What in the World is a Livestock Guardian Dog?

Well hello there! This is Krista with episode #131 on the Wag Out Loud pawdcast. I just learned this about how dogs greet each other, and I just had to share it. Female dogs are more likely to greet other dogs by smelling their snout or their muzzle first, while males go for the genital region. So pay attention on your next dog walk, you might be able to quickly determine the sex of the other dogs who greet your dog, just based on this behavior. Give it a try.

Welcome to the Wag Out Loud pawdcast, where we are obsessed with bringing you helpful tips on canine health care, nutrition, and overall wellbeing. If you'd like to support the show, check out the amazing online events, products and resources that I personally recommend on the Wag Out Loud website. I'm your host, Krista and I'm super excited to be bringing you yet another tail wagging episode.

Hello dog lovers and welcome to yet another informative episode of The Wag Out Loud pawdcast. And I am so excited to learn from our guest, Jan Dohnor who is going to enlighten us on what in the world is a livestock Guardian dog? Jan, I'm so glad you're here today because I never knew that there was such a thing as a Livestock Guardian Dog (LGD). So if you could introduce yourself, and tell us all about it, you know what got you interested in these specific types of dogs.

Jan Dohner is an author of Livestock Guardians: Using Dogs, Donkeys, and Llamas to Protect Your Herd; Farm Dogs: 93 Guardians, Herders, Terriers, and other Canine Working Partners; and The Encyclopedia of Animal Predators. Jan lives on her family farm and has 40 years of hands-on experience with the use of livestock guardian dogs for predator control and working farm dogs. Jan is also a longtime member of the American Livestock Conservancy and the Kangal Dog Club of America.

Hi, sure. I'm a librarian and an author and a farmer. And I live on a small farm in Michigan with my husband, we've been here quite a long time. And one of the things we were doing on our farm was raising to start breeds of livestock. And we were starting to have problems with predators. And then this sort of light bulb went off in my head that I had remembered when I was a girl and madly in love with dogs. And like many other kids, that I had read about the Great Pyrenees, which was a Livestock Guardian Dog from France, and most people are familiar with the breed. And all I could think of was, that's what I need, right? This was back in the late 1970s. And the idea of using these ancient breeds for their purpose again, which is as a working as a Livestock Guardian Dog was just starting to come back sort of into public consciousness. This was not a thing that we had done here in America or Canada. This is an old world tradition, mostly among people who take flocks up into the mountains, you know, in the summer to graze, or people who are migratory with livestock, and they're native to a sort of a band of countries from Spain, and Portugal, Southern France, Italy, and all the way on over into Central Asia. And it's all these same types of people. Well, back in the 70s and 80s, when our native predators began to be, you know, resurge themselves, because we were now protecting them, right? People here in America thought, you know, we're gonna have to think of, you know, sort of sustainable living, non violent sort of ways of living better coexisting with predators. And this idea of this old world job for dogs, which was, as a Livestock Guardian, you know, started to come back and all over the country in the 80s. And 90s, people started, you know, thinking about this again, and writing about it and groups started getting together and talking and I guess, I was kind of in that mix from the beginning. And I've gone on to write several books about dogs, working dogs, I've written a book about the use of Livestock Guardian Dogs, and other livestock guardian animals, and farm dogs in general and historic breeds of livestock. So these two things are kind of intertwined. If you believe that there's a way for us to live in coexistence with nature, this is a good solution because we aren't really, you know, trapping or hunting predators, we're finding a way to live together with them.

Right. And when you say predators, what kind of animals you talking about?

Um, anything from small predators. If you if you raise poultry, you you know, might be dealing with things like raccoons, right, or foxes or something small, or even hawks. If you raise sheep or cattle, we have sheep. We have problems with coyotes, for instance, right? We have problems with other parts of the country. There's a lot of problems with larger birds of prey with lambs or calves. And then, of course, out in the more range areas where adult animals are preyed on by larger groups of coyotes, maybe together wolves, bears, mountain lions, you know, all these things have made a comeback, right? And we're living closer to them. And we're trying to figure out ways to live together. And for the most part, Livestock Guardian Dogs are a deterrent for predators visiting your property. Rather than, you know, a violent confrontation that you would have with them.

Okay. Well, that's good. I like it. Okay, well, I have a million questions, and I'm sure our listeners do too. So why don't you first tell us what is the difference between a Livestock Guardian Dog and a herding dog?

