Conditioning a puppy to chickens

[Gallinarium]

I realize this is a controversial topic, but, oh well.
My family is getting a female German Shepherd puppy this weekend, at eight weeks old. She will be an outdoor dog. We're making her a properly sized, insulated dog house. My chickens do not currently free range, but they may start this spring, and I do often let them out to roam supervised.
The puppy will start out in the garage at first, and may be in there for several months whenever we aren't standing over her, as we realize a lot of the predators here can kill a puppy.
We recently got a cat, who is still in the garage and may or may not be in there at the same time as the puppy. If she is, we will section off the garage so she can get away from the puppy if she wishes.
So how do you all train your dog not to hunt chickens?
Obviously some of the "advice" online is unreliable, like tying a dead chicken to the collar, or beating a dog when they kill a chicken. If it sounds stupid or harmful, I'm not doing it.
A lot of the farms on our road/in our immediate areas have "guard dogs" so I've seen success before. One of my friend's family has three dogs, two Welsh springer spaniels and a Newfoundland/Maremma mix. They have free-range chickens, which the dogs are often left alone with. They don't have problems, though how you train birding dogs to leave chickens alone, I don't know.
Obviously a puppy can not be unsupervised around chickens, but I realize some methods involve starting when young.
We believe proper training is not just helpful or important, but imperative. She will be taught all of the basic commands as early as possible such as sit, stay, heel, down, leave it, and so on. (And also tricks, since tricks are fun and exercise the mind.)
Any advice is appreciated.

 

[LizzzyJo]

My opinion on outdoor dogs that aren't working dogs notwithstanding, here is how I trained my dog to be a chicken guardian:

She is a german shepherd/border collie cross. 65lbs. For the first few months when the chickens were free ranging we would walk her near them on a leash and if she 'went for them' we would pull her back and say NO. Then we would hold her gently down and let the chickens get near her and jump on her and not let her up and talk to her calmly about being good and staying down. Every time she would even look at one cockeyed I would yell and pull the leash. When she oriented away from the chickens and toward me I would give her a treat.

Treat when she ignored them, "no" when she looked at them. Positive reinforcement, positive punishment combination.

It took me 3 months to train her. She was an adult at the time. She turns 10 next month.

I hope this helps! Good luck!

 

[cassie]

First of all, never leave the dog and the chickens together unsupervised until you know the dog is trustworthy. Have the dog on a leash when you introduce it to the chickens and correct any overt interest. On the plus side with a German Shepherd is the fact that they want to please. On the negative side they have a substantial prey drive. Whenever I have had trouble with a dog killing my poultry or livestock, the usual culprit was a German Shepherd followed closely by a Malamute or a Husky. Chickens and rabbits really bring out the prey drive in dogs.

Since you have neighbors who have been successful training their dogs to ignore the chickens, if I were you I would ask them how they did it.

I am sorry to hear you intend to keep the dog outside. German Shepherds get really attached to their people and want to be close to them.

 

[RiverOtter]

I have a GSD. I trained her the same way I train all my dogs. They spend the first year on a leash attached to me, indoors and out. Then they spend the rest of their lives tuned to me like a radio.

Be very careful making a GSD an outdoor dog. Some breeds do ok with it, some ... not so much. If you do not spend hours and hours outside, with the dog, working WITH her, giving her a job, she may get aggressive and a bit feral. Lots and lots of dog owners think since Fido is on the porch when they leave in the morning and before they go to bed, that their little angel stays home. Their neighbors tell a different story. Sometimes with bullets.

 

[Gallinarium]

I have a GSD. I trained her the same way I train all my dogs. They spend the first year on a leash attached to me, indoors and out. Then they spend the rest of their lives tuned to me like a radio.

Be very careful making a GSD an outdoor dog. Some breeds do ok with it, some ... not so much. If you do not spend hours and hours outside, with the dog, working WITH her, giving her a job, she may get aggressive and a bit feral. Lots and lots of dog owners think since Fido is on the porch when they leave in the morning and before they go to bed, that their little angel stays home. Their neighbors tell a different story. Sometimes with bullets.

Yes, we've already decided that if she refuses to be trained to stay home we'll install an electric fence.
Just to make things clear, having her outdoors is not my choice. I hate the idea, but a certain member of the family loathes the idea of an indoor dog, so it's that or no dog.
Also, none of my neighbors are the most talkative, so I can't really ask them how they trained their dogs to be safe around chickens, so any other advice is appreciated.

