Border line brilliance

Ellena Swift gives the top doggingin award to the humble sheepdog

This time of year the majority of keepers face the seemingly never-ending and infuriating task of “dogging-in”. The art of pushing wandering poults back to the more desirable areas of the shoot can be extremely time-consuming and impossible without said canine friend. Not dissimilar to the skills required of a beating dog, the dogging-in one must work steadily, without picking any of the birds (known as pegging).

The most common breed of dog used by keepers is the spaniel, for it is renowned for its ability to hunt tightly to its handler, quarter and sit to flush. While it is acknowledged that other gundog breeds can be just as effective as the spaniel in its role in driving birds home, it is surprising that given what is required of the dog another breed has been overlooked.

The border collie’s entire existence revolves around its desire to herd, drive and move quarry.

It has little if no drive to retrieve and most will herd almost anything.

I often hear pet dog owners claiming their collie herds their children if they wander too far, and nearly everyone in the dog world will have seen or heard of a collie chasing car wheels. It is a simple desire to herd the object that is trying to leave and not the “bad dog behaviour” it is often perceived to be.

So what makes the collie such a useful dogging-in companion? While a spaniel will hunt hard and quarter, it will do so at a pace it dictates. This is normally fairly rapid. A collie will move at the pace of whatever they are attempting to herd. Therefore most birds being dogged-in by a collie will run rather than flush or fly. This means they are less likely to hop over the wrong hedge or fly the wrong way, resulting in either a long walk to get them back or the reluctant acceptance that the bird has beaten you.

The other benefit to using a collie is the ability to send it away and work it back to you, meaning you can act as a team rather than you and the dog always having to work in the same direction. How many times when attempting to push a stubborn bird into a pop-hole have they walked around it? Or when pushing a ditch or hedge up the bird has decided to hop over your head, landing a frustrating 20 yards behind you? With the collie you simply ask for a basic outrun where it runs a long way out to the side and gets behind the bird to bring it all the way back to you. A gundog breed if sent for the same bird would run straight towards it with no regard for the direction in which the bird is being pushed.

“The border collie’s existence revolves around its desire to herd, drive and move quarry”

Working tirelessly

My husband is keeper for two shoots. On both we have used a team of border collie and colliecrosses for almost six years for all the dogging-in and, more recently, beating work. They have proved invaluable, working tirelessly to drive and move the birds to where we want without ever pegging, or rushing, the birds. By using this intelligent breed we avoid mass flushes, panicking birds and, ultimately, birds being pushed to the wrong place. It is also very easy to “dog” hedges and ditches with little input from the handler.