Icaraa

When you say “long lead” for recall training how long are we talking? Fortunately Ben is quite happy on his lead these days, but I do want to get the recall right to stop him running towards people to say hi. I do want to get this recall business right. I accept that I let him off his lead way too early, but I don’t think it’s too late for him.

Similar with our Ben. Incredibly friendly and gentle, but some people just don’t want him approaching them at all. The stick thing is just an add-on to our problem really. We’ve got some great parks here, and I suppose you could call some of them “dog parks” but the thing is here really they’re multi-use. So the idea of taking your dog to the park before work seems great (and I tried for a few months), it becomes problematic when runners use the same park to do laps round. Ben would just run up to them.

Ben is 1 now, he gets loads of exercise as we are lucky to live in an urban area that’s surrounded by open fields and farmland. He’s a very calm boy, good at being on his own and with very few destructive behaviours. He’s chewed the walls in the kitchen a few times, but very randomly. He went months between doing this and once he did it as soon as he woke up, at the weekend! So I couldn’t even put it down to being very bored for hours. Regardless, he’s not done it for a while now. The only other unwanted thing he does is to dig in the garden. He has about 5 dig sites on the go at the moment. Again-not a major issue and I’d hope he grows out of it. So-I’m keen to stimulate his brain more, so that he doesn’t become bored. He’s from a working line, both of his parents were working sheepdogs. So ideally I’d like to try him with some herding. The local farms seem to be mostly cattle, though there is one large farm locally that has many sheep. Ben does show an interest in the sheep, but of course he’s on his lead when they’re close. Does anyone know anywhere that I can take him to see if he can learn to herd? I’m in North West England. So anywhere in this region or in North Wales would be ideal.

All well and good, but our Ben would just never drop it!

I met a BC recently who was all black. The owner got her as a rescue dog and they have always maintained she is a cross. But if you saw her you would say she’s 100% Border Collie, other than being black. Is that possible? I said to the owner I don’t think she’s a cross.

Why not worm without the test? The vet will want paying for the fecal test, so wouldn’t it make sense to just buy the worming product?

I accept that 9 month old Ben was probably let off his lead too early on, but we can’t change that now. Hes fine walking around on his lead until he sees something he wants to go and investigate, or when he crosses the road. So if he sees a dog or person on the other side of the road that he wants to go and say hello to and can’t he goes mad. He starts jumping up and biting his lead and our arms. If he’s on the same side as whatever it is that he wants to say hello to then it’s no problem, as he can do so and then he doesn’t do the crazy jumping up. I can usually get him to stop this by kneeling down next to him and telling him to calm down. However this isn’t really tackling the issue as he just keeps doing it the next time.

That’s great to know! Is it open to everyone or do they have to decide that you meet their criteria?

Interesting. Ben has been very laid back his whole life. He’s 9 months old and definitely used to be more bitey and bouncy than he is now. He’s calmed down a bit in the last couple of months. I think we’ve just been lucky with him.

That’s true. I don’t know where you are (I’m in the UK) but anecdotally I’m hearing the same. Even here where the breed originates their popularity appears to be increasing in recent years. The farm we got Ben from told us that the whole litter have gone as pets. The previous litter was half and half she said. Half went to farmers as working dogs and half as pets. People here seem to like the idea of a really intelligent dog, and it’s common knowledge here that they are the most intelligent breed. One of the things that’s driving their popularity I think. In Ben’s case his intelligence has helped us, he just seems to get things easily and is super easy to train. Other family members describe their dogs as stupid! They just can’t get them to understand basic things.

Our Ben sometimes howls when we go out at an unusual time. Say if we go out for a meal or the cinema in the evening. He’d usually expect us to be in at that time. So he does wolf howls for 15 minutes or so, mixed with the odd bark. When he realises it isn’t working he stops. He doesn’t do it at night because he probably knows we are upstairs so there’s nothing to worry about. I suspect your dog will grow out of it. And may just do it occasionally, like mine does.

Although I can see your point, it does depend on the dog. Our Ben is 9 months old. I don’t think he’s hard work at all and anyone that’s had any kind of larger dog would be just fine with him. He doesn’t NEED loads of exercise, don’t go mad on days when he gets less, hasn’t wrecked the house, is good on his own, is gentle and loves people. I could go on. He’s generally just a good dog. He differs in that he’s clearly more intelligent than most dogs. But that doesn’t mean he’s a little brat too. However I couldn’t recommend the breed as I’ve only had 2 of them. The other was like Ben too! But if you guys are saying I shouldn’t recommend them, then in some ways I’ve got to go with that. I might just have been lucky, twice.

Well said. I think a lot of people just give up on things too easily too, in every element of life.

Interestingly I keep seeing this on here. Are you in the US? Here in the UK I don’t see many Border Collies on the rehoming sites. Maybe people know the breed better here? So their expectations are different. Certainly everyone who I speak to about our dog says “Oh, Border Collies are a lot of work aren’t they?”. But he really isn’t, at all. Depends on the actual dog.

