Grazing the sheep

We've a crap-ton of rain lately and as a result my trainer's field is beautiful, lush and green. Unfortunately, her property is only partially fenced in so if she lets her sheep out to graze someone has to watch them and keep them off the neighbors property and after my main lesson, Soda and I did that for a few hours.

It was so good for Soda! It allowed us, in a practical application, to work on wide, sweeping outruns or patience if I used her to block off forbidden zones. At first she was unsure about sweeping out so wide and so far and was slow but once she got the idea and the hang of it, she was really zooming along.

We did have some problems with the corner of death as I have come to call it. For some reason, only known to Soda, she absolutely cannot work in this corner. She gets all weird, starts displacement sniffing, won't come, won't take flanks or do anything. She just gets down in the ditch and sniffs her way down the ditch until she's about 20 yards away and when I go over and get her, she looks at me like "it's so scary over here!!" I have to go over and physically help her and block her off from just wandering off.

I found that if I go over and stand with her she can do it but I don't know why when I give the commands from a distance it just blows her mind. Note: It only blows her mind in this one corner. I guess it's just another project to work on!

I was sorting sheep for my trainer and her gate is thin and aluminum and has big spaces. Anyway, as I was sorting the gate got stepped on or something and popped up and hit me right in the funny bone. Seriously, I don't think I've ever been in more pain!! My stomach turned, I saw a bright white and got dizzy. My whole forearm went numb, I couldn't for about 2 hours feel my middle, ring and pinkie fingers. I still can't move my arm up to touch my face without white-hot searing pain jetting up. It's awful! I never thought a damn funny bone could hurt so bad.

I got some crap videos on my cell phone of Soda. I think I'll wait 'till next week to post some good videos though. I'll take my camera next time.