Time to introduce myself now that I have joined up...

I'm Shane, I live in Melbourne (in the far eastern suburbs). Rasta is my Coolie that I was very fortunate to get back in October 2007. He was born in July 2007. As you can see in the photos on my website under Coolies in the Media Gallery, he is red Merle with blue eyes. I've had working dogs before (Border Collies and GSDxKelpie), but they just such a different dog to the Coolie.

I got Rasta from Tanunda in the Barossa Valley when my parents still live. He is one of Norm's Coolies. Norm is a very good friend of my mother and in turn I have befriended him and spent a bit of time with him talking Coolie. His shows are entertaining and impressive, working about 12-15 dogs at a time and in 2 groups too.

Now that my career as a competitive athlete is finally over, I can devote more time to other things like furthering his training in line with his natural instincts. So I'm hoping to find some places close to Melbourne to take him to herding training. Still waiting on a few people to get back to me. Anyhow I'll be doing my best to get to the gatherings when I can (I am still highly involved in athletics as I have turned my attention to coaching) but when summer comes around, I'll be following the circuits around as I do every year (Wangaratta, Burramine/Yarrawonga, Euroa, Mt Gambier, Bendigo and the list goes on) and when I can, I take Rasta with us.

I'm looking forward to meeting some or all of you at some point.

Cheers
Shane & Rasta

Hello and welcome shane, im knew here to, and relatively new to koolies, i have found everyone to be very helpful and warming, hope you like it here to

Welcome to the Forum Shane, we are way up in North Queensland and still have people come up to us saying that they have seen or heard of Norm's Koolies. I am not sure of the workshop movements in Vic but I am sure that the Koolie Club puts on a herding workshop down in the Gippslands somewhere maybe Warrigal, might pay to ask someone at the Club or Silhouette when she comes on may be able to let you know. They have a workshop at Binnalong in NSW several times a year and one in Merriwa twice a year and we are having one in Tara in September but perhaps they will be just too far away!! haha.

Hope you enjoy the forum..

You will love the forum Shane! I too am in the eastern suburbs of Vic (more Yarra Ranges).

I dont do any herding but like Jackie said, maybe ask Sil... she is very helpful with what's happening in Vic.

Loved the photos of Rasta... he is a gorgeous boy! And his father is very handsome too.

and welcome from me, i have seen the norm's koolie web page his has some very pretty dogs and well trained mmm my lot need to take some lesson's i think lol anyway i hope you enjoy the forum and post lots of pic's for us we just love pic's

welcome

what a beautiful boy you have i love the way koolies look at pple they love :) can tell he loves you

the pple on here are very friendly indeed :)

Hi Shane, good to see you made it onto the forum, I hope you enjoy it.

I recently had a few days away with a friend to South Australia and said the one thing I wanted to do was head for Tanunda, unfortunately we were limited for time and arrive on Thursday night only to find Norm didn't do another show until Saturday, so missed out.

One option for you which I did forget was there is a dog club at Warragul that has herding, a couple of our members down your way attend regularly including Kool Dog who you could pm for details.

Hope to see you and Rastas in July!

Thanks everyone for the warm welcome.

In regards to the herding down near Warragul (Buln Buln I believe) I've emailed Karen there from the dog club website, but I have still not heard back. Does anyone have a different email address I can contact them on?

Rasta likes to chase the ducks in the lakes and on the ovals, but he just needs the ones that don't fly away all the time :) I just want him to gain a little more focus and develop his abilities more. Will he do any competitions? Not sure, I just initially want him to learn what it's about and we'll take it from there.

Anyone have any tips for preparing him for livestock? He's generally a very confident dog and always pretty good in new surroundings.

Also, I have a really good article on Norm from a few years ago, I'll dig out the details as everyone can have a read.

Welcome Shane

Shane!!
Hope you enjoy the forum. Lots of friendly discussion here that on occasion wanders off topic. I'm sure someone will be able to help you regarding starting on stock. Something I'd love to do one day with my girl. Do you do any other training with Rasta. He's a handsome looking boy!

