video Diane. Thank you for posting to FFF.

Thank you, Jeff!

Impressive! We took our Aussies to a herding test about 10 years ago--they ranged from hopeless to marginal ;) You could tell that the guy running the test only took two breeds seriously--Kelpies and border collies!

Interesting. I had never heard of Kelpies until about a year ago when I was looking online at different herding dogs. If I recall correctly, they are preferred for cattle in Texas. Don't know why. I was talking to a woman (via Panoramio) who owns a sheep farm in Iceland. She doesn't use the Icelandic shepherd, because they only chase the sheep if they're in one bunch. If there are strays, they don't go get them. So, she has border collies, instead!

After the tests, the fellow running them then did a demo with one of his border collies. Very impressive indeed--the dog went out several hundred yards and gathered up a flock of about a dozen sheep, just with commands and signals from the handler! We definitely felt outclassed... ;)

Among the dogs who came to the herding tests were a couple of rough-coat collies, a dark sable and a blue merle. Beautiful dogs--but they didn't have a clue about what to do! So far have we come from the days of Albert Payson Terhune...

Great video. Yes, Kelpies and Border Collies do a great job with sheep, they seem to have endless endurance!

They really do! Wears me out just to watch them. Same with blue heelers - maybe even more so. I've seen videos of them handling some very mean Australian cattle and nothing intimidates them. Fascinating...I think herding dogs are my favorites, though I could never own one.

Thank you for that name, I'm going to read about him! I've read that working dogs have been "tainted" by lines bred for show. Their docile traits work their way into the working lines through careless breeding.

I've only once seen real herding dogs work a flock and I was enthralled.

>Thank you for that name, I'm going to read about him!

Terhune wrote a raft of novels about dogs in the early 20th century, mostly about rough-coat collies (he was a breeder), and many based on his own dogs--with some poetic license, no doubt! His most famous book was probably "Lad: A Dog", about one of his collies. My mom had liked the books as a child, and put me onto them, so I ended up reading a bunch of them too--at least those our local library had. Many are now available in Kindle editions--I picked one up recently that I'd remembered, "Gray Dawn", about a bumptious blue merle. The stories are still eminently readable, and provide an interesting window on early 20th century America as seen by a member of the upper crust, but some of the social attitudes are a bit dated! Alas, rough-coats these days bear little resemblance to Terhune's descriptions.

>I've read that working dogs have been "tainted" by lines bred for show. Their docile
>traits work their way into the working lines through careless breeding.

What often happens is that the breeds split into "show" and "working" lines. My folks raised and trained Labs for many years, and we sure saw this with them. People would bring their show Labs out to retrieving tests, and those poor dogs didn't have a clue! What really ruins a breed, tho, is popularity. There's just too much incentive to breed willy-nilly, while paying no attention to the traits that made the breed attractive in the first place. "Lassie" ruined rough-coat collies, and "Big Red" ruined Irish setters! Many members of the Australian Shepherd Club of America (ASCA) opposed AKC recognition of the breed back in the 90s for just this reason--it would make the breed too popular! They've definitely become more popular; the gal that ran our local rescue said there's no problem finding homes for them now. Just like Labs and other popular breeds, they get snarfed up first thing if they wind up at a shelter. I drove all the way to the Twin Falls shelter to adopt our new black tri last spring, and was lucky to get him. I think the only reason we did is that they posted a very unflattering photo! ;)

Fascinating stuff, Steve! I did see the title "Lad: A Dog" when I was reading about Terhune. That would have been right up my alley as a child - maybe the local library has it. Seems like it would be good, cheery isolation reading!

Glad you found it of interest! I didn't realize that Wikipedia actually has an article on "Lad: A Dog" With a publication date of 1919, it should be in the public domain now--check Gutenberg! ;)