Donkeys for Guarding Livestock?
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 30 เม.ย. 2020
- I've tried using a donkey to guard my sheep and goats against predators for a couple years now. My success has been very limited. They seem to work in smaller pastures with sheep better than goats. Sheep keep their lambs close to them and back in the herd very quickly after birth. Goats seem to hide theirs out all over the pasture for several days after birth. When kidding on 80 acres you may find a kid goat a quarter-mile away from the goat herd and its the mother, who is grazing with the herd.
Livestock guardian dogs will know that kid is there and smell or sense predators in the area or just lay beside that kid at times. I've never seen a donkey do that.
Some people say that not all coyotes kill and that is probably true, but if you've had sheep or goats for a while you will attract predators and over time one will learn to chase for fun and then kill and then eat it. They will teach others and you will soon be losing many animals without some form of protection.
What experience have you had using a Donkey or Llama when pasture kidding?
The donkeys is good to give special voice as crying when they see a danger from hyenas attack of goats, so the owner can give attention and protect the goats. I was witnessed one night in the city of Raaso in the Somalian region of Ethiopia in 2012.
The donkey has to voices normal one and the voice as crying to give people tention of the danger, so people can react.
Afaik the donkey needs to be bonded with the sheep as early as possible. You can probably try bonding a donkey to 1 sheep for a start.
I thought about trying a donkey, but went with dogs instead. My neighbor's got a extra small one that used to guard sheep on her last farm that is 46 years old.
Is moving the Donkey with their own herd of Goats possible?
Donkey is the way to go but you don't keep them with animals in the same fence you have to have electric fence inside electric fence and the donkey sty out to guard the land side of the land and dogs guard the inside.
What size of paddock were these goats and donkey on?
Or moving the Donkey into a new pasture instead of moving new Goats to his established territory?
To take a new group to a donkey we have found we have to bring the donkey home and put him in a pen with his new herd for a few days and then take them all out to their pasture together. This seems to work best for us but I am sure all donkeys are not the same.
Maybe with donkeys it's just luck of the draw. Some will be hyper vigilant always keeping lookout; others will be laid back looking for good grass and not paying close attention to everything going on.
Sounds like a democrat donkey
I have a jenny that is a decent deterrent of dogs. That being said donkey is better than nothing thats about the best thing i can say about them. Just caught a glimpse of an xr650l back there. Ive had a few of those my friend. 😆
Need more than one donkey
Have you ever tried running more than one donkey on a pasture at the same time and would they do better protection working together?
Yea, I had two in a pasture and they just hung out together and didn't stay with the goats. Think it was worse than one.
You should only use female donkeys. Male donkeys can kill offspring but female won't. And as far as I know they also need to be trained to do this. How to do it I don't know but perhaps you can figure out a way. Try having the donkey as early in life as possible, so it's used to be with goats and sheep's from a young age. They say one donkey is enough for 200 sheep's. I will add the link to the video where I learned this.
th-cam.com/video/3lFG1ps3wak/w-d-xo.html
I only have females. You must bond them with the livestock, which I did but they were not aggressive enough to keep predators or feral dogs away. I guess some work and some don't.
I have lost 6 lamb the guard donkeys didn't work. One donkey even tried to kill one of my lambs
Yes, I'm finding out the same thing.
Use llama?
I wouldn't mind trying one.
I saw a video yesterday of a donkey carrying a sheep by the back . I am pretty sure that donkey isn't a good guardian ! Maybe they do better with cattle. Around here I see them with cattle, not sheep or goats.