Farm Fresh Blog

At some time or another most adults have stared in confusion at a child's homework. For every generation there is now a new and improved method for extracting the same answer you got when you were a kid. (And show your work, please.) Although in the classroom we must all agree to accept that there is more than one way to skin a cat, on a farm, math always stays the same. For example, 

1 Anatolian + 1 Old Pyrenees cross = 2 Livestock Guardian Dogs 

or stack it

+ 

 = 2 Livestock Guardian Dogs

Here are other equations:

1 Old Pyrenees cross + 1 Pyreness puppy = 2 Livestock Guardian Dogs

+

= 2 Livestock Guardian Dogs 

1 Anatolian + 1 Anatolian = 0 Livestock Guardian Dogs 

+ 

= Zero Livestock Guardian Dogs

 A few weeks ago a raccoon was bold enough to come into the chicken yard at a time when the dogs were under lockdown. No loose dogs to guard the farm resulted in a headless chicken and an enraged farmer. Score one for the Boogey Beast. This also resulted in more farm math. Let us set up the equation. And show our work.

10 chickens + 1 raccoon = 9 chickens

This leads to another equation:

9 chickens + 1 raccoon + 1 Anatolian = 9 chickens + 1 Anatolian + 1 dead raccoon

therefore,

1 dead chicken = 1 dead raccoon 

Are you beginning to see how this works? Let's try another one.

10 chickens + 3 guineas + 1 fox = 10 chickens + 2 guineas 

Our next equation is: 

10 chickens + 2 guineas + 1 Anatolian + 1 fox = 10 chickens + 2 guineas + 1 Anatolian + 1 dead fox

thus, 

1 dead guinea = 1 dead fox

I see you're getting the hang of it, so let's set the next one up as a word problem. 

A farmer has 20 chickens, 2 guineas and 7 dogs. If that farmer feeds and releases 17 chickens and 2 guineas to free range in the barnyard, and then takes 7 dogs for a walk, how many birds will the farmer have when she returns from a 20 minute walk? 

(The answer is actually in the form of a fraction.) 

The farmer will have 2 guineas and 16.2 chickens. 

A wing. (We will estimate that a wing is .2 percent of a chicken.)

We need to show our work, so let's set it up. 

17 chickens + 2 guineas = 19 loose birds
 
19 loose birds + 7 dogs + X 
X = Boogey Beast

subtract 7 dogs

that leaves .......   19 loose birds + BoogeyBeast X 

This results in 18 loose birds and a fraction of the 19th bird

What is missing from this equation? 

Yes, the rest of the chicken.

Who can project the next equation? 

Correct. 

The next equation is set up as follows:

18 loose birds + 1 Anatolian + 2 Pyrenees + BoogeyBeast X = ?
 

Undoubtedly this will be the result 

1 dead chicken = 1 dead Boogey Beast

It is quite clear from our mathmatics equations that at no point can free range poultry be without Livestock Guardian Dogs for even the shortest amount of time. To hijack the quote by R.J. Childerhose, "There are old Boogey Beasts and there are bold Boogey Beasts. There are no old bold Boogey Beasts."

 Click to find the Farm Fresh Forensics book!

Anyone who lives on a farm is familiar with the emotion. You have lovingly raised something. Poured your heart, your soul,
your time and your money into it. And then you stand in the barnyard and wish it dead. 

Rubber boots aren't made for running, but I still managed to kick him in the ass like a soccer ball. Roosters. I hate
them. If you only want eggs then you don't even need them. I started with seven Golden-Laced Wyandotte hens. No rooster.
Didn't want one. Didn't need one. 

Then my hens started free ranging. They soon left the barnyard area for excursions into the Land Of The Boogey Beast.
That's when I decided I needed a rooster. They do more than just procreate. Roosters are really good at watching for
predators and protecting the hens. Let me be a cautionary tale for you. Don't do this!

Because I'd been wanting to add Blue-Laced Wyandottes, this was the perfect excuse. I
got two beautiful blue roosters and eight lovely blue hens - who unfortunately were all infected with Marek's disease and
were not vacccinated. One by one I lost all but two hens to Marek's. The remaining two hens died of heat stroke last
summer, but not before I was able to save their genes. 

