help! Our lgd was attacking a young goat this morning

[mama24]

We have a Pyrenees Karakachan mix. I think he will be 2 in January, so 22 months old. I've seen him try to play with the young goats before, but he never got too rough while I was watching. We got him in June from a women that kept him with poultry, sheep and goats. He's fine with our poultry, but he does chase rabbits when they get out, which I think would be hard to train out of any dog. I'm not at home, my husband texted me that he went to investigate screaming thinking someone had her head stuck in the fence. Instead he found the dog with a 7 month old doeling's leg in his mouth. He beat the dog (I doubt it hurt him much with all that fur) and she just lay there for quite a long time on her side, but she did stand up eventually, maybe 15 min or so. She hasn't walked yet, just standing there in shock. And he said her ears are pretty chewed up. Wth? What could have caused this and what should we do?

I'm on my phone, so please excuse typos, etc

 

[Southern by choice]

I am so sorry.
I would separate the dog immediately.
Although I understand your husbands response that is not the correct way to discipline a LGD it will do more harm in the long run.

I've seen him try to play with the young goats before, but he never got too rough while I was watching.

This is your key. A LGD should never be allowed play with the livestock. period. Allowing this at any time will eventually lead to just what happened. The "play" should have been corrected from day 1. A LGD ( a good sound one) will submit to their charges and even if the goat is the one that instigates or wants to play the LGD will not engaged but lower head and submit.

At this point you will need to retrain him so he does not play with the livestock.
Who knows, he may have been allowed to do this in his previous home. It is very difficult to correct and may require an adjustable tone-training collar. The tones can be used to give the minimal amount of correction or a shock for max. Using the least is ideal. He can learn, but this may take time.

I have a pup here for training... the ignorant breeder put the pups in with baby goats at weaning time ( so no parent stock to teach the pup what is unacceptable) and allowed them to "play" with the kids ... pup was sold at 7 weeks and this pattern is already ingrained in the dog. It also produces a dominance behavior instead of a submissive behavior.
This pup is adorable as can be but requires constant correction with the goats, and when a goat gently butts him to say no he responds by barking and lunging at the goats face. I share this to show the importance of never allowing a lgd to "play" by running, chasing, or putting their mouth on the livestock.

I am so sorry you are having to go through this as I know it is not just stressful but heartbreaking too.

 

[bcnewe2]

My Toli is about 10 months old. She is doing a great job "learning" to guard her charges.
But we went through lambing a bit sooner than I had planned. I knew it was Jesse's bad teenager stage and had hoped to miss lambing at that time.
Well, she has one lamb that she has decided is her play toy. I'm pretty sure it's because the lamb's Momma is very docile and the rest will butt her away from their babies but not this one.

I first caught her chewing up the lambs ears. I saw it. She was licking them, nuzzling them and then the nibbling got away from her. In her mind she isn't being mean just loving gone awry....she has been corrected lots of times. I watch closely.
A couple days later after I caught her the first time, I thought I saw her up the hill with a stick in her mouth, is wasn't a stick, it was the little lamb. When I got up there I thought it was dead. It wasn't. Limped a few days.
She has been thoroughly corrected and I can still catch her wanting to love this particular lamb to hard.

She is growing and changing all the time. She rarely leaves her charges.

This is what I call the learning phase, if you don't correct it your dog won't get the message. I'm sure your husband beating him did more than you know. I don't beat my girl, a stern voice sends her on her back sniveling. Mainly I get all blustery and hold the lamb so she understands it's mine. She also has a NO command so if I holler NO really sternly she instantly stops what she's doing and lays down.

It's the time or age you just have to be very diligent about watching them and teaching them what is acceptable and what is not.

I'm pretty sure if your dog has been with your goats all along he did not suddenly turn vicious, he is playing rough and the poor goat is the toy.

Just keep correcting and watching. Not so sure about the beating though, just don't seem to need it with these dogs. Claiming things as mine makes my dog understand that she is not supposed to mess with them.

Right now we are going through some chasing of sheep. She has decided the ram is the best game in town. I have let some learning go on without my involvement. She chases the ram a bit and he turns and goes after her. I've seen him hit her pretty hard. Unless I think he's goin to cause damage I let it happen. She is learning it's not fun from him. She goes limp and the game instantly stops. He also goes after her if she tries to chase his ladies.
BUt, I've also seen her lay in and amongst her sheep, and the sheep seek her out to lay next to so things are and will work out for all.

This is a particular hard stage to get through without really watching close. Be diligent and stern and hopefully this will pass. I have a feeling male LGD's mature later than females. Hence the age difference. I could be wrong but I'm sure Southern will post her opinions and she has lots of experience.

