Welcome Ela. We're very demanding about photos for newbies in this forum <g> so please let us see your girl, and tell us a bit more about her (and we'll be interested in your sister's dog too :-).

Yes Koolies are amazing dogs. Someone called Ceejay the Calliope Wild Dog the other day due to her markings. And she is a good guard dog but once they are in the yard she is your best friend. Thank goodness for Izzy being Kelpie X she is a bit more protective of her patch.

With the Council here, I work for them. And they have been clamping down on their laws due to amalgamation here (new management etc) I have asked them, but was told as an employee we have to set an example. And I can see their point of view, the letters of complaint in the paper when an employee hired machinery from council was huge as a result employee's are not allowed even to do that any longer. Amalgamation is the pits, two previous rural councils with a city council and city people do not understand the rural demographics.

Okay going totally

I am amazed how similar in personality Koolies can be.

Hi Dogqz can I ask a question where did you get you dog from. We dont know many people in SA either that have Koolies they are a rare thing in SA most Koolies are interstate. And Koolies that are in SA we have to be careful because we have alot of our own breed in SA so cant really breed with anything from SA. We have sold alot of pups to people in SA. No one has tro answer my questions either I just get a bit excited when I know there is more Koolies in SA as they could possibly be one of ours or relatives of ours. It is very exciting and I love hearing about my dogs and there new owners saying how wonderful they are. Sorry here I go again all excited.

Be warned if you ask me a question it will be answered & could bore you to death . Izzi came from Portland Vic, we drove 10 1/2 hrs round trip to collect her. I told someone else from here about them, because she loved Izzi, & now there are 2 the same around town, both red merle. There is a lady near Springton who breeds Koolies too, I met her at a dressage day. I was just about to start rambling on but stopped myself just in time, if we ever meet in person "run for your life" because I like to talk dog.

Thats Ok I love hearin about other peoples dogs. But I was wondering if anyone knows how to control a dog that is a natural leader dog which is the trouble we are havin with him now we are open to all suggestions right now we love him to death but would love to be able to take him to his full potential but are really struggling with him we havent had this trouble with a dog before in our 10 years of Koolies but he has really tested our patience and skills. I am not sayin that we are the best trainers in the world but we do produce some good dogs but Jack is different than the others. Sorry I know I am rambling but I really want to be able to succeed with him. I dont want him to end up only half ordinary and then not succeed with him so if there are any ideas please let me know.

I'm reading a book called Herding Dogs, Progressive training by Vergil Holland at the moment & he talks about how to train a strong dog. I'd have to go throug the whole book to tell you about it but it's worth reading if you can get a copy, it was suggested to me by a herding trainer/judge. The only thing I know about working with strong dogs is to get the controll without stock first, sit, drop, stay & be the Alpha of the family. Sorry if that sounded "well dah" but that's the best I can do for you, good luck.

OK help me out here do you mean that he stops working and go's to the front of the sheep mob and trots along in front of them ? to me that could mean a couple of things (this is with out seeing him work in real life) OK the first one is he is just to bloody smart for his own good and has worked out that if there is another dog around and it can just go ahead and do all the work while he has a nice rest and heads for home or were ever you are taking the sheep to. the second is he is lacking confidence and readily gives up the work to a stronger dog. my Dance will turn into a lead dog from time to time but when she gets rear the gate she peels away and go's back to help the other dog push the sheep through the gate. now when jack does this leading thing were are you and your husband are you at the front of the mob, side of the mob or the back of the mob, if you are at the back of the mob then you are in the wrong place and jack is in the right place but has given up on trying to bring the sheep to you because you are pushing the sheep onto him. Ok Jack should be able to work by himself or with another dog i don't know how big your paddocks are but you should be able to cast Jack out lets say half way across a 40acre paddock and when he gets to the sheep you should be able to head back to your gate were you would like him to bring the sheep through Jack should pick up all the sheep but if he does miss some thats ok just send him back out from the gate when he has got the first lot in, he now knows were the sheep are so he should have no problems finding them. OK thats how it is supposed to work lol i have 3 dogs that i can work that way the rest i have to get a bit closer to the sheep because if i am to far away then they will rush the sheep back a bit to fast ( got to catch up to mum lol)i think the best way around jack is to work him back in the yards and make him centre to you that means you are at six o'clock and he is at 12 o'clock and if say you move to the 3 o'clock then he has to move to the 9 o'clock but at the same time while you are at the 6 he can move around between the 3,9 and 12. if you keep moving he has to keep moving as well to balance to you this type of work should perk him back up if not let him get a bit rough with the sheep then tone him down before he hurts himself or the sheep but just let him have a little bit of fun this keeps them keen to work i only do this with young pups that are just starting out or older dogs that lacks confidence it's only aloud to happen once and if that does not help then you really have to go right back and start him again like you would a pup. god that was long winded lol see we can all get carried away and you proberly gave up reading half way through lol i proberly would have