They had proven resistant to Marek's disease thus it was really important to me to save those genes. When the first blue
flock started falling dead of Marek's disease I had acquired two more blue roosters and two more blue hens that had been
vaccinated for Marek's. I pulled one blue rooster (Russell Crowe) and bred him to the last Marek's blue hens. The other
blue rooster (Egger Allan Poe) stayed with the new blue hens. Egger appears to be infertile but by all other counts he's
an excellent rooster (if there is such a thing) and thus he gets to stay. 

We marked and incubated the fertilized eggs last spring. None of Egger's eggs hatched.  Four of Russell's eggs hatched. We
were able to vaccinate three of the four chicks for Marek's disease. This was an unfortunate mix-up with the vaccine. Who
knew you had to use ALL the vaccine within a few hours once the vials had been mixed? Now we know. One chick was well
behind the others in hatching and didn't get his shot, thus this bird will be the experimental bird to see if the Marek's
resistent genes pulled through. It sounds good in theory. The reality is that I may put the little bastard in a stew pot
first. 

Three of the four hatched eggs turned out to be roosters. The single hen looks exactly like my favorite hen who died of heat
stroke - Margaret Thatcher, thus I have named her Maggie.

She is an angel. Her brothers are assholes. Well, not really. One
brother is okay. The ugliest one. The brother with no neck. He has a nice temperament. Beautiful plummage. But no neck.
His head kinda sprouts from his shoulders. Thus I named him No Neck. 

The other brothers are exquiste. They were exactly what I wanted to reproduce. They were so beautiful I even forgave them
for being roosters, until . . . 

Let's do some math. I started out with 7 Golden-Laced Wyandotte hens. I lost one to a predator when she left the barnyard and another got sick and died a few weeks ago. Let's ommit all the Marek's blue hens since they died. I can count the 2 new blue hens, and the one blue hen that I hatched. That's 8 hens. That's really all the chickens I wanted or needed, but then my mom ended up giving
me most of her Speckled Sussex hens - 10 more hens. One hen crawled into a spot to lay an egg and couldn't get out. She died there.
Another was killed by a raccoon. That left me 8 Speckled Sussex hens, 3 Blue-Laced Wyandotte hens, 5 Golden-Laced
Wyandotte hens and 5 Blue-Laced Wyandotte roosters. That's 4 more roosters than any sane person needs. BUT - 

My chickens do not stay together. They split themselves into four different flocks, each with its own coop and its own yard which opens into the main barnyard which they all share. (Think of it as apartment complexes which open into the same city.)

Egger Allan Poe has 2 Blue hens, and 5 Sussex hens. Russell Crowe has 5 Golden Girls. Three Sussex hens have opted to roost in a coop
by themselves with no rooster. No surprise there. And until this morning the 3 young roosters, and their sister, had a coop that they share with what guineas remain from Other Half's failed experiment with guineas. I had pulled the young hen, Maggie, out and placed her with another flock but she immediately escaped and joined her brothers again, and since I haven't noticed them harrassing her, I let her
stay. Until yesterday they didn't have real names. Now their names are: Colonel Sanders & Soup Pot.

Russell Crowe and Egger Allan Poe are excellent roosters. They take good care of their tiny flocks, but are being run
ragged by a pair of thugs bent of raping their hens. This recently came to my attention and bothered me greatly. The
little thugs lie in wait for the hens around the feeders and the coops, thus the hens cannot eat and they cannot return to
their coops without fear of being raped.

Their own roosters cannot fight off two thugs because while the rightful husband is busy chasing one
thug, the other thug is free to assault his hens. I complained to Other Half who dismissed it as the natural goings on in
a barnyard. This pissed me off further.  Other Half has not counted on a few things. 

1) This is NOT the natural order of things because in nature that many birds are not forced by food, fencing, and housing
to co-mingle in the same area. (That is what we call city life.)

2) I am the God governing this little planet that is my barnyard and if I say the behavior pisses me off, then God has
spoken and the roosters are either to be incarcerated, sold, or end up in a soup pot. 'Nuff said. 

3) The first little snot who attacks me will be beaten to death with a t-post. He might have Marek's resistant genes but
he doesn't have t-post resistant genes. 

And so this morning the sun rose on a new chicken yard - Alcatraz.

