# LGDs and fences



## cbobgo (Jun 13, 2013)

I am in process of turning a 2.3 ac property into a small hobby farm/ranchette sort of thing.  We have chickens and ducks right now, and plan to get goats.  The poultry are on the opposite side of the property from where the goats are going to be.

My question is in regards to my LGD which I am hoping to get soon, and the fences I will need for the goats.  I want the LGD to be able to patrol the whole property, but he/she will need to get in and out of the fenced in goat area as needed.  How do I set it up so the dog has free access but the goats cant get out.  Can an LGD clear a 4 foot fence?

- bob


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## Southern by choice (Jun 13, 2013)

Will the whole property be fenced? and then separate fenced area for the goats?

Field fencing or 4x4 goat fencing. Hotwire around the top and possibly th ebottom is best.

My 4 LGD's are trained to 5 strand hotwire BUT my F Pyrenees especially has almost gone through twice just this week. Someone was driving by too slow for her liking and they a car turned around in the neighbors driveway... 20 ft from our fence. She is very bold. The males are a bit more discerning and will wait and watch. She is feirce when it comes to her goats. The Anatolian is pretty relaxed, she discerns a threat from non- threat easier.


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## secuono (Jun 13, 2013)

You can make a dog door in the fence, maybe possibly a tunnel or a large tube where the dog can fit through, but the goats cant. If you have small goats, it'll be even harder to work it out. Unless you can get them to obey a short hot fence and teach the dog to jump it, hope the goats don't try. 
Other than that...don't see it happening.


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## woodsie (Jun 13, 2013)

If you find a great answer I'd love to know. I have opened up a section of fencing between my two fields because of coyotes scoping out my property and discovered where my dogs range stops and I had a pen with baby goats exposed. I was considering putting up a 24" blockade in the opening, enough to deter my goats and sheep from jumping (there is hot wire on the top at 5') but I know the dogs would easily clear in the event of a threat. My female too is actually more bold and clever at figuring out how to get into "new areas", my male is much more apprehensive at testing the electric fence or shock collar range. 

I run an "invisible fence" on the perimeter of exterior fence so they know that their territory is everything within the shock collar zone and they allowed to cross the cross fencing - seems to work for my female, the male is not so willing to cross fences but I am sure he would in the event of a threat. If you find a better answer I'd love to hear about it.


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## cbobgo (Jun 13, 2013)

My plan is to have the whole property fenced, with 2 cross fenced in areas for the goats to rotate back and forth and eat the scrub.  About 75% of the perimiter is already fenced with 4 foot field fencing in pretty good shape, part of it has a line of barbed wire about 6-8 inches or so above the top.  I'm thinking of adding poly deer fence on the outside of the fence to a height of 8 ft to keep the deer out.  I need to get a gate across the driveway and then finish the fence on 1 side of the property and the perimeter will be done.

I haven't decided for sure what to do yet for the goat sections.  I was hoping to not need electric fence, but it sounds like that's one of the only things that will keep goats in.  I'm planning to get angora and/or pygora goats, if that makes any difference.  There will be valuable plants and trees on other parts of the property that must not be eaten by the goats, so keeping them in their area is vital.

The chickens will be in a coop at night, but hopefully can be free range during the day.  The ducks will eventually have a pond, not sure what to do with them at night, possibly a second coop, haven't figured that out yet.

The tunnel into the goat area sound like that might work to allow the LGD to have access.  Either that or 2 LGDs, one in the pen for the goats and one in the yard for the poultry.


Thanks for the suggestions.

- bob


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## Southern by choice (Jun 13, 2013)

If you have LGD's you will not need deer anything. The deer will not come near. As far as wire, that was for the dogs. we currently have 21 goats. Our goats never challenge the fence.. hotwire down a fenceline just helps when bucks are in rut so they don't rub up against it. We have Kiko goats, Lamancha , and Nigerians, and jacobs sheep.We do not need hotwire for our dogs as they are trained. 

