Vickie

I would take along photos of your dogs (just to show how proud you are of them), but agree the rest would be overkill. If I found a breeder & LOVED everything about them & their dogs, I would not go & see others. One question I will always ask a breeder from now on is what makes the dam & sire a good match, both in terms of physical attributes & in terms of temperament. I would be wary of any breeder who did not have an immediate answer for this and think it's an important question to hear a response on.

Is it OK to cross post this?

I agree that jealousy is a human emotion but for the purposes of this discussion, it is probably as good a word to use as any. You are not alone Sarah. Many, many dogs carry on at agility when the handler is running their other dog. I think there are a few of reasons why they do: First and foremost, most of us are considerate of other people at trials, so in trying to keep noise to a minimum, the first thing we do is give them attention when they carry on. They learn really quickly that making a fuss will probably make us come back. Secondly, in training, we have revved them up & rewarded them for following our commands. It is very hard for some dogs (mine included) to sit & watch us give commands to another dog. Mine are so programmed to following what I say that they don't seem to realise I am not saying it to them. Thirdly, trials are often a highly charged atmosphere. Many dogs get excited watching other dogs run, but when they have to watch their owner & their mate it can be too much. Adrenalin levels are higher at trials (both ours & theirs) & being confined with all that adrenalin & nothing to do with it can & does cause unwanted behaviours. Things which I think can help: I always cover the dog I am not running, just while I run. I never go back if there is a fuss as I don't want them to be rewarded for the fuss. I ask a friend to stand near the crate. Mine won't take food at a trial while I am running the other dog, but many dogs will & this often helps to feed them while they are quiet. I tend to get someone else to bang the crate & it usually works but I wouldn't do/advise this for all dogs. I also discovered that at training (not at trials), my dogs are much happier & can sit & watch quietly in a stay if they are not confined in any way. I think doing this at training has certainly helped them settle at trials. The last trial I went to, someone handed me a tub of food & asked me to get her dog to do tricks while she ran the other one. I didn't know what tricks he knew but he was a good boy & was so happy to show me all his tricks that I knew his whole repertoire by the time she came back. He was fully aware she was running & usually goes beserk, but he was having fun, so his attention was 100% on me. At the end of the day, remember that there are much worse things in life than having a dog so keen to play with you that they go crazy when they can't. Hope this helps. Vickie

I have friends who breed foxhounds & hunting horses. I believe they still do hunts. Noy sure if it's a secret/allowed or not?

I think the answer is probably yes, they can pant more, because they tend to do more. Some breeds/types within breeds will keep going for as long as you ask them to and I certainly know kelpies that fall into this category. They will often chase a ball for as long as you will throw it. While some breeds may not be as interested or obsessive and stop when they are tired, other breeds would literally fall over from exhaustion unless you stop the game. How is his weight? can you feel all his ribs? can you post a pic? If he is carrying any excess weight that would certainly contribute to panting. My dogs all pant at various times, the more humid it is, the more they tend to pant after exercise. They do recover quite quickly though. If your dog is panting drastically for 20 mins or more after exercise then I would be worried about that.

I wonder if (whatever the initial cause) it has now just become a habit? Based on your information, I think I would probably try to make a list of when he lifts his leg inappropriately. Then go about recreating each of those situations. So if he does it for a pat...build it up until you can give him a really big exciting pat. It's probably not too hard to stop him lifting his leg while you are doing each thing, just by placing your hand in the right spot & rewarding for not lifting the leg. In other words, force/encourage him to form a new habit. Just trying to think outside the square... I think sometimes we spend far to much time wondering why & that time can often be better spent just fixing it.

I like free shaping too & agree that for us, the behaviours that are shaped seem more solid & tend to be performed more enthusiastically. One of my dogs doesn't free shape well. He just doesn't get it, not matter how long I wait or how hard I try. One is renowned for giving the whole repetoire initially but quickly settles down & concentrates on the task at hand. I just don't reward for what I don't want. Shine is probably the best at it as it relates to objects. In anticipation, she tends to zero in on something, whatever is closest & checks in with me to see she has it right. If we are standing in the yard & there is a box (that she jumps in), weaves & a jump, she will first see if she can work out what I want by the position I put her in. If that is unclear, she will lock into one of the objects with her eyes. If I give no response, she will try another object until she gets a yes from me & then we start. It seems to work for us & once she knows what I am after, off she goes at it. Obviously I try when starting something new to make it as unconfusing as possible. Definitely patience is required, but I think it's worth it. I mean there are worse things in training than a dog who is desperately trying to earn a reward .

very complicated I think. I have had quite a few people ask if I would breed one of my bitches. A couple from agility, a few 3 sheep triallers, and a couple who work dogs for a living. I think it would require a lot more than my time & dedication in training. She obviously can do what she was bred for & has enough talent that people want her offspring. For me to justify breeding her, I would have to have enough knowledge to understand in depth the traits I would want to reproduce, and know enough to pick a stud dog with traits to compliment hers. AND...(and this for me is a big and), someone else would not be breeding (and doing it better than I could), the exact same thing in a dog. I spayed her. Her sisters have both been bred & they produce great pups. Who am I to think I could do the same thing with a lot less experience under my belt, even if I do have the time?

