Kendenup Arena Trial

Kendenup Arena Trial. 22nd, 23rd, 24th March.

Kendenup is a small town app 340 kms south of Perth. It is a popular trial and one of the main attractions is the delicious dinner catered by Wendy Gorton on Sat night.

The weather was quite good for this time of year, it can be fairly hot. It was cool and cloudy on Fri and Sat but warmed up a bit on the last day when the sun made an appearence.

The sheep for the novice and improver were probably the best most of us have worked for a while, young, fairly calm and very forgiving, they gave most people a good time and there were many pens and some high scores.

The open sheep proved more difficult. They were older ewes which were inclined to stand up to the dogs and were clever enough to plan escape routes whenever they could. If they decided they did not want to go into the obstacle it was quite difficult to persuade them. The experienced dogs handled them well though and there were also some fairly high scores.

There were 50 entries in the novice, 45 in the improver and 67 in the open. Competitors were limited to 6 runs each and the ringoff system was used.

Overall there were 136 Border Collie entries and 26 Kelpie entries. Kelpies got into 8 of the top ten placings out of the 3 events. So percentage wise only 17% of Border Collie runs made it into the top ten while 28% of Kelpie runs were in the top ten.

Also 10 of the top 12 finalists were bitches.

Novice, judged by Samantha Weaver.

1st. Grant Cooke. Grassvalley Lol. 95.

2nd.. Jenny Palm. Badgingarra Lisa. 92.

3rd. Jane Dorrell. Rocky Dusty. 85.

4th. Peter Doherty. Ramulam Willy. 83.

=5th Rick Jantz. Jandoree Dotcom. 82.

=5th. Ken Atherton Ramulam Jock. 82. (Kelpie)

7th. Richard Mcguire. Mac’s Harry. 80.

=8th. Gordon Curtis. Binnaburra Johnny. 72 (Kelpie)

=8th. Andrew Gorton. Ramulam Ripper. 72 (Kelpie)

=10th. Malcolm Seymour. Somerville Lucy. 69.