Have you tried dog sports like agility or flyball? I bet they'd love that!

I second laurief's suggestion.

But if you for some reason were able to keep geese or ducks, I understand they can also be herded.

I second agility. We built a course for my German Shepherd but even a few obstacles are fun if you don't have room for a full size course. Obedience training or trick training is fun too. You want to keep the mind busy as well as the body. Tracking is fun if you have access to fields nearby.

Lisa
[IMG]http://i226.photobucket.com/albums/dd146/lvdobes/005-3.jpg[/IMG]

Here is Jerri on her A frame.

Lisa

I have an aussie (7 yr old), an english shepherd (7 yr old) and a malinois (10 yr old). All of those are herding dogs. I got all 3 from the shelter I use to work at as pups. The aussie at 4 months, the english at 6 months, and the mali at 3 yrs old.

I did agility with the aussie and just play with the others. They love it.

You can do "tricks" which stimulate them mentally (dance around for a food treat) or teach them to put your socks in the laundry basket. My aussie loves to take my DH's socks off at night when he comes home from the resturant (he's a chef). It is his "thing".

Herding dogs love to have a job to do - no matter how minute that job might be to you or me. Just give them something to do consistently and they will embrace it.

How about herding?
If you go online you may find some herding clinics in your area.

I have a bearded collie and the day to day stuff involves games (fetch, hide and seek, find the toy, chase, frisbee), obedience, walks, puzzle toys like those stuffed animals that lay squeaky eggs and kongs. All at properly tuned intervals. I have a routine where we do stuff at pretty much the same time every day and that seems to be working well for us. During the off times he sleeps and he patiently awaits play time.

And although these are more so activities for other breeds, you might also look into EarthDog and tracking. I have heard of herding dogs excelling at tracking and we do a modified earthdog with my other dog.

Thanks for all these ideas. I realize now how many jobs Aughi has found for himself around the house. I'll follow up EarthDog and tracking since we normally spend a lot of time in the country mountains or fields.
I appreciate all your input.
Nan

Frisbee is another game that heelers enjoy.

I wouldn't recommend any small animals for them to practice herding since the 'herd' could end up with serious leg/body wounds. Heelers are so named because they nip the heels of cattle to control them.. They'll also nip humans!

although herding is instinctual it must be reined in and heelers and border collies and any other type of herding dogs - Briards etc, must be trained to rein in that urge to kill the animal he is to herd. Check with your local veterinarian about flyball, and or a nearby place where your dog can be trained in herding techniques, good luck

We have a company in our area that uses dogs to herd and chase geese away from certain lakes or parks ( due to an abundance of food, alot of the local geese no longer fly south in the winter)... so this business, amusingly called "Get the Flock Out" did the job. There are other similar businesses, and I just recently saw a "dogs wanted" ad on Craigslist, they needed dogs for the job. Do you have anything like that where you live?

On our acreage my Border Collies did gopher patrol keeping the varmints at bay. The old guys job was to go down our very very long driveway/road and fetch the newspaper every morning. On Fridays when the paper had the tv guide insert I would wrap that in a baggy and he'd take it up the way to the neighbors house since I had satellite and didn't need it. I had an agility setup simply using plastic rainbarrels, kids nylon tunnels etc. The young one I would run beside the truck or car at least once a day, a race back to the house for about 1/4 mile. He absolutely loved that. Not advisable in a busy area, we were in a very rural area of little to no traffic.

On another note -- I don't just have one tennis ball for Mocha -- he has about 8. I will often ask him to "get his ball" -- usually when he wants something from me. I always make him get his ball first. LOL. He sort of spits it at me after he gets it, and then awaits his reward (sometimes just a bite of cornbread from dinner).

He loves to spit that ball at us when we get home from work, when he wants to play, or just for any reason at all.

He is also a herder -- so having 8 of them makes it interesting. Sometimes, out in the back yard, he'll bring one to me and I'll throw the second, then the third, etc.

He has a habit of (a herding instinct really) of having to have all 8 of those tennis balls in a pile somewhere in that back yard. He never brings me the same one twice during those games -- he gets the one I threw and puts it in his "pile" then brings me another, and waits. When I throw it, he puts that one in the pile, etc.

He can't stand having his balls strown over the yard, they must be "herded" together in a pile.

We don't do anything special for our two German Shepherds except we are religious about walking them everyday, usually about 6 or 8 blocks, on weekends a little longer. Even though we have a backyard, we can see that they love the stimulation (and probably the feeling of being part of the pack) when DH and I and the two Shepherds head out the door.

I've heard that a huge part of their brain is for their sense of smell. Walking where other dogs have walked gives them a lot more stimulation than they get just in our back yard.

But also, one of them, Ginger has more of a herding instinct. She and I are usually walking behind DH and Spooky (the male Shepherd). She stays right behind DH, with her nose about 1 inch behind the back of his knee. Then she also does the zig, zag routine back and forth like she's herding but always stays just behind DH (when we are walking across the bridge or somewhere narrow). She knows her place in the pack (I'm at the end, LOL).

They are fairly well behaved though rather spoiled. They never try to dig out of the back yard, we have a doggy door they can use as frequently as they like. So I think the walk (and other playing around we give them now and then) is all they need as their "JOB".

I have 3 herding breed dogs, a Dutch Shepherd Mix, and 2 Belgian Shepherds (a Malinois and a Laekenois). We go to herding lessons twice a month, do agility, tracking, and obedience. The mental stimulation of obedience is also considered work. Then we go to the "park" and just run around in the fields sniffing stuff. (Not me, the dogs.)

Just my $.02 worth- I so agree with the others- he NEEDS to do hat he was bred to do. I hope you are in an area that has a herding 'group'. He will try to herd the furniture if he doesn't have any outlets.

Most people are not aware that Corgis are herding dogs. They are actually used to herd cattle by nipping at their legs. We had a Cardigan that really had the urge to herd including the heel nipping for which we had to carefully train out of her. Our two male Pembrokes don't have such a strong herding sense but all Corgis require a lot of exercise. They also do great in agility competition.

I walk my border collie and take him to the lake to swim. When we lived on the lake, he kept the geese out of our yard. He has lost his herding instinct - he will kill anything he catches.