It's a 12 x 12 chain-link cell with a dog house in it. If a
raccoon gets past the Livestock Guardian Dogs and climbs inside Alcatraz then hopefully the dog will kill the raccoon on his way out. I'm not
concerned with the safety of prisoners. This pen is kinda like the goat in Jurassic Park. Actually, I did parole No Neck
since his only crime was being a rooster. No Neck was released into the custody of his sister and the guineas while the
Rapist Thugs will remain behind bars until they either go live somewhere else, get eaten by a raccoon, or end up in a stew
pot. The weather is getting colder. And I do love chicken and dumplings. 

 Click to find the Farm Fresh Forensics book!

Look at this face. 

Part Snidley Whiplash, part Eddie Haskell, this dog is Billy Bob Thornton in "Bad Santa."  An old geezer now, Cowboy is
probably a fugitive from some Old Folk's home. Scratch that, he's not a fugitive - they threw him out. With his sweet face
and lopsided grin, it's tempting to think of him as an old grandpa, but only if your granddad pees on the couch and
exposes himself. He's crude. He's crass. He doesn't even warn you with a "Pull my finger." This dog swigs whiskey with a
cigar hanging out one side of his mouth. He poops in the other dogs' toy box. If someone else is taking a leak, he sidles up and pisses on them. Cowboy is Bad Santa.

Each year we tell ourselves that this may be his last winter. Son jokes that we've said that for five years now and the
immortal foul-mouthed, cigar-smoking, drunkard is still putzing along. Seniority has its privileges - softer beds, more
unsupervised time out. Unfortunately Bad Santa has burned his bridges where that's concerned. His time must be supervised
or you'll find him outside another male dog's kennel, flashing gang signs in an attempt to start a fight through the
fence. If he's loose with a female dog he's trying to molest her. If he's by himself, he marks the recliner. 

His longstanding feud with Ranger, the Blue Heeler, seems to have settled into "Grumpy Old Men" status. One is Jack
Lemmon and the other is Walter Matthau. They despise each other but neither has the energy to do much about it now. Cowboy has
long since retired from actual cow work but still insists on sneaking into the game, hoping to die in a blaze of glory.
More than a few cows around here would happily oblige him. And if it came to pass, I'm not sure if Ranger would cheer, or
silently salute his longtime rival as a worthy adversary who had a good death in battle.

Time has not been kind to him. Years of pulling on the bars of kennels have broken his canine teeth. He had three more
teeth pulled this summer. He lives on pain meds for his bad back, courtesy of a run-in with a donkey - a poor decision
that he lives with daily now. But Bad Santa keeps plugging along. Every day that the sun comes up, Cowboy rises to meet it
like Tim Conway's shuffling old man, waiting for his rimadyl to kick in. He shuffles to the fence where he rallies forth
to charge cows or horses who push too close as they wait for their breakfast. Cowboy stays there as I do chores,
marching along the fence, a grizzled, unshaven soldier, cigar still hanging out, and hung over from the night
before. This old dog does not "go gentle into that good night." He spits a wad of tobacco in Death's eye, and keeps
moving onward. And if Death lingers too closely, that old dog may just hump his leg or pee on his robe. But in the mean
time, Cowboy sleeps in the sun and dreams of working cows and pissing in someone's coffee. 

 Click to find the Farm Fresh Forensics book!

 I measure the success of the Livestock Guardian Dogs not by the body count of dead predators, but by the body count of live
livestock. It's easy to get lulled into a sense of complacency when all your numbers add up each night. It's easy to start
thinking that Livestock Guardian Dogs aren't as necessary. It's easy to start feeling bad when the Big White Dogs leave
raccoon bodies in their wake like tourists leave litter. Or perhaps feeling that escaping Anatolians aren't worth the trouble of
juggling them daily. But then . . .

Most of the year we live in relative solitude, but Deer Season in Texas is by all measure, the shotgun start of weekends
of activity as city dwellers swarm to the country in search of peace, quiet, beer and Bambi. Because one camp of hunters
is close to our sheep pasture and another group of hunters has a deer blind close to our fence, we try to lock up the
Livestock Guardian Dogs when the hunters are down for the weekend. Just as most hunters don't appreciate a dog barking at
them when they're trying to be stealthy, people seeking peace and solitude also do not appreciate a dog the size of a
small pony wandering into the camp with a curious, "Howdy Neighbor!"

