Dan is a littermate to Amanda Milliken's Mabel who are both progeny of GraceXCraig. He is rough coated, mostly black and has semi-floppy ears which tend to pop up when he detects that he is in the vicinity of sheep.  At  home, he is a gentle, agreeable, easy going dog whose favourite pastime is stalking our cat.  Dan  is a pleasure to own.

Dan was purchased as a started dog, trained by Mark Bustard. While watching Mark work with Dan, I noticed that when a "lie-down" command was given, Dan stopped but did not lie-down.  He stood while waiting for his next instruction.  As a very green Novice wannabee, I thought this was great!  Why have a dog lie down when you want him to get up and continue working a fraction of a second later?

Dan and I began working together last January at Viki Kidd's training facility in Milton, Ontario.  Stepping onto the training field with my dog, Dan, and giving him a "come by" or an  "away" or just a plain "shhh" if I forgot the commands, and watching him race out with a  perfect outrun and deliver the sheep to my feet was an incredible experience.

Dan knows how to manage sheep and demonstrated this by refusing to take my incorrect commands.  He loves his work and was not about to sacrifice his standards by doing something which his instinct and training told him was wrong.  Viki explained to me what   Dan was doing, and what my role was in the correct management of our sheep.  I am not  sure which of my instructors, Dan or Viki, had the most difficult task or required the most patience, for I have found this sport to be the most difficult one I have encountered.

For Dan and I to work as a team, we needed to have trust in each other.  This would come about only by working together as much as possible and wherever we could find a training field and sheep.  To this end, we traveled to all of the OBCC novice trial events and to the  USA on four occasions.  During the summer, we were fortunate to work on several different  fields owned by club members.  

After an enjoyable and successful year together, Dan and I are looking forward to the   challenges of competing in the Pro Novice level next season.