Stefan first brought his young dog Dude in a month back and we could not get him to show any interest in the boars. on Stefans second trip in i decided that i would keep Dude for five days, giving him a run in the block every day to see how much improvement I could get out of him. on the day Stefan came to drop him off we went into the training block and managed to get Dude to show a bit of interest in the bail with the other dogs. Once Stefan had left, it gave me the opportunity to do a bit of work with Dude to get him used to me and to listen to me. For this I put a rope onto his collar so that he had no option but to come to me when I called him. The one big advantage that I have with all new dogs is the first impression as dogs are either follows or leaders and if I am a push over for dogs they would not listen to me then I would not be able to teach them as much so I make sure that they listen. Dude turned out to be a really nice dog that did take notice of what I was saying and his improvement on every run in the block was noticeably better.
On the first day he had to be lead right to the bail and giving time to want to join in. By day four when Stefan came back to collect him he was away to the first bark and stuck with the boar and other dogs all the way.
On day three I took Dude up to the top of the hill with Jeff and Shade to see the sheep. By this stage he was keen to chase the pigs so I did expect him to want to chase a sheep if they were running away from him and he did not disappoint. It was just a matter of me raising my voice and saying ( GET OUT OF THAT) he stopped straight away and then looked at the other two dogs and realized that they were showing no interest in these animals.
On the day that Stefan came up to collect Dude we went up to the top of the hill and again Dude did have a run at the sheep again but it was a quick reminder with my voice and he came of no problem. So Stefan knows that Dude does need a bit more time around sheep and not just pigs.
