Into the Field

 I was recently asked to help prepare a group of Heifers for an annual Fall Fair Cow Dog trial. My job is to dog break the cattle which should calm them down for when they go to the arena. The trial is indoors and when you take a bunch of cattle that have never been exposed to that type of surrounding it can take a great deal of fun away from the trial.

This is a perfect time and place to evaluate the training my pups have received to date. I had my new pup, Wage, with me as well as this mother, Kate, and of course my main dog, the old guy. Each morning we would round up the Heifers out in the field and bring them into a paddock. We would then separate a few and move them into another paddock and work them for about 1/2 hour. We then join the separated ones up with the rest of the herd and move them back out into the field. We did this up to 4 times a day.

Wage working the flank

Here he keeping everyone on the straight and narrow

While moving the cattle I used as few commands as possible. Mostly “there” and occasionally a directions command “go bye” or “away to me”. This gives me an excellent opportunity to find out where we are in the reaction to the commands. So now that we are back home it back to the side commands.

Even in the paddock he is keeping order

It was very interesting to watch Wage, he is 8 months old, work the flanks with very little direction. He would swing out and run along to near the head of the herd and then turn into them and run back to where we were driving from. This appears to be natural to him. He exhibited the same technique in the paddocks. He certainly did not pull any punches when one of the Heifers stepped to far of the line.

After 3 days of this, training in the training paddock is not going to be as exciting. Back to working on sides

Side #2

This week we start to train on the “other” side, the “Away to Me”. It's interesting when we started the training this week, Wage, would automatically go to the Go Bye. Now I would like to think that he has that command down pat but I suspect that it has become instinct.

In order to counter act that "Go Bye" command I have had to adapt to it and change my approach. I get behind the sheep and get them moving along the fence line and give the "Away to Me" command.  When he moves up towards the head I call him back and go through it again. The heading instinct in this breed is so strong that it does present some challenges. Of course this is counteracted by the easy by which these dogs can be trained. To finish off the training session I do a couple of “Go Byes”.

You can imagine the added complexity of training if we started on cattle. It probably would be harder on fences and the trainer.

And the training goes on.

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.