 

[RiverOtter]

I didn't mean to come off as judgey, and I will help all I can. It's just a really legitimate concern. My GSD spends Feb through March either in or attached to me, because it's coyote hunting season and if she steps even to where someone can see her on my land, they may shoot first and think later - and she's really, really well trained. Like, stop dead 100 yards from me at a whistle when deer take off running kind of trained. But I know the time that took, and I know that GSD have strong prey drive and can be bad with strangers.
Also, I tragically had to shoot a dog once. I had told it's owner that the dog (a Great Pyrenees) came over and I'd had to run it off, but the dog was there when they checked, so they didn't believe me. One day, he lifted his bloody face out of my goat and growled at me, I had to show them both bodies, I still have nightmares 11 years later.

I don't want that to happen to you, to your dog, to anyone, so I may sound sharp, but I really do want to help.

So, spend every moment you can with the pup. Keep them on a leash - the easiest way is to run their collar through the handle of a leash, and buckle the collar on. Now it's all one piece, and you can clip the end of the leash to the belt-loop of your jeans. Hands free! So long as Pup is attached to you, you can avoid all trouble.
Teach "Leave it". Leave It means "take your attention off X and look at ME" You say "Leave it!" then jog 3 steps back and hold a treat or toy between your eyes. When Pup looks up at your face, Good dog!! and instantly give the treat/bounce the toy to her. Pup is attached to you, so when you jog back, Pup has no choice but to leave whatever fascinating thing and come towards you. Jog, because a) pups love to chase and b) the faster you go, the faster they respond. If you say Down, and then wait 3 seconds to reward/correct, it will always and always and always take 3 seconds for Pup to respond. If you say Down and then INSTANTLY move them to a down, one day you'll have a dog who drops like they've been shot when you say it.
Teach "Drop it". Drop It means "spit it out and look at me". You do this 90% by the Something Better Game.
Know what Pup likes. If she has a sock, you have a squeaker toy. If she has a squeaker toy, you have cheese. If she has cheese, you have bacon. You aren't going to wait for her to find a sock, you are going to set it up. Play with X. She'll want X. Let her play with it for a second, then say Drop it!, and shove Y in her face oooh, look how great and then if she doesn't instantly swap, pry her jaws open (this is the other 10%) and immediately give her something better. At least once you'll have to grab her (and it's easy when she's attached to you!) pry her maw open and retrieve something half-way swallowed. That's ok. That's how she knows you mean it and she can't just hold out for a better bribe.

See if you can compromise for at least some of the training phase by keeping her attached to you (even indoors) for part of the day, so long as she eats and sleeps in the garage and is crated there when she's not attached to you. And please, do make sure she is in a crate or run and can't get to any of the lovely tempting to chew tools and toxins in the garage.

 

[RiverOtter]

A note about electric fences. If you mean an actual fence, ok. My GSD hit an electric fence exactly once and now won't go within 3 feet of a wire unless I hold it and call her, and even then she looks me in the eye and goes Really? Are you sure? Can we go around? before crossing.

If you mean the kind where the dog has a collar - don't. Just don't. for so many, many reasons. To list a few;
Other dogs can come in and harass/impregnate her.
If she is chasing something, and is running fast, she'll run right through and be on the other side before she gets shocked. Then, it keeps her out.
Troglodites may tease, harass, or even (god forbid) "do you a favor" and do something to the "loose dog"
Some dogs learn to just take the hit, for the reward of running loose. I had a beagle who would yelp in anticipation of the shock as he ran towards it, but he still did it (I had told my ex that e-fences were crap, he had to learn the hard way)
Your "loose" dog will get the blame for all neighborhood damage.

The only way that they're good is to keep a dog who dig under or climbs over fences away from the physical fence itself (how we contained said beagle once I got my fence)

 

[MountainWoman73]

My girl is a very good guardian -- barks at hawks and bobcats, and I've seen her pin the neighbor dog on his back just because he ran by and the chickens got startled. She's a herding mix, and I've also spent a fair amount of time working with her.

When my dog was 11 months old she killed my parents' banty rooster (maybe by accident? All I know is his body was found in a pile of her chew toys). That day I spent a good hour or so playing jekyll and hyde. I would show her a stuffed animal toy, play tug with it, talk to her in a cheerful voice, everything happy happy happy.... and then I'd hold out the dead rooster and see if she wanted to sniff it. As soon as she came close and opened her mouth, I went CRAZY, yelling NO! in my meanest deepest voice as loud as I could. It didn't take long before she was terrified of that dead rooster. Wouldn't even look at it.

