Home > Work > Mr. and Mrs. Dog: Our Travels, Trials, Adventures, and Epiphanies
1 " Every trainer I spoke to, though advocating methods as contradictory as Koehler and pharmacological behaviorism, agreed on four basic principles. The are magic principles, and so important that training may not help dogs living without them, while some dogs living with them require little formal training.• Magic principle #1: Don’t be nuts!• Magic principle #2: Puppies are baby dogs• Magic principle #3: Exercise your dog• Magic principle #4: Give your dog a job "
― Donald McCaig , Mr. and Mrs. Dog: Our Travels, Trials, Adventures, and Epiphanies
2 " By human standards, I know far more than the dogs do. But Luke and June can do what I cannot. In a millisecond, forty feet from just encountered range Rambouillets the dogs see, big as a Wall Drug bill board, which sheep is the leader. They immediately understand the complex social order in this particular miniflock. they know whether the sheep are ready to fight, split up, or break for the tall timber, because the sheep tell them what they mean to do. For the sake of that instant, for that millisecond, that's why the Mister and Missus have put so many miles beneath their paws. Luke and June have developed an all-sheep, all-breed, all-terrain method that doesn't give them an edge over dogs who've been working these sheep on this terrain all their lives, but does help them transmute the novel into the manageable "
3 " The sheepdog trial is a contest of farm and ranch dogs doing the same work they do every day at home. It's a simple test: dog runs out, gathers sheep, and fetches them to his shepherd. Dog drives the sheep through obstacles. Then dog and man sort the sheep and pen them. Any halfway decent sheepdog can do it but some are better than others "
4 " So they can talk dogs when ladies are present southern bird dog men call their females gyps. Since modern, vulgar misuses of bitch demean all femininity, gyp is more courteous. "