How do I stop my herding dog from nipping other dogs?
The first thing you want to do is make use of some basic commands. Try starting with the “come” comm Read More
How to tell if your dog has herding instincts?
Carli Jacobi
2025-07-08 06:51:39
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She will become alert and stare at children who are running, screaming, or acting silly. This is sometimes accompanied by one or two very inhibited little barks. She'll do this little bark at times when a stranger of any age stares at her for too long as well. She has on two occasions began running toward a child who was running but she immediately came back to me and disengaged when I called her. She did run toward an adult jogger once in the dog park as well. The reactions are also mostly occurring when she is behind a barrier or on leash. She's much more likely to stare or bark if she's overstimulated and underexercised.
Rigoberto Zboncak
2025-06-28 13:34:33
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To determine if your dog has herding instincts, consider that herding breeds were developed to gather, herd, and protect livestock such as sheep or cattle. That shared heritage means they all have the instinctive skill and drive to control the movement of other animals. To a herding dog, however, other animals means the humans in the house, too. Dogs will express their herding drive with whatever is available, including other pets, kids, and even you. Since these hardwired instincts are triggered by movement, herding is usually not something your dog is doing just to get attention or to deliberately misbehave. When it comes to herding breeds, dogs exhibit the early parts of the predatory sequence more strongly than the others — specifically, the search, stalk, and chase. Dogs aren’t confused about whether or not kids are sheep, and it’s doubtful your pant legs look like cow hooves, dogs are simply doing what comes naturally to them when movement catches their eye.
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How do I stop my Border Collie from reacting to other dogs?
Border collie reactivity – barking, lunging, snarling, and snapping – is a very common problem with Read More
Morgan Fisher
2025-06-28 12:39:03
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Herding instincts and trainability can be measured when introducing a dog to livestock at a young age. Typically, farm bred collies will be put with livestock from a young age and their level of engagement will be assessed. They retain their herding instincts and may sometimes nip at people’s heels or bump them in an effort to ‘herd’ their family, and may need to be trained not to do so. The herding instinct can be hard to live with. Other examples of herding include the way a young collie engages with other dogs out on a walk. They might look as though they are taking part in a ‘chase’ game and running around after another dog. However, this will very quickly become a case of the collie trying to drive the other dog and snapping or barking at it if it doesn’t go the right way. You can see it when a dog is focusing on you and what you are doing and is very aware of other animals, he wants to take control, to be in charge and drive away the other dogs. But some puppies clearly do have more of a drive for this than others. Robbie, Ounce’s brother, has been described as having a strong herding drive.