Estimated read time: 4-5 minutes
MIDWAY — There's no sight quite like watching a border collie quietly circle, slink, crawl and cajole a group of sheep up and down a mountain side, through gates and into pens, responding to the whistling of its human a hundred yards away.
Herding dogs and their handlers from around the country braved the continuous rain Saturday during the 20th annual sheepdog classic competition at Soldier Hollow, a former Winter Olympic venue tucked into the Wasatch mountains.
Low-lying clouds hugged the vibrant spring mottling of reds and greens on the mountainside, reminiscent of the Welsh, Irish and Scottish moorland quite of few of these dogs were imported from. A group of bagpipers played tunes while huddling under a nearby bridge, making the comparison even more probable.
While there are hundreds of sheepdog trials across the nation every year, competition manager Carol Clawson said this is "perhaps the largest attended sheepdog trial in the world," drawing a bigger crowd than the world trial. It's an event that leans more rodeo than Westminster Kennel Club but attracts fans from all walks of life.
The rain, according to Clawson, is "actually wonderful dog trial weather," keeping the animal athletes cool while they work.
Attendance is bolstered by a full docket of events. Local police brought their K9s for demonstrations, there's a petting zoo, sheep getting sheared, and dogs corraling ducks or running agility courses, not to mention lines of food trucks.
But the main event throughout Memorial Day weekend is the over 130 dogs working a flock of skittish yearling ewes, five at a time. The special sheep, weighing around 150 pounds each, winter in the vast west desert of Utah and Nevada where they have learned to fend off predators, and rarely interact with humans or dogs.
The spectacle is a strange dance between canine and ovine. From right in front of the bleachers, a handler releases their dog. It hurtles toward a distant group of sheep, skirting to one side or the other to avoid pushing the flock farther away.
Boomeranging back, the dog makes first contact with the animals, called the "lift," a critical moment for competitors. If the dog comes crashing in, the sheep scatter like pins at a bowling alley. Too gentle an approach and the sheep circle up and refuse to budge, or continue grazing as the handler watches valuable seconds tick by.
First impressions matter on the open range.
The flock must then be "fetched" and brought straight down the hill toward the faux-shepherd. High-pitched whistles from the handler tell the dog to lie down, crawl forward, circle clockwise and counterclockwise. If a dog is especially off track, it may get a shouted reprimand like "NO JILL!" but the dogs are very sensitive and eager to please, so being too harsh or putting too much pressure can derail the whole task.
A handler fluent in whistling sounds like a bossy songbird, encouraging the dog to push a herd back out in a triangle pattern across the field, through gates, returning to a holding ring, and then forced into a small pen. And all this must be done in 13 minutes.
The backgrounds of these handlers a much more varied than you would expect. Some work these dogs on ranches, but others have unrelated full-time jobs — like one airline pilot — and have to get creative in order to give their dogs experience.
Clawson, a handler herself, was living in Millcreek when she first started training sheepdogs. "There was a group of five or six of us that formed a little co-op," she said. While she was not able to keep sheep in her suburban backyard, her group worked a little 5-acre field near Draper.
Others dedicate their lives to the sport, breeding and training dogs that can be sold for upwards of $10,000.
But for many, it's the special bond between working dog and human. "These dogs are unusual," Clawson said, "They're intelligent. They're very athletic. They are bred to want to please and work with you and be a partner. ... It's a pretty magical thing."
Many believe border collies instinctively know how to herd, but there is a staggering amount of training that goes into teaching the animal the practicalities of the work. The breed is naturally inclined to move animals with their body language and sharp gaze, but some are more talented than others. They start young and, depending on the dog, can start competing by the time they're 2 old.
A dog's competition career, if they show themselves to be talented and are handled by skillful owners, can last upwards of a decade.
"I suspect that the truly great dogs are born," Clawson said. "My first dog, I thought she was probably a great dog, but I wasn't ready."
The beautiful thing about the sport, according to Clawson, is the dogs don't care about winning or losing. They love working, and "you just get this bond with them and you're happy to have it."
