Working Dog Helps with Catching Escaped Sheep

by Anne Jespersen
(Wisconsin)

Just after we moved to our farm in Wisconsin our little flock of sheep took off through an open gate (oops) and got mixed in with our neighbors' flock of sheep. They had an electric fence at the time, which did not even slow my sheep down- they went straight through it to get to visit with more buddies.

I went and got Cinder, my Aussie, who was just learning to shed (split sheep into groups). "Now is your big chance to see if the lesson took," I told her.

Well, it was not a problem for her. We lined out the sheep, with the neighbor's non dog broke sheep in the front and split off all of mine from the back. Cinder took them through the electric fence, which was now turned off so we wouldn't get shocked on our way back, and put them back in our field.

It took about 5 minutes, not including time to walk over there and back. I don't even know how long it would have taken if I hadn't had a dog to help.