Bullet87 Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 Hi All, I am having a bit of trouble transitioning my guy from sheep to cattle. He trains on sheep on and off and at the end of last year spent a month and a half learning a lot of the basics on sheep. My problem is that now he does not like to work cattle. Sheep group easier, move off the dog easier, where as our cattle will stand around and do not group well once they get going. Nature of the beasts I suppose and granted the sheep are dog broke, more so then our cows... I just do not know exactly what to do. It's almost as if he is afraid of the cows now. Before the month and a half training, he worked some cattle in a round pen and smaller corral to practice directions just fine. Not afraid to approach, and was even heeling a little. Now he goes up with his flag of a tail flying, goes in, barks to get them to move after he sees that giving them an intense stare doesn't work. He won't even complete a small outrun on the cows, but he is totally ok with it when we train on sheep. Being new to the BC world, its confusing to me because I am not sure what to do about it. I've only dealt with my Heeler for herding the cows. Any opinions and suggestions are welcome! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Debbie Meier Posted March 15, 2012 Report Share Posted March 15, 2012 Put him on some young light weight cattle/calves that move off easily and then work him up to something more challenging that he has to be a little more physical with. I'm suspecting that on sheep he has learned to use his presence to move sheep and now feels unnerved when that does not work. Keep things calm and if needed take the lead and move the cows while alowing him to help but don't try to use excitement to get him to move them, that will cause the cows to go out of control and make the dog more nervous especially if he has gotten to like having everything in order. Basically he may have learned how to move sheep in an orderly under controlled fashion, he will have to get things shook up a little to get the cows to move but that may be against what his plan is, that being keeping things under control. Hope that helps and makes sense, anyway in short, just help him a little. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jdarling Posted March 17, 2012 Report Share Posted March 17, 2012 I'd give Norm a call. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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