It’s in an Anatolian Shepherd’s DNA to be a great livestock guardian (LGD).  They just naturally bond with their herd and want to keep them safe.  However, these inherent protective instincts can also lead to trouble if left unsupervised without proper training. 

Kidding season can be a particularly risky affair.  I’ve heard and read many horror stories regarding young LGDs left unsupervised in the pasture with kidding goats.

A few potential issues:

1. Confused LGD attempting to protect a newly born crying kid from its mother.  This generally results in a bloodied nanny or an abandoned baby.
2. LGD gets to aggressive in helping the nanny goat clean the newborn kid.  This can result in a maimed or dead kid.  It also takes away from the bonding between the nanny and her kid.
3. LGD starts chasing the nanny around trying to pull the afterbirth before it has naturally detached and been pushed out.  If the LGD pulls the afterbirth before its ready it can result in the nanny goat having internal bleeding and death.

Our suggested training solution

Our solution to all three above issues is to train our Anatolian Shepherds to give the nanny goat space during and after kidding.  Its surprisingly easy to do, if you’ve already taught them the basic commands of down and stay.  We wait till a nanny is starting to kid, bring the livestock guardian into the pasture, walk him over slowly to the nanny goat and have the LGD lay down and stay about 10-15 foot from the nanny goat.  We step away a few yards away and give verbal correction if he/she starts to move in closer. 

Once the kidding process is complete, we continue to keep the dogs at a distance.  We do not allow our dogs to help clean the kids.  We know some people swear by allowing the dog to clean the kid and believe it helps the dogs bond to the kid, but in our experience, the dogs still bond with the kid just fine.  Additionally, allowing the momma to clean the kid helps them bond, stimulates the kids desire to stand and nurse and removes any risk of the kid being accidently injured by the dog.

Once the kids are up and nursing, we allow the dogs to engage.  Sometimes this results in an aggressive nanny goat that butts at the dogs.  In this instance we like to see the dogs roll on their sides and low crawl up to the nanny and her newborn kids.  If they do not, we give verbal correction and move the dog off a distance until it approaches properly. 

The low crawling and being submissive to the nanny goat results in the third issue being corrected.  If dog attempts to get at the afterbirth the goat corrects him/her and they stop.  However, we also monitor this closely and use it as another training opportunity to teach the dog to properly approach the nanny goat.

Finally, after the afterbirth has dropped, we still do not allow the dogs to eat it.  Instead I take the afterbirth and wrap it around my arm.  When the dogs start to eat it aggressively, I yank my hand back and act like they’ve hurt me.  This results in them learning to eat the afterbirth slowly and carefully.  I do this just in case there is ever a case where a trained unsupervised LGD forgets his space training and decided to help with the cleaning.