Presents
Starlight Hill's Zelda
Sire:
Shininger's Rocky
Dam:
Shininger's Nikki
6/04
UC Davis DNA Ivermectin Sensitivity Study: Normal/Normal
Zelda
Achievements:
Zelda's grandparents work.
Zelda has worked goats, ducks and is learning to help with the sheep. On her own, she lacks confidence with the less familiar stock like the sheep. She is quite brave and helpful if Tucker is with her. I've chosen to work her all alone on easy, gentle stock to boost her confidence. She has taken a lot longer to mature mentally than Tucker did and at 22 months still seems puppyish.
Zelda loves to help me and will wait at the gate for me to return. If she sees me headed for my shoes, she races to the door so she can accompany me. She is extremely biddable and handles direction well. She doesn't take correction personally and bounces right back.
She is much lighter than Tucker and stays further off the stock. She is developing into a pretty good duck dog. Zelda will grip the goats lightly above the hock. She uses lots of different methods to move animals. With babies she puts her mouth over the back of their neck and steers them around; she will also wrap her front legs around their necks and push them back. With adults she grabs above the hock or front legs; she shoves very hard with her nose.
She is more effective getting animals out of corners and when they refuse to budge, she walks away like she's given up and as soon as they start to come out she gets behind them and drives them back to the herd.
Zelda is most successful driving the livestock and it has taken some training to get her to stay behind while I'm in front.
She is ever ready to enforce my commands. She hasn't independently returned escaped animals, but does guard the gate after she has penned animals and is waiting for me to come shut them in.
Zelda herds to please and help me.
Zelda is an excellent watchdog and is observant of the tiniest change in the environment. If she were in an urban setting, she would bark a lot. She is reserved with strangers and takes a while to warm up.