Category: Pic of the day
Molly Completes Our Kelpie Trio
Molly joins us as Kelpie number three! We’re very pleased to welcome our latest Kelpie puppy Molly to join our other Kelpies Will and Tucker, as trainee sheep and cattle herding dogs. Mollie is super-obedient at the moment, a real pleasure to have around but of course, she’s only been with us for a few days. Once she begins to settle in fully and gain… Read more.
Pic of the Day – Eric’s finding his place
AND his name! It turns out that the Chihuahua, formerly known as Emrys, is actually called Eric. Eric’s been with us for a week now, and is starting to find his place within the pack. I’d assumed that Eric’s “pack” would be the existing small dogs, Alfie and Chester, but Eric’s clearly aiming higher than that. Eric’s perfectly happy in the house, organising Alfie and… Read more.
Training your dog with cattle or ducks
“Starting your Border Collie on Cattle, Sheep or Ducks” – from the Website Shop Not all Border collies are needed to work sheep; we’ve had dogs attending our courses who were needed to work with cattle, alpacas, goats and turkeys. Although we don’t keep cattle ourselves, it was often useful to have Carew on hand. From time to time we needed to collect sheep from… Read more.
Pic of the day – Puppies! Hurrah!
We’re delighted that one of our favourite collies, Isla, has produced a litter of seven fabulous puppies. Of course we’re just assuming, at the moment, that they’ll be fabulous, but with Isla for a mother, and a father like Ezra, what else could they possibly be? The puppies, four girls and three boys, were born 5 days earlier than we expected, but this is Isla’s… Read more.
Three Years Ago Today!
As we await the coming storms, remember March 2013 As we bask in glorious sunshine today it’s hard to imagine there are some unpleasant storms approaching the UK. I was looking through some old photos recently and came across some which I took on this day (March 25th) in 2013. We don’t expect (or want) snow in late March, but there was more than just… Read more.
Dogs aren’t the only ones who can learn
People ask if sheep are clever? Perhaps not clever, exactly, but our sheep have become experts at avoiding pressure Our sheepdog training course yesterday was a great demonstration of just how clever sheep can be. Many people believe sheep aren’t intelligent because, to us, they seem to do some very unwise thing. Anyone who has lived with sheep has a lot more respect for them.… Read more.
Tucker and Pip
Keeping two puppies demands extra time and attention. However, when they’re as gorgeous as our Kelpie and collie youngsters, it’s not a hardship. We’re still very sad since losing Mel so recently. Yet, having the other dogs around, especially puppies Tucker (a Kelpie) and Pip (a Border collie), is a great tonic. It’s impossible to be sad when they’re around. Despite Pip being several weeks… Read more.
The End of an Era – Mel
So sad to report that Mel died yesterday One day I’ll write a page in memory of Mel. She’s probably the greatest sheepdog we’ve ever had the privilege to know and work with. Mel’s daughter Carew was far easier to control around sheep, and was definitely easier to stop (I couldn’t actually get Mel to stand still with her four feet on the ground until… Read more.
Pic of the day – Catching up
Life’s slowly returning to normal after a trying month There’s been a distinct lack of news here in recent weeks, due to our domestic ‘flu epidemic (if two makes an epidemic). Luckily we weren’t ill at the same time, but for some weeks we’ve been operating with a skeleton staff, first Andy and then me, just keeping things ticking over and the dogs clean, exercised… Read more.