Working dogs: a farmer's best friend

SHEEPDOG handlers are becoming a rarer breed according to the Yorkshire Sheepdog Society. The society is finding it hard to interest younger people in organising sheepdog trials which one young enthusiast describes gloomlily as "an old man's hobby".

But how does this state of affairs square with the fact that demand for trained sheepdogs is sky-high? Two went for a world record price of 4,900 guineas each at the summer working dogs sale at Skipton Auction Mart a few weeks ago.

One of them was John Bell's 14-month-old Border Collie Ron, sold to a Scottish farmer who wants the dog to work with 3,000 sheep in Perthshire and in staged trials. So what goes into training such a dog and who else would pay that much when they might have a quad bike for the same money?

More than 60 years of experience has provided John Bell with an extraordinary ability to spot potential talent in young dogs, and an innate understanding of how to harness and hone a border collie's natural intelligence and instinct.

John first started training sheepdogs as a 16-year old working on his family's farm at Giggleswick in the Yorkshire Dales. In those days, a good working dog would sell for 15. The average price of the sheepdogs sold at the recent auction at Skipton was in excess of 2,300.

John later moved to his own farm at Wetherby and became involved in schooling ponies for children to ride, as well as training horses for appearances on television programmes, including Follyfoot and The Chase. Since he retired from farming 12 years ago, he has been able to spend more time working with sheepdogs and established a reputation as an expert trainer. These days he is based at Parks Farm at Newsholme, near Howden, a working farm run by his son, Christopher.

"I like working with young animals and I think that's how I became involved in training ponies and sheepdogs," says John. "I was brought up in farming and understand animals well. One of the skills you need with the young sheepdogs

is to be able to judge how much or how little direction they need.

"Their basic instinct goes back to a dog's natural instinct to kill and you have to turn that to your favour, making sure that you respect the sheep. Border collies are the biggest worriers of sheep if they get away and are left to do their own thing because they're naturally attracted to them and become very excited around them.

"The young dogs will tell me when they're ready to start training by showing me that they're interested. That would typically be at around seven months old. I like them to be keen. If they're not interested in sheep, you can't train them and some are simply not cut out for it. I had a lovely dog that just wasn't interested, even though his sister made a good working dog. He made someone a lovely family pet instead. Every dog is different and you can't use the same approach with them all. People ask me what the secret is, but it's really about understanding each dog as an individual."

Although John occasionally breeds a litter of border collies, he usually buys young dogs at five or six months after spotting their potential talent. At any one time he is likely to be training five or six. He keeps a small flock of Hebridean wethers (castrated male sheep), which have a calm and quiet temperament that makes them suitable for use with young dogs working with sheep for the first time.

"I will be buying more lambs of different sorts at the end of the month so that the dogs get used to working with different types of sheep. I train the young dogs regularly but for short periods at first so they don't get bored and lose their concentration.

"They get a lot of outdoor exercise in a huge purpose-built pen, so they're very fit by the time they start training. At first they might train one day in three. When they get to a certain age, they will be training almost every day. It comes with experience and you do have to put a lot of thought into getting them to a high standard."

John encourages potential buyers to visit Parks Farm to see his dogs at work before they consider making an offer for them at a sale, where they will have only minutes to decide. "I'm a trainer, not a dealer, and I like my dogs to go to permanent homes. It can be confusing for a young dog to be moved around and it's a big risk for a farmer to buy a dog at a sale that they've not seen before."

John was delighted with the record price for Ron whose potential he spotted early on. "He was showing style when I first bought him. It's different with different dogs, but you're trying to establish what sort of feel and balance they have with the sheep. He's a special dog; it's amazing how intelligent they are and nice to watch them mature." He believes the price was a fair one for a highly trained animal that will work on a farm covering thousands of acres of rough terrain for the next few years.

"In some areas of Scotland, the dogs are responding to commands when they're half a mile away from their owners. From that distance, the only way that the owner can see what the dog is doing is by watching the movement of the flock down the hillside.

"People spend six to seven thousand pounds on a quad bike and they can't do everything a dog can do. Quads can be used to drive sheep down from the hills but not to pen them up. So you still need a dog."

CW 7/8/10