County Clare and the Burren

Wednesday, September 18, 2019
Burren National Park, County Clare, Ireland
The sheepdog demonstration, which took place at a farm next to Caherconnell stone fort, was very interesting.  The three dogs were named Lee, Sally, and Rose.  Two of them are border collies and the other is half collie and half Scottish cattle dog.  They would each respond to their names, and to a specific whistle from the handler.  And they could be instructed in five ways: left, right, away (from the sheep), approach (the sheep), and lie down.  The paces through which they were put included splitting the sheep up, isolating a specific sheep, and rounding the sheep up near the farmer.  Only the females (and not all of them) are trainable for working sheep.  (The dogs that work cattle cannot work sheep because they are too rough).  After the demo, the handler was very willing to answer questions, and listening to him was better than a poetry reading.

Comments

2025-02-16

Comment code: Ask author if the code is blank