Get the dog comfortable in the crate, but don’t feel you have to put her in there and close the door. Our Ben was crate trained when he was tiny. He used to sleep in there with the door closed and even spent a few hours a day in there with the door closed. However, eventually when he was about 4 months old we stopped closing the door on his crate. Now he goes in there at night voluntarily and sleeps in there with the door open. Sometimes in the daytime he goes in there for a sleep too. I’m comfortable with how things are now. I know that if I do need to close the crate door he will be ok with it.

Wow he looks almost identical to our Ben, who is 9 months old. This last couple of days he’s also started to settle down of his own accord in the living room. I was painting upstairs and he was happy enough to just lie down there on his own. In the past if he knew I was in the house he’s have to be with me.

Wow, he’s beautiful! Our Ben had a mono ear at that age, or triangle ears as we called it! He’s 8 months old now and I still couldn’t really say how his ears are! Half the time they are flopped (airplane), the other half one is pricked up and one is airplane. But it’s not always the same ear that is pricked up, that varies too! If he’s concentrating they’re always pricked up, and if he’s tired they’re always airplane.

Our Ben chewed on our kitchen wall for absolutely no reason on Saturday morning! Hes 8 months old. He hadn’t damaged a wall for months prior to that. We were upstairs in bed, had not long woken up. He’d only been awake for half an hour or so himself, so I don’t even believe it was boredom! He hadn’t barked, didn’t need the toilet or anything. This is a puppy who is perfectly well behaved on his own when we are at work, I do go home for lunch. I just put it down to him still being a puppy, and doing random things

About 4 months was when we started leaving the door of Ben’s crate open at all times. Prior to that the door would be closed whenever he was on his own. At night he chooses to sleep in there, comes out every few hours to stretch his legs. In the daytime he likes to sit and sleep on his blanket on the kitchen floor, looking out of the window. Occasionally he goes to his crate to sleep in the daytime. I don’t know how much more he will grow now-he’s 9 months old. He mostly likes to sleep curled up at the bottom of the crate. It was sold on Amazon as a large, and is 95-100cm in length (rough measurement using my iPhone). He can stand up in it at the moment, though his back is touching it now. I would be more concerned about the height of it if he gets locked in it, but he doesn’t.

I know in my part of the UK (who knows, it may be the whole country now), people tend to make you feel very guilty for leaving your dog at home during the day. I’m convinced this is all being driven by the dog walkers themselves. Its actually having the opposite effect in some ways and lots of dogs are not able to be re-homed as even the re-homing centres are refusing to let dogs go to homes where they will be left alone in the day. It’s a ridiculous situation. So don’t get caught up in all of that if it goes on in your country too. Every dog is different, we both work full time but I’m lucky enough that mostly I can have my lunch break at home. If not I ask my dad to pop round. We fitted a camera in the kitchen where Ben is during the day. He mostly just sleeps and plays with his balls/Kong. He looks out the window too. Mostly seems fine. At all other times (apart from at night) he is with us. He sits and watches TV with us and we play with him, goes out with us when we do errands, all sorts. He gets two walks a day, before work and after He’s a great puppy and seems really happy, and is incredibly loving towards us both.

Ah yes, my puppy does the spinning and somersaulting when we cross a big road also! I have no idea why, or how he even knows it’s different from being on the pavement. He also still bites bites his own lead on walks when he sees another dog that he wants to go and say hi to. I can stop him doing it by standing still for a while and ignoring him. But I’d love for him just not to do it in the first place. He will happily walk on the pavement sensibly, and if another dog walks past us that too is fine, as he can sniff them and say hello. It’s when they’re on the other side of the road and he can’t get to them when it’s a problem. He knows “wait”, from when we are on walks and he goes too far ahead. So I’ve just extended that to crossing busy roads. I tell him to sit, and then say “wait” every so often. Once it’s clear I say “come on Ben” and we walk over.

She’s beautiful. I’d say with some certainty she’s a Border Collie, don’t think she’s got anything else in her. Facially she’s so similar to our Ben, he does have all the whispy bits round his ears though and being a boy has more masculine features.

I agree. It all seems to come out quite soft anyway with him licking at it and squeezing it. It just means he gets a bit more time out of the Kong. If if I don’t freeze it I can stuff it full of stuff and it still can sometimes only take him 25 minutes to finish it. He’s a Kong pro!

What do you put in the frozen Kong? I mostly go for veg that is said to be dog safe, some cheese, and peanut butter. I’m going to Pets at Home now so I’ll look for some of the other recommendations. Ben seems really bored of his dry food now. Each meal gets eaten, but over a few hours sometimes. Up until a month ago it was wolfed down in one sitting!

Ben is 8 months old!