So we have been working well...

LOL we will see if it all works out in a trial situation though. I rarely get nervous for anything anymore thanks to the years of showing horses....but ummmmmm well I'm not really nervous now just want them day to come to see if the big Gael/Kelly debut will be magical or disasterous. Its gonna be a long weekend! I keep using the techinques of invisioning the run in my head as I want it to happen, so hopefully the good visions will carry us through!

Jen will be in tow so that I can get all her rehab in that day and Dutch as well so that he can get some socialization.

Updates to come Tuesday, wish us LUCK

Moving forward....

Lots of things have been going on lately. We have gotten several new chickens because of my egg business literally exploding. Its a good thing and Tucker has named them all. The newest injured hen (bought that way) named Henrietta LOL.

Jen is trucking along in rehab. We are down to only 1 vet visit a week, she is walking 4 times a day for 20 minutes each time. And 1 day a week other that vet visit day I take her soft cast off and she gets to spend the day without anything supporting her leg and she gets to walk without the cast for 15 minutes 2x that day.

Dutch is coming along. He has been out on sheep quite a few times and seems to get better each time. He is a nice looking dog so far and even during an experiment out in JP's field that went wrong he didn't majorly lose his head!

Gael is working nicely for me, I'm trying to learn her whistles better as Spottie would take anything close where Gael won't. We are entered in a trial, starting out in P/N in a few weeks and then the end of next month, pending the first trial goes as plans I have moved us up to Ranch. It will be nice to have her to learn from. I have basically decided to retire Spottie to just farm work, she was getting slower and slower while working in any sort of larger area and just wasn't recovering as well as I thought she should, so its definitely nice that Robin has let me borrow Gael (and good thing she works for me)......Now if only I could find an affordable dog that could definitely take me to open ;)

Other than that nothing around the farm has really changed......more updates to come!

So the long process continues on....

Unless you have the patience, of oh say Job, please do not ever allow your dog to cut her flexor tendon. I am somewhat patient (LOL) and have a knack for sticking with rehab in horses. But man let me tell you, rehabbing a 2 yo border collie when you really have NO idea how its going is to say the least frustrating! Especially when said border collie is tired of being braced/casted/bandaged and really just wants to go work so she decides to eat the custom made brace. Patience I tell you, someone really thought I needed a lesson in it!
Thanks to a friend, thanks Barbara, I'm going to ask for an outline of the basics of what we will be doing for the next 9 months....it may change but at least I have something of a baseline. And maybe my vet won't disown me in the process with my incessant questions!

On another front, Dutch is going nicely for a 9 month old pup. I really like him and am glad he has worked out for me since Jen is out of commission for a while! We have Ranger here spending the weekend so he is having a great time playing with him!

Gael and Spottie are doing well, we are trying to get back in line so that we can do some trials this spring. Definately doing Dr. Ben's trial and hopefully we can get in at the bluegrass. Then after that maybe I'll make my debut in open at Robin's trial, with all that patience i'm learning!

So this is a short update, but hey at least its an update. Maybe this weekend i'll try to do an update on all the new chickens we have, thank Julie for encouraging the habit, since all of the old ones met an unfortunate demise.

Ok so you all probably thought I got lost

But I really haven't I have just been SUPER busy with things!

First off, poor little Jen, my all time favorite dog managed to injure herself about a month ago. I had her out in the yard with all the dogs, they were having a grand time playing, and some how she managed her cut her leg just above the carpal pad, well being that dogs dont have any fat in that area, she also managed to cut the flexor tendon on that leg. She had emergency surgery to repair the tendon and has been splinted for 4 weeks now. I think we are going to try to move to support bandages next week and go from there but its going to be a long recovery for her.








Dutch has decided that sheep are fun and now wants to work all the time. He has only been on sheep 2 times, if you don't count the 1 time he broke into the pasture, and seems to be doing well. I think I will like him....that is if I can catch him when its time to be done working sheep. He's 7.5 months old now and is small like Jen, I think that runs in the lines, but he has enough attitude lately for 2 dogs! This is a picture of him after a long day of destroying a toy with my old labx.








I managed to steal Gael from Robin back in December. Well actually Robin offered, but I think she thought I would have sent her back by now. Its nice to have her around now that Jen is hurt and she is a blast for me to work. I really like her style and may even try to trial her sometime this spring. Don't worry Robin she will come home sometime!!



That's all the dog updates I can think of for now, I'm sure there will be more soon though....

Working Dogs

So I needed to move some sheep around yesterday....in the rain....and since I was already wet I decided to make work for both the dogs. First, let me apologize, I have no pictures as I am not yet talented enough to keep an eye on Tucker, yell at other barking dogs, watch horses reactions for signs of panic, watch sheep reactions since it requires moving them where there aren't any fences for a time being, and working/watching my dog. So I will insert a pic of Jen working over the summer for your viewing pleasure at the end.



