Better Farming - November 2016

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Better Farming November 2016 FarmNews First > 27
In punishing August heat, Kevan
Gretton and his sheep hosted 80
top dogs and their handlers this
year at the Canadian Border Collie
Association’s National Sheep Dog
Trials on his Shepherd’s Crook Farm
near Woodville, east of Toronto. The
day was hot and dry after more than
four weeks without much rain, and
the fields were hard baked.
There came a point on the first day
of competition when organizers
considered a pause. Dog tongues
dangled. Everybody was hot. But
event organizers proceeded, periodi-
cally consulting judges and owners
about the condition of both sheep
and dogs.
They worked carefully through the
weekend, pausing only two days later
when torrential rain and tornado
warnings finally spelled the end of
drought in this part of Ontario.
Holding the trials under such
conditions puts everybody at risk,
said Gretton during a mid-day
interview when temperatures that he
described as “really brutal” hovered
in the plus-30 C degree range.
Gretton, who markets lambs from his
300-ewe, 200-acre operation, had
long since moved his lambs indoors
to begin feeding them hay.
Good husbandry requires care and
attention to the needs of livestock,
and that goes double for the farm
dogs who uniquely serve as farmers’
workers and companions.
Gretton has worked with border
collies throughout his 30 years at
Shepherd’s Crook; he worked with
them even earlier when he was a
child in England. The dogs play the
role of the “hired man,” he said. His
three working dogs live in kennels
along one wall of his drive shed, and
he enters them in international
competitions.
“I had an accident when I was
Farmdogs
Are they livestock or part of the household? Maybe it’s a bit of both.
by JIM ALGIE
younger. I can’t run. He (one of the
dogs) will do the running for me,”
Gretton said of his canine help.
“I use a dog, not necessarily every
day. But he gets used quite a bit,
moving sheep, putting them through
the chute, as you would a second
person.”
Gretton’s dog Sid won 153 points
and placed 10th in double lift finals at
this year’s nationals. Sid came well
behind a dog named Dorey who took
the competition with 257 points.
Dorey belongs to Amanda Milliken of
Kingston.
Gretton enjoys trials which mimic
daily field work. They test the herding
skills of individual animals and the
communication between him and his
dogs. Beyond their practical value,
trials also provide opportunities for
travel and socializing.
“We spend February in Florida,
competing (there),” Gretton said. “It’s
a good holiday and good reason to
go.”
Teresa Castonguay’s interest in
herding dogs led her to sheep.
Castonguay, an arts administrator
who has a small flock of 40 sheep
near Warkworth, became interested
in border collies while she was
driving in England and saw them
working sheep on rural roads.
“I lived in Toronto, so I got a
border collie and said, ‘Oh, this dog
needs something to do,’” she ex-
plained in an interview. She described
FARM DOGS
Kevan Gretton and his dog, Clint. Gretton hosted this year’s
National Sheep Dog Trials at his Shepherd’s Crook Farm near
Woodville, in Kwartha Lakes, in August.