Now that Newport goat farmer Kaili Wardwell has livestock guardian dogs to protect her dairy herd, she’s comfortable letting them forage in the woods on her farm for the first time. By eating trees and shrubs in summer, they get good, free nutrition that’s more reliable than hay.
Wardwell, of Abraham’s Goat Farm and Dairy, is one of a growing number of small farmers and homesteaders in Maine who are putting these large, highly intelligent dogs to work.
Guardian dogs do a combination of jobs no person, piece of equipment or other animal can: keep watch over livestock, make independent decisions, fight off predators and even defend against people.
But the qualities that make them so good at their jobs also mean they’re not simple to raise, and more are ending up in rescues as unprepared homesteaders seek the sense of security the dogs provide and ultimately can’t handle them.
“People need to realize the difference between wanting and needing a dog,” said Robin Wilkey, who runs a small Western Maine rescue for Great Pyrenees, a popular guardian breed.
In many cases, she said, homesteaders just need a better fence. Either way, they should know their property’s “predator load,” or the real level of risk to livestock. But the dogs have become a common recommendation on social media groups where homesteaders seek advice.
Nearly a dozen Mainers have asked to surrender dogs to her this year. Wilkey thinks this may be a result of the pandemic homesteading boom that led some people to jump into farming and livestock. Maine rescues that accept farm animals have said they’re seeing a post-pandemic increase in surrendered livestock too, often from people who weren’t prepared.
These dogs really can make a difference on a farm. Researchers have found guardian dogs bring lamb survival numbers up from 20 percent to nearly 100 percent on sheep and goat ranches in western states.
Predators start to avoid areas where the dogs live, and if they do approach, they’ll be met with barking and a physical confrontation.
Great Pyrenees gained popularity in the United States in the late 1970s as this research began, joined by other guardian breeds such as Anatolian Shepherds, Maremmas and more from Europe and the Middle East. Most can weigh more than 100 pounds and stand close to 3 feet in height.
Although they have great livestock skills, they also often bark, like to wander, are stubborn and can be aggressively protective. These are some of the behaviors that lead people to surrender them to shelters.
As the dogs became more popular, rescues dedicated to specific breeds, particularly the Great Pyrenees, opened around the country.
A working dog in Maine needs a unique set of qualities, according to Tarma Shena, a breeder and trainer of Turkish Shepherds in Greenfield. Here, the majority of guardian dogs are on small farms and homesteads instead of huge isolated ranches, meaning they have to be skilled at both protecting animals and interacting safely with people.
Shena first looked for a farm dog after a fox killed half of her poultry flock. She tightened up coop security, but the fox returned and killed the rest. Searching for a working mutt like the kind she’d grown up with, Shena found they didn’t really exist anymore.
Instead, she brought home her first livestock guardian dog in 2009. But the obedience training skills she had developed with other dogs didn’t work with this one. Because guardian dogs are so intelligent, they need good motivation to do something.
She learned to listen to the dog and built a relationship with it, leading her to create an online training platform to teach what she calls the Farei Method. It typically has between 2,000 to 5,000 subscribers at a time, and as both a breeder and a trainer she’s seen interest increasing. She urges people to do their research and not commit unless they’re completely sure it’s the right thing for them.
“It’s been a progression of events over the last five years,” she said of growing local interest in guardian dogs. “All of a sudden, it doesn’t matter if you’ve got a quarter of an acre … it’s the solution for everything.”
No matter what, the dogs need training to know what they should protect and how to do it, which can take years. Mentorship also helps a human trainer, and the skills don’t come naturally when dogs meet livestock, like some people think.
If they’re doing something against their training, it’s likely for good reason, according to Shena. Recently, she found one of her 11 guardian dogs outside his fence — and wildcat tracks around it.
Over time, owners say training pays off into a meaningful partnership.
Wardwell, the goat farmer, has had some powerful moments working with her guardian dogs. She got one, Chile, from Shena in 2020 after continued coyote scares on her farm. The next year she added Hank. Now their farm has no predator problems.
“At first you speak two languages, then you speak one,” Wardwell said. “What’s important to a shepherd is important to them. They really can feel what you’re feeling.”
Shena’s own dogs protect her farm from predators, but they also bring her peace of mind about her family’s safety after a recent crime on her road. Wardwell said one of her neighbors had goats killed by a loose husky, but when another got loose, Chile and Hank kept it out of her yard.
“With the proper training and genetics, they can be amazing dogs,” she said.
