Wednesday, June 9, 2010

Getting off the property

Our field, being shaped an awful lot like a runway strip, isn't a very good place to work on outruns. Lucky me, my neighbour Don owns a fair bit of land in the valley and he lets me trailer sheep over to his fields to train. I can use whatever field the cows aren't in.

In the past I've happily trained on this field. 


and not so happily trained in this field. 


Here's a reminder in case you've forgotten.
 
http://tailsfromthedarkside.blogspot.com/2009/06/kates-first-field-trip.html

When I mentioned my misadventures to Don, he replied with something along the lines of "Lord, why would you want to work in that field when there's a 100 acre field just past it?" 

So...this week I went "just past it". 

 

It was a "pushing past the coats in the wardrobe" kind of drive. 

 









and coming out of the other side of the wardrobe...this.

 

Yep. That should do. 
 

The "We don't need no stinking dogs!" gang.


The sheep were "WE'RE FREEE!!!"  light so the dogs got a good work out, and the field is pretty typical for around here, with lots of hills and dips that don't really show up well in photos. These hills and dips led to lots of good "learning experiences" such as coming in way too tight and below where the sheep really were, or getting lost in the dips and and coming out about 150 yards too far past the sheep. Yep. LOTS of opportunity for "learning". 



Bruce pretending to be interested in the sheep. 

When really he was only interested in this.
Tired + Dirty = Happy Dogs

We'll definitely be heading back there on a regular basis. 
Speaking of "Getting off the property" - we're heading to Jasper for a week and half of camping with a bit of hiking and a whole lot of laziness. See you on the other side.

2 comments:

WalkOn Border Collies said...

I am SO jealous!!!!!!!!

nelda said...

Beautiful county, but even I don't think I can make that log house livable. But beautiful......