Eye Contact....

Too much eye contact...mine with the dog.
Know I have a bad habit there and need to be more conscious of when I'm doing it. Making hard eye contact or alot of eye contact with your dogs eye pulls them in tight...Twigged into this when working on releasing my dog to stock for his out runs... I was still doing it....one of those ' V 8 moments ' as I'm working through this part of training.

Wind basically died down with the sun trying to shine through the clouds.
Worked in the small cattle pasture as abit of grass there from first cut of hay...enough to let the sheep settle to a graze as I worked on sending my dog....basically was trying to set the criteria that the dog had to get up right and if he didn't ...no sheep and we set it up again with the idea ...we have all day to accomplish this.

When he was right he was allowed to finish all the way to lift > then fetch back to me. With the sheep happily grazing they needed a dog engaged to lift them which is what a person wants...the dog to feel that bubble and push it forward at an appropriate pace back to you. The dog never gets
to learn 'the feel' of that bubble if the sheep always leave before the dog makes contact with them.

Quade and I have come along ways and considering how we spent the first couple of years we may take alittle longer to retrain a few bad habits than if we started with a clean slate...however I couldn't ask for a better dog to teach me to improve my skills as a handler....I wouldn't be without him for getting the work done around here. (Infact while I was gone to the states my son was using him for cattle chores and those 2 have never worked together...they managed just fine )
Anyways our journey certainly has made it easier to train and work the other dogs here....what took me the better part of the year to accomplish a certain set of skills on a dog is taking me far less time with fewer holes to fix.

Worked Sting in the sheep pasture, mainly off the fence and doing what I call 'doodling'.... basically a walk about with the dog balancing the sheep to me ....serpentines, figure 8's, 1/2 circles, stair steps ,etc...with a stop / settle in the middle of the pasture mixed in there....all keeping in mind everyone's space.
She's coming along just fine.