We use hotwire for rotational grazing over a large area of land, for thhick heavy woods for the goats

Hot-wire _may not_ be nec. for your dogs BUT keep  it in mind. MANY Lgd owners need wire at top and bottom so- No climb No dig.

I would strongly recommend you remove any barbed wire.


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## cbobgo (Jun 13, 2013)

Thanks Southern - so do your dogs go in and out of the goat area, or do they just patrol the rest of the property?

- bob


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## babsbag (Jun 13, 2013)

I too have a 4' fence with hotwire top and at knee height. The goats and the dogs both respect it and don't challenge it at all. 

I tried many ways to let me dogs into pastures while keeping the goats out; anything the dogs could use the goats would too.  I finally put in the 4' gate that has 2x4 wire on the bottom and an open top rung. The dogs have learned that they are supposed to go over/through the gate, the goats either don't, can't, won't, or they are just lazy. 

The only problem is now if I put up a gate I don't want the dogs to go over I have to use a different kind of gate.


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## Southern by choice (Jun 13, 2013)

cbobgo said:
			
		

> Thanks Southern - so do your dogs go in and out of the goat area, or do they just patrol the rest of the property?
> 
> - bob


Our LGD's are with the livestock, often rotated so they  can go with all livestock and not see them as "foreigners".... poultry ( chickens, ducks, geese- free range about 300 birds) , goats and sheep. We have our goats in different herds. 

We have a "farmdog" and a German Shepherd Dog ( GSD) for all the property that is non- livestock. Our non livestock property is not fenced and we are on a country highway. Our 2 Family protectors do not leave the property. They guard everything else.

*I would really consider your plan about wanting them to have a way between places.*

These dogs are highly intelligent and whatever you teach them you will need to think big picture. There will be a time when you may need to keep your LGD/S in an area, if they have learned HOW to get through , get around, get under this will be a long term *problem*. It also in many ways encourages future "escape" artists. 

Pups I train up start in a dry lot that has fencing 5 ft high pointy at the top, concreted at the bottom. As they are growing and all the daily introductions are going on they learn at a young age they will get nowhere trying to dig under... too hard to go over. My dogs only dig in a spot to keep cool, never to escape. 

I do have one GP that hates geese, I have a post about the whole reason somewhere on here but he learned by watching us humans at 8 weeks, how to put a nasty Gander in his place and make him submit... the pup by 3-4 months mimicked all he had seen. The one dog and the geese have a HATE HATE HATE relationship. We are raising a new gosling now that will be with him (supervised) daily... we need to retrain him  for this. What he was doing was right, but only we should correct the geese.   This goes back to think "big picture" .  He still thinks the humans need to be protected from the hormonal breeding season mean geese. LOL


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## cbobgo (Jun 13, 2013)

So, since my goats and my poultry are in separate sections, it sounds like I am going to have to have a dedicated LGD for each section, rather than 1 for the whole property, even though I only have 2 ac.

I'm certainly not opposed to having more dogs around, I love 'em.

Regarding your comments about keeping LGDs in certain areas - can they not be trained to stay in a specific area like your farm dogs are?  Is it not possible to have LGDs in a non-fenced yard?  They will always run off? 

- bob


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## Southern by choice (Jun 13, 2013)

It is really not possible to not have them fenced. I do know of a breeder that has his 1 male anatolian free on the property, but that is highly unusual.

I will get back to you on th rest... had a storm come through and a tree just took out part of our fencing. Glad it was the one LGD team in there cuz if it was the other... well... they'd be gone.


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## bj taylor (Jun 13, 2013)

interesting thread.  I too am in the position of how to get the dogs access to the goat fenced area & back into the other areas without the goats doing the same.  3 1/2 acres are very well fenced for goats.  I have two gsd.  as of right now, the dogs are fenced Out of the goat area during the day.  I figure the predator threat is pretty small during that time.  we have a relatively low predator threat compared to many & the fence is very good.  at night after locking the goats up in their pen, I open the gate so the dogs can access that area & deal with anything that comes in.  the dogs are not trustworthy w/the goats by themselves at this time.  