That's cool Rubedoo . Having your own stuff is great & helps with training so much, especially for weaving & contacts. I finally bought my first competition weave poles last week. I wish I hadn't waited so long, they are GREAT!!! I would not recommend weaving (other than basic entries) or full sized Aframes (other than an end behaviour) for dogs under 12-18 months (depending on growth). Tunnels are fine, but too much too soon can create a tunnel suck pretty easily.

Thanks Jed, your posts have always struck me as being rational & open in the past. I guess I can see why you got a little heated. I guess your reasons for posting in this thread are similar to mine. I don't believe these types of statements: are fair as they relate to herding dogs and it bothers me to think that the casual reader thinks working breeders are all shit, or worse. As you & I know, they often breed with dedication & ethics too.

I suggest you go & read the extended Border Collie standard, especially the movement section. Interesting though that this was the only section of my post you commented on.

and the best way to test that soundness is by comparing every aspect of structure to a piece of paper (that can & is interpreted in a number of ways)? or to have the dog move around a ring with a style of gait that is totally foreign to the task it is supposed to be bred for? sound? sound for what? My opinion is that the best way to test for soundness relating to what the breed is supposed to be able to do is to actually do it with the dog and it's parents and it's parents before that etc. I believe that is a much better test of whether a dog will break down or not, but that is just my opinion, I may be missing the point.

I think to blame "the standard" or the way it is interpreted, (although there are some valid arguments for doing so) is missing the point Jules. The biggest issue the people I support believe is that since the traits required for herding are so incredibly complex, to introduce any other selection criteria (such as appearance) into breeding is to compromise those thngs they consider important and crucial to maintaining the breed as it has always been. Here's an anaolgy, I was just outside looking at my ripening mandarins on our tree & it occurred to me (yes I know it's weird , but hey so am I). My mandarins look totally different to the supermarket ones, they tend to be on the small size, it varies a bit, they are full of seeds, their colour ranges from a pale lime orange colour to rich orange and they are sometimes a bit blemished. But they are the best damned mandarins I have ever tasted. They serve a purpose for me, my friends & family, we love them & can't get enough of them. I don't buy mandarins from supermarkets. They look good, perfect uniform colour & shape, hardly any seeds & unblemished...but they serve no purpose for me b/c quite honestly they taste like crap. They may look good in my fruit bowl & I'm sure a lot of effort went into making them so perfect, but...I don't like them & won't buy them. I know it is ridiculous to compare a dog to a piece of fruit, and I know the process of creation has few parallels. All I am saying is that sometimes in trying to achieve something else, you can lose aspects of what is really important and I believe that is what has happened to the conformation bred BC.

I don't understand your animosity Jed? It seems out of character. I don't understand why you are more entitled to an opinion than I am? I am no expert either, but my opinions are based on knowledge, research & experience. They just happen to be different to yours. I don't say standards are rot and I appreciate the dedication & success that people put into achieving them. But for my breed, the Border Collie, I believe that focussing on a conformation standard is detrimental to the breed. This is not something I sat down & personally came up with on a rainy day, it is an opinion I share with those far more knowlegeable & experienced than I am. There are books written about it, the biggest purebred BC registry in the world took the Kennel Club to court over it. Surely you can be open to the fact that there is some merit in the discussion? The country of origin is still breeding outstanding dogs just as they have done for hundreds of years, without any attempt to focus on a conformation standard and the dogs still look and work just like they did before Australia tried to "improve" the breed. There needs to be a distinction made between a farmer who puts 2 pure or crossbred dogs together to get pups and one who maintains pedigrees and breeds the best he can with certain traits in mind. The 2nd type of purebred breeder puts every bit as much effort into improving his lines as a dedicated conformation breeder does. If a conformation breeder breeds 2 dogs which have 6 generations behind them that resemble the standard very closely, the likelihood is that nearly all the offspring will also resemble the standard very closely. Same for the working breeder, 2 great workers with generations of great workers behind, will for the majority produce great workers. There are great breeders of conformation dogs and there are great breeders of working dogs...and there are also duds in both too. I am happy for you to call me a smart arse know it all, but I think you also need to accept that the opinion I have about my breed is shared by many (actually the majority of Purebred BC breeders) with concrete facts & logical arguments and more experience than you or I will ever have with working dogs. I don't see them as "rubbishing the standards" so much as desperately & successfully trying to prove that one particular breed is better off without them.

