Our Herding Yorkie

 This is Ajah. She's my 11 year old mostly Yorkie pup. Big Onion likes to say that every dog on this farm has a job: the shelties move the livestock around and generally guard the farm, Barley pulls the cart and stalks the backyard for rats, and Ajah? He says Ajah's job is just to keep me happy.
  As you can tell from the picture above, Ajah prefers to spend most of her time indoors snuggled next to us on the couch, destroying small squeaky toys, or trying her best to sneak a lick at the cat bowls, but Ajah has some hidden talents....

Tonight, I decided to give Ajah a chance to help us put away the poultry. She did great! When we first went out, I think she was a little overwhelmed by the sheer number of birds all milling around waiting for their dinner. She kept eyeing the turkeys (who are easily 3 times her weight) and looking back at me like, please tell me you don't want me to move these things! Luckily, the turkeys come when called. 

She was a big help though with the ducks. Went and got our newest batch of youngsters (this was actually their first day on the ground) and tucked them into their new enclosure for the night. She was even ready to take on the geese if I'd have let her!

I should say that herding is nothing new for my girl. She's had years of watching the shelties work and even had a bit of formal training with the Golem Kennels crew on our visits. I wish I could find the videos from those trips. Totally hilarious. 

She did such a good job tonight, I guess I should give the girl a shot at working our sheep next....

On second thought, maybe we'll wait until the flock is a little more 'dog broke' before sicking 7lbs of terrier terror on them.