Self-Assessment & Discernment for LGD Owners
A special chapter from my book,
The Way of The Pack:
Understanding and Living With
Livestock Guardian Dogs
Understanding and Living With
Livestock Guardian Dogs
So how many of you LGD owners or LGD wannabe's have still have not bought this copy yet? How many of you still sit back and hem and haw? The time is now...
He who knows others is clever;
He who knows himself has discernment.
~ Lao Tzu
Man, know yourself... and you shalt know the gods.
~ Egyptian Proverb
How many of you will read this chapter, or skim over it and toss the book aside in a flustered huff and carry on as usual? Or will you use this as an opportunity to “start over” and learn and do things differently - more mindfully and responsibly - and make positive changes to how you live with, train and use your LGDs? If you want to succeed with LGDs, you must not only be willing to work very hard, you must undergo some honest self-assessment, and you must also learn how to develop discernment. To be an honest owner, to progress well with your dogs, and own and raise them to their fullest potential, being honest with yourself and developing discernment is paramount.
Self Assessment
Self-introspection is never fun. It requires honesty and that is not always an easy pill to swallow. But these dogs are honest with us. They deserve honest ownership.
Here we go. Get the family together in the living room by a toasty fire; pour some hot chocolate, get comfortable, and make this a group learning experience. Discuss these questions with everyone who will be involved with owning an LGD. Take a deep breath, and let’s go down my laundry list of questions:
Do you really need an LGD? Or do you just want one because you think that “Breed X” looks “cool?” Or are you getting one because it’s suddenly become the popular thing to do?
Be truthful with yourself. Too many people are fad and binge-buying LGDs because they’ve become so popular - they then grow tired of the work involved, or find out they are in over their heads, or can’t handle the commitment, and then they dump them in shelters or try to give them away without any vetting of the new buyer. These dogs deserve better than that!
Can your predator issues be solved by the fencing you currently lack? Or can you deter predators by repairing the poor fencing you currently have? Have you looked into electrified fence or netting, fladry, noisemakers, game cameras, and if not in large predator territory, the use of a donkey, llamas, geese or even guinea hens to be watchful over your flock or herd? Do you truly understand the requirement for good dog-proof fencing to keep your LGDs home where they belong, and alive - not run over by a semi-truck on the Interstate, stolen, shot or lost?
Are you doing your part keeping your livestock safe by being a good, attentive shepherd? Or are you too busy to spend time in your livestock because you are gone 8 or more hours a day to a job? How do you expect to raise and train a puppy, then, if you are gone all the time?
Are you buying an LGD as a “quick fix” for in-depth problems that need more than a dog to fix? Are you using an LGD to put over your predation problems like a band-aid - a band-aid that will soon come off because you aren’t around to train and monitor your new LGD puppy? Go back and read the “On Being a Good Shepherd” chapter.
Did you get into hobby farming without doing the research first? Did you plop your experimental free-ranging chicken operation in the middle of coyote and hawk country without considering the consequential - and inevitable - loss of poultry?
Did you research your choice of land or farm or ranch before you bought it? Did you really think you could raise sheep or cattle next to several packs of wolves without suffering some losses? Or did you buy your farm or ranch or homestead without asking around to get the “feel” of the country and find out what predators you’d face?
How much money and time do you have to raise an LGD puppy? It takes a lot of time to rear up LGD pups and train them. Are you prepared for the financial burden of feeding, vet bills, regular vaccinations, and emergencies?
LGDs are big dogs - independent dogs. Do you truly get that? Do you grasp the fact that most LGD breeds grow into very large if not giant dogs who can be an independent handful, even in the most experienced of hands?
What has been your dog experience up until now? Do you realize LGDs are different than non-LGD dogs? Do you understand the ways they are different than other, non-LGD breeds?
Do you have young children? Most LGDs are good with children, but if you have small children, are you up to training them not to pull a dog’s ears or tails, and be respectful of your LGD?
Is your whole family on board with getting an LGD or are you the rogue elephant crying for one? Do they have good reasons why an LGD would not work, and you refuse to listen?
Do you realize LGDs need to be be run in pairs at minimum to be effective? If you are contemplating pulling it off with only one dog, forget that fantasy right here and now. You’ll realize too late you should have started with a pair or trio.
