Kristin Sittner's first dog was a sheltie, Tika, who competed mainly in agility, but dabbled in all the dog sports. Tika was Kristin's main farm dog for a number of years, until she acquired Gyp from Shauna. This task has now been passed on to her youngsters, Tag and Spy, who have already proven themselves invaluable to the Flock 'n Paws team.
Kristin's experience lies on the agility field, but she also competes in herding with Tag and Spy. She has trained running contacts on three dogs so far; Tika,Tag and Spec. Tika was consistently one of the top dogs of her height class until her retirement, even winning the South Central USDAA regional in 2009. Gyp continues to place among the top dogs at nearly 11 years old, earning the second seed in Grand Prix Finals at the 2012 Cynosport World Games. Tag, now three years old is already wowing people with her speed, efficiency and running contacts. She won Team Standard and placed 2nd in Jumpers at the 2012 Cynosport World Games. Spec made her agility debut at the Rocky Mountain Regional this year and placed 2nd in the Master Challenge Biathalon.
Spy is making a splash in her early herding career. At only 18 months old, she is already qualified for the 2013 USBCHA Nursery Finals and won three of her first four competition runs.
Kristin has had experience working at a veterinary clinic, a training center focusing on hunting, scent detection and police dogs, and a farm where she helped develop the variety of sheep which Flock N Paws now runs. She has worked on a variety of sheep operations, helped at Utah State University's wool lab, and has also worked with many rehabilitation and rescue dogs, many of which needed significant behavioral modification.
She received her bachelors degree in Animal, Dairy and Veterinary Sciences from Utah State University and is currently working on her Masters degree in Agricultural Extension Education., also at Utah State. This education helps keep Flock N Paws' sheep program consistent with the most up to date practices.
Shauna Gourley has been training dogs for over 25 years and instructing for 15 years. With her border collies, she has competed in obedience, agility and herding. She is always among the top competitors, having performed in multiple national events for each sport. She has earned many championships on a variety of dogs, the most all around accomplished being Xena, Ch OTCh MACH WTCh Highland's Hot Off the Press. Most recently, Shauna has taken up open field herding trials with her border collies. Her dog, Keli, has placed in the top 9 dogs at the Meeker Classic for the past three years. Locally, Shauna competes at the Soldier Hollow Classic every year and is an active member of the Utah Stockdog Association. She and Keli have been ranked in the top three dogs in Utah all of the past 3 years, with Shauna's other dog Mercy ranked first in 2013.
Shauna has breeds dynamite litters of border collies under the kennel name Redsky. A few of her better known pups are out of her Hope, including Rob Bardenet's dog Pistol Pete, Monica Bush's Grit, and Kristin Sittner's Tag. One of the first home bred dogs Shauna has kept, Jade, is qualified for the 2013 USBCHA Open Finals in her first year of competition. Shauna will also be running her Redsky Mira in the 2013 Nursery Finals
Shauna has worked with all different breeds of dogs, teaching obedience, agility and herding. She was one of the original founders of the dog training facility at Willow Creek Pet Center starting in 1995.
Shauna and Kristin have developed their own variety of hair sheep, raised at Flock 'N Paws.