What a ridiculous statement. Not only is it inappropriately emotive, it is simply not factual. How about this instead? Just like show breeders, farmers keep only the best to go forward with. A farmer breeds a litter in order to get 1 or 2 working dogs to replace current dogs. He picks what he thinks are the best at a very young age and has no use for the others & in some isloated areas no way or inclination to find homes for them. They are disposed of. Some farmers believe that if a dog is not showing everything they want to see at 8-12 weeks, they are no good. Different lines mature & switch on at different ages, some farmers do not believe this and are not willing to waste their time on something that is not as good as others they have to choose from. They are disposed of. Some farmers have no time to give 2nd chances, if a pup displays any undesirable traits related to work or not. The farmer cannot afford to take the chance & spend time training the pup if there is a possibility it is no good. They are disposed of. Some pups show little or no work ability, for any number of reasons. There are plenty of talented rescue dogs around, one man's trash is another man's treasure. Do I condone disposing of dogs? of course not! but to say that every dog who dies on a farm does so because it did not have any ability is just not true. We have a dog in our family, a working kelpie who spent the first few years of his life on a station. He is a good dog, very talented & served his master well His job ended when they moved off the station. He has been on a chain for the last 5 years. He is given food but that is about it. It may seem he is one of the lucky ones...to be kept alive. Honestly I wish he had become one of those corpses you talk about. It would have been much more humane than the life he is now forced to lead.

Of course they are, isn't that the point of this whole discussion?

good suggestions .

Hi Jason & welcome .What kind of information are you after? You will find lots of people on here very experienced in both agility & obedience who will be happy to help. Where are you located? One idea would be to go along to a club and have a look at the training process & visit a trial or two so you know what the end result should be.

Have a look at this page: http://stilhope.com/stilhopemain.htm do you recognise a breed just by looking at the images? These dogs were not bred to any standard other than work & yet they are still recognisable as a specific breed. If you google sheepdog trial galleries, you will find hundreds of pages of Border Collies, one after another, none bred to breed standard, all bred to work standard. They may have different markings/colours/earsets, but are recognisable as the same breed often in appearance but mostly in what they do & how they do it.

Interesting statement. Your opinion is of course your own, but not everyone needs to agree with it and many don't. Thank goodness for that! In some breeds, without your so called "working mongrels", the breed would cease to exist in a true working capacity. The fundamental problem I have with the above is that no-one (at least in herding breeds) is out there proving this in any more than a recreational capacity. When farmers start purchasing dogs bred to the standard because they are more funtional/talented than dogs not bred to the standard, I may start to believe your arguments, but until then I firmly believe that the current standard is not only unessential for my breed, it is detrimental for it's future. If you had 2 dogs, with talent scores: 1 is a Choc tri , prick eared "9/10" & the other is a B&W, semi erect ears "6/10", is it right to stick to the standard? red is a fault(but only in Aust.), blue is acceptable. Is it essential? What happens when you continue to do this over a period of time? The answer is all around you... As a case in point, the majority of the foundation (most successful/talented/funtional) Border Collie's in the history of the breed DO NOT meet our Australian standard. Thank God, they ignored the standard (even if Dougie did call them "boarding house stew").

Just 2 light sources, it's all I have. They are 150W globes on adjustable stands. well, I should say all I had. I now have one after Shine knocked one of the stands over this morning & smashed the globe ). I am going to try to buy a couple more this week.

Thanks, I guess I could fix it up with PS...but the aim is to not have to do that. Here is another attempt, I think it's a bit better technically but I like the other one better conceptually

not many that I'm not embarrassed to show . Here is one I took this morning of a spinning top. I still have a long way to go...but better than I cold have done without my homemade contraption.

I think lots of words could be "correct" according to the dictionary...doesn't mean they are always appropriate or meaningful in context through. Take "pedigree" for example. My dictionary says having a register of ancestors. Funnily enough, as per your example, there are people who feel their dogs are the only "proper" dogs according to one specific registration & get shirty when others use the word according to the dictionary. Is that ridiculous too?

I tend to get a little irritated when people use the term "work" to describe obedience or agility. I often hear people say their dog is working well & it just doesn't sit right with me. I am not saying it is wrong, it is just a term I don't use. There is a vast difference in my dog's attitude from agility to sheep. Agility is fun and although they are very driven & giving it their all, it is still a game for them. I do not work sheep for a living, but my dogs take it very seriously when I put them on sheep. It doesn't seem to matter to them whether we are moving groups of sheep around in a work situation or training flanks in a small yard, their demeanor is the same & it is very serious business for them. They treat it as a job, not a game that has a reward at the end. Trim can look intense in pretty much everything I ask her to do...but I have never been able to get the same focus from her in sports/tricks/training as you see in the pic below where she is working sheep. I remember sending her on a cast out in a paddock once, she was running up the fenceline & there was a horse & rider in the next paddock running up the other side of the fence, parallel to her. LOL, to my knowledge she had never seen a horse before. She did the funniest double take I have ever seen & then back to her sheep & she never looked at the horse again. I can guarantee she would have had a different reaction in agility. It is just different for her, one is work & one is a game. So I use a different word.