We took the dogs to Petaluma for a sheepherding lesson at the Dairy Dell Doggie Dude Ranch and Training Center. It cost fifty dollars for an hour with the sheepdog trainer, Frank: a kind man with many years of sheepdog training experience; the dogs liked him almost immediately. We reserved two hours, optimistically an hour for each dog, but it was very hot that day and we took frequent breaks, so an hour might have been enough for a first session. The dogs alternated turns of about fifteen minutes each, and then we tried both at the same time.
What we learned was that both dogs instinctively would make the sheep stay put. The training aspect was to teach the dogs to stay behind the sheep and make them move around the pen. They both learned to do this: Jeff took to it fairly quickly, but Penny needed her leash for one session -- to help encourage her to stay behind the sheep and make them move.
Cheryl filmed the lesson and we've divided this excerpt into three parts: (1) Jeff; (2) Penny; and, of course, (3) Jeff and Penny. The dog that wasn't in the ring would peek through the gate and, you can hear, bark.