Good question. And it makes sense that lots of us don't understand these differences. Because this is, like I said, a farming or ranching tradition that we grew up with, right? This is something that we're coming to new. So Livestock Guardian dogs are actually a more ancient type of dog than are herding dogs. Back when early man started keeping sheep and goats and cattle and things, they needed ways to protect them, right? And so you started using dogs to help you when you're up in the mountains or something. And this is so old that the ancient Roman writers wrote about Livestock Guardian Dogs, and the native dog of Italy, the Livestock Guardian is the Maremma and the way they described the Maremma 2000 years ago, they would recognize today's Maremma, it's that much the same dog, right? They were giving the same kind of advice like, you know, what your dog should look like and how he should behave and what kind of a good shepherd you should buy your dog from so that he would behave properly. So this is a very ancient, you know, type of dog. Herding dogs were developed later, when we began to keep flocks mostly in Great Britain is the home of many of you know, the Border Collie and those kinds of things. And they weren't dealing with predators so much anymore. They don't have large predators and herding dogs became the shepherd’s companion in places like the Pyrenees mountains in France, a shepherd would still have his Livestock Guardian Dog will probably also have a small herding dog, a smaller dog to help him move this flock. The names are all very confusing because Livestock Guardian Dogs were originally called sheep dogs or shepherds in their homelands, because these herding dogs weren't developed until later. So they're different than modern sheep dogs or shepherds that, you know, that we think about, and they're very different in behavior too because herding dogs have so much energy and Livestock Guardian Dogs are about the opposite. herding dogs are very, you know, they want to please you, they want to follow directions, they learn lots of words. Livestock Guardian Dogs, very aloof and independent dogs and don't follow, they’re self thinkers, and they don't follow directions. Well, so there is that difference. I think that a lot of us think of farm dogs, because that's the tradition here in North America. And they can be from a wide variety of breeds, right? They were companions on farms to families. They did a little bit of a lot of different things. But they weren't dogs bred specifically for this job of living full time with livestock and thinking on their own and protecting them just sort of instinctively. And that's where the difference lies, although the name sort of overlaps frequently, right? That breeds The Great Pyrenees is the one I use, for example, a lot because most of us are familiar with what a Great Pyrenees looks like. And they very much are like most of the Livestock Guardian Dog breeds, which are all very large. They tend to have floppy ears. They tend to have curly tails. The early shepherds were breeding for a kind of dog that didn't look like a wolf, you know, they wanted a dog that looks sort of blended in with the flock. Frequently they're white. Sometimes there are other colors, but it's interesting in some of their homelands, if they're dogs that are, you know, sort of fawn colored, well, the sheep were that color too or the coats, right? They were looking for an animal that blends it in, right, so maybe the predator wouldn't know that there was a dog there. So they are, like I said, very independent thinkers, they're strongly protective, low in energy. They have very little chase drive or prey drive. We always laugh that when you go to pick a Livestock Guardian Dog puppy out, you know, people throw a little ball when they're picking out another puppy to see if the dog you know will respond to them, bring the little ball back or engage with them, right? With a Livestock Guardian Dog. Even a grownup one, if you throw something, they just kind of look at it go well, I guess you didn't want that right. They have no interest in bringing something back to you and they just don't have those same drives like that. Today, there are some other breeds that if you're a dog person you might be familiar with because the Komondors have been around in the Kuvasz. They were dogs that were here in North America for you know as companions or show dogs or something. Now there are lots of breeds because since we began using them, we have brought a lot of breeds in from Europe and Central Asia. And you might have heard of the Akbash. It's a white, Livestock Guardian from Turkey and very popular in range situations like there are a lot of them in Texas and Oklahoma and places like that there are other dogs from Turkey called like the Anatolian Shepherd and the Kangal dog, which is the breed of dog I've raised for a long time. There's other dogs from Spain and Portugal, there's the Estrela Mountain Dog, which some people might be familiar with, because you see that as sort of a Home Companion sort of dog too. there's the Spanish and Tibetan Mastiff. And they're not really mastiffs. Same thing, we're, you know, dog names aren't always accurate right? people call them something, but they're really a shepherding dog, right? Both of them. And then there's some that are a lot more rare that you're not likely liable to run into much, but they're going to all resemble each other in a sort of major way. They're all about 80 to maybe 140 pounds, they tend to have heavy coats, because they live outdoors much of the time, although some of them do have short, dense, warm coats, but they're always double coated, because they need to be warm and protected from the elements, right? They almost all have curly tails. Although some cultures in Europe and Asia with bobbed tails, you know, on dogs and stuff. they all have floppy ears, they don't none of them have stick up ears. And they kind of look like big overgrown puppies, even when they're grown up if you you know, picture a Great Pyrenees. That's a common trait of how they look.

