Perry's Mum

Perry loves sardines and is happy to eat home brand in oil but when it comes to tuna she wants only Sirena.

Turns out to be at Deniliquin not Wagga - not sure how convenient that is - and apparently the classes are only for people seriously interested in trialling. Let me know if you want me to try and find more details.

I believe there are classes held near Wagga - I will see if I can find some details.

Fantastic Vickie - I am not surprised Trim did well.

Perry and I go a sheepdog school where any breeds can participate if they show interest. We have a wide range of herding breeds, Koolies, Borders, Kelpies, Briards, Bernese Mountain Dogs, Pulis but I have also seen a doberman, blue and red heelers, and some with an interesting mix of ancestry. We go near Canberra but I know that classes are also held at Camden.

Poor Shadow - at least she knew what it was to be loved.

Em I am so sorry to hear about Loki - what a loss.

Perry thinks that a scoop of vanilla icecream with liver sprinkles on top is one of the essential major food groups and insists we stop for it on the way back from sheepdog school.

Is anything planned down there for late June/early July? Perry and I are going to be in the Beechworth area for a few days around 4 July and we could stay on a few days or come earlier.

Perry and I are obedience school dropouts. She came to me with lots of problems and obedience classes were not the answer. There were so many people in the class it was difficult to hear, there was little explanation of why we were doing some exercises, some were just pointless like looking for balls under cones. I wanted her to learn to sit, drop, come, give, take, walk nicely on the lead, ignore other dogs, wait to eat until I told her. She would already sit and come when we started and after 5 terms had not learned much else. She has learned most of the rest either at home (thank you K9 Force) or at herding school. Since she has to pass Advanced obedience training before we can do flyball or agility, we will never do them because we did not even pass Intermediate, never mind advanced. Thank God for sheepdog school.

Great story - Steve is fantastic - he really helped me with Perry who is now a very different dog.

There are Koolies around who work ducks - I have seen it on video.

Funny you should ask M, we are looking at buying a 100 acres to have sheep for the pups, do you think that's excessive.......... I know a number of people around Canberra who have sold up their town homes and bough acreage just outside Canberra to keep sheep for their dogs.

I am very impressed - I would like to see how Perry would go with some ducks - she has been trying to herd the magpies in the garden but they won't play. At the moment she is playing with the other members of her local 3 year olds play group - they are playing sheep and sheepdog - she is the sheepdog and they are the sheep and she has to try and get them together while they try and escape. Keeps them quiet for hours until one wants a go at being sheepdog and wants Perry to be a sheep - she just does not do sheep in that sense.

Warned you.

This has definitely become a Koolie appreciation thread and I just love them.

I have to disagree there are a couple there who are lovely to look at - especially the red one in the middle, bottom row.

Perry is a demon barker in the car - particularly if she thinks we are going to sheepdog school or the dog club. My brother who lives in Canada got me a husher muzzle which actually came from Australia. She wore it one day for 5 minutes and whinged constantly. I took it off and for the rest of the journey every time she looked like barking I dangled it in front of her. The next time we were in the car I dangled it again and it has really cut back on the barking. I would not leave her unattended with it but it does seem to be working. Let me know if you are interested and I will get the details of where it is made.

Good luck - I am sure she will love it - prepare to become addicted.

Those puppies are lovely. I wish I had known about the possibilities of herding for suburbanites before Perry was 2 so she could have been doing it for longer. I also wish we could go a bit more often than about once every couple of months.

Perry came from a farm up there and she has strong instinct even if the farmer wanted to shoot her for not working. I have had national champions tell me that if they had had her since she was a pup she could have been a champion dog because she likes to work. She is the first Koolie I had met and I think they are just great - I love having an intelligent dog.

Those Koolies are lovely Pax.

I'd like to see Panda working - I have seen a shetland pup ordering a mob of big merinos to get moving - he might have been 10 weeks old but he was not putting up with any nonsense.

I am always being told to watch the sheep and learn to read them. Sometimes I don't think I am learning fast enough. Perry rarely barks at the sheep (or anything else) and she is not into body slamming, she just expects them to do as she wants and on very odd occasions will go in for a quick encouraging nip if they don't move fast enough. She is much better at working in a bigger ring than in the small beginner's ones. I do think it is tone of voice rather than gender which makes her respond differently to different people - she adores Robert and thinks he is God and if he says something she will do it even if she thinks he is wrong, whereas if I asked her to do the same thing and she thought I was wrong she would do what she thought was right. A lot of the time she is right which is a worry. I am sure I am too soft with her but in the long run she is a much loved pet (or as my next door neighbour puts it - my canine companion) rather than a full on working dog.

I think one of the major differences is that Koolies tend to work in a more upright fashion and don't creep in the way that border collies and kelpies do.