Chicken killer cured

[nembula]

I have a Boxer Lab cross,that was killing off my chickens horribly three years ago. I started really working with her using Victoria's methods last year. So, I am back with happy results of some concentrated effort. I took a page from Victoria's book and kept the dog on a leash pretty much tied to me for over a week and a half last year. Every time she stopped hunting them, i.e. staring at them and seemed to relax I praised her. We started quite a ways away from the chickens and gradually worked our way to sitting amidst them as they ran and flapped and scratched around us. I then started quite a ways away again only off leash. Same routine good results until a group of people showed up one day and I lost track of the dog. She got one chick, I scolded her rather mildly and went back to the leash for another week and then off leash for concentrated training for another three weeks. The second thing I started doing was giving her something she could hunt; chipmunks. The chipmunks were carrying off an amazing amount of my animal grain every week and I was constantly opening my grain bin to have them dash out. When the grain got low enough they sometimes were trapped in there. So I would sic her on them. Now that was last year. This year I again got baby chicks and she seemed pretty good around them, but, I still wasn't very confident with them loose around her. Until the other day. I was in my house and had the chicks in the garden in a large tub with a woven wire cover on it. The children had put the wire back on upside down and I heard the chicks screaming bloody murder. I dashed out, followed hotly by my "pack". There was a rogue chipmunk in the container with a chick by the wing trying to drag it out to kill it and eat it. (He had already gotten one.) Not thinking I just threw off the cover pointed in the box and said "get 'em" to the dog. A split second later I realized what I had done. The dog never even hesitated, she drove her head into the box and snapped at the chipmunk. All around her face flapped the little terrified chicks, but she focused on the chipmunk that leaped up out of the box and mad a dash for the garden fence with both dogs hot on it's heels. They were held up briefly by the garden fence but in a moment were out the gate and away after their quarry. She never hesitated or looked back once at the box full of fluttering screaming chicks, she had found her job and did it with her whole heart. So, Thank you, Victoria Stillwell, for inspiring a method that saved a dog from being a liability in her home to becoming a bit of a hero.

[CarolineLovesDogs]

Woo hoo, good for you, that sounds like great success! This sounds like a tough case to crack so you did a great job, thanks for sharing, nambula!!

[MPbandmom]

Yippee! Such a great outcome for all your hard work.