Oh my god this dog stuff is exhausting!!
7.a.m. on the road to a nearby sheep farm 8:30 a.m. - 7 p.m. attend a herding clinic given by Tanya Wheeler, Mady is wonderful! 8:00 p.m. get home from the clinic 8:00 p.m. - 11:00 p.m. groom Mady, bathe Mady, dry Mady, groom Mady again... did I mention it had been pouring rain all night and morning and Mady spent 12 hours frolicking in muddy sheep poop?  11:30 p.m. collapse into bed...  |
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| Shhewwww That was a busy day. Glad Mady and family had a great time. Did you take pictures? Cant wait to see. Lisa and Frankie |
| Exhausting but you'd do it again just for the joy Mady had and your love for her. Good daddy for taking the stinky sheep smell from the sheepie and getting her all warm and fluffy again before bed. |
| David is amazing. The last thing I had energy for after getting back from a day on the farm was bathing Mady, but he knew that she had to get cleaned up and so he did it. No heart attack is going to slow my man down when it comes to caring for his furry baby girl! But this does raise an issue that I would like some guidance on from any of you herders or farmers out there who keep your dogs in full coat. Is it even possible? Do we have to choose between herding as an activity (and I think that Mady enjoys herding) and keeping her in long coat? She loves herding, she looks so happy out there, and I love her long coat. Can I have both? Oh, and does anyone have a sheep farm for sale? |
| Only if you really love grooming her after each event. Wet is bad enough, when you think if the heavy groundcover back in the Old Country. But when you add in mud and animal feces, working dogs were either kept in shorter coat or bred with shorter hair. Look at some breeds, the body hair is longer but the legs are shorter haired.....feathers out back not withstanding. Guard dogs had longer coat as they weren't mucking about. They ran off predators and the longer coat gave them protection is scuffles......and made them appear larger than they were. Even Chewie got a hair cut after he ended his ring competition. He's still a fluffy boy complete with Shrek horn buds to hold back his face hair. You can get leggings for Mady, but would they be a distraction? Probably. (I'm not saying for whom they would be a distraction, people, dog or sheep) You'll have to decide on hair length and her "job." |
It does create some dilemna.  Also, the condition of the area you do your herding in plays into your options. At our house, the sheep have dirt areas close to the barn that get muddy when wet. Otherwise, the rest is a grazed down grassy surface. My friend's place where we have class is a bit more dirt, but still is mostly grassy. So even on a wet day, it's not a total disaster. Sunday at nationals Chewie was the only JHD OES in the mud pit of an outdoor arena. All the rest were HCT legs one or two, and indoors in the arena. He got MUDDY, I know some people got pictures, but I haven't received any of them yet (hint!!). My camera was used to video, and it won't upload onto youtube after many tries...but anyway,.... he was dirty. He was out w/me or in his crate the rest of the day (we were in the AM) and I brushed out as much as I could as he dried. Lots came out of the belly and upper legs, the lower 6 inches of foot/leg hair was still damp and dirty. I ran a couple inches of water in our tub (hotel, shame on me), used a cup as a scoop and floated out/rinsed out the bulk of it (it was kind of a sand/gravel/paste) and splashed it out of his belly, and used the bar soap as shampoo. I had brought my own towels with, and squeezed/blotted him out, then fluff/brushed as he dried. He really came clean, and it only took a bit over an hour all told. This is him the next day, getting his agility awards - he really was clean!  and then this picture at home yesterday, with no further bathing (besides his face/mouth area) - also shows more coat detail.  His coat is between 4-6 inches long, depending on where on the body you measure. I like this length - it is long enough to look like a hairy dog, but pretty manageable. I do plan on taking it down a bit now, as we will be doing a lot more carting in harness. He gets too hot, and the harness rubs mats into his coat. And I will shave his belly again, as that helps cool him (and cleans up easier) also I can pretty much trim or not to suit our needs. You can do the same w/ Mady.  |
after watching you and Chewie do your thing I got the same herding bug that Dave and Maddy have.  Bella passed herd instinct test and now we are signed up for our first herding lesson this coming Sunday. I wanted to say you and Chewie looked great out in that muddy mess of an arena and everyone had a blast watching you two work. I assume she won the class since it looked like it to us newbies. I'm glad to see and hear how easy it is to clean them up. I was worried since it will probably be a mud fest this weekend. Hubby is so excited about the herding he asked when are we getting sheep.....anyone got any hanging around they want to unload for a sheep starved sheepie |
sheepiegail wrote: after watching you and Chewie do your thing I got the same herding bug that Dave and Maddy have. Bella passed herd instinct test and now we are signed up for our first herding lesson this coming Sunday. I wanted to say you and Chewie looked great out in that muddy mess of an arena and everyone had a blast watching you two work. I assume she won the class since it looked like it to us newbies. I'm glad to see and hear how easy it is to clean them up. I was worried since it will probably be a mud fest this weekend. Hubby is so excited about the herding he asked when are we getting sheep.....anyone got any hanging around they want to unload for a sheep starved sheepie You should have introduced yourselves!!! I'm glad you and Bella did come and test, and that you passed. It is a great feeling seeing our dogs turn onto the sheep  We didn't qualify - and neither did the other dogs in JHD. I'm glad we at least looked good out there. And really glad neither one of us wiped out! Good luck with your classes ...and getting some sheep!  |
| The herding workshop was at the same farm as the instinct test back in May, and will be the same location for training. At the herding instinct in May it was dry and Mady didn't get anymore dirty than she would at a dog park on a dry day. At the workshop as mentioned, it had been raining all week and overnight, and it was a wet muddy mess. I'm still committed to keeping her in full coat, and I figure it's fine as long as I want to put the work in. It would be different if she was a working dog every day in those conditions, but even if we're going once per week for lessons, when it's dry it's ok, when it's muddy, she'll need bath and full grooming. Averaged out, it should be manageable. Mady had two sessions during the workshop, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. The morning was I was a bit disappointed. She was surprisingly shy and actually ran back to the gate a couple of times. But after speaking to the master herder, it seems because we were trying to train her with some basic positioning, and this threw her off a bit. But the 2nd run, she did fantastic, she was picking up really fast and learning the positioning and stopping immediately. The herder said she'd learn really quickly and be easy to train. She's such a smart cookie. I wonder if she learned a bit by watching all the other dogs in between her turns? |
OMG, what a busy day for you!!! It seems it wasnt as busy and exhausting for Mady!! I cant imagine you gave her a bath so late in the evening after you had such a long day  well done!! |
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