The challenge of training a border collie
Herding cats is not easy! If you don’t believe me, you can ask my border collie, Jake. We live on a ranch, so Jake is a working dog. Has a job. When cows need to be herded from point A to point B, it’s Jake’s job to get them there. Jake loves his job and he does it very well. He wouldn’t dream of playing with cows, that’s his job, but Jake is a Border Collie, and Border Collies are born with a natural herding instinct. So, Jake herds the cats (or tries to) just for fun. He hasn’t had much luck with that yet, but he will never give up.
Training a border collie, regardless of popular opinion, is not easy. It is not difficult to train a Border Collie because it is dumb. Border Collies are anything BUT dumb! No, the problems that come up when training a Border Collie are because they are TOO smart. A border collie WANTS to obey his master. You want to do exactly what your teacher wants you to do. But there are problems in training border collies because the trainer can send mixed signals without even realizing it.
For example, you can teach a Border Collie to sit on command in just two or three tries. But then the next time you give it the command to “sit”, it will look at it for further instructions. Why? Because you raised your arm in a different way or used a different tone of voice when you gave the order, then he thinks this is a different order. You need to find out what you want me to do. Consistency is the key to training a Border Collie. You must use the same commands (both voice and hand signals) in the same exact and precise way every time.