Livestock Guardian Dogs (LGDs)
3 Comments Published by Kim Nikolai on November 18, 2006 at 11:55 AM.
This is Henry and Sweetie with their new paddock mates. Having a guardian living with the flock can be a very good thing. Good when they protect the flock from intruders like stray dogs or coyotes. It can also be a very bad thing when they themselves turn on your flock. Henry likes to chase the sheep and when he catches one will pull the wool from them.
Sweetie is younger and has caused much more damage. Again she was "playing" but ended up hurting poor Derry so much so that she has had to live in our garage under a heat lamp just to keep warm. Derry has very little wool left on her body and couldn't keep warm. She also had cuts and tears all over her poor little body. This happened about 6 weeks ago and Derry is going to make it. She is doing much better. This is why Henry and Sweetie have new paddock mates. Hopefully these adult rams will teach both of them some respect for the sheep. So far so good......Labels: LGDs
Is it a pyreneean mountain dog?
We used to have this breed for about 20 years.
Henry is a Great Pyranees and Sweetie is a mix of Spanish Ranch Mastiff/Polish Tatra/Italian Marema
I hope this works for you! Wouldn't it be wonderful if the dogs could actually live in harmony with your sheep? What a relief it would be for you to know that your flock is safe and that your dogs are living up to their potential! I'm proud of you for hanging in there...