I made it a point this year to go to the National Sheepdog Trials competition this year as part of my renewed commitment to take advantage of as much of the summer as possible before it passes by. While this may not be the hard hitting action that is present in some of the more entertaining/popular sports, these are athletes at work and it is fun to watch them do what they do. I am particularly interested in more individual sports so the fewer the elements present the better for me.
The handler and the dog are working together to try to force the sheep to comply. These trials are timed and there are several objectives that must be met by the dog and handler before the clock expires. Free range sheep are the opponent and they are skittish as can be.
The dog starts with the handler at the caller's post.
The dog is sent on the outrun where through a series of whistles and verbal calls the dog is directed to the sheep hundreds of yards up the hill.
The dog must take over to push the sheep down the hill. There are a series of gates that the handler must direct the dog to push the sheep through, a cut where 2 of the 5 sheep are separated and finally the sheep must be penned by the dog with very little assistance from the handler.
Here the dog is pushing the sheep through the opening between the fence panels which is considered the gate, You can see the tail end of the dog as it has started running up the hill to come around and stop the sheep from going any farther up the hill.
The dog makes is in front of the sheep and starts the push back down the hill.
This handler and dog weren't able to get the sheep penned before the clock ran out and by the time I left there had been only one team during the day that had been successful.
Originally posted by littledrawe 
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