Working the young dog

Well as our job continues my little Kate has her ups and downs. This could be attributed to the fact that she is pregnant.

As in all training, repetition is the key to success. I pick up a bale on the tractor and place it over the round bale feeder then get out of the tractor and with my main dog start to move the cattle away from the feeder. The young dog usually moves right in with my main dog and start to move the cattle away. This is when I start to introduce the command "walk up"

It is important that once you have the cattle away from the feeder that you stop the dog. I use the command "there".

Doing this procedure over a couple of weeks usually is all that is required before the dog start doing it on there own. This is the sign of a useful working companion.

To finish off each feeding session I like to
add a little more training in such as moving the
cattle together. Again I use the walk up command.
From this training I will start to move to the gathering
command,which incidentally, she has been doing it on her
own up to this time. This would be a good time to start putting commands to it. I want to do this slowly as she has it figured out what way to go around the cattle.

Onward and upward .. the training continues.

Feeding Cattle using dogs

Well it's that time of the year again. Each year at this time I, along with my dogs, head north to look after a ranch for 2 months while the owners get away for a holiday.... hmmmmm what's wrong with this picture ... I'm here and the owners are in Mexico??????

One of my main jobs here is the daily feeding of the cattle. I feed using round bale feeders and when the cows are hungry it can be a real gong show around the feeders. Not only that it can be very dangerous; first to the cattle ... I'm lifting large round bales that can kill if they are dropped on the cattle, and secondly, when I am backing up or moving around with the forks down it is a potential mine field for the cattle. and Thirdly, when I am cutting the plastic and netting from the bale I'm in danger from hungry cows.

So what is a person to do? Well the obvious answer is to use dogs to keep the cattle back until the bale is placed and I'm out of the way. Of course that is exactly what I do and it not only make the job a lot easier, it gives the dogs the work that they so want to do and enjoy doing it.

Where do you start in training your dog to do this very valuable and useful job? I like to start away from the work area and do a little basic training. If you have been following my post you will know that I'm not really big on commands but there is one that I always teach my dogs before I let them do this type of work. The command is "behind". I want my dogs behind the tractor and hay wagon when we are moving to the work site. The second command is "get them or get out". I want the cattle away from the feeder and the dogs in the early stages need to learn this command. Eventually both of these commands will be used only rarely as the dog begins to understand and will get the job done.

In my next post I will give more detail in keeping the cattle away from the feeders using my partners.