LGD which are the best breeds?

[AllenK RGV]

I had to police 20+. My Pointer points them out as we pick them up. The English Shepherd pup in training is learning not to bites chickens even when they run into your mouth. Also still learning about hotwire. We do have owl worry as a GHO comes in every night.

In Decater, TX WE HAD WHAT APPEARED to be greater owls every evening at dusk. So happy not to have them down here. They fly silently. Thankfully the cat and our thunderqueen dog were never on the menu for them. We named her thunderqueen after she sighted her first bobcat, wow, the ground shook under her feet running it off. To be more than honest she ran plenty of them off. Also she was always smart enough to never catch one. This is just a let a bobcat vocalize around this dog storey. At 55 pounds she was capable of making the ground rumble as if she was a 200 pounder.

Still I do need to train out the chicken killing instinct from the Australian Cattle dog. They call them heelers down here ours is a red heeler. I am thinking tomorrow we will be in the chicken pen for training duty with the replacement flock.

Also, my wife wants me to start clipping wings our Minorca flew off and seems to have gotten itself killed. We have found our other birds as high up in the trees as the Minorca as well(18ft).

If you are able please send me link to a proper or competent article on this matter from the learning center.

 

[50-45-1]

I hope no one took my comment about our rescued german shepherd wrong. We love her just the way she is.
Momo is a purebred, but was given to us FREE as he was last pup not sold in a litter due to his coloring. The two pups we found on craigs list as i believe they needed to be young to get the correct training. They are 5 yrs and 1yr now.
none of the breed of dogs i have are supposed to be good at the job they do. I believe they are classified as herding breeds, but they dont seem to know that.

 

[llombardo]

My best ever flock gardian dog is an Austrailian shepherd named Momo. I free range my chickens and Momo knows what belongs and what does not. He has rescued more of my chickens than i can count. He always has his nose on duty and would start barking and running off an we knew there was something lurking. Once we were working in the yard and the chickens went crazy, 2 seconds later a red hawk went flying by us with our banty hen Carmel Cream in its tallons, and Momo franticaly barking underneith. Well the hawk dropped the hen!
He is 13 now and has trained 2 other pups for us as he is slowing down. Our new trainees are a Ausie-pit bull mix and an Austrailian cattle dog. Momo has taught them well and they are as good at it as he is.
I have had to correct these new dogs around the chickens very little and mostly when they were pups. I think any dog breed can be taught to be a guardian IF they have the right temperment, AND training.
PS. We also have a German Shepherd that we rescued and she likes to chase butterflies...

My german shepherd chases bumble bees all the time...lol

 

[llombardo]

I don't free range, but I take advantage of my German Shepherds to alert and patrol the area. They are darn good at it. My female can smell a raccoon a mile away and has alerted me the last two nights. I then switch over to my male GSD staying out at night(he can come and go through the screen). His sense of smell and hearing are outstanding. When I wake up in the morning I find his feet prints on the fence. He jumps at the fence, so I know he is hearing something either on the trees or on the other side of the fence and keeping it away.

 

[centrarchid]

Regardless of breed used, try to keep area protected tight (not too much area) and easy for dog to get around without obstructions. My dogs have to go through an extended orientation to learn fencing that changes once in a while and pens that are moved around a lot. Chicken keeping can be a lot different from sheep and goats because dog navigation with respect to chickens here at least is a lot more technical requiring mental effort and physicality of dog doing the work. If you are too spread out like we got for a while, then particularly capable predators like a Red Fox can make dogs job difficult.

 

[AllenK RGV]

Regardless of breed used, try to keep area protected tight (not too much area) and easy for dog to get around without obstructions. My dogs have to go through an extended orientation to learn fencing that changes once in a while and pens that are moved around a lot. Chicken keeping can be a lot different from sheep and goats because dog navigation with respect to chickens here at least is a lot more technical requiring mental effort and physicality of dog doing the work. If you are too spread out like we got for a while, then particularly capable predators like a Red Fox can make dogs job difficult.

Man I hate foxes especially their night time vocalizations at 3AM. We had those in Germany fortunately not here in South Texas. I can totally empathize with English Fox hunters. We had 2 to 3 that lived out back of our home there that would interrupt my sleep each and every night because it was a wooded area. Our fencing never changes, we just have the one large run and one coop.