EAST LANSING, Mich. — Jeanne Weaver uses her dogs every day to help manage the flock of sheep on her Williamston, Mich., farm.

During the 33rd annual Ag Expo last month, Weaver shared her 30-plus years of dog training experience with visitors as she demonstrated what it takes to create a healthy working relationship between dogs and livestock.

“The value of the dog is in the training,” she said. “They come with instinct, and lots of it, but you have to teach them what to do with it.”

During two presentations each day of the three-day show, Weaver shared techniques on how to carry on a conversation with dogs using whistles and commands. She also demonstrated the importance of developing teamwork between dogs and handlers and knowing how dogs interpret and understand livestock.

Weaver said she starts training dogs using verbal commands and eventually transitions to whistle commands, which dogs can hear from a greater distance.

“By using whistle commands, we can work quite a distance from each other. Yelling doesn’t work well,” she said.

Weaver’s seven-year-old border collie, Tim, and her two-year-old, Maggie, demonstrated for visitors their ability to work with Weaver as they moved sheep around an enclosed demonstration area. “They don’t chase the flock, they control it,” she pointed out.

“The way you train a dog is to put pressure on it. When they do what is right, you take the pressure off. The one thing about training these dogs is they’re sensitive – they really just want to work for you.”

Weaver said it’s important not to overwork the dogs.

“You want to stop them at the point of balance,” she said. “They have a feel for being around livestock and they know where they need to go.”

That instinct sometimes causes them not to listen to commands. “If the flock is taking off, their instinct takes over and they won’t listen to a stop command.”

Weaver starts training dogs at 10-12 months of age and said it works best to start them on livestock that is used to being around dogs.

“They aren’t mentally or physically ready for training at a younger age,” she said of the dogs. “You really need to wait until they’re mature.”

She also cautioned participants against training dogs using full-grown steers or mother cows. “That will get you killed,” she quipped.

Instead, Weaver prefers to use calves or sheep during training because they are smaller and easier to handle. She started training dogs because she enjoys working with animals. She has always had livestock and used to show cutting horses.

At that time she had an Australian shepherd and raised the breed for several years. In 1992, she got her first border collie. In her 30 years of training and competing, Weaver has produced 10 Australian shepherd and border collie champions, most notably the Canadian national champion, Liz.

Weaver said her dogs are a necessity on her farming operation because they make managing the flock much easier.

“I’ve had sheep for about 35 years. I would not raise sheep without the dogs,” she said.

In addition to raising sheep and horses, Weaver teaches others how to train their dogs through both group classes and individual training sessions. “It’s something I enjoy and I’m good at it,” she said. “For me, it’s better than having a job behind a desk.”