Sheep Herding with Youngster "Rook" (February Classes)

Rook is my youngster in the crew. I have started him on herding classes to work on his exposure and "calmness" around the woolies with Louanne Twa our instructor. She is located south of Calgary in the Okotocks at Phantom Ridge. Rook was introduced to working on cattle with my crew and he did well but working smaller stock is still a new challenge for him. He was introduced to the woolies at 11 months back in the Fall 20ll with Calvin Jones from Wales and showed great potential. I am working on tailoring his stock sense with both sheep and cattle.

 We are keeping him on a long lead right now in our training so we can step in when we have to. He is a "cocky youngster" which is to be expected with a "Thinking" boy who is too big for his britches and needs to be tamed to get the best from his potential as a working boy on my ranch. We are working on pace, distance and respect toward stock.

Working with stock takes a lot of practice, time, and  consideration between you and your stockdog  in order to establish a safe and healthy environment with all  involved - which includes the "stock", the "shepherd handler" and the "dog". We know that Rook has the drive and instinct so it is all about getting down to business now with the training and  instilling the need for "teamwork" since he thinks he can do it all on his own whenever he "thinks" the job should be done.

My young  handsome boy on the homestead in the early morning before setting out for our 2- hour drive for classes. 

Here are some pics from our Sunday training session on February 19th .

Me and Louanne getting ready to curb Rook's wanting to "zoom" in on the woolies

Louanne coaching me about pace with Rook

Louanne helps me out with distance and pace

me working on Rook's pace with the sheep - this is hard work!



My Crew keeps me busy- and I would not have it any other way!

This is the beautiful landscape out where we have classes- my friend Donna Brinkworth captured this pic after our class