Herding Trial Calendar

The major events of the trial season, how regional schedules build toward national finals, and what each event signals to handlers planning their year.

A Year on the Trial Circuit

A competitive herding season is not a random collection of events. It is a roughly predictable arc of regional trials in spring and early summer, championship-qualifying events through late summer and autumn, and the marquee finals that close out the year in places like Klamath Falls, Sturgis, and Meeker.

Articles tagged here cover the structure of that calendar in North America and the UK, the trials that consistently draw the deepest fields, and the logistics that handlers manage to compete coast to coast across a single season. Coverage includes the events themselves, the qualification math that turns earlier results into later opportunities, and the practical question of how a small group of trials end up shaping a handler’s reputation more than dozens of routine entries.

For new spectators, this is a way to find which events are worth a road trip. For competitors, it is a reference point for planning a season that actually leads somewhere.