Jack has the confidence and likes to keep the sheep together at the front aswell when there is another dog. Does that make sense. And the painful thing is the sheep will follow him. I suppose it isnt painful they respond to him. We have been told good leader dog is worth alot of money and a self taught one is even rarer I am not sure about that though. Thanks for that royalla I had been thinking some of that like takin him back to the yards and startin fresh sort of he knows it all so it wouldnt be long winded. I see him as havin too much confidence. But when he is with the sheep we have started to call him off the sheep to stop him thinking he can do what ever he likes we call him off and give him a big pat when he doin something right and then let him go again. That does seem to be workin some of the time. He is worst with our other make dog. Those two really seem to work well together. Especially when we get a new mob in and they are station sheep. This is when he is very handy as he will lead them out the yard and slow them up and watch them for awhile so that they dont take off like a bat ou of hell. So he is very handy. I started him back in the yards this morning actually and he did really well. I did waht you said to do and he looked at me a bit strange but more like Mum we know all this but he quickly thought well it works so will do it. Anyways thanks for that I am hopin it will work If I keep persisting with him. I thought I would reply to you before I go back up the yards and work my babies for the day. Thankyou again. Sometimes it is nice to hear it from someone else that what you were thinking of doin is probably the right thing. And cause Jack is so head strong we havent come accross that really bad head strong bit in our others. Thanks again will keep you posted

he sounds like a nice handy dog, and probably a good dog to breed from if he has more force and confidence then your other males. do you have any working pic's of your dogs i would love to see some and i think everyone on this forum is sick of seeing my guys working and would appreciate seeing some nice working pic's of other dogs.

Ok a bit of excitement on my behalf. Today was d day foe the babies. 6 months old and I have been doing leed work and basic stuff with them for the last three months they have been on leeds with me when doin the sheep and a couple of intros but not much else really I wanted them to be ready.
Well today was babies Vs Sheep. And COCOA my little champion after a minute of looking at me and thinking bout the sheep and then going towards the sheep then lookin and comin back to me and me sayin its ok. Cause I knew what she was wanting to do I went to the sheep and got in amongst them so that she was on the other side of the sheep as if she was bringing them to me she did it I moved the sheep followed me and she was staying so the sheep were in between us and bringing them too me if i went away and all of the stuff I just knew she could do and she was so proud of herself and I was so proud of her she did so well like I knew she would cause we have been workin hard together to get to this point. It didnt matter if I tried to trick her she still knew what she had to do I was so excited I jumped up and down.
Next was BJ well we didnt start of as well as Cocoa but he was interested but didnt have the conidence after 5 minutes well he still didnt have it I tried everything. Then the husband came up and he of course is more behaved to my husband than me I got out the yard and my husband got in BJ was all over him like a rash they started to get all excited in there and within 2 minutes he had it. So he still got it but not with me. He was doin it like pro after ten minutes all up. I figured that I taught him it all but he needed the hubby to do it with well thats what I reckon anyways.
Then came the quiter Digger and a little slower to get his confidence did some quick lead stuff first and all good. Then went to the sheep. I couldnt get him to follow the sheep he kept folowing me and looking at me after 5 mintues I thought well we had fun in there he got some work sort of and will let that do until tomorrow. Then he went around the back of the sheep and looked at me fromm there as if to say is this what I was supposed to do and I got so excited he cme back to me with the sheep and came around to me and sat in front of me as if to say well I did it but only once so I think he is going to be like his Dad (Jack) sort of lacking confidence but cocky at the same time. So some extra work with him but I think he wil get it I just need to be a bit more patient with him right now until he is more confident. So that was my morning and I had to write bout it as I was pretty proud of all my babies. And know how they are lookin to work. I must say with Digger he is little more aggressive worker than the other two he will look to have a bit of a bite which I didnt not condone at all. He got a growl at that but I think he figured out that it wasnt right. He also is flat out not steady like the other to so I am going to have my hands full with him I think but Cocoa my baby girl and the one I have a real bond with is going to take it all in her stride, BJ well I will teach him it and hopefully along the way I may get some respect happenening if not then he will have learn it then I get the hubby and he can test my hard work. And well digger some patience and reassurance and we should be full steam ahead in a week or so hopefully cross fingers. I am hopin. I am sort of glad they arent all the same as each other otherwise it would get a bt boring. So wich me luck I am startin now. Whcih is pretty good I think at 6 months wanting to actually do the contructiv stuff I am pretty excited really

