Hitting the Mute Button

At our last lesson Jennifer hit the mute button and forbid me from yelling at Piper during our lower field driving drills.

It was for at least two reasons - one - we were trying to avoid upsetting Rylee who is sensitive to commotion in general and - two - it is important that I learn to rely on the whistles and get Piper to pay attention to them.

The result was probably the best extended driving session that Piper and I have experienced together. Last weekend - while Jennifer was out betting on the ponies at Del Mar - we continued with the mute button working at Anna Guthrie's. I worked Piper for an extended period in Anna's covered arena concentrating on solely using whistles and not using any voice commands whatsoever. If she did not take the whistle command the first time I simply took a step in her direction so she would know I was serious. Once again it was one of our best sessions for properly paced straight driving and Piper was definitely paying much more attention to my whistles.

As Candy Kennedy observed in a recent blog I think I had gotten into the habit of blowing the whistle and expecting to follow up with a shouted "Lie Down". Piper, in turn, had gotten into the habit of not believing the lie down whistle meant lie down until she heard the angry yell. So this is a habit I have to break and I think hitting the mute button on my shouts is a good start. Next I want to work on toning down the whistles so they don't sound as shrill.

With Rylee I worked on some confidence builders and simulating actual ranch type tasks. It seemed to help.

First, I sent Rylee to gather the approx 125 sheep spread out grazing in a mid size field so that we could sort out a working group. It was wonderful to watch her thinking as all I did was give a simple "away" command and watch her figure out what was needed to get the whole group together. Left to her own devices Rylee had the whole group trotting comfortably to me in a well grouped flock. Then we gate pushed them into a small catch pen and gate sorted about ten ewes off from the group to work with.

From there I had Rylee take the working group down the driveway from one pen to the covered arena where I worked Piper. I also gave Rylee a single session in the arena trying to get her to whistles and flanking without losing contact. We did a bit of driving, also, making sure Rylee would come by my feet. After working Piper I had Rylee finish with a few minutes working the small group back in the catch pen before turning them out to rejoin their friends in the grazing pasture.

A good day and I think valuable for our progress.