As you shop for pups, are you scrutinizing potential LGD breeders or just accepting shallow and vague answers from them? Be sure and read the Finding a Good LGD Breeder chapter. Do not be in such a hurry to get an LGD that you are settling for less in terms of a breeder and the dogs they are producing.
These are just a few questions you need to ponder before you race out and buy your first LGD, or buy one to replace the one you claim is not working out for you, or add to the ones you already own.
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Developing Discernment
Discernment is the ability to judge well or in a Christian context, perception in the absence of judgment with a view to obtaining spiritual direction and understanding. Discerning LGD owners learn to evaluate where they get their dog information.
For example, discerning LGD owners realize that most social media platforms, such as Facebook, have become hotbeds of armchair experts, fake members, and people who are in dire need of self-validation. They are usually not the best sources of good information, yet thousands of people rely on them. Yes, there is a connection between that sad fact and the huge numbers of dumped LGDs showing up in shelters all over the country now.
Livestock Guardian Dog forums on social media platforms and stand-alone website forums are time consuming due to their layouts, and by the mere fact that there are typically thousands of people on them, all seemingly competing against one another to be the “resident expert” or most active commentator. Common sense should tell you that if you are a busy farmer or rancher with work to do and time constraints, that your time is very valuable. It is too valuable to wade through hundreds of posts by fake posters and total unknowns on a forum. It is best spent reading legitimately sourced material that you will find in books, magazines or quarterly journals written by people with bonafide expertise. Agriculture journals, magazines (such as Sheep! Magazine,) and quarterlies, livestock breed association journals, woolgrowers and goat club periodicals, dog breed club magazines (The Akbash Journal, for example) and farm industry websites are much more vetted-out in terms of their content than a Facebook forum ever can be. Discerning LGD owners will lean on these solid sources for intelligently written and sourced material, steer way from information sources that use fake names or hide behind “cute” monikers.
Practicing discernment is a full-time job. Your judgment on whether or not to trust someone or believe what they are telling you in terms of LGDs, will make or break your success with them. This goes for most everything in life.
In our uber-politically correct society, too many people take things at face value and don’t look beyond facades. Too many people are afraid to ask questions. Too many people are too lazy to develop and use common sense. Too many people spend too much time in the shallow end of the pool; they become easily led because they are too lazy to vet out sources of information.
Don’t be one of them.
Don’t take LGD advice from incompetent or vague, shady sources. The man who claims to be an expert yet only owns one LGD and no livestock and lives in a city apartment; the woman who professes to be an LGD expert yet when you dig deeper you can’t find any real proof of her so-called “decades” of writing and research experience. The LGD blogger who hides her real name and her location and regularly plagiarizes other people’s works without giving due credit to her sources. The plethora of Facebook LGD groups. And more. These are the people you need to not listen to in terms of credible knowledge.
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Lack of LGD owner’s self-assessment and practicing intelligent discernment is rampant in the American LGD community, and I see signs of it happening overseas in the Old Country, too. Lack of self-assessment and discernment is the core of so many LGD problems, failed dog ownerships and relationships, training and use issues, and results in dogs suffering by being dumped in shelters, pounds and rescues. It has become so bad that there are now rescue LGD groups all over Facebook, for popular, more common breeds, and rare ones as well.
That alone speaks volumes.
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God gave you brains to use and think with, not park and gather dust in a corner of your head.
Owning LGDs is not a social exercise in gaining popularity, collecting friends you never had before or Facebook pals and “likes.” It is a very serious commitment. Please treat the ownership and use of these wonderful dogs with the serious respect it commands.
Look in the mirror first. Ask those hard questions of yourself and don’t settle for sugar coated solutions.
You portend and profess to love and care for your livestock and your agriculture-based farming, homesteading, prepping, organic produce, ranch, self sustaining “back to the farm” kind of existence and lifestyle. Well, time to do more than talk about it: it’s time to walk the walk and be serious about it. That includes your LGDs.
Don’t treat LGD ownership like an “E” ticket ride at Disneyland; don’t gentrify it or dumb it down into cute social media posts; don’t treat these dogs like plastic picnic plates you toss in the trash after you’ve used them. These amazing dogs give their lives in service to you, to keep your property, family members, precious livestock and fowl safe from harm.
You owe them so much for their valiant efforts and their devotion. Taking their ownership seriously and responsibly is a great way to start.
