Bart

Bret used to be Jet, then we tried to Jeddy. Now he is a maverick, Bart and Bret. I am thinking of calling Flint, Beau. Did you see this story? Is it possible our dogs know what day it is?

By Robert Singer I have five border collies waiting for me to start the day; they don’t care if it’s raining. Click here to read the rest of the story and see an image of them waiting for me in their 4-wheel drive kennel to entertain them. Border Collies In The Rain Robert Singer writes for The Market Oracle and The Peoples Voice

All 5 of my border collies have access to my bedroom. Some sleep on the bed, others on the floor and Bart always sleeps outside. They have a morning routine that begins at a different time every day. Therefore they either don’t know how to tell time or their routine begins when they can sense when I am about to wake up. Yes, I agree it could be a coincidence that each morning at that exact moment when I come out of a deep sleep and am about to open my eyes, the routine begins. Bart after being outside all night comes in the bedroom. And regardless of how many other border collies are strewn about the room he makes his way to the head of the bed and puts two paws right up next to my face and makes a combination whine, howl and growl. If I had to express the sound in words it would be: It’s time to get up.. I am bored. How much sleep do you need, let’s get this day going. This morning I wasn’t ready to get up and most of the time it works to just ignore him and make some excuse. I was up last night looking on the Internet to see if anyone is reading my latest article (Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité – Providence, Miracle or What Really Happened) go back to bed, I will get up later. I usually can go back to sleep but not today, FRIDAY. Bart’s whineghowlgrowl is especially intense and his signal got the pack in frenzy. They are now all jumping on the bed and whining Bart’s, right lets going. I now have to cover my face with the sheet or risk get an eye gouged out with a flying paw because they are all in too close for comfort, so a fight is now possible. Finally Bart gave up, left the room and the chaos subsided. What was different? We go herding (sheep) at Judy’s on FRIDAY. Bart's website http://www.k9baseball.com Bob also posts political stuff at http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/UserInfo-Rob...Singer.htmlJuly 3, 2009

My dogs haven't seen sheep for at least six months. Yesterday I felt sorry for them and I took all five of them to Judy Vanderford's. She has so many sheep and areas to work it was actually easy to work 5 dogs. Since I hadn't worked them for so long they forgot all my inconsistent incoherent commands and their natural instinct returned. Toward the end of the day I was moving the sheep from one pen to another and they had to pass the area where they are fed. The Sheep were hungry, they wanted to eat but I was too lazy to shut the gate to the feeding area. I wanted to try and command my only trained dog Flint to move them without having to shut the gate. Judy was amused at my lame attempt to command Flint in time to keep them from breaking into the feeding area and kept telling me to shut the gate. She noted I was not thinking fast enough to accomplish the task. It looked impossible and so Judy got her BC and sure enough her dog took the commands and did it beautifully. I went to try it again and this time I let the dog and sheep settle before I tried giving the commands fast enough when I noticed Flint working them on his own. Then it hit me, I am standing at the gate, he knows where I want the sheep to go, maybe I should just shut up and see what happens. You guessed it he got them through the gate without any commands. His technique was different than Judy's and the geometry he used to keep them from getting into the feeding area was quite impressive. Why wouldn't he be able to do it? The dog is not stupid, he sees me at the gate, I don't know how to read sheep, I should just keep quiet and leave him alone. Next I tried Jeddy and you could see his inexperience. He knew what I wanted and was working on his own but he kept flanking them and all that did was give them time and space to get to the feeding area. After three times I could see it wasn't going to happen and then I did something very strange. I went and got Bart. Bart who displayed incredible talent when he was 9 months and then according to all the experts I ruined him teaching him behaviors: baseball, basketball, agility following a rope, sorting and reading. I will admit he did quit herding for about 3 months. Bart got them through the Gate without commands as well. He used the same technique as Flint, although not as smooth (Flint is an 11 year old fully trained dog by Terry Parrish, Bart is 4, trained by me), but he was successful and forced them to enter the correct gate. When I do my exhibitions I always start out with "we don't know how smart these dogs are", because our dominant sense is sight and theirs is smell. I need to add "and because we don't know how smart they are" we under estimate them. My experience yesterday proves it. Bart's website http://www.k9baseball.com Bob also posts political stuff at http://www.marketoracle.co.uk/UserInfo-Robert_Singer.html

