Best internment for LGD puppy?

[Duckfarmerpa1]

It varies but generally speaking they sleep where the animals are. Some will come into the house for a bit but won't spend the night away from their charges. If you lock the animals in the barn at night, you might need a door for the LGD. Things might not go well if it can't get out to the fenceline to warn off what it hears. You don't want the dog frustrated or ripping at the doors to get out.

Given you have other dogs, you might need to keep them out of where the animals are if you get an LGD, it will quite possibly consider them a threat to the guarded animals.

Oh..geez...

 

[Duckfarmerpa1]

Forgot to mention....they don't just shed...they blow their coats out like clouds of fur

 

[Baymule]

They also dig holes. Lots of holes, big holes, deep holes, keep a shovel handy. When I tried to move my psycho female GP Paris up to the sheep barn, she climbed out and went back to her backyard. So I chained her in the pasture. She responded by digging a hole that I could have buried a Volkswagon bug in. I declared her the winner and let her go back to her backyard. Then I put up cow panels linking her backyard to the sheep barn. She is still the winner. LOL

 

[TXFarmGirl]

Got it, thank you all so much! In all of our previous reading and such, alllll we were told is never let the dog be with the animal until you know for sure that they won’t hurt them, keep them separate till the puppy matures is all we heard, but then we would put her locked in the barn with them at night sense it was dark, and she doesn’t touch the big ones, but she doesn’t like the 5 new smaller chickens we got(they are about 7 months old, so they aren’t that small), and our new silkie rooster, she pens them down, suggestions for integrating new chickens would be great too. But starting tomorrow she will be with the chickens with lots of supervision! Thanks again everybody!!

 

[Bruce]

I think chickens are the hardest because they tend to freak and run squawking and flapping. That can get a young dog into a "lets play with the toys" mindset.

 

[TXFarmGirl]

We spend 2 days straight keeping her with all the chickens, and we would recorrect her every time she started _______ (doing whatever she wasn’t supposed to. But as soon as she knows we aren’t watching, or we go inside, she gets a duck of fluffy chicken, or eats more eggs, or chases them, etc.

Just a minute ago, we were inside, and she was outside with them, and she almost killed a duck. What should we do? She doesn’t do anything bad when we are watching...

We also need suggestions on how to stop her from eating eggs, she eats every egg she can find when we aren’t watching, if we are raking the barn, and she is in there with us, she won’t touch an egg, as soon as we leave to empty the wheel barrow, she eats the eggs. She isn’t hungry, because she has 24 hour access to food.

Another problem we have with her, is if we are throwing food to the chickens, she will try to kill them, if they get close to the food we are throwing to them. We feed her off to the side, so she is getting some too, but she is still growling at the chickens eating beside her...

 

[Beekissed]

We spend 2 days straight keeping her with all the chickens, and we would recorrect her every time she started _______ (doing whatever she wasn’t supposed to. But as soon as she knows we aren’t watching, or we go inside, she gets a duck of fluffy chicken, or eats more eggs, or chases them, etc.

Just a minute ago, we were inside, and she was outside with them, and she almost killed a duck. What should we do? She doesn’t do anything bad when we are watching...

We also need suggestions on how to stop her from eating eggs, she eats every egg she can find when we aren’t watching, if we are raking the barn, and she is in there with us, she won’t touch an egg, as soon as we leave to empty the wheel barrow, she eats the eggs. She isn’t hungry, because she has 24 hour access to food.

Another problem we have with her, is if we are throwing food to the chickens, she will try to kill them, if they get close to the food we are throwing to them. We feed her off to the side, so she is getting some too, but she is still growling at the chickens eating beside her...

