If my dog killed a sheep I'm the one responsible yes?

[YerAWizardHarree]

THIS HAS NOT HAPPENED TO MY DOG

Just seen a post on my local group that said a dog had got loose and killed 4 sheep so the farmer had shot it dead. Loads of people saying it was disgusting that the dog was shot, whereas my point of view was that it 100% is the owners fault for having a dog that had poor recall of the lead. I mentioned it to my local dog training group and I've been called a cunt, a fucking disgraceful human being. I'm not saying that the dog should have been shot I'm saying that the owner is at fault for allowing the situation

Im sure if an out of control farm animal attacked dogs, the dog owners would want the farm animal put down...

Dog owners responsibility to prevent their animal attacking other animals and people. I'm a townie and know that.

I also agree.
Are the same dogs allowed offlead near children? I'd be very concerned.
Huskies and Akitas have a terrible reputation where I live because of a few stupid owners who don't train them properly and let them cause havoc. A number of smaller dogs have been attacked.

[quote YerAWizardHarree]@Covidchameleon the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.
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Then they shouldn’t have the dog.

Can you imagine what would go on if dogs weren’t shot for worrying sheep? People are bad enough at controlling their dogs most of the time, let alone if there is no consequence. There would hardly be a sheep alive.

If my dog killed a sheep I would be crawling with shame, not trying to justify it.

the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.

Frankly it sounds as though it was for the best that the dog was shot in this situation! Having had a husky kill all my kids bantams in front of them and then been called a cunt for catching the dog and calling the police, my sympathy lies with the farmer. The owner is right - a husky does have a powerful kill drive but this does not excuse the owner from keeping their dog under control. If the owner does not take responsibility for the animal they own, the farmer has no choice but to take responsibility for their animals. There are too many completely ignorant dog owners out there.

Heartbreaking but the farmer was within their rights to do so.
If as a dog owner your dog has poor recall or keeps chasing things it needs to be kept on a lead. The onus is on the owner to train their dog.

Covidcameleon
So while you’re right - if the owner is in that group, maybe have a heart and let them let off their understandable emotions.
Why? Perhaps they should have had better control of their dog?

Op I would be deleting that group and finding another class to attend

One of my friends grew up on a sheep farm. There was an overnight dog attack that killed and injured a lot of the sheep. The insurance paid up but when her parents tried to renew the insurance it was sky-high and they had to change to cattle. Fortunately the farm adapted to that easily but there are plenty of places that are suited to sheep that would be good for cattle or other types of farming. It's more than losing just those individual sheep.

[quote YerAWizardHarree]@Covidchameleon the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.
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It's quite right that the farmer shot the dog.

In addition to that though, I'm not sure why the law doesn't seem to allow for sanctions against the owner? From their post it sounds as if they believe they were not at fault, and will probably just go out and get another dog, and the situation repeat. The owner should surely be banned from keeping dogs for a time, and required to pay for the farmers losses?

@YerAWizardHarree we are in the same town!
The farmer is being attacked on Facebook but it looks like the dog was free to worry sheep for 20 mins.
The photo is of the farmer in a pond trying to save a sheep ... it's an awful situation and I think tempers are frayed after the other dog getting stuck and dying in the drainage pipes last week.

What other option did the farmer have? Just carry on letting it kill his livestock? Deffo owners fault
Poor dog and poor sheep .

[quote YerAWizardHarree]@Covidchameleon the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.
[/quote]
Jesus Fucking Christ.

She was OK with the dog chasing sheep? Because it's natural and she can't do anything about it?

There's an easy thing to do about - don't take the fucking dog anywhere near livestock - and better still, if she's that incompetent a dog owner, don't have a dog at all.

'Well, you have to remember that dogs have chased and attacked small children for tens of thousands of years, it's their natural instinct and I can't do anything about it when walking through the playground with the dog poorly secured actually off lead but I'm keeping that bit quiet if he then chooses to take the face off a three year old'. Just the same reasoning.

There really is no hope for humans when I hear shit like that come out. And I still think that for many farmers, it's a shame that it has to be the dog that gets shot, not the human being responsible for the carnage.

[quote InTheShadowOfTheMushroomCloud]@YerAWizardHarree we are in the same town!
The farmer is being attacked on Facebook but it looks like the dog was free to worry sheep for 20 mins.
The photo is of the farmer in a pond trying to save a sheep ... it's an awful situation and I think tempers are frayed after the other dog getting stuck and dying in the drainage pipes last week. [/quote]
I really don't understand why the farmer is being attacked at all! The fact that the dog escaped does not make the sheep any less dead, or the vets bill any less expensive.
I realise that some don't, but I supervise my dogs in the garden, because one is good at escaping even when I'm sure the fence/gate are secure. She's got good recall and will come straight back when trying to Houdini it out. But should she get away from me and do what this dog did, then it'd still be my responsibility. I'm sick of this attitude that if it's not your fault then it's not your responsibility. Something can be pure accident, but still your responsibility.
The dog was loose for at least 20 minutes, that was just the time it was worrying sheep, how long had it actually been loose for? Did the owner even realise?
I'm dumbfounded that people are having a go at the farmer.