First I took Spottie out and got all the sheep in the round pen, the 2 that I was keeping out of the main flock to strengthen up and then the rest of the flock as I wanted to move them somewhere else for a few hours. Spottie works well so truthfully there isn't much to talk about with her, except we are working on hind end strengh. Which I oddly enough have a lot of experience in with horses.....so some of those techniques are going to work on Spottie, we will see if that works out for her too!



After I had the sheep all put into the round pen, I put Spottie up and got out Jen. I wanted to push the sheep up to me so I could check eye color and worm if necessary. I also wanted to check feet because I'm a horrible owner and I hate doing feet unless absolutely necessary. Don't worry they don't suffer and they eventually get done. She did a great job at that. She occasionally creeps up on her belly still but a firm lie down keeps that under control. And if one splits off she takes that as a reason to very quickly make sure its put back in its place. She doesn't grip anymore but she sure is quick if they try to make a break for it which tends to upset the other sheep. But all in all she did well. I guess nutty sheep don't particularly scare me, so when they get a little upset, I just keep working.



We have fenced off the bottom section of the pasture as we are going to till it up this fall and replant seed since it isn't very good forage for either horse nor sheep down there. When I am taking the sheep down, I typically move the horses over to a paddock so they don't intermingle. Well it was raining and I was lazy. I had thrown some hay out to the horses so I thought they might stay up top while I had Jen pushed sheep to the bottom. They did and Jen managed to drive the sheep down through 2 gates and into the bottom. I'm really learning to trust my dog, its hard for me she started out as a sulky, sharky, fast dog. She is doing well....now if we can only learn inside flanks! If i'm in the picture we have this huge wide flank or either a sulky short flank!



Jen works so well around quiet women......I have been trying to just have her around men or people with more presence with me. Not working, just around them as she tends to get very sulky if she feels a strong person is around......not sure how to fix that but we keep moving onward!















I'm more than happy with both my dogs.....and soon I'll have that puppy to start! Thank you Robin for Spottie, she has taught me a lot in the short amount of time I have had her and she is a riot in the house and magically gets along with everyone!

OK OK I know I haven't blogged in a while!

So there has been a lot going on lately!!



First, I went to my first dog trial 2 weekends ago. Boy, now I'm hooked! Being a former competitive equestrian, I really have the desire to now be a competitive dog handler! I replay it over and over again in my mind and just think of all the things I could have done better. But I think we all did OK for our first trial....2nd in P/N with Spottie and 6th in N/N with Jen. It was Jen's first trial as well and the competition wasn't exactly easy either! Spottie is down to her ideal weight but we now need to work on Endurance!



Second, Dutch is growing and growing. He is up to about 15 lbs now and he thinks he is King of the Hill (see below). He continues to be a great puppy and gets along well with everyone. I have to say, I have been keeping my sisters 6 month old lab for the last 2 months who never quite got dog manners, the first time someone growled at Dutch over a bone, I was ECSTATIC to see him back off and find a different bone!! His ears have started to stand...OK well they both stood for a while, now only one stands, the other is a 1/2 way up other 1/2 sideways ear! But its CUTE!













Thats all for now.......There will be more to come! We are entered in a couple of other trials coming up and I will try to get better updated pics of the puppy and the other happenings around the farm!

New Field

I haven't been able to work lots of different places with my dogs, and while Spottie has been MANY places thanks to Robin, Jen has not. I don't know if Jen has really done any work other than my field, JP's field and her old owners field ever. So when I was presented with the opportunity to go to another field and work them I jumped at the chance!

It was a bigger field than I had ever been on and we were working lambs, not somewhat broke lambs, just lambs! I worked Spottie first and true to form she lifted the sheep nicely and worked well. We are still working out a few kinks between us, mainly the fact that she knows she can get away with more with me than she ever could with Robin. But I think we will make a nice team and I think she will really help me get started in trialing.

Next I brought Jen out, I wasn't nervous, but had prepared myself for disaster. We started out in a smaller fenced area and she was working quite well so we moved out into the big field. That little dog went right around and did well. She worked those flightly lambs like she had been doing it forever and was even driving them with confidence and energy! The only bobble we had was my fault, I couldn't see her and thought she was chasing the sheep. I should have trusted her as she was only covering and JP said she would have done just what was right had I left her alone rather than lying her down. We even got to take the lambs and work on penning them. Something Jen and I had never done and she did great and we got them penned more than once!
I'm glad to see her really starting to come into herself...now I just need to trust her!

All is good on the puppy front, we had one bad night but that seems to be over with and he is doing well. He is very sweet and gets along with everyone so far.

All in all it was a good evening, hopefully we will be able to get out somewhere this weekend and work again.