I read quite a few pet forums but very rarely do I join but I see that you are worried about your Great Pyr and maybe I can help a little. I have a Male Great Pyr that is now about 120 pounds. We bought him when he was 3 months old. At the time we had a sheep and a lamb. Well when I put him in with the two of them he nipped the lamb's leg so bad one night that I thought I would loose the lamb. Fortunately with a lot of medication, bandages, loving etc. the sheep is now four years old and pregnant with her fourth lambing. We now breed Barbados and St. Croix sheep and have three Pygmy goats. Also have acquired an Australian Shepard. That is the background now for the "helpful" facts. The Great Pyr is strictly a guard dog and is used as such the Aussie is the herder. Since our first experience with the nipping, when we have a new lamb, which in fact we have two now, I leave them in a "maternity" ward and when they are about a week old I put the two dogs and the sheep and lambs together in a smaller pasture and supervise for about an hour and than put everybody back into separate areas. I do this for about a month and increase the time. As of right now, knock on wood, I have never had that experience from the Great Pyr again. The Aussie did the same thing when she was new, acquired her from a rescue when she was three months also and she picked on the smallest ones. The dogs will nip at their legs and/or ears to show them that they are Alpha. The Aussie was far more aggressive than the Pry. So I separated the lambs at the time from the Aussie and repeated that process with her. And continue this process when we have either new lambs and/or goats.
The Aussie was the easiest dog I have ever had to train, now the Great Pyr, who is a gentle giant, will NOT, I repeat will NOT listen when he is intent on something else. Naturally we have a fenced in pasture which he continuously climbed out of, finally had to resort to an electric fence top and bottom. He is wonderful on a lead, but you cannot trust them to run free they will take off and come home when THEY are ready. They are forever teenagers and will do what they want. Although as far as a guard dog I cannot say enough for his ability to protect. He is very close to me and "tolerates" my husband. Another example of their guarding the other day we had more hay delivered and I was in the barn while they were taking it off the truck and the Great Pyr was in the big pen that leads out to the pasture and he was fine just watching, well I went to the chicken quarters to feed the chicks and ducks and the Pry pitched a barking fit at both my husband and the hay man, but the minute I returned he settled down. As long as I am around him he is fine but if somebody happens to walk down to one of the barns and I am not there he will get as close as he can to the pasture fence line and scare the holy heck out of that person.
Also when we got the Aussie she had no problem with the Great Pyr, even though she was about as big as his head at the time. They are glued together now and the size difference is amazing, the Aussie just walks right under the Pyr.
I am not an expert and don't claim to be all I can give you is my experience the past four years with my dog and his habits.
I am having a problem posting this so either you will get 12 posts from me or just this one, an old lady shouldn't be up this late......
OK I must apoligize for my "welcome", Just a little leary of newbies around here sometimes. Something that is hard to explain and would take forever to explain. Again I am sorry, I jumped the gun.
Wow, that is sounding like perfect advice. I am so glad Barnes has someone to relate to here with the pyrs doing their jobs.
Thats sounds like the right thing to do. Perhaps later on as the dog matures he will be less apt to man handle the babys.
I've seen certain dogs at dog parks zone in on the very smallest dogs and pester the living daylights out of that dog so much that the owners either up and leave, stand there holding their scared dog, or yell at the offending dog owner. Hoping they will leave.
Jaw, thanks so much for posting! What you said makes perfect sense. I tried things the way you said today......introducing them for a small amount of time.....and things went great. She didn't try to attack the goat at all. I'm gonna keep this up and see how things go.
