Many questions

[dogs4herding]

I have a bunch of questions, but I'm going to start off with these two: Does my BC have to be registered to participate in trials? What age is okay to start nursery trialing? Thank you!

[Pipedream Farm]

Originally posted by dogs4herding:

Does my BC have to be registered to participate in trials?

Not for USBCHA trials or local/regional club sanctioned trials aligned with the USBCHA.

 

Originally posted by dogs4herding:

What age is okay to start nursery trialing?

If you are talking about USBCHA Nursery there is no minimum age requirement.

 

I know of no minimum age requirement for the training classes (i.e. novice-novice, pro-novice, ranch) sanctioned by the local/regional clubs that are aligned with the USBCHA. However, the trial hosts (and owners of the sheep) would not appreciate dogs that are out of control chasing and harassing their sheep. However, some "excitement" from inexperienced/young dogs is anticipated.

 

If your dog is capable of running the course you plan to enter and you think your dog is ready for the pressure associated with trialing, then you and your dog are ready.

 

Mark

[dogs4herding]

Thank you! Yes, I am talking about USBCHA trials. What is the youngest dog you have seen that has done well? My pup is 4 1/2 months old, and has a lot of eye. I don't want him to get sticky, so in order to loosen him up, would it be okay to start early? He is doing beautifully on commands so far, but of course that will all be erased for a little while once the sheep come out. I was thinking of starting him at about 5 1/2 or 6 months old in order to loosen up his eye. Then I'll trial with him this summer when he is 9-13 months old. Is this a good idea?

[juliepoudrier]

What makes you think that starting your pup early will loosen his eye?

 

No one can tell you the appropriate age for starting your dog. It really depends on the pup and your own skill as a trainer. I would hazard a guess that more pups are ruined by too much training pressure at too young an age than the other way around.

 

Why is nursery so important? Are you a seasoned trainer and handler? Mark makes a very important point here: "If your dog is capable of running the course you plan to enter and you think your dog is ready for the pressure associated with trialing, then you and your dog are ready." Some of the top trainers/handlers can indeed have a 9-month-old ready to trial in nursery, but I think that's more the exception than the rule (you are aware that nursery is supposed to be the same as the full open course, jut without a shed?)

 

J.

[Eileen Stein]

Hi dogs4herding, welcome to the Boards.

 

It's pretty much impossible to say when a pup is ready to start training on stock without seeing the pup. A lot of people set one year as the time to start with sheep, although nowadays plenty of experienced people start much earlier than that. The dog has to be physically developed enough to be faster than the sheep, but more important, he has to have the mental maturity to take training pressure -- both pressure from the sheep, and pressure from you asking him to do one thing when his instinct is telling him to do the opposite. The best way to decide if he's ready is to take him to sheep a time or two and see how he does, with an experienced trainer present if you don't have much experience yourself.

 

The first trialing you would expect to do would probably be in what we call the Novice classes, rather than Nursery. Despite its name, Nursery is fairly advanced. Novice-novice is the class most people start out in. If you tell us where you live, there may be a regional association we could refer you to where you could see novice trials and perhaps find some local people to work with. If you start training in February or so, and your dog is an unusually apt pupil, you might be trialing in novice-novice by summer, but you pretty much have to just wait and see how he comes along. It's good to look at the training as a goal in itself at first, and let the trialing come along later. Good luck!

[kelpiegirl]

I would also like to add, that in addition to each dog starting at their own appropriate time, setting date related competition goals is a bad idea. Train your pup when he/she is ready, and teach the dog the language at their pace. As I have said before, this is a marathon, not a race. And, in the end, isn't it more important to have a dog who can not only read the language, but can be tested, and not only pass, but ACE the test?

Julie

[Pipedream Farm]

Originally posted by dogs4herding:

I was thinking of starting him at about 5 1/2 or 6 months old in order to loosen up his eye. Then I'll trial with him this summer when he is 9-13 months old. Is this a good idea?

Dealing with eye is a whole other discussion. As already stated, starting a pup is not how to loosen eye because eye can be affected in a good way and a bad way with work (depending upon what you do while working).

 

Pups are individuals, each have their own rate of maturing (physically and mentally) and rate of learning (highly dependent upon the trainer, sheep, field, etc). Let the pup set the pace. This is where a knowledgeable and unbiased second opinion is good to temper your enthusiasm to get onto the trial field.

 

Think "The Tortoise and the Hare", where a fully trained dog is the finish line; and novice-novice, pro-novice, ranch, USBCHA nursery, and open are tests of your progress towards the finish line.

 

Mark