Sheep, Sangria, and a Herding Title!

I'm a proud mama! Gyp earned her first herding title this weekend "CKC Herding Started". I had made the decision not to go this weekend because she had come up lame at Regionals. But she had been sound for a week and off of meds for 5 days, light exercise was showing nothing. She had acupuncture, chiro, laser and massage (by me) - and was seemingly OK. And she was. Not a miss step or a limp all weekend. This are looking up ...

... Just for fun ...let's take a look back at where she started ...

Gyp at her Herding Instinct Test a three years ago ...
"look Ma I can make sheep jump!"

then we took some lessons with Scott in the round pen ...

more like let's chase the sheep and bite them and build some confidence ...  weeeee!

I'm pretty sure nobody thought we'd ever get anywhere with the herding - and I didn't either, I thought it was just cool to see her instinct and let her have some fun and learn to boss something around - when she wasn't being pouty that is. We would go out and herd every few months, but never really progress much, it was just for fun afterall, and I didn't really have goal.

Then we started going regularly training with Jenny and Louanne, and we had a goal - a CKC Herding Started Trial!! YA let's do it!

This weekend we made our debut along with Amanda and Brit (I'm sure you've seen her weekend results ... seeing as she isn't as much of a Blog slacker like myself).

 Gyp and Brit ready to go ....

Gyp wowed me, she kept a cool head and only had a couple crazy eyed moments ... She qualified in all 4 Trials with scores between 93.5 & 98!! She earned 2 High in Trials, One Reserve High in Trial and 4th place.

 Gyp with her loot ....

Now we hope to get out into the big field and see where we can go with that, and keep up our skills on the farm this summer, and pursue further titles if we can. It's an amazing sport, and I'm so proud of my dog - and so incredibly grateful for the opportunities I have had to train with the BEST!!!!! And an extra thanks to Louanne for that killer Sangria and borrowing me those equally killer cowboy boots. Those are on my to buy list!! Did I just say I was buying Cowboy Boots?

Here is a video of her HIT run (98/100)