I have but one speed....fast

The title to this post is the mantra of the typical young Aussie when working stock. Ok, probably when doing anything! Diva, I swear, must have chanted this over and over in her head anytime we approached the sheep. It was almost like a talking to a teenager with their headphones on. I would say something, she wouldn't do it, I would yell louder, and she would run faster. For someone who wasn't very familiar with sheep and having this speeding young dog I often felt like the ringmaster to a circus. In my mind I knew I was supposed to walk somewhere and give the sheep room to move to off of the dog but my feet simply disconnected from my brain. This in turn caused me to get flustered and I would stop saying anything of use to Diva. This was how we spent a lot of our early training sessions. Diva was trying but I wasn't fast enough with my commands or the stick to help her be in the right place. We continued to have our monthly lessons and I did pick up some very useful exercises but what I also picked up was a tendency to expect to much from my very young puppy and an over bearing need to push her way off of the sheep.

Around the time Diva turned 8 months old I noticed that she was starting to really check out when I applied any pressure and we got the default behavior of bombing off to eat sheep poop. I now had a little more education and had gotten some good advice about the difference in BC's and Aussies so I made the decision to stop taking monthly lessons with our first instructor and give Diva some time off. This was by far the best decision I made in those early months.

The thing was Diva wasn't doing anything that a typical Aussie pup doesn't do. She wanted to work close and she wanted to be fast. She was also to young for the type of pressure I was asking her to take and I was too green to help her. I consider the fact that we made it through that point real proof of Diva's heart and devotion. She probably isn't the most talented stock dog but she is biddable and that will get you a long way.