Working Lambs and a puzzle unsolved

Thanksgiving weekend was much fun...after the family dinner at our house on Thursday, I got up at 3am Friday morning to leave for Vergil and AnneMarie Holland's beautiful farm down in Kentucky for their Turkey Trot Trial. It was an easy drive, and I got there in plenty of time for the Ranch class, which Sue and Luc were entered in.

The trial field is characteristically Kentucky...with rolling hills and interesting terrain, lots of trees on the edges and some in the center of the field. The people are warm and friendly - and competitive! The Holland's have quite a few sheep these days, with choices of several flocks, and he decided to run the flock of spring hair lambs for the Ranch class. That was it - 4 lambs, no ewes. No leader. These lambs had never been worked in small groups and proved to be quite challenging for the young dogs! More than half the class either retired or got dq'd. Challenging may be the understatement of the day.

Luc went first, and the hills caused him to cross over. I did get him stopped, but not before he crossed the center line, and he did then go out on the same side I sent him after all. Success! (Last year was Maya's first time on this field, and it took me two runs just to get her to find the sheep, and finally by her fourth run she was able to get herself out there.) There was a dog-leg fetch thru a deep valley that runs across the field and we did that OK, then an interesting drive which was also good. These lambs had never been penned, and didn't want any part of it, and we timed out at the pen, after Luc gave a great effort and worked the lambs quite well. I was very pleased with his run.

Sue went last, and she ran out well, having no problems with the hills at all. Just like her dad! She lifted beautifully and had a great fetch. Our drive was going very well until the cross drive panel when Sue was pretty sure she had to cover the pressure and insisted on taking a very wide flank at the panel, (just like her dad) so I worked on that a bit and showed her how to hold the pressure in a different way. She got it, and we then worked at the pen, but did not get them in before the timer went off. She had a very nice run!

None of my young dogs have worked lambs very much, since we haven't lambed for the last three years...and they did a great job, I was very pleased with their maturity and the way they handled the lambs!

Maya ran early on Saturday in Open, on the same field with a longer outrun and a much longer and very difficult drive. This time we ran 4 spring lambs from the wool flock...even more challenging than the hair lambs, but their behavior Saturday was easy compared to the next day, as it would turn out. Maya's outrun was a little tight, but her lift and fetch were good. We had a bit of trouble at the drive away panels, but overall a nice drive. Our task was to split the lambs in the shedding ring, which we did very well, then regather and pen. I was closing the gate on the pen when the timer went off...so no pen points!  Bummer! We ended up in 6th place, even with no pen.

Sunday proved to be the most challenging run of all. The group of lambs that we drew to run the course and prove our merit was about as tough as it gets. We had one lamb that just wanted to bolt - anywhere - all the time. And the other three just wanted to eat. Apparently they worked up an appetite the day before.

So, we did our best to manage our small flock, but I didn't handle it very well. Nor did Maya. By the turn around the post, I realized just how difficult this run would be, and by half way up the drive away, I was considering giving up. What I managed to do was create a situation where my dog was holding the running lamb quite well, but because of her positioning to do that, the three others felt free to just drop their heads and graze. Every time I tried something to get this flock moving well, it failed...and what I ended up with was a dog who was not releasing on her flanks at all, and eyeing on her sheep, moving them at a snail's pace. Yiikes! My worst nightmare.

I decided not to give up, but to keep trying to solve this puzzle so that we would have more information for the next time this might come up. Eventually we timed out on the drive, puzzle unsolved. Wow...that was a humbling experience! And, yes, I will keep working on it and let you know what we figure out!

We'll have lambs in the spring and lots of opportunities for new skill building!