This past weekend was the last weekend of Buck Season and so hunters were down trying to get their last shot at a big
buck. Starting Wednesday night, Judge and Jury, the Anatolians, went on lock-down. They cannot be trusted not to visit the
neighbors. The Pyrenees-bred fluffy, white dogs, Briar and Bramble normally stay closer to home. Bramble will stay with
Briar but can be coaxed to join Judge in a Welcome Wagon expedition to the hunter's camp, so in an effort to nip that
foolishness in the bud, Bramble's new working partner is the tried, true, and trustworthy Briar.

Briar and Bramble are normally loose all day long. In the evening Bramble is locked in the barn with the sheep. Jury
normally is loose all night to guard the barnyard. The chickens free range all day long and return to four
separate coops at night. They are locked safely in these coops when the sun sets. After dark Briar is locked in one pen with chickens and Judge is locked in the chicken pen farthest from the house. This system works
pretty well, but hinges on the fact that one or two Livestock Guardian Dogs are loose in the barnyard at dusk when the
chickens are returning to their coops. And therein lies the problem. The chink in the armor. 

Dogs MUST be loose in the barnyard at all times. It's easy to get complacent. Easy to assume. Surely the Boogey Beast
would not be so bold as to launch an attack so close to the house. And "bold" is the word of the day. Read my lips. 

We have 12 dogs. Twelve. Two more than ten. Except at night, half of those dogs are either running loose or locked in
outside kennels in a rather large barnyard. Thursday night was The Perfect Storm. 

We decided to go out for a pizza. For two days we'd had rain and sleet, thus the outside kennels were a muddy mess. All
non-Livestock Guardian Dogs were either locked in the house or in the barn. Because the hunters were in blinds close to
the fence, we discussed whether or not to lock up Briar and Bramble. They'd been loose all day, but hunters would be more
active now, so we decided the neighborly thing to do would be to lock up the Livestock Guardian Dogs. Because the chickens
were not yet in their coop for the night, I didn't lock Judge in the chicken pen. I normally feed him in there and if
chickens are not locked in the coop they will foolishly try to steal from his bowl. So I opted to wait and lock Judge in
there when I got back. This proved to be more than a small chink in the armor. 

We returned home exactly 1 1/2 hours later and as is my habit, I immediately went to lock coops and move Livestock
Guardian Dogs. I was greeted by bloody feathers, a headless chicken, and shellshocked survivors. Rage. Rage doesn't even
begin to describe it. It's bad enough to lose a chicken, but when something just eats the head and nothing else, that adds
insult to injury. We had not interrupted the Boogey Beast's meal. The bird was stone cold. Apparently the Beast struck
shortly after we left. 

There are several guarantees in this world - death, taxes, and the return of the Boogey Beast. It is likely this
particularly Beast is a raccoon because they are quite numerous here and are notorius for beheading chickens. I stared down at my headless chicken and thought about the number of times I have stared regretfully at a raccoon carcass baking in the sun after a close encounter with a white dog the night before. I will no longer feel sorry for Rocky Raccoon who cannot outrun an Anatolian. No sympathy whatsoever. 

The life span of a chicken is from birth until its first encounter with a raccoon. The life span of a raccoon is from birth until its first encounter with a Big White Dawg. And there you have it. An hour and a half. That's the measure of your security system. It's easy to believe the dogs aren't worth the trouble when they're working and your nightly numbers add up, but how long can you go without the dogs? I cannot go even an hour and a half.  

Merry Christmas Y’all!!! 

My aging Livestock Guardian Dog, Briar, has reached the point in life where the weather is tough on her bones and she has discovered things the Border Collies already knew, primarily the couch and the wood-burning stove. Sometimes the call of the night is too much however, and when she hears the cry of coyotes, like a veteran rising from a wheelchair to salute, she wobbles up to answer the call. She walks the fence and woofs a warning while younger and meaner soldiers take the fight to the enemy. 

And then last night happened. 

