We were graciously given free rein to use cows for the afternoon which is something I know everyone appreciated. Cattle opportunities are far and few between so having fresh stock to work is exciting. The farm is home to a variety of breeds so there was a lot of fun to be had when sorting groups and figuring out how they all worked. If you haven't worked dairy cattle before they don't tend to stay together as well as their beef counterparts. Further more there were three types of dairy cattle, Holstein, Guernsey, and Jersey. My experiences raising bull dairy calves has left me with a rather well develop dislike for Jersey's. I think it is their deceptively sweet eyes that war against their often opinionated nature. As babies I dare you to look at one and not want to hug it! But what is the fun in life if you can't in good humor give your friends a hard time? So naturally as Kelly was helping me sort off my group I ended up with the Jersey and two Holsteins ;-). Diva was doing a nice job moving the cows around and we put them through the various obstacles that were set up a few times. The cattle moved very nicely off the dog and despite trying to set up a nose grip opportunity they just never really needed one while Diva was out there. We did at one point lose one of the Holstein's to the back by the re-pen/draw and when I started to move in to push the cow out of the corner Diva suddenly decided she was going to come in full throttle and "help" me. This resulted in the calf making every attempt to not step on Diva while he hit the fence with his shoulder trying to get away. I really hate to lose my cool but let's suffice it to say that Diva got scruffed up and endured the walk of shame out of the arena without a chance to fix her mess. Probably not the best choice but there have a been a couple of times on cows since Diva gained her confidence that she has suddenly decided to get naughty and I want to nip it in the bud!
After spending her time out in the truck away from everyone she came out much improved and working awesome! I made a point of telling her how good she was frequently and we celebrated together with her bouncing all over me and making silly noises. That is the great thing about Diva. She really does take emotional correction to heart but as soon as you find a place to praise she is 10x better. I was working on sending her all the way around in the corners to make a space on the fence and each time she was successful she would fly over to me and leap in the air with a huge grin on her face. Happy dog! She continues to be much more successful on the away side but we were able to end on a very pretty go bye into the corner which made me happy.
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