 

[mama24]

He is definitely going through some sort of stage. I have a very dominant personality with dogs, and they tend to listen to me even if they don't know me. He's been weird lately, not as submissive as usual, though definitely not acting dominant. I do have a shock collar from when we had a Siberian husky mix, but I cut the collar part to her much smaller size, so I'll have to wait until I repair that to fit him before i can use it. I did correct him with a stern "no" which I'm not sure he fully understands, but seemed to work, when I saw him trying to play in the past. The woman we got him from really babied him like a pet, which was definitely not a good thing. I think he gets bored since he got used to more interaction when he lived with her than he gets here. I'll definitely need to spend more time out there, but I was worried this was a "the dog is no good, put him down" situation. I'm glad there's hope that he will get better again.

 

[Southern by choice]

It will take time. At this age however there should not be any of this.

The woman we got him from really babied him like a pet, which was definitely not a good thing. I think he gets bored since he got used to more interaction when he lived with her than he gets here

Actually LGD's that have been raised in a full, farm & family manner have less issues that LGD's just dumped in a field. Most of the trouble calls I receive is based on the idea that training and interacting and human bonding will ruin a LGD, quite the contrary. You will find more stability, better adjusted less problematic LGD's. LGD's are still dogs and are social animals. They are also pack animals and IMO ALWAYS do better in teams. Although these animals are stubborn they still have a desire to please the master and developing that bond will give a LGD greater confidence as well as become a very reliable animal.

All 4 of my LGD's have been house trained, spend time in the house, interact with non LGD dogs, cats, chickens etc. None of our LGD's chase mouth or roughhouse with a goat. Our dogs are in with livestock full time by 4 months of age. At 11 months are dogs were in with the does kidding. These dogs know what we expect from them from the start however our training program is complete training to build relationship with the dog. We have never had to separate any of our dogs from kids at any age.
Dogs we train for others are also trained in the same manner.

Your observations are probably right on... go play with your LGD! Giving him an outlet may reduce these undesirable behaviors.

 

[mama24]

There's a big difference between letting the dog be part of your pack/family and babying them. By that, I meant she talked baby talk, let him jump on her, and basically treated him like a human toddler. Not good.

He won't play with me. He won't even leave the pasture to come into the yard to play with my kids. He acts like we're punishing him if we try to get him to come through the gate. I've tried to let him get playtime, but he isn't interested. I have even had friends bring dogs over. He'll play for maybe 5 minutes max, then he goes back out to where the goats are and lays down and will ignore the other dog trying to play. He's also fine with other dogs being in the pasture as long as they don't start trying to chase or play with the goats. The main dog we have here is my friend's Malinois. He plays for a few minutes and is done. Then she gets bored and starts trying herd, so he chases her down barking bites her/puts her down without hurting her. I have really wanted to get another Karakachan or mix to be his companion, and had an opportunity to get a little puppy a few months ago, but my husband is dead set against it. He's never really been around dogs and doesn't understand the need for him to have a companion. He just thinks getting another would be another useless mouth the feed. If I can convince him otherwise, that would probably be the best thing for our situation. Really, it's costing us I think $30 a month (Kirkland premium from Costco, however much that is) to feed one dog, so another would double that. I personally think that's well worth it since we no longer have raccoons and possums eating our chickens, or coyotes running through the pasture (they never hurt a goat, but we have only had the goats 2 years, it was only a matter of time.) I think this is the first dog my husband has actually met and liked, but that may have changed today.

 

[Southern by choice]

Mama24 I feel for ya. I think some people get the big picture and some don't. I see the LGD's as worth their weight in gold! Sounds like you do too. I always look at the big picture... for every goat taken that is not just the price of the goat but also all the raising feeeding care etc and then its offspring it would have lived. Same with chickens.... everyone lost was 6 months of feed til laying and then poof gone by a coon. I for one couldn't keep starting over. We use to have a chicken a day taken. The goats have always had protection and no losses. The coyotes are so bad here that our neighbors dog was taken right off their porch. ... the second one.
Even when they mess up or do something stupid those that have the LGD "love" will figure out what to do. I have found that people who don't have a love for dogs in general usually do not like LGD's at all. LOL
BTW I love Pyrenees Karakachan cross!

 

[mama24]

Our LGD is actually the only dog my husband has actually ever liked! LOL. So at least we have that going. I'll get another eventually... I've been making my boys go out and play with him daily. It's hard on school days. The amount of homework they give these days is unbelievable.

 

[HoneyDreameMomma]

Our LGD is actually the only dog my husband has actually ever liked!

This made me smile. My husband enjoys our hobby farm, particularly the chickens and goats, but he has never been 'a dog person.' I had to talk him into having an LGD. However, it turns out he absolutely adores our LGD, Miller, bragging to his friends about Miller's intelligence and excellent guarding behavior. I said to my son, "Bet you never thought that living on a farm would turn Dad into a dog lover," he laughed, and said, "He's not a dog lover. He just loves Miller."

Might be true, but it was my husband that first suggested getting Miller a buddy or two to help guard. Here's hoping your husband comes around. Like Southern says, "LGDs - they just make life better!"

 

[Southern by choice]

"He's not a dog lover. He just loves Miller."

I love your son's line! These dogs are so truly different!