Diary about farm life, sheepdogs and trialing.

August 5th 09

The last few weeks have been somewhat hectic.

My poor husband, barely recovered from his shingles attack, was then hit with a bad case of the flu and to top it off, had to have a hernia operation.

So he has been unable to do very much but is recovering now.

I managed to get to the Ongerup three sheep trials as fortunately our team of crutchers arrived a few days late which gave me Thur, Fri and Sat free.

Aside from the freezing cold nights the weather was fabulous. The previous Ongerup trials have been held in October and it can be hot and uncomfortable that time of the year, so it was quite pleasant.

The sheep at Ongerup are always challenging and this year was no exception. Fast running, and fairly strong. They mostly stuck together though except for the odd few. Poor Jane Dorrel and Rocky Dusty had one sheep that was completely unworkable and refused to hang with the other two.

Despite lack of real training all my dogs performed exceptionally well and I was super pleased.

Driftz was my first dog in the novice and produced a great run to pen with 8 seconds to spare, giving us a fifth placing, her first.

Rio also had a lovely run in the novice finishing in 7th place. We had arrived at the pen in good time with the loss of not many points but could not get them to go in. She tried her best though.

Angel had some ordinary sheep, but her work was fabulous and much better than her score suggested. The sheep were extremely difficult to unwind and when we finally got them around they decided to hang on the fence in the corner, very tricky. But she persevered and we actually got the sheep back under control and managed an obstacle as well. She was fairly tired but I was pleased with her. After some ordinary runs early this year I think she is finally getting it together.

Angel working the sheep out of the corner.

Angel’s litter brother Barney, worked by Karen Buller looked superb and placed second in the novice.

Driftz crossed in the Improver event, disappointingly, as we had completed one obstacle and were looking ok.

Rio’s run in the Improver was lovely. A near perfect cast, she had the sheep walking beautifully. We had to unwind which ate into our time a bit, but she managed an obstacle, and a score of 58. Strangely Angel also scored a 58 in this event but much less tidy although she did complete two obstacles.

Ex UK resident Mike Scott and the 16 month old Torbay Badger.

Badger is out of his UK bitch Torbay Tig by Richard Mcguire's Boylee Fred. Richard and partner Sam Weaver also have two pups out of this littter and they look very promising.

Sam Weaver and Boylee Bill. Bill is fresh out of isolation from a broken toe and did some nice work to hold together some very tricky sheep that wanted to bolt into the distance.

Balto came along to socialize and get used to the atmosphere. He is quite relaxed about it all actually.

It didn't take him long to learn that when the buzzer goes off, sheep appear down the other end of the ground. Whether this will help him in his trialing career or not, who knows. Here he is watching Tony Boyle and Boylee Mustard (I think.)

Hopefully balto is learning something here.

I took Pixel along to her first trial and she took it all in her stride, not concerned about anything. She actually spent a portion of the nights in my bed, under the covers. (Well it was cold)

It was a lovely relaxed trial, very social, and after being stuck on the farm with a sick husband for a few months I really enjoyed the outing.

The full results of the trial are on Sam Weaver’s blog, here, as well as some great photos.

Unfortunately I had to leave Sat afternoon and missed all my open runs.

We had to muster and needle drench 1600 hoggets on the Sunday to get ready for crutching the next day. As Murray is not allowed to do any heavy work or lifting I filled in and helped my brother-in-law drench them. This took up most of Sunday and I was prettty tired by then.

We finished crutching today, thank goodness and I have finally found the time to update my site.

The dogs have done a great job on the farm as well. Hoggets can be very tricky to work, you need a dog with push and cover as they can run fast and split in all directions. They will also run over the top of a dog to escape if necessary. A dog like Driftz with bounce and speed can turn them.

Yindi has reached a stage where she really wants to work. Very high energy like her mother she dug out of her yard twice so I took her out for a go on a big mob to help put the crutched sheep back in their paddock.

She worked very well actually. Kept cutting a few off the first time but by her third go was driving the mob well. Very fast though, needs to slow down, but she kept a good distance and has a lovely stop at each corner before racing madly back the other way.

Our lambing is going fairly well as the weather has been fairly mild. We have had an unusual number of stuck lambs this year. We always get the odd few but I think I have had to pull over 20 this year. I usually carry disposable gloves in my bike year after year but this year I ran out of them. Not a fun job without them, but necessary.