With the SARDA Obedience Test out of the way we started to look towards the Stock Test, a process to ensure that a search dog poses no danger to livestock while working and is not distracted from its task when operating in their vicinity. It involves the dog walking on and off the lead in close proximity to sheep, being able to stay put while sheep are driven within 5 m, and to recall through a flock.
Well actually, I was so surprised by the Obedience Test result that I felt the need to keep the pressure on the obedience work as well as think about the Stock Test. I doubt we will ever get to the stage where she is too obedient! But anyway.
With the season rapidly approaching lambing time, it was not a great time to be getting access to them. There were a couple of places I knew where a public footpath crossed sheep fields, but we were very much limited to walking the line of the right-of-way while the sheep moved off to the far corner.
We approached our farming neighbours who very kindly allowed us access to their sheep fields, populated by year old ewes who were a flighty bunch but critically, not pregnant.
We made our first forays shortly after the first of a sequence of winter storms that had caused flooding along the estuary and beyond. The floods had subsided, and from a distance it looked fine, but on closer inspection the water table sat somewhere just below the tips of the grass. We set off with Venn working on a 15m line to help her feel like she was acting under her own choices, but giving me a panic button if things went wrong. With a small puppy jumping in every available puddle, and dragging a long line through the mud, we were very rapidly covered in filth. Even the ‘Bananas Of Power’ briefly lost their squeak after getting waterlogged.
For the next two weeks or so we made frequent visits to the fields. My first objective was to make being close to sheep unremarkable, so we played games and did obedience drills in sight but some distance from the sheep. As our confidence grew we were able to work closer and closer until our first drive past. I put her in a ‘Wait’ while some stragglers ran through the gateway we were stood at to re-join the main flock and she held firm. Fantastic. We stayed with the acclimatisation exercises on some days, and Jacky came down to help drive the sheep for closer work on others. It all looked great and so I arranged for some of the trainers to come down and see what they thought. On another wet and miserable day we essentially put her through a mock assessment and she gave a seamless performance.
Finally, something we were good at!
Alas no.
On the day before the formal assessment I remarked that she was being a bit wilful in her behaviour and that I hoped that was not a bad omen. On the day this seemed to continue as we got ready, and once in the field (a new venue for us) she was very distracted and sniffy. She was not too bad while I had her on the lead, but once off it was really difficult to maintain her focus. We might just have been scratching though, but on the drive-by she broke her hold. This would still be acceptable had she retreated or run to me, and it looked initially like she was doing the latter, but as the last sheep passed behind her, she wheeled around and took up the chase.
Disaster.
An instant fail.
So, its obedience and sheep fields for another month or two I fear.
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