Our three border collies want to relocate to colorado and are willing to take us with them. They may or not take our 15 sheep but we want to get at least 5 scenic acres near a small town where people raise their own food and have their own wells (as opposed to a bedroom community). Any suggestions? what should we expect to pay, property could have a house or just land zoned for a modular.

he does so much he has his own website www.k9basketball.com. I have had to cut back on his activities (we have our own sheep) since I had to work this last few months. But he still gets more sheep and other training time than most dogs I know. He could be bored but I notice he is only doing it at night. last night at 1 Am I let him out because he was barking and I made the mistake of laying back down. I realized he was out and sure enough he escaped. I had to get in the truck and go find him. As soon as he heard the truck he came out of the brush and jumped in. I know it is dangerous, I just don't want to rush to alter him and find out it was not the cause.

he is two and half, I have heard both sides of the question regarding neutering and will probably do it after I capture his sperm (he is a fabulous dog). My question was whether I could explain his behavior or do something else to keep him from escaping other than kenneling him all the time. thanks for the responses..

My BC has now learned to escape from the fenced yard and has taken off several times on his own hike. Last night he got out and chased a coyote. He comes back directly, I keep pretty close tabs on my dogs so I know if they got away sometimes within minutes. He so far comes back directly either when he is out of breath or hears me call him. He doesn't show any obvious signs he is looking to mate but will fight with my other bc who was in tact until he was 2. What are your thoughts on altering him.

my 2.5 bc has had two episodes in 1.5 years, one just yesterday. He can't stand up and trembles. Does not lose consciousness and does not froth, just looks pathetic and will let you comfort him. the first 1.5 years ago (we spend a lot of time with our dogs, it is possible he had others) was about 15 seconds this one lasted much longer at least 1-2 minutes. As before he his perfectly normal after the episode. Also and I think unrelated he has a little cough like he is clearing his throat that is so intermittent two vets said to ignore it. It never happens under stress and more often than not, when his under NOT stress. We have checked for everything and it does not seem to be contagious since my other two BC's do not have it.

I have 12 ewes that I could breed but have no experience with a ram. I understand BC's are not the best at controlling a ram and can be dangerous. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Don't know if you can make anything of this but here is what happened when I quit working two dogs together. I am not sure what i was doing really qualified as working two dogs but because it was inconvenient to work the dogs separately I would take two dogs down when i grazed the sheep in the AM. No real training just moving the sheep and containing them with two dogs. In fact they were sort of working together and I wasn't really doing any real training and since I had decided to abandon trialing I didn't really care. But one of them had torn a pad so I took just Jeddy down this AM. I had been getting annoyed with him since he hasn't settled down considering how much time on sheep he has had (sometimes an hour a day) probably more than most dogs ever get. I cursed my self over and over that I was a failure at training. But today I took him down by himself and he performed better than I had ever seen and better than I could have expected if I he had been in training all this time. I won't bore you with what he did but we were out 1 hour and he was a little intense but did well. Worked Bart next and had the same experience, he worked better than ever, then I got Reilley to work last and what do you know he worked better than ever as well.

I gave up trying to keep them quiet. I tried everything including a shock collar. I doubt if I am going to trial so the problem is how to get 3 dogs time on the sheep everyday in the most efficient manner and to keep it interesting. I have noticed they are trying to work together and don't mind if another dog is out there with them but can't stand it if they are tied up and have to watch.

how old are your dogs. I am hoping it will get easier as they get older. I have noticed the more I do it the better they seem to work as a team. When one is in front of the herd and the other is behind pushing I notice he will drop in place and wait. He hasn't learned yet to get behind, maybe he is waiting for a flank command from me. I think I need to do more with the name first and then the command.

by the way how old are your dogs? I have three, 2 are under 3 and 1 is about 1.5 years

Just today I was out with them and I noticed they are starting to listen to their name. That was my thought, their name and them a command, what else could you do if you want one to wait. I wasn't thinking of brace, just wanted a way to work them more efficiently. Having 0ne tied up and watching the other work was so distracting since I couldn't get them to stop barking. This way they both work and they don't seem to mind the other dog is with them.In fact I have two that really don't get along but work great together.