I
moved to a small farm at the end of 1990, in the foot hils to the border ranges in far northern NSW, Australia, and was immediately
notified by the local Rural Lands Noxious Animal Vet, that I was in the
middle of a high predation area, and our Toggenburg Dairy Goats were at
great risk. Neighbours had lost hundreds of goats, sheep, calves and even
young bullocks. The biggest threat I face are packs of domestic dogs let
wild, that were breeding from Rottweillers, German Shepherds, Bull Terriers
and the like. They are formidable, and cunning. They soon learn to avoid
baits and traps, and roam a territory of hundreds of miles up and down
the Border Ranges. I was locking the goats into a secure shed at night,
but the threat of a day time attack was just as real.
I
began to research my options and chose the maremma sheepdog.
Living on that small farm for 18 years I never lost a single goat to predators - a true testimony to the incredible guarding ability of these noble dogs.
I had up to 3 maremmas living with my livestock at any one time, and usually had 1 or 2 living around the home area where I lived with my children and assorted cats and chickens.
It was so difficult to find information back in the 90's and so this web site was born as I tried to organise what information I could gather and get my own experiences documented in order to help others.
Since the launch of this site in the late 90's it has gone through several revisions and I have gone through several lifestyle and situation changes. The site is always being added to, and the new addition in 2012 of 2 blogs and the hosting of the mailing list that used to be on yahoo in a forum on my own server I hope has increased the amount of information you can easily find in your searches.
Please do submit articles here, send me emails if you have questions, and join the community forum to get the most of your maremma experience
Katrina Jeffery (was Sommers)
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Please enjoy this website from a devoted maremma owner |
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