I was reading that goats don't like to go into dark places.  if the tunnel could be made 'dark' enough, perhaps the dogs could go back & forth & the goats would choose not to.  the tunnel could be a piece of culvert or big pvc type stuff?

i'm one week into owning goats.  

I can't imagine two sets of dogs & so the gsd are what we have.  I prefer my protection more than the goat protection if it comes to that - so the german shepherds stay.

sounds like y'all out east got some tough storms.  sure hope it all works out ok.


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## Southern by choice (Jun 14, 2013)

Our chickens are with our goats... kind of... we have a large field where many of our chickens are... the goats are there too... we move our goats though for forage freshness etc, but we have chickens everywhere! 

I am a big fan of teams. Lgd's work better in teams. Can you separate the dogs and have them in their own areas... yes. There are things to consider with this....

Dogs are pack animals, it is their natural inclination to be together, they will naturally want to be with each other.
Think long term big picture. If you train one dog for one field, one dog for the other... these dogs are possessive. So when a chicken goes to the goat field by some chance... that goat lgd will kill it. The chicken LGd will not take to kindly to a goat either. 

One of our teams back in the deep woods became accustomed to the chickens that came back there everyday... no problem.... BUT one day a  chicken that never goes back to those areas decided it would ( probably looking for a place to make a hidden nest) this chicken was a foreigner to this team, they did not recognize it and so they killed it. They were doing exactly what they should.... the animal was not suppose to be there. We want them to grab the hawks and owls so we can't get mad when this strange bird comes in and they kill it.  

Raising the dog/s for variety is best, alternating between areas. The dog tends to be more protective of area as opposed to just livestock type. This makes for a more versatile dog. We rarely have a LGD in the poultry field because with them all around and our family dogs on the property we have no issues with poultry being taken anymore.

We rotate our teams to acclimate to large and small goats, many LGD's that were raised with large goats only and suddenly you have a small goat ... they can have a hard time with that. Rotating is best. I do think it has already been mentioned... IT will take time with poultry, and diligence on your part. YOU WILL LOSE POULTRY.

Although I understand where BJ taylor is coming from, GSD's have a distinctly different purpose than LGD's.

My family raised/bred GSD for many generations and the GSD is my passion as well as the LGD's I can say if a pack of coyotes come in the GSDs do not have the power or size to take care of the problem. My GSD and farm mutt can go anywhere and can be in with the livestock but their number one priority is human gaurdians, not livestock. Different breeds different purposes. Our livestock is never "locked up" at night, they are sometimes ( depending on which herd) in deep thick forest woods. No worries ever with having the LGD's. The GSD and farm dog come in the house, family dogs so to speak. The GSd cares about pleasing its master, is highly trainable, and bonds with its humans. A LGD does not necessarily care about pleasing its owner, they are highly independant and need to be. They prefer their livestock to humans. They will defy their human and make decisions based on what they believe is best for the livestock. They are usually right. 

Utilizing a dogs given disposition and abilities is important. Hunting dogs don't make good guardians, and LGD's don't make good hunting dogs. LOL herding dogs are smart and intelligent but make terrible livestock guardians.  If a LGD acts like a herding dog then there is aproblem.... it really is about the purpose.


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## treeclimber233 (Jun 15, 2013)

I have a chain link gate that separates the goats from the area under the rabbit cages.  Drift climbs over the  gate whenever he wants to gain access to the area under the rabbits.  The gate keeps the goats in. He was also climbing the board fence by the barn and getting into the yard where there is no fence to keep him home.  I stopped that climbing by putting wire (same as the electric fence) along the top of the wood fence. I did not need to put current there because he knows what the electric fence does if he touches it. (It hurts.  Just ask me how I know......)


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