In August, Bryna and I went up to Raspberry Ridge Sheep Farm in Bangor, PA for a week of "sheepdog dude ranch". We began on Saturday August 16, by meeting our friends Pam and Ziggy McGarvey at Dulles Airport. We drove up in my Saturn wagon, packed to the gills with stuff for the 4 of us, Pam and me in the front, and Bryna and Ziggy just visible in my rearview mirror over the mound of stuff. They did travel in style though, with a nice dish of frozen water and a fan to make sure the AC reached all the way back to them.
The trainer, Carolyn Wilki-Holmgren, limited attendance to 5 dog/handler teams max., and all had to be training at the Started level or above. There were 2 border collies, 1 sheltie, and our 2 beardies, and their 5 humans, all of whom happened to be women. One of the border collies was really accomplished, and the rest of us faded back from there. I knew that Bryna and I would be the least experienced of the bunch. When Carolyn asked each of us what our goals for the week were, I said "survival". I was nervous about her assertion that we would be herding gobs of sheep, in 10 acre fields before the week was out.
When we arrived at RRSF, our first task was to help put about 120 mixed breed sheep (Dorsets, black-faced, Katahdins, Tunis, and mixes of all of these with who knows what thrown in for good measure) into a pen that was perhaps 20ft x 20ft. Then we marked their heads with sheep crayons, which look like magic markers on steriods. We divided them into 5 groups, including one group of ram lambs (say that fast!) and another of ewe lambs.
As we marked, we pushed sheep out of the pen and into a grazing field. This catching certainly helped sharpen my aim with crook, and my confidence in pushing sheep around a pen with my knees and hands. Not to mention keeping a weather (wether?) eye peeled for any sheep about to pee on me. As the pen emptied, we needed a dog on one side to keep the sheep from just orbiting the pen. When our turn came, I got Bryna from the distant fence where she was tied, though the distance hadn't kept her from giving "Please, Mom, I volunteer, take me, take MEEE!" bounces at intervals. We took up our station on the side of the pen opposite the gate. I'm no fool, so I kept her on lead. In light of later events, you should note that it was practically impossible for her to hold a sit or down-stay for more than a few minutes under those conditions. She sprung into vigorous beardie bounces, to the consternation of the sheep.
On Monday morning, the 3 flocks of adult sheep were loaded into trucks and moved to a rented site about 5 miles away. The rented site had 4 fields in two pairs and a dirt road connecting the 2 pairs of fields. The B course was set up in one of the fields. It also had a (gasp) unfenced corn field not too far away. Nothing was fenced, but all of it was surrounded by hedgerows. Ungated openings separated the fields, and one field had a smallish temporary pen that held the sheep overnight. This pen was re-set each night so that the sheep wouldn't trample the same place each night, and there would still be recognizable (but well-fertilized) grass each morning.
The first afternoon, Judi Lehrhaupt (owner of a beginning border named Bonnie) and I elected to work together at the farm after I had a lesson with Carolyn. We practiced getting the ewe lamb flock out of a big pen into an open field and back into the pen again. This was not an unmitigated success, shall we say. But we did it, and Bryna began to get the concept. Meanwhile, Judi and Bonnie practiced with a few sheep on the A course, while the others went to the other site.
In the afternoon, Judi and I combined the lamb flocks for work in a field of about 10 acres, I think. We worked our dogs on long lines at times, sometimes one dog at a time, and sometimes the other. It was great to have a partner, since we could help each other, and also since just knowing that someone else was present gave confidence. Bryna would still bounce like mad if I tied her to the fence while Bonnie worked. And Bonnie returned the favor while Bryna worked. Though Bonnie, being a border collie, didn't bounce like a beardie, of course. On one of the occasions when I was helping by holding a very, very long line on Bonnie as she worked the sheep, all of the sheep decided to take off through the blackberry thicket at one corner of the field. In a rash moment, and not realizing the ticket was, well, thick, I charged right through with Bonnie leading me. I was wearing shorts. Then I was bleeding and looking like the victim in a fight between 2 cats. We kept on going, nonetheless, and got those sheep rounded up.