The Anatolians have proven to be quite effective guard dogs when separated but are less than worthless when together because they run off. To thwart this, Judge is the Dayshift dog while Jury remains locked up and Jury is the Nightshift dog while Judge remains locked in a large chicken run to protect the coops at night. Unfortunately several days ago Jury injured his foot. He limped into the barn bleeding profusely and declared himself "injured on duty." He was then taken off the active duty roster, bandaged up, and given antibiotics and a spot beside the fire. Judge was assigned both shifts. Bramble, Briar's successor, remained at her post with the sheep. 

All was well until Day Two of Jury's confinement. The antibiotics were kicking in and his bandage acted much like a tennis shoe on his injured foot. Yesterday I let the house dogs out for a potty break and didn't notice Jury slip away. He did not come back. Apparently he found his brother and the Frat Boyz took a ski vacation. By nightfall neither had returned, thus the farm was left in the care of a Senior Citizen and a Rookie. As I gave the Border Collies a final bathroom break I heard the coyotes yowl in the distance. There was no answering Anatolian bark. Bramble was locked in the barn with the sheep and Briar was lying in a small grove of trees beside the pasture gate. I returned multiple times during the night to check for returning Anatolians. Nothing. Nada. 

This morning they had still not returned. I flung open the back door to find a frosty landscape and no Briar. Briar always comes to the back door to give me her work card. There was no Briar. Fearful that her back was out again, I searched the barnyard. No Briar. This led to a quiet panic. Was she down? Had she marched out by herself only to be killed by coyotes? Why did I leave her out alone? Why didn't I bring her inside? Lock her up? I quickly finished chores and began my search for Briar. It was a long and lonely walk. 

I took Bramble and Dillon, the Labrador. I hunted Briar. Dillon hunted rabbits. Bramble kept tabs on me. Dillon disappeared. He popped in from time to time but was otherwise useless as a companion in my search for Briar. Bramble and I  went to all Briar's favorite resting places in the pasture. Nothing. No Briar. I was beside myself with fear. Was she lying in the cold unable to get up? Had she gone down in a blaze of glory fighting coyotes? I dropped to my knees in prayer, "Dear Lord, please bring my dog safely back to me." There was no answer but a cool breeze whistling through the branches of a cedar tree. 

I went back to the house and woke up the Other Half to inform him that I was driving out in the mule to broaden my search for Briar. I last remembered her lying beside the gate. He rolled over in bed and informed me that before I went to bed, I brought Briar inside and left her asleep on the couch near the fire. Before he came to bed he put her in my office because she got too hot. Hope sprang into my heart like a flower blooming in the snow. I ripped open the office door to find a happy Briar sleeping on a sheepskin rug. She announced that she had to pee. 

I gave silent thanks for old dogs as I watched the Briar wobble out the door and into the cold. And I was reminded that Briar isn't the only one getting old. 

What a difference a pill makes!  The vet put Briar in Rimadyl. We know it’s not without risks, so we monitor her closely and only use it as needed. She is doing quite well on it.  Briar went from dragging her rear legs in pain to trotting and playing again. It was such a joy to watch her coax the Labrador into playing. I’m a firm believer in quality of life over quantity of life, and this prescription helps her to live a normal life again. I’m sure that given a vote, Briar would vote to take the risk along with her pill. 

My heart broke yesterday when my old Livestock Guardian Dog, Briar, couldn't get up to greet the day. Her back legs wouldn’t work.  She was quite calm. I cried like a baby. This was most unproductive as it upset the dog. I got her up and she wobbled around to supervise the chores. I put her in the house. She followed me back outside with a determined wobble. I cried some more. 

I see the sun setting and am not ready to lose her. She is my rock. She insisted upon walking the sheep to pasture. It was a long, slow walk and after a short time she looked up at me and announced that she’d had enough - and so we walked back together, leaving the pup with the sheep. 

On our way back to the barn the pup joined us. Bramble is not quite ready to stay alone. Briar is both her Professor McGonagall and her Professor Dumbledore. She is not ready to lose Briar either. They came back to the barnyard with me. A few minutes later the Anatolian Shepherd came back, followed shortly by the sheep. 

I wiped my tears and walked back inside. Some time later I stepped out to check on them and wasn't sure whether I wanted to smile or cry. Briar was sunbathing on a hill as Bramble sat perched at attention beside her, watching over the flock. 

My heart smiles and it breaks. 