Well, I've read that you mentioned that Livestock Guardian Dogs are usually very independent. I've read that they're typically stubborn, single minded, and focused solely on the herd. So yeah, are they also good pets or not so much?

They can be a good companion dog in the right home. And I mean, their ideal home would obviously be a family that was either on a farm or ranch, or just lived in a rural piece of property right, where the dog was going to have enough room for exercise. And not be, it had something to do all day too. They are very frustrated if they're kept in a very small yard, or in a house, and they tend to bark a lot then, because normally they're outdoors and what they're barking at, or sounds they hear, like maybe a predator that might be nearby or another strange dog or something. And that's their alarm system. So they're going to do a lot of that, right. So in a small yard, or a house or something, they're going to be far more frustrated, because they're they're a working breed like other working breeds, and they need something to do and for them, it's to be outside and something to protect, and they need to be well fenced, they will roam off, because what they're doing is like trying to really patrol out looking for potential danger, right. And they all came from cultures where they were not kept fenced in anywhere, they were all up somewhere in the mountains or on, you know, grazing land with shepherds and stuff. So this idea of patrolling out and around is kind of built into them and sort of hardwired, so if you’re going to keep them you need a good fence. I think a couple of the biggest things that when people think about them for companion dogs is that you really have to educate yourself and understand these basic things about them, because you're not going to change them, they are going to be strongly self thinking dogs, you know, they their job was to live alone much of the time and make decisions on their own. So I don't know if it's stubborn, or if it's a matter of that they feel like whatever they think is important. Maybe more important right now, you know, right now, maybe what you want, you're not going to get that same kind of response from them, that you would from like a herding dog, right? That wants to be your companion all day long and do everything with you. They're also going to be strongly protective. And that's just hardwired in too. this is what they do that says this idea of protecting something, whether it's your family, or the yard, or your property, or you know, the sheep or whatever, that's their job, and they inherit this. And to keep one as a companion, you need to be prepared to deal with them, right? you aren't going to be able to change the basic traits of a dog just like you can't change the basic traits of a herding dog or a hunting dog. You know, so you need to be well prepared for that. The owners inability to control the dog right or to keep them contained in a yard. And the barking are the biggest reasons that livestock Guardian dogs are turned into rescue, where people have been trying to keep them as companion dogs. You need to be that kind of family that or person that's going to enjoy your dog for what he is right? Not going to be a dog that's going to be comfortable going to the dog park, because these are all strange dogs. If they feel like that the strange dog is threatening you. They're just going to react the way they do and it's defensive, you know, and it's not that they should be uncontrolled. No, they should be socialized and They should be leash trained and they should be all those things. But this is still their basic nature to protect something.

Jan, I'm gonna stop you here real quick, we're gonna take a sponsor break. I am just loving this because this is all things I didn't know. So we will be right back.

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And we are back with Jan Dohner who is giving us such amazing information about Livestock Guardian Dogs. So Jan, you were telling us before the sponsor break, that these dogs really need a special family if you also want them to be a companion dog. So yeah, I wanted to ask, first of all, are these traits bred for Livestock Guardian Dogs? And where do you find a reputable breeder such as yourself?

Good question. You do these breeders of Livestock Guardian Dogs are breeding them to have these traits because if there's especially if they're placing them in working homes, which there's a very big demand for working livestock guardians in this country. So you're breeding for these traits, right? For the fact that they are nurturing with small animals you know and gentle with small animals so the fact that they'll be protective that the fact they'll be a self thinker, you know, all these kinds of things. So you know, when people are looking for a working Livestock Guardian Dogs, they need to, like cast their net out and find breeders who are selling to working homes, right? And they also need to do things like ask other people they know that have a successful working Livestock Guardian, where did you get your dog, right? Ask on, you know, livestock and farming groups and lists and your local neighbors and people who stuff too, because you are just like with a good herding dog, you're looking for somebody who's paying attention to those traits. Yeah, and they're all not going to be perfectly successful as a Livestock Guardian, any more than every herding dog puppy is going to be an outstanding herding dog, right? But you really increase your chances by going straight to the source that was somebody breeding for these things. Some of the some breeders of the more popular Livestock Guardian breeds are also breeding for companion homes or for dog showing or activities, you know, and I think of the Great Pyrenees because that's the most popular and well-known dog here. So there are people who are also just breeding for that, right? And so there's a difference, if you're looking for a working dog, you know, you need to look for that kind of breeder. If you're looking for a companion dog, then you need to be doing the things you would do with any good companion dog, you'd be looking for an ethical breeder that, you know, only breeding healthy dogs, breeding dogs with good temperament, you know what I mean? And doing all those kinds of things. So it's the same in that respect. Yeah.

