Today one of our four livestock guardian dogs is at the vet's clinic to be spayed. This would be my good girl, Bayla. She is a Great Pyrenees that was born and raised on our farm, her mother Abby and her father Dreyfus is also livestock guardians on our farm. Hopefully I will be able to pick her up before they close today, I have been worrying about her all morning. The vet said we could only bring her home today if she was awake enough, apparently they have a broken leg coming in today and will have to work her surgery around that so they might not get to her until the afternoon. If she is awake enough they will let us bring her home, but they were adamant that it was only on the condition she stays in the house for one day after surgery, otherwise she will have to stay there for an extra day.This could be interesting, Bayla is an 112 lb dog that was born and raised in the goat pasture. She has never been in the house before, but I can't bear the thought of her spending a whole extra day in a strange place and in a cage so it looks like it might be an interesting night for us. Normally bringing a livestock guardian dog in the house breaks the cardinal rule of training them and I would never do it, but Bayla is over two years old now and she is well bonded with her goats and knows her job as well as any working dog could, so I think it will be OK this one day.
We do raise Great Pyrenees puppies on rare occasions, but it is quite rare as we have only raised two litters in the last 4 years, besides our dogs primary function has always been to protect our goats from the numerous coyotes, bobcats, hawks and large owls on our property, not to mention other roaming dogs...probably the biggest threat to livestock of all. After she is spayed we will no longer have to separate her from our male Pyrs and thus her important job in the big pasture with the goat herd twice a year. If we can just get past this one nerve wracking day.
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Jennifer, as I read your post I thought about the vet's comment, "If she is awake enough." I began thinking about her size, then you said 112 pounds and I smiled. I hope you do get to bring your Bayla home today. But I cannot imagine her not being able to assist you with walking herself. God bless!
Bless your heart. I know this is a hard day for you. We get so attached to our animals around here. They become part of the family. Our Pyr. has been a pet from day 1 so I am not to sure if he would guard goats but he sure guards us.
Hope she does well.
Do you pet your working dogs? Just wondering, I've never had one but was at goat farm the other day that had a GP dog which they don't pet because the dog does not desire to be petted. They really love and appreciate the dog.
Whenever I talk to people about security, the first thing they ask me about is wildlife as predators but I back them up to DOGS as #1.
We don't have a lot of land like most of y'all do, so we were able to put a tall fence around our critter lot, chickens, turkeys, and goats. We haven't had any predator problems. We also live in a rural neighborhood, not so woodsy.
Oh, I know how that is Jennifer! It was quite interesting getting all of our cats spayed and neutered as well as the dogs since they love being outside of course but we had a nice pen for the cats to be in while they recovered and same for the dogs but when our lab mixes were spayed they were house dogs at the time anyways but our black lab mix female hates males now, humans that is, she doesn't mind women since they're not the ones that spayed her, you should have seen her at our good vet friend's clinic after being spayed, she's 10 years old now and her brother is the one that we put to sleep in November '08, now she's best friend's with my brother's Boston Terrier/Beagle mix.
Well I can only bring her home if she is awake enough, if she is still drowsy I will have my husband help me get her up the steps. I like to do things on my own, but I know my limits and I won't try to carry 112 lbs of dog up those steep steps.
Thanks Becky! Our dogs are working dogs but we really love them! Pyrs are also more sensitive to anesthesia than other breeds, so I have been worrying about that too.
We do pet our dogs and train them to walk on a leash, but when they are puppies we only give them attention in the goat pasture, around the goats. So they learn all good things happen in the goat pasture and there is no point in leaving the goats because they won't get any attention from us down by the house and away from the goats if they do.
Thanks Amy! I am so sorry to hear about the dog you had to have put to sleep. We had to have our dog Kody put to sleep this year, he was 12 years old and got to where he could not get around anymore and he finally quit eating. It was hard to do, but what was best for him so he wouldn't suffer.
Hope all goes well with Bayla, bring her to my house I'll baby her to death. Well that may not be to good for a working dog but I can't help it. Injured animals just break my heart.
Chris
She's a beautiful dog. I hope everything went well!
Well, Bayla did not get to come home today, I will go get her tomorrow. They did not get to her surgery until late in the afternoon and so they kept her for the night. I hate that she did not get to come home, but when I talked to them she had just come out of surgery just fine and was just starting to wake up.
It is a hard thing to do Jennifer! He was 10 years old and has just started not eating a whole lot and our vet came out with a vet tech here to our farm and said he had a large mass on his abdomen, they took him to the clinic and called us back and the mass was the size of a volley ball and it was not operable so we thought the best option for him was to be put to sleep but at least we had my brother's dog here for his sister's companion and our vet cremated him at her clinic, they have a beautiful clinic too with a pond in the back of their building but now we didn't have to worry about him suffereing, he didn't complain about being in any pain though but he wouldn't any of his food at the end though and was losing a lot of weight.
I hope your dog Bayla has come home from the vet's without any problems.
I am sure she will love to be spoiled by her people friends for a couple of days while she recovers.
Tania
That is so sad Amy! It sure is hard to lose them like that when there is nothing you can do.
Thanks Tania! She will come home today.
Oh, I do hope she gets to come home today. Be sure and let us know.
Linda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com
I hope Bayla is recovering and home now.
We use to have 2 Great Pyrenees when we had about 60 goats a few years back. Henry and Angel. They were so sweet to be so huge. Their only fault was digging under the fence. They could dig a hole.
Get well soon Bayla.
Pam
Thanks Pam and Linda, yes Bayla is home now and doing very well. Oh yes, I had to laugh at your comment Pam. We have never had any trouble with them digging out, but mine like to dig dished out places in the ground to lie down in in the summertime and those big paws can dig quite a hole!
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