McLean County cattleman Bruce Hopgood proudly describes his employees’ expertise in working cattle: “I can go in the middle of the pasture — and without any panels or gates — open the back of my trailer and load my cows.”

And Hopgood doesn’t worry that his employees will ask for raises, better health insurance, or leave to work for someone else.

His dream employees are his dogs, specially bred and trained to work with cattle.

“One dog can take the place of three people,” Hopgood said. “I want to stand at the gate, send out the dogs, and have the cattle come to me.”

Hopgood breeds, trains, and sells cattle dogs through his business, Midwest Cattle Dogs {www.midwestcattledog.com). He has shipped trained dogs as far as Texas and Louisiana.

“So many people think dogs would chase cattle. The key is to have control of your dog,” Hopgood explained. Trained dogs learn to not spook cattle by entering a cow’s flight zone, he added.

Hopgood got started because he couldn’t find dependable people who knew how to work with cattle, and he couldn’t afford to hire several full-time employees. “One day a friend told me, ‘You need a dog,’” he remembered.

His research led him to Gary Ericsson, an Oklahoma cattle dog trainer, from whom Hopgood bought his first dog and learned how to train and work with dogs that herd cattle.

Hopgood prefers border collies, Australian shepherds, and “the Cadillac of cow dogs” — hanging tree cattle dogs that are a cross of several herding breeds that gather, rather than drive, cattle. Training starts when young dogs are at least 7 months old to be able to withstand being kicked by a cow.

Cattle dogs aren’t inexpensive, Hopgood said, but make a sound investment over a 10-year-plus work span. Training costs are $500 per month, and a well-trained, mature dog sells for $6,000 to $8,000.

However, a trained dog is cheap compared to the annual expense of a full-time employee’s salary, health insurance, and other costs, he noted.

Hopgood’s dogs are trained to follow both voice commands and whistles because a whistle’s sound will carry farther, especially in windy conditions. After a dog is trained, the next step is training its master.

He encourages dog owners to return for monthly sessions to review “what to do and what not to do” with their highly trained canine workers. Knowing the right commands to give a dog must be second nature or the system doesn’t work, according to Hopgood.

“If you have to think, ‘What is that command,’ then it’s too late,” he explained. “You need to say it when a cow’s head moves in a certain direction ... You learn by your mistakes and by trying over and over. You’ve got to build up confidence in yourself, and then the dog picks up on that.”

Once a master has built that trust with his dog, he’ll have a best friend — and an employee for life, Hopgood said. – Kay Shipman

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