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Date Posted: 14:06:05 05/12/09 Tue
Author: Sara R
Subject: Re: that should read
In reply to: Wil 's message, "Re: that should read" on 07:34:37 05/12/09 Tue

Okay first off we need to discuss here what the dog's job is... Personal experience with LARGE chunks of land (more than 5 sections--look it up) that house livestock as well as wheat or what have you.

If I have a dog that's supposed to be my "property" guardian that means the valueable stuff...land sure that's valueable but seriously there's not a huge risk of someone stealing "land"... So by property I'm going to say that means my outbuildings and home (which would likely sit on 15-25acres, possibly even 40... even my Boel with too short a nose could easily handle that kind of property to patrol at a good click even... In fact that's really small potatoes if you want to talk about endurance you see in an LGD like a Pyr...

The LGD is bred to watch over the livestock...depending on size you've got a dog meant to patrol likely over some 30miles or so...usually more than one dog at a time... Even at that type of work LGD's are not known for their ability to "RUN" the long haul at a good click...if anyone has seen a herd of cows or sheep generally they're eating...all day...and sleeping...while they cover lots of ground it's not a race by any means and a good LGD lays around keeping an eye out and when needed will take on the bad guy... Even this type of work doesn't require the kind of abilities you're talking about Jordan...or Will...either of you.

NOW comes the drover type dog...those dogs have more stamina than a plain old general LGD but still it's not a race...droving is just slowly pushing animals from behind...that's it...I've been on plenty of "cattle drives" and let me tell ya...stamina at the walk is pretty much all you need-- as a sidenote, on one paticular ride halfway through (8 hours in) the kid with the prized roping horse was leading his mare because she was TIRED...poor gal hadn't been outside of a training arena.

LAST but definately not least is your hearding dog...these guys not only push from behind but they're also keeping everybody together...on a few of our trips moving cattle there were dogs, little McNabs (look it up) and talk about serious agility and stamina...those little suckers were EVERYWHERE at once and no doubt in my mind they ran at LEAST 30 miles at a good clip with lots of direction changes etc... in a day and none were worse for wear...

That's what jobs one sees on a working ranch and aside from a good shepherd (dutch etc...) you can't have one dog doing them all...for one a dog can't be in more than one place at a time...

Oh yeah and what did a Boerboel do???? As far as livestock is concerned from what I understand they're job regarding the livestock in SA was about the doctoring...basically their job was keeping the ranchers safe while they were doctoring the livestock...again...we're not talking about any marathon running even if you're doctoring a whole herd of babies...I spent a day or so doing that as well back in Idaho and running back and forth keeping the cows at bay whlie they're babies were getting branded and whatnot was probably in total a 20mile run for the day...MAYBE...and at that it was probably more a trott than anything...so...as far as stamina goes...the BB doesn't NEEED to be some kind of marathon runner even to do the job of property guardian...it just doesn't.

Jordan...seems to me the problem here is in the real understanding of rural living and what needs the dogs meet in that environment...Wil seems to be confused as well... What you want to see Jordan is overkill for the purppose of the breed originally...your AD test actually does a pretty good job of it and you'd get more kudos in having completed it had you NOT critized the test in the same post.

just a thought...glad you've got at title on a dog of yours though.

Sara

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