Ah-Hah!

Ah-Hah! Clong! I got it! Those phrases all describe Tam's day today. As you can see from the picture, he's worn out from all the activity, but today a teeny little light bulb flashed on over his head. All I ask is improvement from day to day, and that is just what my bright youngster gave me today. He was better than yesterday.

As keen to work as ever, Tam headed down to the round pen yesterday after a few days off and was all about the slash and burn. I mean the streak and grab. OK, well the dash and dine, if you will, and determinedly in just one direction, come-bye. His preference was also to stop and go. In other words, he would fly around the round pen, hang and rattle on a ewe, then lie down looking at me and refuse to move.

As happens, I lost patience with him in the beginning and unfairly insisted he travel both directions. He just refused to move, so I got him going happily come-bye, then slipped in front to turn him. With that he would beat me, slice to the inside and grip. Am I too old for this, I wondered? Have the pups gotten faster? That must be it, because I can still move, I'm sure.

After a few greased lightening away-to-me turns, we called it a day with Tam panting heavily. It was hot, he's out of shape. Would he be better tomorrow? Hope so.

You bet he was. As we entered the round pen, I stood on his rope while I tied the gate shut. I didn't want the sheep escaping as they did the first day. I may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I can learn from mistakes.

This time I encouraged him to flank come-bye and he happily complied. It's easier to change directions when their feet are moving and they're a bit too excited to realize they're doing something uncomfortable.  And the dog can mortally fly. There was less wool pulling too, but Tam still managed a couple impressive hang and rattles. I tried to keep up, but it's been 2 years since I started a pup, and I seem to have lost a step or two along the way.

Pretty soon, Tam was traveling willingly in both directions and reversing from simple changes in my body position. At that point, I introduced verbal commands. Do I expect him to understand them? Of course not, but I always introduce them at the earliest opportunity.

Next I moved to flank him, then backed to the fence so Tam could fetch. Before he or the sheep came to a full stop, I moved to flank him the other way again backing to the fence for the fetch. We were flowing and it was a beautiful thing.

Never wanting to over do with pups, I quit while I was ahead. I asked Tam to walk up without flying in, which took two requests. On the 2nd try he accomplished a quiet walk up, and a nice stand, so I said "lie down" and he hit his belly grinning. He came towards me when called ignoring the sheep right in front of him, I grabbed his collar, said "that'll do," and walked out giving much praise on the way.

So all this made for an excellent day, and I would prefer to continue it daily for a while. Unfortunately, I'll be at a dog trial beginning tomorrow, and Tam will be on full rest. We'll see how he comes back after the time off.