When we got our own chicks, I let her see them right away and talked to her in a soothing voice about how good and gentle she was. They were always supervised together, and if the chicks got upset (for ANY reason, even if it wasn't her fault at all) she got a hard NO. Eventually we could put them on her back and balance them on top of her head, telling her what a GOOD dog she was the whole time. If they fell off or got upset at all, she got a NO!, so she learned to stay really still and move really slowly. As they grew, she got used to them being around and accepted them as hers.

Some dogs have better dispositions than others for protecting livestock, but all of them need training. Puppies can be tough because they're rambunctious and don't have much impulse control. I hope it all goes well for you!

 

[Gallinarium]

I didn't mean to come off as judgey, and I will help all I can. It's just a really legitimate concern. My GSD spends Feb through March either in or attached to me, because it's coyote hunting season and if she steps even to where someone can see her on my land, they may shoot first and think later - and she's really, really well trained. Like, stop dead 100 yards from me at a whistle when deer take off running kind of trained. But I know the time that took, and I know that GSD have strong prey drive and can be bad with strangers.
Also, I tragically had to shoot a dog once. I had told it's owner that the dog (a Great Pyrenees) came over and I'd had to run it off, but the dog was there when they checked, so they didn't believe me. One day, he lifted his bloody face out of my goat and growled at me, I had to show them both bodies, I still have nightmares 11 years later.

I don't want that to happen to you, to your dog, to anyone, so I may sound sharp, but I really do want to help.

So, spend every moment you can with the pup. Keep them on a leash - the easiest way is to run their collar through the handle of a leash, and buckle the collar on. Now it's all one piece, and you can clip the end of the leash to the belt-loop of your jeans. Hands free! So long as Pup is attached to you, you can avoid all trouble.
Teach "Leave it". Leave It means "take your attention off X and look at ME" You say "Leave it!" then jog 3 steps back and hold a treat or toy between your eyes. When Pup looks up at your face, Good dog!! and instantly give the treat/bounce the toy to her. Pup is attached to you, so when you jog back, Pup has no choice but to leave whatever fascinating thing and come towards you. Jog, because a) pups love to chase and b) the faster you go, the faster they respond. If you say Down, and then wait 3 seconds to reward/correct, it will always and always and always take 3 seconds for Pup to respond. If you say Down and then INSTANTLY move them to a down, one day you'll have a dog who drops like they've been shot when you say it.
Teach "Drop it". Drop It means "spit it out and look at me". You do this 90% by the Something Better Game.
Know what Pup likes. If she has a sock, you have a squeaker toy. If she has a squeaker toy, you have cheese. If she has cheese, you have bacon. You aren't going to wait for her to find a sock, you are going to set it up. Play with X. She'll want X. Let her play with it for a second, then say Drop it!, and shove Y in her face oooh, look how great and then if she doesn't instantly swap, pry her jaws open (this is the other 10%) and immediately give her something better. At least once you'll have to grab her (and it's easy when she's attached to you!) pry her maw open and retrieve something half-way swallowed. That's ok. That's how she knows you mean it and she can't just hold out for a better bribe.

See if you can compromise for at least some of the training phase by keeping her attached to you (even indoors) for part of the day, so long as she eats and sleeps in the garage and is crated there when she's not attached to you. And please, do make sure she is in a crate or run and can't get to any of the lovely tempting to chew tools and toxins in the garage.

Thanks for the advice.
I have the ASPCA guide to dogs, and that talks about the switch-out-for-something-better method, though it has a different idea on "leave it". I'll have to try your way, though.
We live in the country, so the houses are slightly farther in between than normal. We still somehow have neighborhood dogs over here. This pair of ankle-biters trots up our driveway every so often, and once we came back from yard work to find our neighbor's yellow Lab chasing an inch behind our oldest hen. Thankfully there were no casualties that day. I'm going to keep her on our land any way possible.
We do have a lot of coyotes here, which is one reason we need to keep her in the garage for a while, but none of my neighbors hunt them. Still, better safe then sorry.

A note about electric fences. If you mean an actual fence, ok. My GSD hit an electric fence exactly once and now won't go within 3 feet of a wire unless I hold it and call her, and even then she looks me in the eye and goes Really? Are you sure? Can we go around? before crossing.

