Friday, June 18, 2010

Saturday runs with Nan and Roo

The sheep set nicely and Nan was amped up. She leaned forward, her nose twitching and the dust hardly had a chance to settle when I sent her. Round powder puffs of fine dust were tossed back at me as her hindquarters dug firmly into the ground. I relaxed and waited for her to reach the top. I sent her on the away side  and was planning to stop her at 1:00 so she would be between the sheep and the trailer. She cast out nice and wide and was one of the few dogs that went behind the trailer. Most of the dogs came in even with the trailer and that made them tight. I blew a down at 1:00 and she ran right through it to the top and stopped. I waited and decided to let her lift. She came in nice and soft and then they busted back to the trailer.

Well, they tried but Nan had learned her lesson from the day before and go in front of them and turned them.  The fetch was offline but not much and at last step these sheep slithered around the fetch panels.

Waiting for the sheep.


On the fetch. At the last minute they went to the side.

Settled them nice at the post.

She had a nice turn at the post and then the first leg was heavy to the exhaust. We missed the first panel, then settled for a decent crossdrive. at the second panel, they scooped to the bottom. So far, I had missed all of my panels. Sheesh!!

Nice turn at the post.

Nice crossdrive. It was the best part of her drive.

She had a nice turn to the shedding ring. She was on the muscle and it was good to see the fire in her eyes. She was really teaming up with me and  we entered the ring as one.

We looked at each other in the ring and I saw that same sly smile that I had with Tess. At this point, I knew I had a shedding partner.

"These ones" I told her and she came in clean and walked them off.

At the pen, she was wide and soft. She held her ground when the sheep stamped at her.

OK, we got a pen. We had one swirl then they marched in. Not that many pens that day and Nan made it easy. She didn't win but ran well (aside from the bobbles in the drive and not wanting to let go of the pressure). I was happy on how well she handled the range ewes and stood up to them. A couple of time the ewes took a run at her to try to get to the exhaust and she stood up to them. She even showed them her pearly whites.

Roo ran out nice and wide and cast out behind the trailer. He lifted nice but then suddenly forgot his downs. I managed to remind him at the fetch and we had a nice turn. The drive was horrible and he was too pushy and not stopping well. In the ring, we timed out and I gave him a stern look and he quickly dropped. Parts of went well and parts we will need to work on. He has no issues with the range ewes but had an issue on stopping. This week at home, he suddenly remembered what it was like to stop at 400 yds.

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