The Guard at Lawrence Cottage!

How do you keep sheep from coyote, bear, cougar?  Here at Lawrence Cottage we have had excellent success with our livestock guard dogs.

Cooper

This is Cooper.  Cooper came to us from a working farm in The Dalles, Oregon.  Cooper is primarily Great Pyrenees, with a very small percent Koomador.

Cooper first lived with our ewe Lola and her two lambs in the barn.

Puppy Cooper, fast asleep w/ the sheep

Cooper does well with the goats and chickens, but he loves the sheep.  So, it only made sense that when we purchased a second puppy some four years later that we would repeat our training him up with a ewe and her lambs.  It seems to be working well.

Milo

Milo came to us March 2014 from a working farm in the Willamette Valley.  He is working out well.  Milo lives with the sheep in the pasture.   Milo is mostly Maramma/Great Pyrenees with a smidge Akbash/Anatolian.

Cooper has free run of the entire property, while Milo will be confined to a large pasture for as long as possible.  Milo is a great jumper, we hope he does not learn to jump the field fence.  Our guard dogs wear radio collars and a wire outlines the perimeter of our property.  The collar beeps if the dogs nears the perimeter.  That is usually all it takes for them to turn around and stay within the perimeter.  

Many farms use guard llama's and we tried that for a period of time.  Cassie has been re-homed to a small farm with shetland sheep to guard.  Even with a guard llama the coyotes would enter the barn and partake of chicken dinner.  So we went to guard dogs and the problem ceased immediately.  Livestock Guard Dogs are industrial strength nocturnal barkers!  They sleep a good portion of the day.  

We miss Cassie, and are glad she could go to a new flock.

Cassie, Livestock Guard Llama

Predators in our neighborhood include hawks, coyotes, black bear & cougar.

Thanks for looking!

--The Ladies of Lawrence Cottage