She doesn't respect your authority. Period. That's the root of the problem. You'll need to establish yourself as her pack leader before she will respect you even when you are not there. A leash is a good place to start, with appropriate walking on that leash~not in front of you....EVER. Consistent, daily establishing that she goes where you go, stops when you stop, sits when you say sit, lies down when you say, comes to you when you say, etc. A lot of folks say you can't obedience train these breeds but you can and you need to have some measure of authority over them if you want them to respect you even when you are not there...this is particularly needed when using a LGD around poultry....it's not a type of animal they bond with naturally.

These breeds, in particular, need a strong owner. They are smart enough to avoid correction while you are present....most of the time.....but just from reading the description of what she is doing, your corrections are not true corrections to her. She doesn't connect them to her own actions, she just knows you freak out if she tries something around the chickens in your presence. So, she waits until you are gone before proceeding.

For chickens, I do something called "MY chicken" training with each dog I get, be it a pup or an older dog. For most dogs it never has to be repeated, but the short of it is that the dog needs to learn these are YOUR things, not hers. That you want her to submit to the chickens, remain calm at all time around the chickens, and to see them as your possessions, not hers.

As for eggs....ANY dog will eat eggs. It takes some intensive training to keep a dog from eating available food....you could do a version of "MY chicken" with the eggs, but I've never tried it and don't know if that will work. It's best if she's not allowed in the coop at all, no matter the reason, even if you are there. I don't allow my dogs to EVER enter the coop area, even if the door is open and I'm there too. The chickens should have a safe place and that coop is always their safe place. They should be able to eat, roost, lay or socialize in their coop without any fears of a predator coming in there and a dog, no matter how good they are with the chickens, is always seen as a predator.

Feed the chickens in the coop, away from the dog. Kitchen scraps are fair game for any and all animals, so I don't mind if the dog gets his fair share before the chickens do and he's allowed to guard that food or his own from chickens. If I don't want him to have the scraps, I feed them in the coop. Guarding his food is the only time I allow the dogs to growl or lunge at the chickens....if not, they will steal the dogs blind when I feed the dogs. If they growl or lunge at chickens when there is no food present or if it's clearly chicken feed only(fine grains), they get a strong correction.

Going to take more than a few days of work to get results, though.

 

[frustratedearthmother]

So, she waits until you are gone before proceeding.

Exactly! At four months old your pup just isn't old enough to be trusted. Leaving her with the animals at this point is setting her up for failure. Love all the above training tips above - but your little one isn't old enough or mature enough to retain all that information for very long. I'll bet you wouldn't leave a toddler child unattended and expect them to remember everything you said "no" to. Same thing with the dog. She needs some maturity before she can be expected to act like an adult. Thankfully dogs mature a lot faster than children, lol!

Your best bet is to remove her from the source of the problem. Then the only time the pup gets time with the birds is while under your direct supervision.

Going to take more than a few days of work to get results, though.

Training (ha!) an LGD is a lesson in patience. Bee is right that taking on an LGD isn't an event - it's a process.

 

[TXFarmGirl]

Exactly! At four months old your pup just isn't old enough to be trusted. Leaving her with the animals at this point is setting her up for failure. Love all the above training tips above - but your little one isn't old enough or mature enough to retain all that information for very long. I'll bet you wouldn't leave a toddler child unattended and expect them to remember everything you said "no" to. Same thing with the dog. She needs some maturity before she can be expected to act like an adult. Thankfully dogs mature a lot faster than children, lol!

Your best bet is to remove her from the source of the problem. Then the only time the pup gets time with the birds is while under your direct supervision.



Training (ha!) an LGD is a lesson in patience. Bee is right that taking on an LGD isn't an event - it's a process.

That’s what we were doing, letting her be with them while supervised, and not with them while unsupervised, but then we thought everyone was telling us to put the dog and chickens together, and not to have them separate. Starting tomorrow, we will start with all @Beekissed info & advice, and see what happens. Thank you so much @Beekissed for all the time you took to give us that info.

 

[TXFarmGirl]

We had her sleeping in the barn with the chickens, but is that not a good idea? At night should she stay in the separate pen that she stays in when we are gone?