I've done quite a bit of work with him, I can call him back from playing with other dogs, chasing the ball, he is really well behaved when walking in public, across roads etc... I took him to Eastern Companion Dog Training in North Ringwood when he was a puppy, then 2 years later I took him back and he's right back in the intermediate class and doing really well there too. I will move him to agility work too, probably just for fun to start with. I looked at fly ball, but I just don't think he'll enjoy it as much as he would herding or agility. I also suspect he'd go well with tracking...

He's really easy to train too. He's about 99% with food refusal, in fact I can leave food out on the coffee table overnight (he sleeps in the lounge) and it will still be intact, untouched in the morning. Just a dream to have around the house in general. But having said that, he is very head strong and requires constant work to keep him in check, but he loves it.

sounds like you are doing a great job with him shane, i am looking forward to achieving similiar results with alice

hmmm...doesnt sound like he needs much training! If you can do that please come to my house and train my Koolie to leave the food alone. the other day she dragged one of the boys breakfast bowls off the counter and it smashed on the floor. Hubby is still getting used to having a "big" dog and did not put the bowls back far enough.

Welcome to the forum and I am sure you will love it here. I have found it a wonderful source of information and the people aint half bad ether.

Huge welcome to the forum. He is beautiful and sounds really obedient and switched on, just like mine is. lol.

hmmmm...I do believe raz would eat the food if left alone in the room with it...how on earth did you stop him eating it??? I just dont leave food low enough for me to reach, if im in the room i can tell him to leave it and he wont snatch anything off the plate though

The dogs I used to have many years back (2x GSDxKelpie) were the same, you could leave a plate of food on the ground in front of them and they look at it and then put their heads back down and go so sleep again... I'm not really sure if I've had incredible luck or if it's something in my training, but dog's I've had just don't take food that isn't theirs...

I never feed Rasta anything from the table or where we eat, he only gets his food in his bowl in the same location every day and night. He's learned through repetition I guess and never been exposed to food from the table, kitchen etc... Ignorance on his part?

reminds me of a time when a drunk guy tried to hand Rasta a half eaten hamburger... Rasta turned his head away from him continually, then the drunk looked at me said what's wrong with your dog. That's when I politely asked him not to feed my dog, but I never said a word to rasta to prevent him from eating the hamburger, he wasn't on lead and was about 5m ahead of me sniffing around when the drunk came up. I found it most amusing actually. Rasta was only 18 months old at that stage.

He's not really a big eater either, most nights he leaves his food in his bowl, then the cat comes along through the night and eats the left overs.

Welcome Shane - next sheepdog school at Binalong (near Yass which is near Canberra) is 17 and 18 July - if you want to go on the mailing list for details of the schools here just email me - ailsat@netspeed.com.au.

Hi Shane, welcome to the list, from New Zealand :-) I'm sure you'll enjoy joining in the conversations that go on here. I see from your site that you like taking photos of your handsome boy :-) I'm Penny, I have 2 Koolies, and I have heaps of photos of my guys too! <grin>

Paste this link to your browser if it doesn't come live when I post this...
http://s279.photobucket.com/albums/kk139/3WSS1Koolie/
to see my photos.

My Dice (2yo)has a very similar coat to your Rasta, but less fluffy around the ears, and he's Blue merle. I also have Haze,(4mo) a red merle short coat. Both from Tjukurpa. :-)

My dogsport of choice is agility, and I'm having a great time training and competing with Dice, and am sure the same will be true of Haze when she's older...

I find them very easy to live with too, to the point that when I was having a discussion with some border collie owning friends, and they were describing all the trouble their pups/young dogs get up to, and I had to say neither of mine had chewed anything they shouldn't, their worst habit is licking me, and Haze sat in the dianthus plant a number of times.

Made them sound really boring!