i like the sound of Digger i like a bit of bite in the dogs that way if you get shitty sheep that put there butts in a corner the dog can still move them out a soft steady dog is good out in the paddocks but a nice hard dog in the yards just keeps thing moving a bit faster, it's easy to steady a hard dog down but hard to make a soft steady dog harden up so my pick out of your pups would be digger. your boy thats lacking conidence put him in with digger (dutch corage) let them go feral for a minute then take digger out and finish on a good note with Bj working nice and don't work him again for a day or two that way he has had time to think about it and he will work a lot stronger the next time he go's in. i was told to start my pups this way by a very old cattle bloke he also use to have sheep many years ago and he told me if you want a usles trial dog that can't work paddocks and yards start your pups off steady if you want a bloody good farm worker that can handle anything then let your pups go feral on the sheep just once or twice just make sure the pup don't get hurt and only let it happen for a minute or two then take your pup away and don't work him for a day or two. i can tell you this it really works you end up with a nice strong worker and with the normal training that follows you get a bloody good dog that can move your sheep even the cranky old rams take a quick look and work out that dog ain't going to take any shit and quickly move their butts lol.

Thanks royalla. I really appreciate all your good advise I love advise I am not sayin I have used all the good stuff I have read or been told yet but I love havin in in the back of my mind and I will need to always be learning. That is an excellent idea with Digger and one of the others lettin them go stupid sounds like it cold encourage the others to get a bit of guts. And I totally agree that it is really hard to get a soft dog to become gutsy. I aint givin up on digger I just want to be able to guide him in the right direction to constructively use his aggression I let him bark while he was up there and let him go at the sheep but he looked to bite so that was the only time I said No and I am hopin that he will keep that bit of go about him I just need to gain his confidence and I wasnt goin to work him tomorrow I was just going to do a bit of leed work or do you think just leave that too and get him all excited to get to work. I love all the advise I am gettin. We have only been in this training stuff a short time compared to some of the other breaders on this forum so all the advise we can get the better. Thankyou all you are all the nicest people thankyou.

it's fine if digger bites or pulls a bit of wool at this stage of his training you can back that of easily but you need him to hype up the quiter pups if you can give me a ring i can explain how to go about this the safe way so that you don't make a monster out of him lol my phone number is 07 41689512

Thankyou royalla. I will give you a ring at the end of the week as I have to work Mon Tues Wed and Thursday so will ring either thursday or ffriday if that ok. I have read lots of books. But to talk it over and gain other peoples experience is really good. Our other dogs havent been as head strong and have always been so easy to train but Jack and Digger are a lot different than we are used to. So thankyou I will ring at the end of the week. Thankyou again

that will be fine
did you have a look at the Nov workshop pic's that i put in web sites and photo's if not nick over and have a look the post is called Nov workshop what a blast or somthing like that it was posted on the 8-11-08 there was two post put up of the work shop so just check the dates. now the first pic's are of Jax (black koolie pup) he is five mths old, now he went in strong onto the sheep and a little bit feral i just let him go but at the same time kept some control over him, after a minute of him having the time of his life i started to work him and finished on a good note with him responding to me.
the next pup is Rylie red merle then my Fitz and then Pepper owned by Melissa now these 3 pups are 6 mth old litter mates, but Rylie and pepper have not been near stock before and just wanted to leave the yard and get away from those scary wooly things so i put Fitz in with them who has worked the sheep once before and was a nice steady strong worker on his sheep, yes Fitz went a bit feral on the sheep because there was two more pups in with him but look at what happened to the other two pups that were scared of the sheep they became keen, i did some more work with Rylie and his owner on monday after the workshop and Rylie went home a working dog nice steady and strong and listing to his conmamds and now keen to learn, of course he still has a lot to learn you can't chuck a dog out into a yard/paddock with stock it has to learn what you want it to do not what it wants to do.