On Monday night, Pam and I had looked forward to getting to cook together for the whole group. We marinaded some beef, peppers, onions, Portobello mushrooms, and tomatoes in my family's famous read wine marinade. (After a day in this marinade, your old tennis shoes could turn out pretty tasty.) These went on skewers at the barbecue. Then we made a nice spicy tabbouleh, and Pam prepared a salad with sauteed cremini, oyster, and shiitake mushrooms with a Dijon dressing. Two kinds of wine to go with all of that, and followed by vanilla ice cream and a chocolate sauce with macadamia nuts in it that I had made ahead of time. We all went to bed very happy that night! (Did I mention that I view a dinner at-- well, pilgrimage to--Chez Panisse as ranking right in there with the specialty itself as a good reason to go to California? For those of you who are not foodies, Chez Panisse is to American nouvelle cuisine as Mecca is to Islam, Jerusalem is to Christians and Jews, etc.) I think they liked it!
On Tuesday, we tried to do more off lead work. I think Bryna was beginning to get the idea that she might do this all day, and that she didn't have to get all of her herding done in the first 10 min! She would still dart off after the sheep when I allowed her to start, and cut in far too quickly, but she settled down faster.
We had a lesson that afternoon with Carolyn. We worked the sheep in and out of a large pen (about 30 ft x 30 ft) that is used in the C course. Since we had tried to do this exercise in a previous visit several months ago and produced a lot of frustration at the time, I was a bit nervous about how this would turn out. Some things went well and others not so well. Bryna did a fine job of gathering all of the sheep (about 25 of them) up if they started away from the pen into the pasture. She had a hard time getting the ones who started into orbit around the pen to finally head into it. I really had to help her there, sometimes guiding her by the collar. When we had them all in the pen, then we had to take them out again and do it over. We tried to have Bryna force the sheep out of the pen while she herself was still outside it. That usually worked pretty well for most of the sheep, and failed for few who had figured out this game already. I sometimes had to bring her in to help get them out. It got a bit wild since she still had a hard time holding her downs in such exciting situations--several sheep really close and moving fast. But I think that by the end of the lesson, she had improved and begun to get the idea of what was expected of her.
By Wednesday, whenever we returned to the room, Bryna was walking in just far enough for the door to shut and then sprawling. She wasn't actually running all day, since that wouldn't be good for the sheep, or her, or me. But bear in mind that this is a dog who probably sleeps 14 hr/day on weekdays, and 10-12 hr on the weekend. And here she was, awake probably 12 hr/day, alert and moving (walking) for 3-4, and running fairly fast for 1-2 hr. She was wiped out, even though she was in fairly decent shape. Though after a few days, I decided that even though she feels harder than many dogs I know, it would be even better if she weighed even less. So I put her on a diet to lose 2-3 lb (down to about 42 lb) when we got home, and didn't increase her food much at all there. At the same time, I was not feeling sore--just tired. So I felt that for an ol' gal like me, that wasn't too bad. Not counting the blackberry scrapes and the bug bites, of course.
Wednesday afternoon, Pam and I took off to see a litter of puppies she was interested in, after Pam had already watched Sandy Weiss, Chip (Ch. Britannia Chip Thrills, HI, etc., etc.), who was the dad. So we visited Kibbles (the mom), and her litter. In all, by the end of the evening's visits, I got slathered in kisses from 10 puppies of 3 different litters. I don't know how Pam will ever pick! I loved a sweet brown mismark who was just full of cuddles and kisses. I sure hope she goes to a family that might want to use her for a therapy dog, because she is a natural! I can't wait to see what Pam does with her choice. The rest of our colleagues, when we got home very late that evening, were quite disgusted at our timing. We had noticed that while we were riding around in cars, having dinner at Michelle's etc., it absolutely poured all afternoon and evening. We were unrepentant, and Sweet Pea, with a bruised paw, and Ziggy, who had been doing a huge amount of hard work (that I still hadn't gotten to see at that point), didn't seem too distressed at sleeping all afternoon and evening in the back of my car as they rode around with us.