And what training is involved?

There is some training involved, obviously, first of all, you need to socialize this dog to it just like you would any other dog, right? It needs to be able to go to the veterinarian with you once a year, right? To be able to, to do those basic kinds of things. It needs to have its nails clipped, it needs to be groomed. I mean, there was kind of a myth for a little while in this country that if you had a Livestock Guardian, you should just throw them out in the field and never touch them. never pay any attention to them, they should live with the sheep and not with you. And that's completely wrong. Because as the actual way these dogs lived back in their home countries, was very closely with the shepherd right, this is the person that they were out with months on end. And so the working nature of the dog is not harmed by you building a bond with the dog right and with members of your family building a bond with the dog too. you need to be able to safely handle it and groom it and take it someplace and stuff. So that's the basic stuff. Other than that, what we do is try to make sure that we set the dog up for success when it's a puppy and don't put it in situations where, you know, there could be a catastrophe. In their homelands, most puppies were raised in the, you know, 24/7 care of a shepherd, and maybe his older working livestock dog or dogs, right. So they had mentors around them, and they couldn't get away with bad behavior. Sometimes what we see here is that people have jobs that they're off their farm, or they're away from home, or, you know, and they're not out there with a puppy that might be with a flock of sheep. And they might have lambs, and then they get into trouble because nobody's, you know, guiding them, you know, into proper behavior. So, they need time to grow up too. they need, you know, 1.5 -2 years, in which you need to be supervising them, or only putting them in situations where they'll be okay, right? Like, a friend of mine often says, you don’t put a baby in with a baby to watch a baby, right? So, you know, don’t take a puppy and put it in with those lambs and think that's all going to work out, right? Because the lambs or the baby goats are going to try to play with the puppy. And, you know, so you want the puppy to grow up with some older animals that will sort of teach it to behave, right. A common problem we have is with poultry, because so many people want to keep a Livestock Guardian Dog, because they have, you know, some chickens on their place, right? Or, especially free range. Chickens are not the native, you know, species that these dogs protected in their homelands for all these centuries, right? They were doing sheep and goats and cattle. So chickens are kind of like very flappy, you know, do things that entice play, in lots of young dogs, right. And we're all familiar with the problem with any kind of dog and chickens and, and so I really caution people not to rush at that at all. And you got to give a dog a long time, and you've got to really introduce them to chickens and supervise this. And, you know, because you, you want to have positive experiences as you're building the dog's behaviors, right? And you want to stop anything that's play, and anything that's dangerous and stuff, too. So if there is a little training, it gets easier, actually, once you've raised one Livestock Guardian Dog, because when that dogs grown up, and you bring in another puppy, maybe the older dog can often help train the puppy, right? Like, no, we don't do that here, you know? And I've seen, I've seen that myself, where the older dog says, nope, stop. You know, we don't chase the lambs, right? and stuff. So it gets a little easier. We're kind of in a hybrid situation here in North America, right? We're not full time shepherds. When we can't supervise the growing Livestock Guardian Dog, it needs to be someplace safe, where it can't get in trouble. And where it can't hurt something else, until you've had competence that it's matured. And they can take a while to mature, it can be a year and a half, two years. But you know, I also have always had herding dogs, and you know, you can't do much with them before a couple years old either. They need to learn their basic commands and all kinds of other things to be under, you know, and listen to you before you can take them out to a flock of sheep too. So you just have to be patient. Right?

And do they work better in pairs? You mentioned you know, maybe an older dog being the mentor.

You know, it depends on each family, they do work in pairs, they are used to working in situations with more than one Livestock Guardian Dog many times two or three or more were kept with big flocks up in the mountains. So they're used to this idea, right? You don't need to get two puppies at the same time, though. And I'm seeing too many people thinking oh, I'm going to get two copies of the same time and raise them and, you know, it's, it's often not a good idea with a companion dog to raise two puppies at the same time. And you're much better off to raise one and then bring in a puppy if you feel like you need two dogs. Or maybe as you know, rescue or adopt an older one, because there are older ones, looking for new homes at times too, right? and then get that dog to listen to your voice and get a puppy. it kind of depends on your needs. If you don't have a lot of heavy predator pressure, just a little bit of predator problem around your you might be just perfectly fine with one, the people who live on larger farms or ranches or have 200 sheep right or something and they're out on you know, 100 acres or something. They're going to need more than one dog because they can't cover that territory and keep everybody safe.