If you mean the kind where the dog has a collar - don't. Just don't. for so many, many reasons. To list a few;
Other dogs can come in and harass/impregnate her.
If she is chasing something, and is running fast, she'll run right through and be on the other side before she gets shocked. Then, it keeps her out.
Troglodites may tease, harass, or even (god forbid) "do you a favor" and do something to the "loose dog"
Some dogs learn to just take the hit, for the reward of running loose. I had a beagle who would yelp in anticipation of the shock as he ran towards it, but he still did it (I had told my ex that e-fences were crap, he had to learn the hard way)
Your "loose" dog will get the blame for all neighborhood damage.

The only way that they're good is to keep a dog who dig under or climbs over fences away from the physical fence itself (how we contained said beagle once I got my fence)

The breeders recommended electric fences, so that's where I got that idea...
I mean the "invisible" kind. We live on forty acres, so it would be even more difficult/expensive to construct a large enough fence around it to keep in a GSD. Still though, those points are something to consider. Do you have an alternate suggestion?

My girl is a very good guardian -- barks at hawks and bobcats, and I've seen her pin the neighbor dog on his back just because he ran by and the chickens got startled. She's a herding mix, and I've also spent a fair amount of time working with her.

When my dog was 11 months old she killed my parents' banty rooster (maybe by accident? All I know is his body was found in a pile of her chew toys). That day I spent a good hour or so playing jekyll and hyde. I would show her a stuffed animal toy, play tug with it, talk to her in a cheerful voice, everything happy happy happy.... and then I'd hold out the dead rooster and see if she wanted to sniff it. As soon as she came close and opened her mouth, I went CRAZY, yelling NO! in my meanest deepest voice as loud as I could. It didn't take long before she was terrified of that dead rooster. Wouldn't even look at it.

When we got our own chicks, I let her see them right away and talked to her in a soothing voice about how good and gentle she was. They were always supervised together, and if the chicks got upset (for ANY reason, even if it wasn't her fault at all) she got a hard NO. Eventually we could put them on her back and balance them on top of her head, telling her what a GOOD dog she was the whole time. If they fell off or got upset at all, she got a NO!, so she learned to stay really still and move really slowly. As they grew, she got used to them being around and accepted them as hers.

Some dogs have better dispositions than others for protecting livestock, but all of them need training. Puppies can be tough because they're rambunctious and don't have much impulse control. I hope it all goes well for you!

Thanks, this is helpful. Also, beautiful pupper!

 

[RiverOtter]

The breeders recommended electric fences, so that's where I got that idea...
I mean the "invisible" kind. We live on forty acres, so it would be even more difficult/expensive to construct a large enough fence around it to keep in a GSD. Still though, those points are something to consider. Do you have an alternate suggestion?

I live on 415 acres. My dogs (I have 3, and have had as many as 7) have chased a coyote across my land, across a neighbor's land (200 acres) and past another neighbor's house (80+) acres. Happily, where I live now, folks love dogs and appreciate ones that chase coyotes (and not livestock, my dogs are trained hard on that), but don't underestimate a dog's ability to roam! My guys were home in an hour - it takes them no time at all.

My recommendation is to fence a small yard right off the house for dogs and kids to play unsupervised to their merry heart's content, and keep an eye on them the rest of the time. PITA, I know. Both dogs and kids are, but worth it, imo.
While we're speaking of fence, cattle panels are one of the greatest inventions of mankind. And an electric livestock fence is always a good idea. But invisible fences ... I like my dogs, so that's a hard no from me. Worse than useless, for the reasons I mentioned and then some.

GSDs boundary train well. Daily, walk the boundary of where the dog is allowed. If Pup steps one paw out of the border, pop the leash, jump back and make a show of walking back and forth on the "ok" side of that line. One fine day, a couple of years from now, your dog will happily patrol that route religiously. My dogs know that they can break patrol for coyote, fox or weasel and run them to ground, but NOT for bear, porcupine or deer, and if the neighbor's cows are there, to just go check somewhere else and never, ever run through the herd. Although if there is a newborn calf, Sunni, the GSD, will then stand guard over the herd till I come relieve her.

So it can be done, but it takes YEARS of training, working with them, creating a routine. And it's a bit easier for me because dogs train dogs - I still see the fruits of the endless hours I spent with Thunder, my first dog. So DO take the time! Like me, you may still be reaping the rewards 20+ years later.