GERMAN SHEPHERD DOG: HUNTER TO HERDER

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Rich is both an AKC and AHBA Herding Test and Trial Judge. He and his dogs have earned six herding championships culminating in two "Triple Crown" wins in AKC, AHBA and ASCA. His dogs are among only a handful of German Shepherds in the entire nation to achieve this honor. Rich has been involved in herding for nearly two decades-training, trialing and teaching. Rich specializes in working with all dog breeds. As a testament to his teaching and coaching skills, his students and their dogs have successfully won awards at all levels of herding from instinct tests to championships. Rich is a Vietnam era veteran who served four years as a Navy Corpsman. After leaving the Navy, he spent the next 38 years as a med tech for the Veterans Administration Hospital in San Diego.
Unlike work with Collies, German Shepherds never gather sheep into a flock. They never use what is called the "EYE" to control sheep and they are never used to cut sheep out of a flock.
In the Tending style the sheep are trained to come to the shepherd when he calls them. The sheep are trained to follow the shepherd when he leads the flock to a new pasture. The dogs only role is to act as a LIVING FENCE and a Policeman to keep the sheep within the borders that the shepherd establishes.
It is not easy for one or two dogs to control a large flock of sheep. In Germany the flocks I watched averaged between 300 and 800 sheep. The dogs are expected to keep these sheep out of vegetable gardens and fields of fresh plants as the flock passes by or grazes next door. This is a difficult thing to do if the sheep have had nothing to eat all night or if they have been eating dry stubble for the past two hours. The dog's only means of maintaining control is through gripping or biting the sheep.