     Those of you with a dog training (or dolphin training!) background will remember Karen Pryor's book, "Don't Shoot The Dog." In my day it was mandatory reading. It's about more than just clicker training. If you haven't read it, pick it up. That book dates me though. I've been training dogs most of my adult life and I can tell you this - fads come and go, but dogs are always the same, and they don't read the books. But you should. I started out in sport dogs, then moved to show dogs, then working dogs, and now ranch dogs. There are some rules I've learned over the years. Purely positive dog training is nice in theory and it makes everyone feel good about themselves, but it isn't always reliable. Sometimes dogs, like kids, need to understand that the hand of God will reach out and smite them when they've committed a grievous sin.

     In this blog I've always tried to share the triumphs and the tragedies because ranching is not always about babies and butterflies, sometimes it's about blood and bird feathers. The #1 reason why so many Livestock Guardian Dog breeds end up being dumped is because people don't train the puppy. And they are puppies. For the first two years that giant behemoth is a puppy. People always ask me "What is the key to raising a Livestock Guardian Dog?"

     My answer is simple. Supervision. Supervision. Supervision.

     First let us assume that you do have a Livestock Guardian Dog puppy comprised of some combination of Livestock Guardian Dog breeds. There are too many to count but here is a list of the most common: Great Pyrenees, Anatolian Shepherd, Maremma, Akbash, Kangal, Polish Tatra, Karakachan, Sarplaninac, and Tornjak. If your dog is some combination of these dogs, then you most likely have the raw material for a good Livestock Guardian Dog. If your dog has ONE of these breeds combined with some other breed, such as a Labrador, Blue Heeler, or Border Collie, then you don't have a Livestock Guardian Dog, you have a pet. And there is nothing wrong with a dog being a fine pet, just don't trust it with your livestock. Before you regale me with tales of your Border Collie/Pyrenees cross who is the smartest dog since Lassie, let me just give a word of caution. Livestock Guardian Dog breeds come from generations upon generations of breeding for one job - protecting livestock. When you monkey with that breeding by adding things such as Labradors and St Bernards into the pot, you have unwittingly added traits and behaviors that go against what a Livestock Guardian Dog is bred to do. Prepare yourself. Genetics have a way of popping up at the most inopportune moments.

     So let's go back to our assumption that you do indeed, have a Livestock Guardian Dog puppy. How do you train it?

     The one piece of bad advice which is simply the booger on the end of your finger that you just can't seem to shake off is this - put the puppy alone with the livestock and have no contact with him. Then he'll bond with the stock instead of becoming a pet.

     I really wish I could smack these people over the head with a dead chicken.

This piece of advice is the #1 reason why people trash Livestock Guardian Dogs. Quit doing it, folks. Stop it right now.

     You will end up with dead livestock and giant dog that you cannot handle.  So what do you do? You supervise the dog. Put him with the livestock but protect him from them and them from him. Kennel your puppy in a pen with your sheep. Put the dog in a separate pen so he can be with the stock but not be harmed or harm them. During the day when the flock is loose your pup may have to be locked by himself where he can see them, or you may have to leave a few sheep inside the pens beside the pup for company. When you are there to supervise, let them loose together. Do not let your pup play rough games with your livestock. Yes, he is playing. And yes, that's how he learns to kill. The game gets out of hand. Toss a bucket at his head immediately and inform him that is unacceptable behavior.  I toss a lot of buckets when I'm training puppies.

     Now let's move on to older pups. They seem dependable. They do. They do all the right things. They are submissive to the stock. They follow the stock. They seem to be buddies. This is when you are most likely to screw up. You think the pup is grown and ready for prime time.

    He is not. This is when poor decisions are made.

    For example:

Bramble got the crap beat out of her with a dead bird this week. And it was my fault.

     First off, it is never the dog's fault. You're the one with the big brain and the thumbs. If things go south, it's your fault. And so the events that unfolded were entirely my fault. Bramble (Bam-Bam) has been a model Livestock Guardian Dog puppy. She's submissive to goats and sheep, and she ignores the free range poultry. Bramble is in the point of her career where she is given more and more free time and responsibility. She has been shouldering this well - until Monday morning.

