Workin' the night shift...

No not me, silly. Our pyrennees, Peaches. Every evening about dark we corral the sheep and feed them. Then we set Peaches free to roam the pasture for the night. She stays up all night on guard for any danger to her sheep. I know she's awake and on guard because she barks at anyone who steps out the door to let you know not to mess with her sheep.

Promptly at seven in the morning, Peaches goes to her doghouse and crawls inside for some much needed rest. That is where we find her when we bring her food, latch her cable and let the sheep out for the day.

We'd love to let Peaches roam during the day too, but she's still such a puppy. She forgets when you weigh 85 pounds you can't play puppy games with baby lambs. So this is our compromise.

In the afternoon, Peaches holds court with her wooly charges. She is definitely the warrior queen of her domain.

The perils of Peaches

Welll, putting the tire on Peaches' cable didn't work. She kept crawling under the fence. Only now when she crawled under she got stuck in the woods and barked until someone came and rescued her.

So after the umpteenth call from the neighbors we decided she needed to spend a few days in dog "jail" - the 6ft tall chain link kennel.

The first night she used the dog house to jump out. She was waiting for us in the morning. We moved the dog house well away from the fence.

We never dreamed that a 62 pound, 11 month old bundle of fur would climb a 6 foot fence, but some time during the night she did just that. Unfortunately, she didn't make it all the way over.

We found her in the morning hanging upside down with both back paws stuck. It took me lifting her and Brian prying the panels apart to get her free. Her right hind leg was covered in blood and obviously broken.

Peaches never cried when I carried her to the car. In fact, she only wimpered once at the vets. Not when he realigned the bones, not when he set the leg in a splint... she cried when he gave her an antibiotic shot.

Now Peaches is confined to the garage. The vet says if we don't lose circulation to the paw and the cut doesn't get infected she should mend. We'll go back on Wednesday to see.  In the mean time, every morning I mix up a bowl of milk and an egg then crush a calcium pill into it. Peaches thinks this is a great treat. I hope it helps her heal.

bad habit

Peaches has discovered that if she crawls on her belly she can just fit under the south fence. Then she goes over to the neighbors for a little visit. The one neighbor has 2 dogs in a kennel. She goes over to see them then stays to see if the people will come out and pet her. We've hauled her home and patched her excape holes so many times I've stopped counting.

Yesterday we got a call from our other neighbor on the same fence line. Peaches was in his yard. We jumped in the truck and went after our wayward girl.

She new she was in trouble when we got out of the truck. I called her and she crawled over to me on her belly. Brian had to help me lift her into the truck. She's gotten really heavy.

Back at the house we moved her dog house and food closer to the yard, but still in the field. Then we took the advice of other Pyrennees owners and cabled a car tire to her collar. She's so big she can drag it all around the field. We've even seen her flip the tire up and push her head through it. Then she walks around with a tire necklace.

The tire hasn't stopped her attempts to go under the fence yet but it has made it harder to get under the fence and impossible to negotiate the woods on the other side of the fence. Brian has had to go stuff her under the fence back into the pasture several times. We're hoping that by keeping her from the neighbors houses she will learn that there is no reward to going under the fence.

We'll see.

Peaches the Pyrenees

In the last six months, Peaches has gone from a ball of white fluff to a beautiful dog who knows her job - mostly. Sometimes Peaches forgets that guarding the animals is her job. She's still a puppy and she wants to play!

Yesterday I looked out the window and caught her chasing the sheep. I watched a minute to see what she was really up to. She would start to run then the sheep would start to run. Before it all got out of hand I opened the window and yelled "Peaches, NO!"

She sat right down where she stopped and looked at me as if to say: AWWW Mom! I was just playing. I wasn't hurting anybody.

I just looked at her and shook my head. I truly believe she wasn't trying to hurt the sheep, but she's getting really big. When she was littler she stayed with the hens and when she was bored she would hold one of the hens down just to here her squawk. She never hurt them. Once they squawked she would let them up. That's why we moved her over with the cows and sheep until she matures a bit. Still it's better to nip that behaviour before it gets out of hand. In the spring there will be tiny lambs and we can't have Peaches getting everybody all upset.

Lately, Mom says she hears Peaches barking at night. If you listen you can hear her go to the 4 corners of the pasture and bark into the night. I told her that is good. Peaches is letting all the night time bad boys know she is on the job and her bite is as big as her bark!

Great Pyrenees tend to patrol at night and sleep during the day. Peaches' favorite sleeping place is with the calves in a hay pile left over from one of the round bales. That is where I find her stretched out with the steers sound asleep when I go out to feed in the morning. She wakes up when the steers get up. Looks around sleepily, then ambles over to get a pet.