Thursday was interesting since Bryna and I went to the other, unfenced site. Carolyn started us out with virtual herding--2 sheep that stayed inside a very tiny pen (the pen used in B course, about 8 ft x 8 ft?) We were to try to work on getting Bryna to stop at a balance point just opposite from me and then lie down (or sit, or do a major pause, or anything really slow, d.....t! Sweet Pea, Lie down NOW!) Well, this was turning into a huge frustration for both of us. Two sheep are just gobs and gobs harder than a lot of sheep. In many ways. Sometimes this was working and sometimes it wasn't. Carolyn stayed with us, and helped guide Bryna into position. Bryna got a bit better about stopping in the right place. And when I told her "Lie down," her little rear would give a bob that was quite visible, a sort of a 2 inch rear leg genuflection if you will. It was quite comical, as if she was saying "I want to, but I just can"t, Mom." So Carolyn, several times, stepped forward and pushed down gently with just a finger, and down Bryna's little bottom went. I was reminded of what I had read about ancient dinosaurs that were so huge that a major nerve signal to the back end might take too long for safety. So in the course of evolution, the critters evolved to have sort of secondary brains in their butts to take care of urgent rearward matters. Maybe Sweet Pea had a rear brain that wasn't giving in to her front brain signals?!?
After lunch, Carolyn said we should work on this exercise and if Bryna could get it right 4 times in a row, I should open the gate, let the sheep out slowly, encourage Bryna to go to their rear ends, loop around, and swing them all back in the pen again and do it over. Yeah, right....
So after a period of meditation and a few stray thoughts about the Good Shepherd, I positioned Bryna and opened the gate. "We're outta here!" said the two sheep, and they bolted, as fast as 4 legs could take them to the opening in the hedge. Bryna outran one of them, and turned her back, but while she was doing that, the other one got clean away. That first sheep stayed with me, and Bryna took off after the other one, down the dirt road as fast as she and #2 sheep could run. Good sheep and I took off after them (they had disappeared beyond some trees). We came upon, wonder of wonders, Judi, her Bonnie, a black-faced sheep with a makeshift rope halter with a local resident at the other end of the rope, and our two sheep huddled next to the black face, all of them in a pile of lumber next to a tumble-down barn. Bryna and Bonnie were both trying to shift the 3 sheep off the lumber, and the sheep didn't seem to be cooperating much. Then suddenly, my two bolted for another miscellaneous pile of farm rubble, cast-offs, and bushes. Too eager, Bonnie and Bryna brought them out of there, after Bryna tap-danced in the bushes where the 2 sheep were. These bushes turned out to be common burdock (Arctium minus).
Judi and the farmer and I had had enough of this circus, so we put leads on our dogs, Judi grabbed the halter of the black-faced sheep, and pulled it out. The other two followed, and I brought up the rear with Bryna and Bonnie to help keep the two errant sheep with their buddy. We headed back up the road, thanking the farmer. Judi explained that she had been working 3 sheep, and two of hers got away while she managed to keep the third, and the farmer had rigged the rope for the one she had. They were there just finishing the halter when clippety clop comes a sheep, zoom comes Bryna, and huff-puff comes Lynne and another sheep. We were now off to put our 3 in the pen and go look for the other two. As we expected, our colleagues up the road who had been working about 40 sheep suddenly had been presented with 2 extras and they had been expecting one or the other of us for 20 min.