     Because I had an appointment and would be gone, I chose to lock Bramble up in a large pen with the Other Half's cow dogs because her sheep were already out to pasture and I didn't want her unattended while I was gone. I locked her up and then went inside the house to change clothes. On my way out the door, I heard Other Half yelling and using the Lord's name in vain. Apparently a free range guinea had chosen to fly INTO the dog pen with a Border Collie, a Blue Heeler, and a Pyrenees puppy. Poor life choice.

     We've accidentally locked chickens in the dog pens countless times with no tragedy. The chickens tend to walk out of dog house like little Napoleans and strut around the pen with the dogs. A guinea is a much more reactive creature. They fly against the bars like a pinball. This behavior is a surefire way to awaken the prey drive in even the most dull of dogs.

     When Other Half rounded the corner he saw his Border Collie and Bramble actively playing tug with a dead guinea. My guess is that Bramble killed the guinea and the Border Collie thought that was a fine idea and joined the fun. No matter which dog killed the guinea, both were in position of a dead bird and Bramble was having fun. Read my lips - she was not trying to save the poor bird from the Border Collie. She was having a spot of fun and it got out of hand.

     After verifying that the bird was indeed, deceased, I did the unthinkable. I beat Bramble with the dead bird. She was horrified. Truthfully it was probably not any more painful than a pillow fight, but it rocked her world. She has never been smacked with anything other than a bucket (probably more painful) and being hit with a dead bird by someone she trusted was terrifying. I hated to do it, but here's the thing - I freaking can't have her killing birds for fun. And as horrifying as the experience was for her, the poor bird was probably having no fun when she killed it either. Shouting, "No, NO, Bad Dog" wasn't enough of a correction for the crime. This was a monumental sin which required a monumental punishment. She was beaten with the dead bird and locked in a kennel by herself. As I washed my hands I realized that I would be late for my appointment and my only excuse was "I'm sorry I'm late but I had to beat my dog with a dead bird."

     When I returned, all was forgiven. Why didn't I take the dog to the pound? She had the taste of blood. She can never be trusted, can she? Horse Hockey. Bramble is a puppy. Puppies do those things. I should have locked her in a kennel that a guinea could not fly into because I know she is too young for that kind of temptation. Briar, my oldest and best Livestock Guardian Dog, was a confirmed chicken killer. She killed every one of the neighbor's chickens that walked across our barnyard. She killed them and she ate them. Briar knows that chicken tastes good.

     When we got chickens at this place I made a point to teach Briar that these chickens were part of the farm and were not to be eaten. She is now fine with free-range chickens. We have 12 dogs and 17 free-range chickens and 5 (now 4!) guineas. I use the same training method on everyone. If you make a chicken run for any reason, I scream at you and bounce a bucket off your head. This method is high effective but you actually have to be present to toss a bucket at their head. This means that if the dogs are loose with chickens you must be out there until the dogs are trained. If you can't be, either lock up the dogs or lock up the chickens. Do not get rid of the dogs.

    Too many Livestock Guardian Dogs end up trashed because no one took the time to train them properly. Trust me, it is far easier to train the first dog than it is to get another dog, keep it until it kills something and then shoot it, then get another dog, keep that one until it kills something, then get rid of that one and get another breed of Livestock Guardian Dog. If you don't change what you're doing the same thing will happen again. The cycle will continue until you give up and proclaim that Livestock Guardian Dogs don't work. Or until someone beats you over the head with a dead chicken. Don't trash your pup, train your pup.

    And when mistakes happen, it isn't the end of the world. There is nothing wrong with your dog. He just isn't ready for prime time yet. Give him time and training. It's worth the investment. Supervise your dog and your livestock. And when you can't supervise them, lock them in a safe place. My mistake was that I didn't lock Bramble in a safe place.

Wet sheep shit squishes through the cracks in my boot like wet coffee grounds pushed through a child's Play-Doh machine. No. It's wetter than that. Sloppy wet. And much more unpleasant. It's the sheep pen behind the barn. After months without so much as a hint of rain, the dried and barren pastures are finally getting some relief. Grass is awakening and springing back to life, bringing me with it. I know I've been gone too long when readers begin to send me personal emails and Facebook notes.

"Are you okay?"

Yes. Yes, I am. I'd like to say that I've been busy writing my next books. I haven't. Well, I have been writing some, but life got in the way this summer and I had to take a break. I lost my mojo. Temporarily. Not lost. Just shelved. The summer was spent driving back and forth to the doctor. Eventually, after a total hysterectomy, my oncologist declared "No cancer cells" and my life, which had become a merry-go-round in slow motion, began to unwind and spin again.

