New lessons - contextual understanding/learning

The Boers and Lamanchas looking at eachother during quarantine

Well, my flock at All About Dogs is now up to 6 Lamancha goats, 10 Boer goats on loan until September, 6 adorable "rainbow" lambs that are something like Katahdin and Barbados, and 9 Barbados. We lost two of my Barbs early on - one little ram that I think panicked and ran into something and broke his neck and one just mysteriously . . . which now gets me tagged on Facebook in all these sheep memes about deciding to die for no reason. Oh, and my ducks came home.

Otherwise, it's pretty smooth sailing. We're aggressively grazing the 5 acres in this unseasonable rain bringing up all kinds of thistle, and I'm loving every minute of it.

I have been pretty obsessed with fencing since WAY before I was ever into livestock or dogs, so I'm pleased to report that my pen setup is AWESOME. The only hard part is getting them from the run in shed on the hill to the pen system at the top when they don't understand what's up.

See all that green and yellow? That's probably 3 acres of brush, thistle, and more goodies that if you lose some animals, good luck having a smooth recovery. It was all well and good before they grew in this winter - Rippa could go down, round em up and call it good. But next her feet hurt from the thistle (which is how I ended up with the goats on loan) and then it grew taller than she OR the stock can see.

Hi, boys!

Which has been SO good for me. I'm starting to totally understand why I've felt so uncertain all these years training in flat arenas for things like rate and control and parallel drive. The sheep are trained to hook into me when they see me so as long as Rippa sees me, they come right to me.

The boer goats are pretty heavy, but they don't like me as much as they don't like the dogs, so when they got loose in that brush field, I learned the value of a parallel drive and then some.  Rips pretty quickly learned to push from the rear and then I, since I could see everything, would make adjustments as we walked along the fence. Once they hit the open field that's mostly just grass, Rippa can get out wide and hold them from going back in there while I push them up and either into the pen system or into the run in shed pen. Trying to do this without a dog is STUPID.

Lamb pile. <3

Then we've got lambs. Oh, they are so cute. But those things are just panic city if they see me or a dog. It's going to rain, so I needed to get them into the run in shed to get out of it, and tried without a dog for a solid 20 minutes before I brought Rippa in and even then, with her holding, they'd just run past her because she was trying to be patient with them and not overpower them while I pushed. I eventually got my boys (the Barbs) and while the Barbs were kind of pushing them away the whole time, they made a bigger, safer herd for the Rainbows (as I like to call them) and we got it done by working the Barbs together.

And then, today, something I was hoping wouldn't happen but suspected would - the goats busted out of the rusty cow fence along the back perimeter of the property. I got a panicked call and sure enough, they were all over the back field where this Episcopal church and nursery are. Whelp, it was an easy enough job with Rippa. She just went out, pushed them out of tree branches and motivated them to go back where they came from. So, after the rains, I've gotta refence that area.

But here's the part where I was like, "OHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" and also, "MY GOD STOCK PEOPLE NEED DOGS."

Now all the herds were mixed and I had to push them through two arenas, a chute, a small pen, the duck pen, and then out onto the hill and into the run in shed for the rain.

Four totally different flocks at once.

Rippa is NOT a finished trial dog by any means, but what I really appreciated about her today was that she was willing to figure out the job and do it. At first she tried to herd them all in and she got close with the sheep (both herds) but the lambs freaked and the Barbs followed) while the goats hung back. Then she tried the entire herd, and it was really cool as I basically tried to fetch them (because, again, the Barbs could lead everyone) to the gate as Rippa stayed back and basically traversed the whole field to cover everyone dropping off and splitting up. It didn't work because 75% of the stock didn't want to fetch to me, so when I got out of the way they flanked again . . . so basically, I got the goats through, then the Barbs, then did the lambs. Each needed a different technique. By the end, it was old hat and the only difficult bit was field to run in shed.

Those damn Rainbows. The Barbs knew what to do so they led the way and then once I got all the goats pointed in the right direction Rippa and I could just sit and wait for them to go in. Then the lambs . . . OHHHHHHH the lambs.

But by now, Rippa was thoroughly practiced and didn't need a lot of instruction to just walk up as we teamed it across the field to the pen, and when they started thinking about heading into the brush, Rippa went out wide slowly and just kinda let them think about it. They passed the run in shed gate, so I just opened it the other way and then sent Rippa and the went right in.

And I'm just sitting here thinking some thoughts:

1. A lot of the training I've been doing just didn't feel practical so I couldn't really do it, and now I get it. And so does Rippa so we're so much better now.
2. I really like my dogs. I really like that I don't need to say a lot to get the job done because they figure it out and then anticipate what you need. Sometimes Rippa's stubborn and takes over and messes stuff up, but it's always better than doing it by myself.
3. I've always known Rippa was pretty frickin' cool, but she's not had a chance to shine until now. I always said she was "ranchy" - and she is. She wants to do her job and then go in her little den (she dug one in the back yard under the shed) for a while. She is a great little town dog in that she'll follow me around but doesn't want pets or make too much a fuss.
4. I decided when I started breeding that I wouldn't use dogs that weren't tested (aka working on farms and ranches) and I'm really glad I am. The difference between a trial dog that lives in a house and doesn't have to do all this can really be huge. I'd err on intelligence and grit over biddability any day and I am.
5. I do not understand why people with stock don't have a dog. With minimal training, everything you do is both easier, and, honestly, more fun. That's my new tact, I think. It would be fun to do a series of videos of without dog and with . . . stuff like medicating (in the holding pen, if I don't have a dog, the ovids run everywhere. If I do, I can catch them like it's nothing), stuff like moving them from arena to arena . . . holding them at the exit of a hot wire netting fence that's not lit up yet . . . working perimeters, all of it. Without a dog, heck no.
6. I'm feeling privilege to work various breeds of dogs these days - I'm learning a lot about what I like, what I don't and how to change my philosophy. And I'm proud that people are seeing a difference between what I offer and what others might - hat tip to Kathy Warren for teaching me to develop instinct and not obedience (which is what we all really want to do first).
7. I've long had a goal of just being a better trainer and helping create a community for people who want the same and I think I'm ready. Squee.