At this point I realized that Bryna was in severe distress--her feet were COVERED with burdock--there must have been over 100 of them. All of her feet, her abdomen, her face--it was awful. And now that the excitement was over she was trying frantically to pull them off. She was getting them in her mouth, and choking at intervals. It seemed desperate. Judi rode with me back to the farm and tried to pull burrs out as I drove, or at least keep Bryna from going nuts. I raced in to get a grooming rake and a pair of scissors. As Judi drove us back, I used the rake to get out as much as I could, but the sheer magnitude of the job was overwhelming, and Bryna continued to try to work on any paw I wasn't actually holding. Executive decision: I got out the scissors and started cutting. She had bunches right on her belly that I couldn't have groomed out without an anesthetic, probably. By the time we returned to the field where we had been I was nearly finished. (And glad that I was working on a bitch, not a dog.) Bryna had somewhat less hair on 2 feet, and a lot less hair on the other two, and a haircut on her abdomen. I was thinking about why the plants that become extinct are never the ones anybody would really like to get rid of!
We got back and the entire flock (about 75 sheep at that point) had been grouped and was grazing. It was too tempting. I soon asked if Bryna and I could move them when they needed to be taken to water. We did it! Bryna worked at a nice distance, and it wasn't a screaming rampage. It was a bit raggedy, but not too bad, given that Monday was the first day we had ever worked more than 12 sheep at a time. And it is amazing how much easier it is to make a dog that is bone-tired lie down! (I should point out here that before camp, Carolyn warned us that the biggest single problem at camp was lack of conditioning of dogs or humans or both. We had worked to get ready for this. Sometimes unprepared dogs just crash.)
Judi and I that evening did a walkabout--just walking in a huge field with our dogs, no sheep, no leads, just doing unexpected things, and praising and rewarding our dogs for watching us and keeping an eye on us. Not that we wanted them to heel--just to be very aware of where we were and that we might do something fun and unexpected, or even disappear at any moment. It helped both dogs, who had tended to take our constant presence a bit too much for granted.
The highlight of the next day was all of us running the A course. Bryna and I had 5 sheep. It was the first time we had ever run the whole course, with everything all put together. Oh, we had done each obstacle separately several to many times, but never the whole course, one thing right after another.
Our outrun was chaotic, but we got control fairly quickly. On the other hand, I would say that Bryna and I conservatively had 5-10 reverses on the course. The Y chute was difficult, the Z chute was a good bit better, and the runway was, if I may say so modestly, so slick it should have provoked gasps of wonder. I had a proud moment! The cross-drive wasn't bad, and the pen was sort of OK. I decided right then, however, that I wasn't going to stuff Bryna in a cargo hold and fly her to the national beardie show the next month in San Francisco on the strength of that performance. (Equally important, I was not going to sit there in the plane worrying about her down there in the hold.)
In the afternoon, we loaded the sheep into trailers. While waiting for one of the trucks to return, I had to try herding all the sheep (about 60 at the time, I think) once more. Practically everyone was there watching. Sigh. Bryna gathered them all far, far too fast. She brought them to me, pushed too hard, and had them swarming around my knees so that I could hardly move--like a lighthouse in a storm. A voice from an old lesson said "Stay really, really relaxed, and bend your knees a bit. You're really very unlikely to get hurt." Subconsciously, my brain must have concluded that sheep surfing wasn't nearly fancy enough for that big an audience, so as I gently lost my balance, I found myself in a very graceful side-saddle position on one large ewe in the middle of the packed flock. I rode her very calmly, and I think with great dignity, for about 10 yards. The situation sorted itself out and I dismounted with considerable aplomb. I decided to assume my compatriots' smiles at the end of this performance were intended as congratulatory. Then, with an expectable number of smashed knuckles and sore muscles, we finished loading the sheep.
That evening, I got to watch Ziggy work about 80 of the sheep. It was beautiful to see him control so many, and the light of the setting sun turned the scene golden. It was a fine way to end camp. We, and our dogs, said good-bye. ("Have your people contact my people," they said to each other.) Ziggy and Bryna hardly moved on the 6 hour drive home. It was a wonderful experience.