Sheep worrying is a big issue in general life for farmers, it doesn’t take a lot to scare a sheep into shock and when they are pregnant it is easy for this to cause them to abort their lambs. A shepherd’s stock is their main priority and it is their lively hood and legally they have the right to shoot a dog that is worrying their sheep. Even when your dog doesn’t show an interest in sheep it is still important that you have respect for farmers and put your dog on lead when there is livestock around. This is because dogs don’t have to chase sheep to worry them, a dog’s presence can be enough to panic some sheep.

 

Our training…

 

• The methods used are reward based and are simple to understand for both dog and handler. There are no old methods used e.g. putting a dog with rams or ewes with lambs in order to scare the dog into being frightened of sheep. I never use this method of training as it doesn’t always work and I don’t think it is ethically correct.

• This is available for any breed of dog and to those who have or haven't chased before. It is very hard to work with a dog that has chased before as they have already had the ‘thrill’ of chasing and the association of sheep being fun is already there. Whereas when working with a dog as a preventative measure it is much more successful as they don’t have the same view of sheep as the dog who’s switch has been flicked ‘on’.