Sheepdog News

I took early retirement this spring so I could spend more time traveling around North America visiting my friends and running dogs. I think it was one of my most brilliant decisions yet. Time will tell what my friends think.

This trip started with Amanda's hospitality and I'm now headed to South Dakota for quick visit with Bud and Sarah Boudreau before heading up to Pat and Stormy Winter's place in Saskatchua for a longer visit and some more dog work. Once we are (I hope) all prepped, it's off to the EID trial of Ian and Joann Zoerb's in Alberta. I have never been to western Canada and I'm really looking forward to new trials.

Wandered around Amanda's this morning after she went to work, poor dear, admiring all her beautiful fields and gardens. The place is a real showcase. Worked all my dogs on about a dozen of her ewes and lambs in a field I had never been in before. Esther really looks good, if I do say so myself. Big question is if she can handle the western sheep and if I will be able to stop her. We'll see soon enough.

Hemp, Mirk, and Esther

Pulled the camper out on the road around 10:30 and headed west. Made pretty good time. Brief slow down in Toronto for rain and traffic. Endless one-hour wait to cross the border into Michigan.  They wanted to search the camper. So they look inside and never bother to look in the storage compartments which are big enough to hold an army. Go figure.

Attention, Walmart shoppers!

Stopped for the night at a great Walmart. Lovely big fenced in area at the back for dog walking. So kind of them to build all these combination shopping center campgrounds for me. Replenished my food stocks and made an early stop at 8:00.

I don't have an Iphone, so my blog entries are apt to be more sporadic than Bev's.  Furthermore, I am not retired, so I don't have all day to sit around and consider my blogs.  I dream of my rich sister Bev,  my rich sister Bev.   I sure dreamt of her last weekend when I was sandwiched in between her two dogs again in the results.  "First Prize goes to Bev Lambert and Hemp.  Second prize goes to Amanda Milliken and Clive. Third prize goes to Bev Lambert and Mirk."  That is the story of my life.  I will be working to change that over the next couple of weeks, just so that she doesn't think I am being charitable and letting her win out of kindness.

Bev is going to the Zoerb's trial.  Not me.  This western trip is already too long away from my life, which any onlooker would be shocked to learn is quite good, considering how much I take to the roads.  I could not pad another weekend onto the six weeks it is likely to require–the Canadian Championships, Soldier Hollow, Meeker, and then an endurance test to the National Finals two weeks later, with a painful return drive afterwards.  I am not so much a dog handler as a road rider.

I am training two Nursery dogs that I will be taking on the road.  One is already handy, Roz, who has won an open trial or two already.  Hands may recall the story of her being lost in an accident in Wyoming last year.  I worked her on Monday morning on the Waupoos sheep, while waiting for the trucks to return for the next load.  I have never won the Nursery.  Several times, people have expected me to do, but I never have.  There is an adage about history repeating itself.  Monty is Roz's cheerful younger brother.  He has been surprising me pleasantly for a few months now.  He is only one and a half, so good for next year's Nursery too.  I thought I detected some pressure cracks in him a couple of weeks ago, so I laid off which was easy, being so busy with the Kingston Trials.  He is being a good drug for his handler again and he loved the Waupoos sheep.  That makes me love that dog.  Both my Nursery dogs are from Ethel, by Stuart Davidson's (my) Star, the 2002 International dog.  The Star ones are running well for me.  Clive is one too.

Roz

My open dogs seem a little more complicated.  Clive is running well.  Ethel was spayed three weeks ago and had a post-op bleed that required rest.  She did not run in Kingston.  Now I have to get her back in shape to run her, not easy for a ten-year-old bitch.  Bart has severe spondolosis and does not have the pliability I like to run with.  If things go all right so does he, but if things go wrong, so does he.  I could run Roz, but she lacks experience.  I will have to see how everything transpires.  So many choices.

Clive

These five will be riding with me.

I have not yet organized my farm for my absence.  It is a busy little place.  If that doesn't work out, neither will my western trip.  and Charlie Torre will be a happy guy.  I'll stay home.   Bev will be there.

