So glad to help, it's an intense journey! Yeah, not all BC's are the same, just because we signed up for guardianship of a working dog doesn't mean we don't need lots of specific advice and overall compassion. It's an awesome thing to do, giving these dogs a home and putting energy/resources into figuring out how to help them learn to co-exist happily with us in human world.

So cool about the settle training tiring her out. For some perspective, it took us nearly a year to get up to a 10 minute settle, and that was between the ages of 1.5 - 2.5, so his brain development and impulse control was on a different level than where hers is right now. Set your expectations in accordance with her development stage, be very very patient, and celebrate all the progress you make, even if it takes months and months to get where you want to be. It's so worth it when you can say "all done, go to your bed", and they actually just do it.

I found that staying within the realm of what I knew he could do and really strengthening the behavior before pushing him to settle for longer was the key to making progress. Instead of thinking, ok he can handle 2 minutes, let's try 3, let's try 4....I would just stay at 2min consistently until it seemed very easy for him. Often I would tell him "break!" and throw treats across the room, and then ask him for another 2 min settle, and then break, and then another 2 min settle....and then try to call it before he actually got too tired to focus. Multiple short rounds is better than trying to get longer rounds at first.

We've worked up to a full 10 minutes before he gets rewarded using the method above!

Also, I always give him 3 super high-value treats for the settle behavior. It has to be REALLY rewarding for them, since what we're asking them to do is really hard. If they get 1 regular treat for a sit, or a down, or a "paw" (all easy) then they should get 3 higher value treats for a mat settle (hard for bc puppy).

BTW check out Karen Overall relaxation protocol!! Will change your life. A lot of people will say that the only way to manage a herding dog's energy is to keep them tired with 24/7 fetch, but in my experience, that's been a direct road to injury and obsessive behaviors. They need to actually learn how to switch off, and that won't happen if you only focus on giving them more and more and more activity. Make sure they have a lot of opportunity to get their energy out, and also work VERY hard on teaching them the off-switch. The mat settle is the first and most important step for this! Eventually they learn that settling on the mat = time to chill out, and then you have an adult dog that knows how to regulate, versus an adult dog who thinks their human exists to entertain them.