LGC

LGC
Clear Creek Farm has about 75 Boer goats, two Border Collies herding dogs (Daisy and Sage), two Great Pyrenees (Dixie and DeeDee), a mix sheep dog/Pyrenees (DaleDell). In addition, we have three Border Collie puppies, two male and one female, and a female Great Pyrenees puppy, and one male Great Pyrenees (Big Boy) who adopted us. Oh, I almost forgot: Pooh, Tigger and Einstein the cats.
We have several paddocks for our goats. The bucks have a 4 acre wooded hillside. We have two breeding paddocks: one is about a half acre at the foot of the hill and one about an acre of wooded hillside. In addition, the main herd lives ‘out of the barn’ in a four acre wooded hillside, and bottom land.
DaleDell lives most of his time in one of the breeding paddocks, DeeDee and Big Boy control the bottoms and Dixie is the boss lady. The Border Collies live in pens when they are not working; a border collie left to its own ‘will’ get into trouble.
When we sale animals, if they lived in DaleDell’s pen, he will come through what ever fencing is restraining him and watch them leave. He wants us to know they are leaving – and its not his fault!
This fall we moved a bunch of six month old doelings into the breeding pen at the top of the hill, and for some reason DaleDell decided they were his and he would watch them. He moved to the top of the hill. When Dixie whelped, as she normally does under the crib, a 100 plus year old building we moved up from my dad’s farm in Alabama, we had two LGDs at the top of the hill. DaleDell and Dixie work the parameters of the paddocks, insuring they leave their scent around the area. Meanwhile, Big Boy and DeeDee have the main herd. The cats normally stay with the main herd, going to the pasture with them, catching mice that are kicked up by the goats.
A couple of weeks ago, we built a small paddock to hold some of our show goats following their fitting in preparation for a show. Since that paddock has been used, we have acquired one of the three cats at the top of the hill - normally not the same cat two days in a row. What we think happened is:
Dixie got everybody together - well as many as possible, the 10 doelings and their buck did not attend. Any way, Dixie told them there were just too many paddocks for her to cover and the cats would have to help, thus LGC. Livestock Guardian Cats

If you liked this article please let us know by signing our guestbook.