Training
Australian Cattle Dogs are highly intelligent and independent thinkers who tend to react to aggression with aggression.  A Cattle Dog needs to be trained or they will find their own things to do which may not please you. A positive style of training rewarding with food, toys or life rewards is the most effective way of training a cattle dog.

Cattle Dog’s independent thought means they respond very well to clicker or marker training where their behaviour is shaped to what you want - cattle dogs just love to work out what behaviour is going to get them that reward. 
If training is always positive you will find that you will benefit from what Karen Pryor refers to as accelerated learning – teaching new things becomes faster and easier.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I like to train using positive reinforcement

As dogs repeat behaviours that they find rewarding and we both have fun training. 

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The basic principles are:
•    Reward (Positive reinforcement) to increase the behaviours you want
•     Ignore (Negative punishment), look or turn away and remain completely passive, or calmly walk away, or leave area, to stop behaviours you do not want. 
•    It is important to remember – that positive is not permissive – set rules & boundaries, your dog needs to know what is unacceptable behaviour. Do not let your puppy practice behaviours you do not want – distract, redirect or manage the situation by getting the dog out of the situation before the bad behaviour starts, walk away to gain distance, crate or put dog in a no trouble area.

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Free shaping is fun -
you shape a behaviour by marking
small approximations of the behaviour,
in this case with a clicker

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Markers
To train successfully you need to develop a communication system with you dog using markers.

1. A click, a whistle or a simple 'yes' to tell the dog what it has done is right, followed initially by a reward - food or toy. This marker is an end marker indicating that the behaviour is over and the reward is exciting - a thrown ball, an active tug session, chasing the food reward in hand or thrown food. This marker promises that there will be a reward coming.

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Using Yes as a marker

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2. A duration marker that tells the dog to go on doing what it is doing - a verbal good, a certain whistle. Initially the value can be put on the marker in a stationary exercise, marker followed by a calmly delivered food reward (needs to be food) that does not break the dog out of the behaviour - sitting calmly is a good one to start with. Once the dog expects the reward start rewarding randomly, building up the expectation that the reward will happen but not just yet, this then allows you to mark the correct behaviour and the dog will go on walking at heel, doing the weave poles, doing an out cast etc.

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Dogs quickly learn the distinction and the duration marker becomes a powerful training tool.

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The sequence is simple - the dog does what you want, you mark it with a duration marker (once trained) and the dog goes on doing it until you give the end marker and reward the dog - keep in mind that for many working dogs the next step is the reward - chasing the stock, taking the next item on an agility course.

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video about markers 

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