Sheepdog Trials

This weekend the kids and I went to watch a sheepdog trial just outside of Lyman. It was lots of fun to watch the dogs work and we could hardly believe how smart they were. We were able to drive our vehicle right up to where all the action was, we were lucky enough to listen to the handler's commands while they were working, and we were able to tell them "Great job!" when they finished.

Our favorite part was when the dogs would separate the sheep. Some had collars and one had a black face. Towards the end of the pattern, the dogs would cut the black face ewe from the others, and then separate them into groups of who had collars and who did not. There were also times when the dog was so far away, we could barely see it, but it would still be responding to the handler's whistles. Very impressive!

We also enjoyed watching the other dogs watch the trials. The ones who were not competing at the moment were still totally interested. They were great fans!

Spencer spent most of the time completely enthralled with an ant hill. He even fed the ants some of our snacks.