[Jacob-list] LGD's

[Cathy Brown]

I have used Anatolian Shepherds for the past 5 year; first to guard goats and in the last 3 years, sheep.  This is the only breed we've used, although Pyrenees are probably the other most commonly used breed.  As far as training, the original dog we purchased was born on a goat farm.  At 8 weeks of age he went in the barn with our first goat (6 month old buck) - they totally bonded, and even when that buck reached 250 lbs and was scarey to us, he and the dog would play (the buck would toss the dog onto his back gently using his horns).  So, from our experiences -
1.  keep the dog with the animals you want him to bond to at an early age
2.. realize a puppy will naturally play - some (really an individual thing, some never do) will nip at them quite a bit.  If possible, you can put the older chasing puppy (usually a problem at 6 mos to a yr of age) with older animals or your rams - they will teach them the proper behavior.  They do grow out of this - they ARE NOT acting like predators.  The beauty of LGD breeds is their low "prey instinct" along with their protective nature.  People have used shock collars to help "remind" them not to chase.  Chickens are a bit trickier - we didn't introduce them early, so our dogs like to play with them by putting a big foot on the chickens when they run - chickens do not survive playing with dogs very long - we have a donkey for our chickens.  One note about donkeys - they can be difficult to predict behavior - I know of some donkeys that were fine with adult sheep but killed lambs.  One of our LGDs got out one night and we found them in a neighbors goat pasture the next day - along with their guardian donkey!
3.  I was initially troubled by having a dog that never came into the house.  I have gotten over that - these dogs seem happy, are very friendly toward people (ideal to have a big dog that is safe around everyone but still scares strangers because of their size, but are really independent.  We keep 2 dogs together now, but if you have a single dog that was raised and bonded to sheep, one dog is fine (and maybe less distracted?).
4.  You need a good fence - again, an  individual dog thing but my feeling is they are less likely to try to escape than Pyr.  They are VERY sensitive dogs - we put a single strand of electric line at the bottom of a fence for one dog that was getting out - after touching the wire she quickly stopped trying that, and has decided not to leave (even tho the fence is no longer electric)
5.  You can see some pixs of our dogs on our website (sadly in need of updating - ignore that) www.canoelakefarm.com<http://www.canoelakefarm.com>   We no longer sell LGDs, but you can at least see and read a little about them.

Hope this helps.

Cathy Brown
Canoe Lake Farm
Georgia
________________________________
From: jacob-list-bounces at jacobsheep.com [jacob-list-bounces at jacobsheep.com] on behalf of Karen Askounis [kaskounis at threefatesjacobs.com]
Sent: Saturday, September 29, 2012 5:34 PM
To: jacob-list at jacobsheep.com
Subject: [Jacob-list] LGD's

Now on to the next subject. For those of you who use LGD’s do you have a breed preference? Do you use one dog with each group (if sheep are separated into different pastures) or several dogs that are free to wander the entire property? How do you train/condition the youngsters to the sheep before they are turned loose with the sheep?

Karen Askounis
Three Fates Farm
Crete, IL
kaskounis at threefatesjacobs.com

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