[Jacob-list] Dogs, Sheep & Guardians

[Linda]

We use donkeys (and good fences).  I would not recommend donkeys to shepherds that don't also love donkeys.  It's mandatory that your donkey will lead and your donkey will need regular farrier visits.  We are lucky in having a premier barefoot farrier to take care of our girls, but finding a good farrier is almost as hard as finding a good shearer!  Our jack was pretty noisy.  His daughters are usually quiet, except at feed time.  I got my first donkeys years (many) ago.  They were the weanling jenny and yearling jack from a pair of donkeys that were guardians for a commercial Suffolk flock.  

If noise were an issue, llamas might be something to research.  And there is all that nice fiber.

Linda
 
www.patchworkfibers.com
Registered Jacob Sheep, Angora Rabbits, Handspun Yarn

On Wed, 15 Mar 2006 18:26:35 -0500 (EST), perfectspot at blueridge.net wrote:
> I would like to expand the topic of sheep and dogs in slightly
> different direction, and hope that there will be responses from
> many of you.
>
> I am curious about what (if any) flock guardians various shepherds
> maintain in their flocks.  Do you use dogs, llamas, nothing at all?
>
> We are located in an area that is growing quickly.  I do not
> foresee that we will be able to use dogs as flock guardians in the
> future, once our current dogs have finished their work with us.
> They are wonderful and I can’t envision using anything else, much
> less nothing at all, but am interested in hearing what is working
> for others
or not working.
>
> Thanks!
> Cathy
> Perfect Spot Farm
> http://www.patchworkfibers.com/perfectspotfarm.html
>
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://www.pairlist.net/pipermail/jacob-list/attachments/20060315/3b7f72c4/attachment.htm