Perfect day to start my 2009 western odyssey since the sun is shining and it’s not raining. I am at Amanda Milliken’s farm in Kingston, Ontario. Sunday was the last day of the Kingston Sheepdog Trials and Amanda very kindly invited me to stay over at the farm and leave from here for my western trip, saving me a seven hour drive home for one night before starting west.

Let me introduce my canine traveling companions. I will be running Mirk and Hemp in the Open competitions.  Mirk is a three-year-old imported dog that I bought a year ago this spring from Florence Wilson and ran last year at Meeker and Soldier Hollow. Hemp is my husband’s dog raised and trained on our farm. He is five years old but has not had a great deal of experience since he has always been third dog to my old Bill and Pippa, now both retired. I ran Hemp at the finals last year, but a crossover cost us a place in the semi-finals. I was pleased with both dogs last year. While they didn’t place in any of the big trials, they managed the courses and sheep reasonably well. I hope this year with the additional experience they have had over the spring and summer to have more success.

I also have on this trip my nursery dog, Esther. She turned two in May. She came from Amanda, being a daughter of her Ethel and Star and littermate to Amanda’s very successful Roz. While Esther is not nearly as far along in her training as Roz, I like her quite a bit. For a long while I was not sure Esther would make a dog for me, but just in the last month I have begun to get quite enthusiastic about her and am now trying to hurry and get her trained well enough to be competitive at the nursery finals.

Yesterday was a rest day for the open dogs since they had both been lucky enough to make it through and run in the double lift final on Sunday. I had an opportunity to help move the trial sheep with Esther which was great as I don’t think she had ever worked anything quite as aggressive as the Wapoose sheep we use for the Kingston Trial. She had a little trouble moving them but hung in there in the face of stamping feet and threatening heads and got the job done.

The enjoyment of the sheep work was followed by a bit of real work as I helped Kate Broadbent and Amanda by running a few errands and generally acting as a gofer while they did the work of taking the course down and moving all the equipment back to the farm.

Today I plan to begin my driving so while I will keep you all posted about my progress–it isn’t going to be very exciting for a few days.

The results from Grass Creek Park will be posted regularly (they're promising every hour, and it might even happen!) throughout the event (August 5-9) on the CBCA site.

From time to time, I'd like to be able to call everyone's attention to some of the many private blogs that are out there in the webiverse. (When I started blogging about my first trial dog Phyl seven years ago, blogs were new and cool–I was the lone voice in the working BC world for quite some time.  Now there are lots of blogs, many of which are far better than my PhylBlog ever was.)  One blog that I particularly enjoy is Robin French's stories about the trials and tribulations of Shoofly Farm.  Robin writes in a very clear, detailed, and interesting way about training her dogs and competing with them in trials; she tends to be very honest, and I always learn a lot.  Check it out for yourself!

It's just about time for the Bluegrass, and I for one can't wait to get on the road and face those scary, undogged sheep!  For those not lucky enough to be going, check out the Open, Nursery, Ranch, Pro-Novice, and Novice running orders!

I have to hand it to the folks in charge of the 2009 Klamath Falls finals–they’re really on the ball and tech savvy.  First of all, they produced a really kick-ass promotional video that’s already pretty popular on YouTube:

They also have a wonderful web site–make especially sure that you visit their blog to get all the latest news of the road to the event (Scott Glen and Patrick Shannahan have posted some terrific articles there).  Keep it up, guys!

The results for the 2009 Sonoma Country Sheepdog Trial results are up.  Makes sure to check out Amanda Milliken's wonderful photos of the event!

Amelia Smith is offering to donate half of the subscription price of The Real Time Canine for the next six month to Mid-Atlantic Border Collie Rescue.  If you've been thinking about subscribing, now's the time!

I've recently become more and more addicted to Facebook, and much to my surprise (since I'm used to being in the forefront of sheepdog technology), lots of other sheepdoggers have put down stakes before me–the place is loaded with Open handlers, and plenty of amusing conversation.  If you haven't checked it out, I think you should: accounts are free (if you don't count selling your soul to advertisers), and it's a great way to waste time as we all wait for Spring to spring.