Penny,

I see what you mean about the markings, yours has a fuller mask over the eyes and yes, less fluff around the ears. I can see a lot of Rasta's mannerisms in his pictures. Dice is broader in the nose and across the head compared to Rasta though. I bet he gets a lot of comments from passers by.

That's the great thing with having a Coolie as part of the family, people always ask about them. A guy came up to me on Saturday when I was at the training track with Rasta and he says "You don't see too many Coolies around these days", so it's good to see some people are aware of the breed, it's great actually. My favorite comment from people is "What's a Coolie? What's it crossed with?" My answer is always, "That's a Coolie, they are Coolie crossed with Coolie..." It seems to do their head in a bit, then so many people ask if he's blind. I ask why? They say, "coz he has blue eyes". My rebuttal is, I have blue eyes, I'm not blind, should I be?

I know it's a little harsh, but it does amuse me some of the weird statements people make about Coolies. Small things I guess???

gosh...thats where i have failed...raz doesnt always get any of our leftovers...just sometimes but he always get maccas chips when we have maccas lol...he is a bit spoilt however we can sit with the plate on our laps and he leaves the food alone

Hi Shane and welcome to the forum. I haven't been here or a Koolie owner very long myself, but like you I am very keen to get Echo involved with herding. I plan to go to the Binnalong Workshop next month - I am thinking it's about 2.5 to 3 hours from Albury, so really not too far from you.

I live in Sydney not far from the Dogs NSW HQ where they also do herding. I have contacted these people a few times now, but they don't seem as organised or welcoming as either the Koolie Club or those on this forum, and no one ever offered to take my details and get back to me with the information and dates that I was after, so I guess we won't be doing that...

Meanwhile we have started in Agility and Echo seems to find it a real challenge and is much more suited to this higher energy environment than he is to the obidience classes that we have also done.

I hope you get as much from your envolment with this site and the people on it as we are thus far and good luck to both you and Rasta.

Cheers,
Matt

Binalong is definately the place to go if you get the chance...all the hard work has been done for you and Brad now has plenty of experience training koolies and their (slighty wacky) owners. I think he now admits freely they are different to kelpies and (thankfully some) kelpie owners. It is a great friendly experience unlike a lot of the events run by Dogs Vic & Dogs NSW etc where competition seems to overtake everything. You'll come home exhuasted but very satisfied!

Exhausted! I'm sure, but I don't think I'd want to try to drive home for 7 hours if I'm exhausted... Tiring me thinking about it. I think Binalong is a too far for the weekend, it's a 7 hour drive there from Melbourne.

I'd love to see some video footage and photos of what goes on there, I'm open to just about everything. I even think the training at Nyora might be a bit far too. This is being organised through the VHA. I'm waiting on a bit more info to come back to me... But I'd prefer to go somewhere that is familiar with Coolies and their traits. Yes they are different. And I'm quickly learning owners are too :)

Bloody hope we Koolie owners are different from Kelpie owners. Them is STRANGE people! (well the ones I know anyway) lol

It's about 9 hours from here (except when TJ is driving!!) but I would be there for every one of them if I didn't work in a 7 day a week industry. I am plotting to work out if I can do this one...but I doubt it.

I note with glee you have no aversion to being labeled "wacky", thought I would at least get a nibble...

You could even take a large holiday and come to sunny Queensland in September for our once a year workshop.

Now we are really stange up here and we like to herd goats and cattle around.

My OH & I travel two and half days to get to the workshop from North Queensland which is why we only go once a year! Great time, however, and the dogs love it!

the ones i know are strange too

That would be nice, particularly compared to what I will be doing at that time! I'll be up to my neck with calves, probably feeding (twice a day) 60 or so by then...yuck, I am so over dairying!! Unless some poor sucker comes along and wants to buy a dairy farm, then I would be there with bells on!!!

Most we have had at one time is 6 friesian x droughtmaster poddies, Sil, so hats off to you with 60!!