DTR Working Dogs - Great Pyr / Akbash Cross LGD - Willow

by Arlette

This short working dog story is about Willow; at time of writing she is our oldest female guardian dog. She is an Akbash / Great Pyrenees Cross. Six years old.

Willow has been a great learning dog for us. She is a mild LGD on predators but very good with the livestock. She often appears laid back and looks like she doesn't pay a lot of attention. But the opposite is true. She is very attentive to the happenings around her flock.

Willow was our second guard dog and in hindsight we gave her a too much attention and we find she is too people friendly and soft. She was also allowed too much interaction with our herding dogs, something we have curbed with our other guardian dogs.

Willow makes a pretty good Mother Hen though and we have seen her intercede on rough behavior with the stock from other younger dogs.

She will also set her self beside any dead ewe or lambs. Out on pasture it can be easy to miss a down animal but we often notice something is amiss because Willow is sitting still with the animal rather than coming to greet or moving with the flock.

In the first photo Willow was working as the solo LGD on our then small flock of a hundred or so ewes.

The later photo is her checking out a couple of the lambs on pasture.