Herding with Slayte

I'm finding that herding is actually becoming kind of fun and addictive with Slayte. With Enzo it is frustrating and tiring and we never improved. Slayte still has tons of drive for it but is much more pliable. Funny because in life he is much more headstrong than Enzo. He pushes out and stays out. He is also willing to slow down and use his brain which also gives me time to think. Enzo thinks that going faster is the solution to all problems which makes him a great agility dog but it's bad for herding. It also caused problems with tracking in frisbee but we figured out a way to work around that. When Enzo is in drive mode his brain shuts off. Slayte likes to mix things up when he sees an opening but a lot of that is because of my bad timing and handling since I kept getting stuck against the fence. I feel like I am actually able to learn now and that is a good feeling. I still have a bad habit of walking towards the sheep when I send him around and sometimes I still get stuck in the death spiral but at other times I feel like we are actually doing what we should be! I need to get better at watching both the sheep and my dog and I need to be more proactive about keeping the sheep off of me. It's also nice that Slayte doesn't mind working for someone else.

Slayte has had 6 lessons so far and this video is from our 5th lesson. Now just to figure out how to squeeze in herding lessons around my agility schedule!