Now come the medical bills. They are delivered, not by a Harry Potter owl, but by vultures perching on the mailbox. The healthcare industry has a complex billing system, which either by accident or design, leaves the reader scratching the head in confusion.

"When did I see that doctor? Didn't we already pay that? Why did I get a bill for ABC and XYZ when I already paid ABC? Why am I getting bills from clinics on the east coast? I live in Texas."

And so it goes. Life goes on. The farm and its cast of characters is doing just fine. No, that's not true. I lost my beloved pet chickens Margaret Thatcher and her friend, Mrs. Gray in the wretched heat due to a miscommunication with a farmsitter. Everyone else on the farm survived the godawful heat and are now enduring the near-daily rains. And the mud. Other Half and I made a trip to Colorado to meet with friends and deliver some sheep. It was a nice vacation for us. A dear friend of mine from Houston farmsat for us that week. After months of no rain, it poured. She was stuck juggling sheep and ten dogs in the rain. With no cell phone coverage. I'm sure she was in hell. She endured it like a champ. A retired Crime Scene Investigator, nothing a farm could throw in her direction ruffled her feathers. After all, what's muddy dogs in the house when you've dug through brains in search of a bullet? Experiences like that shape and define you. After that, everything else is smooth sailing.

This summer has given me a greater appreciation of friends and living in a small town. There are no secrets in a town this size. That can be unnerving when you want to crawl into a cave and lick your wounds.  In a small town, people will lift the rock you're hiding under, and reach down with a helping hand to pull you back into the sunlight. They will wipe your tears, ignore the dog hair dust bunnies you couldn't clean, bring over their own Border Collie, and set up camp in your house to help you until you can help yourself. And they will bring food. Lots of food. Friends in the country will not let you starve. Think funeral food without the funeral.

Our farm has been a revolving door of houseguests recently. That brings its own stress. Ours is a rather extreme lifestyle. I understand that but always worry that guests won't until they experience it for themselves. It's like a farmyard version of Jurassic Park. We live in a barn. With the animals. The line between house and barnyard grays considerably here. I try to stress that before people visit. Dogs. Twelve dogs. Large dogs. Some are the size of small ponies. If you are afraid of dogs, don't come. These dogs are our friends and co-workers. They belong here. This is a working ranch. We need them. Some of them are retired and living on disability.  They still have a place here. (We should all have a retirement package this good.) Our door is always open to guests who understand that twelve dogs live here and the barnyard is just outside the back door. That raucous racket you hear outside the kitchen door is a group of guineas talking to my Other Half.  That rubbing noise is a sheep scratching her ass against the wall. I am not kidding when I say there is a very thin line separating the barnyard from the house. And the dogs walk back and forth over that line like square dancers in a high school gymnasium. Some people can be unnerved by that. Others think they're in Disney World.

I'm writing this straight onto the website because my Other Half accidentally deleted Microsoft Office from my laptop. I know, huh?! How the hell did he do that? (Everyone in our small town is asking the same question and he's tired of hearing it.)  So I no longer have Word, thus I cannot open my documents. When I remedy that problem I will share with you the first chapter of the new murder mystery ghost story I've been writing. Yes, I am still writing a sequel to FARM FRESH FORENSICS but this isn't it. At the moment I'm calling this novel BENEATH THE BLUE BOTTLE TREE and it's the story of a crime scene investigator who sees ghosts.

But at the moment, I still don't have Microsoft Word, it's cold and has been raining for days, I'm out of hay because it's been raining and I can't get hay, the sheep are stuck inside and are making a muddy, shitty mess of the barn, and dogs are sprawled all over the house like college students the day after a frat party. Sounds like a good time to make chili.

And for the folks who thought I fell in a well because I wasn't blogging. Here is how the other folks reached me:

Facebook personal page: Sheridan Rowe Langford

Instagram: sheridanrowelangford

Twitter: @rowe_langford

You can also check out my sheep facebook page at Red Feather Navajo Churros.

Come join us on social media. You can catch up on farm pictures there. Bramble is growing up so fast that you won't recognize her!