Well, me taking a cue from everyone who’s been telling me I’m not handling my best definitely helped. Rippa is just killing it on stock these days. Every single lesson is a leap forward for us in one way or another.
I think I told you that CA Sharp sometimes comes with me to start her dog in the round pen with Stephanie while I train mine in the field. Well, last time, Stephanie asked if I could handle sorting off the sheep CA needed and, well, duh.
Rippa is a most excellent pen work dog. Calm, controlled, takes her commands, totally gets what I need. Makes me think that Farm Trials should be our forte’.
Anyway, once we sort off the heavy sheep for Kira (CA’s dog), I think, you know, it’s not like the sheep are going to run for the hills, I bet I can use Rippa to take them from the arena to the round pen.
And you know what? I can. How we did it also kind of settles in my mind that Rippa is a strong driving dog. I haven’t trained her formally to drive, but she tends to do it in situations like this – we pushed them through the gate and Rippa got them bent the right way, away from the draw of the rest of the sheep, without my help and ahead of me, so I just followed and warned her to ease up periodically.
I think the job would have totally gone perfectly except 1: CA had her dog there, and had to open the gate and the sheep were like, “Noooooo!” and me, being a stupid handler. I pulled out my phone to get a video to show you how sexy our chore work was and me not paying attention to the dog situation ahead and help Rippa out made me lose the sheep. They ran into Stephanie’s barn and it was more than a little complicated to get them out. As I’ve said, the “flow” of her setup is less than ideal, but it also makes it pretty fun to try to figure out how to handle those situations.
I was proud of me for knowing how much pressure I could put on dog and sheep at the right times and it was pretty fun and rewarding.
Stuck with spazzy lambs, we had a hard time getting started but Rippa is getting it – her outrun is widening and she’s staying off them when she’s fetching. Thinking about past times I’ve felt like we might not be able to even work in the arena with the heavy sheep bouncing all around, I’m feeling really good about it all.
And then duckies come in the mail next week and we start that adventure! Even Fury will get to work them.
I am so confident in Rippa’s talent at this point that I think it’s time to invest in all her health clearances. I still don’t know if we’ll breed her, much less to who, but good to know at this stage if it’s even a thing. I don’t expect any issues to come back, her lines seem really healthy from my experience and conversations. Exactly what I want.
I definitely know a goal of my program is to capitalize on that calm, quiet control. I’ve seen Aussies at finals be heeling fools for no good reason and dogs rodeoing cattle for the fun of it (which, totally, Rippa does), but after having seen the red border collies at the Woods’ house absolutely kill it, my program has to absolutely be based on confident power rather than showy power.
Rippa started out a little tentative on cattle, but she’s grown into herself now and I don’t see any hesitation at all to do what she needs to do. Fury started out all fire and power but never added the calmness to it instinctually that I’ve seen Rippa demonstrate – with more experience, she should be a great dog. One I’ll be able to take to cattlemen in the area and show them what an Aussie can do.
I hope. Could be kennel blindness, too, but we’ll see soon enough.
On another note, I’m taking the kids to an agility/obedience trial next weekend. The real point is to finish Fury’s CD. Rippa might do it, but not with a very high score. She can either be totally on or totally distracted. Today she was sure she didn’t know what “Stand” meant, much less that she should sit when heeling. Both dogs weren’t awesome at agility, either. Fury is a lot slower these days – not because she’s getting older, I think she just doesn’t care and my handling’s gotten bad with no practice (which she always gets mad at me for). I think I might stop kidding myself that I’m into all the venues because I have no problem driving an hour round trip twice a week (I’d do more if I didn’t have to work) but can’t bring myself to spend 20 minutes training them.
Oh well, wish us luck anyway!
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