Sheep and cattle dogs have long been praised for their work ethic on Australian farms, but now a new challenge has been set up to demonstrate their endurance and show how valuable they are to farms.
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The Cobber Challenge has been set up and will test eight working dogs across the country in their natural environments.
The dogs have been fitted with a GPS collar and their activity, including kilometres travelled and speed, will be logged for three weeks.
Two regional farmers have dogs entered in the challenge: Delungra’s Matt Ehsman with his seven-year-old dog Minute, and Armidale’s Jeremy Grills with two-year-old Tammy.
Matt said the value of his dogs can’t be underestimated.
He believed they can get through the workload of four men.
When stock is handled right, it can save you a lot of money.
- Matt Ehsman
"It saves a lot of time and effort plus it handles your stock a lot better.
“So the biggest thing with handling cattle and sheep is how to handle them right so there is no shrinkage,” he said.
"The best thing about dogs is when they are well bred and under control quite well is they are always in position and always know how to handle the stock even better than we do at times.”
Many farmers have chosen vehicles to move stock, but Matt said a team of working dogs can get the job done more efficiently and place less stress on stock.
"When everybody was using horses and dogs all the time, the horses got you from A to B and the dogs did all the work,” Matt said.
“Nowadays, people are doing a lot of stuff on the bike so sometimes they lose that 'stockability',” he said.
"With that as well, the cattle are running a lot more and when they are running they lose shrinkage and that can cost you a lot more dollars in your pocket than what you think it can.
"When stock is handled right, it can save you a lot of money.”
Grills agreed with Ehsman and said working dogs can access some of the tough New England terrain vehicles couldn’t.
“You can’t get the buggy in some of this rougher country so you wouldn’t get the job done without a dog,” he said.
“We’d be lost without a good dog like Tammy.”
You can follow the progress of these eight great Australian working dogs on the Cobber Challenge website: http://www.cobberchallenge.com.au.