Well that was my next question. How many animals can a dog protect at one time?

It depends on the area and the kind of terrain you know, like obviously, if you had a 10 acre pasture, it was very flat. A dog or one or two dogs can really keep a good eye on all that right? If you translated that same 10 acres into extremely rolling brushy ground, their line of sight would be you know obstructed all over the place and there'll be all kinds of places where something could you know sneak up on the sheep and so it depends on the terrain. And it depends highly on whether or not you just occasionally have a coyote or a fox that tries to get in your fences, right, or whether you actually have, you know, a coyote pack in your area. And there's multiple coyotes. Because if there's more than one predator, it's not really fair to the dog to have to, you know, face a pack of coyotes or something. you want them to be able to drive it off. And that's what we're looking for is all that bluffing that Livestock Guardian Dogs do they bark, run fiercely at this thing that's coming through the fence, right? And just throw a fit and everything and for the most part warns off, you know, the predator, or they chase it off. So you don't want them out numbered. So it really depends on your, you know, individual situation. Okay?

Well, as we're wrapping up, why don't all farmers have these dogs, it makes so much sense.

It's an investment in working with another living creature, right? You're you're taking on an animal that you need to build a relationship with, and you need to do training with you need to supervise and you need to enjoy in your life. You need to want this kind of like working relationship. Not everybody, you know, has the time to do that maybe they're not comfortable with large dogs, maybe they're not comfortable with large dominant dogs, which these dogs are, you also need to have good fencing, you know, if you can't keep them on your property, they're a liability to you, you know, you can't have them roaming the neighborhood, you know, where they might, you know, decide that a neighbor's dog is, you know, a danger or something, right. So it's your, it's your responsibility to keep them fenced in. They are enormously popular with the growth that we have seen, especially in the ranching and farming communities, people who raise sheep and goats and cattle. the US government tracks the statistics in agriculture. And over the last 20 years, this has changed from being a minor thing that a few percentage, you know, ranchers do to the second most popular thing that ranchers do to protect their flock.

That's great.

Yeah, because it is it's a way of coexisting with nature for the most part, right? And it's a way of you not having to physically be present all the time for your flock to be safe, right? and stuff. So but it takes it's a learning curve, and you've got to be willing to put in the time and, you know, so it has really grown now it really has.

That's cool. And how much would a dog cost?

If it is a dog, that might be a cross between a couple of Livestock Guardian breeds, you don't want a dog that is a cross between a Livestock Guardian breed and some other kind of breed. Unfortunately, there are a lot of people who cross by accident, like their border collie on their farm. That that's, you know, that might be a great companion dog, that's not a good working dog. So if if a dog is unregistered on paper, right like that, that it's just a cross between working dogs. And instead, it could cost you at least maybe $800. If you want a dog from a good breeder who's tested for hips and has registered dogs of a certain breed, that's going to run you more like 1500 up to $2500 or something. And that's an investment in. And one other thing, I guess I just want to mention it, there is a difference between these breeds. We talked about the Great Pyrenees a lot and that is probably the most user friendly for the brand new person new to Livestock Guardians because it's the most people oriented right? And not quite so defensively aggressive. There are other breeds that are far more serious, and they you know, belong in the hands of people who have big ranches out in Wyoming right. Other things are a lot of experience. And so some of those people are looking for a specific kind of breed of dog and that's going to cost you more too because you know you're looking for something that's bred specifically to do something that will help you.

Jan this has been such a joy thank you for bringing us this amazing information. I learned so many new things today. Where can everyone find out more information about you and your books on Livestock Guardian Dogs?

Everything is on my website and it's JanDohner.com The books are there lots of articles and blog posts and things I've got lots of tips and resources for people trying to use Livestock Guardian Dogs as well which I think will be helpful and useful to people. I've done a number of webinars which are FREE and you know, be a great thing before you buy one. Educate yourself and watch a couple webinars and see how this whole process of training one would be.

Well, thank you for all that you do. This is such a great alternative to as you said coexist with nature. So if anybody is interested in learning more again go to Jan's website JanDohner.com. Learn more, it sounds like you have all the information out there. So Jan, thank you. Thank you for being with us today.

It was great thanks.

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Hey Winston was that another tail wagging episode?