As a sheep farmer you'll know the financial cost to this would be potentially huge. The cost of the dead ewes, the vets fees for the others injured, even if not by the dog but the injuries from fleeing, the lambs lost with their mothers and they won't be the only lambs lost either. Half that flock could have miscarried their babies in terror.
The farmer needs to get them rescanned at a later date and the number of dead lamb babies be posted on the page for all to see. Let those bleeding hearts see the other side. Let them know how many innocent animals died because of a vicious dog and an incredibly stupid owner. I wonder if you would be a cunt then.

And I hope the farmer pursues the dog owner for compensation.

Dogs do escape sometimes. It can happen even to conscientious owners (though of course vastly more rarely)

And sometimes when it does, the dog comes to harm. Round here, it would be from being run over. Near livestock, it could be shot, near children and it could be impounded and PTS.

It's not about recall. A dog can have really good recall but if it has a very strong predator-prey instinct then it will chase and potentially kill sheep. And there is no amount of shouting for it to come back that will help. In the heat of the moment, it won't hear. Which is why you should always keep dogs on a lead in a place where there is sheep. Even gentle dogs will chase sheep, not necessarily with the intention of hurting them but because it is instinct to chase something that is running away.

It wasn't the dog's fault. It was the stupid owner's fault. I feel sorry for the farmer because he probably took no pleasure in killing someone's pet and he has lost four sheep. Possibly more if any died of fright after the event.

@DefinitelyPossiblyMaybe

Where on earth do you live that locals find it disgusting that a dog terrorising and killing sheep was shot? Around here nobody would take issue with the farmer's sad but necessary actions. Do you live near large new estates full of city commuters?

I'm in a very rural village. Loads of farms but also big housing estates within the village. The amount of people who live in an area completely surrounded by fields, rolling hills and moors and yet have absolutely no idea about the countryside is astounding. Complete and utter townies who get to a the fields gates and the first thing they do is Unclip their dogs. And these are sheep fields too. I'd say maybe 1 in 20 keep their dogs on the lead ((I have a cracking view straight into the most popular walk and have seen owners running screaming at their dogs while the dogs chase the sheep. If the farmer only knew the half of it!

I've seen a sheep after a dog attack and it's utterly horrible.

There was recently a case local to me where the farmer had to PTS 14 (yes, you read that right) ewes after a prolonged dog attack, quite possibly by more than one dog. He's gone to the police with all his info and I really hope somebody ends up in the dock.

the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.
That is just mind-blowing. If you know you have a dog with high prey-drive, you keep it under control and you train it thoroughly. And if you fail in either the control or the training, you own up. I'm on a couple of gundog pages and a couple years ago there was a long post by the owner of two German Wire-haired Pointers who had run off during training, and spent the afternoon and evening chasing down sheep. They were shot by the farmer and the owner fully accepted that outcome and analysed where he had grown wrong. He was heartbroken to lose two dogs (a mother and daughter), but he had the guts to accept that he'd made a series of mistakes. He posted pics of the sheep, and of his own two dead dogs lying in a wheelbarrow: he was hammering his point home in any way he could to spare anybody else the same experience.

I don’t think a lot of dog owners know what sheep werrying actually is. It’s not playful, like chasing a ball in the park and refusing to come back from it. It’s hideous - the dog literally can’t hear you. My friend’s pet goat was attacked by her own family pet, the dog was daft as a brush usually and yet went absolutely bezerk. Her dad tried to drag him away and couldn’t, and instead had to go in and get the gun - (find the key to the gun cupboard, open it, find the key to the cartridge cupboard, open it, load and head down the garden and shoot, and all the while the dog was still going absolutely mental.)

He shot his own dog. And the goat died anyway. Dreadfully dreadfully sad.

Yes, the law is quite clear.

People are ignorant.

My dog was shot by the farmer when I was a child and it was absolutely devastating as us kids had grown up with that dog and our cousins had ddogs brother. Mum and dad tried so hard to keep the dog under control, they’d had him tupped several times, kept him chained up, didn’t let him off the lead during walks but he was like Houdini and got out several times. The farmer had warned mum and dad a few times too so none of us held it against him when our beloved dog was shot, heartbroken though we were. Really I suppose the dog should have been rehomed or PTS.

I grew up rural and we had a bit of a small holding, and also dogs throughout my life. It was accepted amongst all that a loose dog would be shot by a farmer if on their land. As a child I was in no doubt that my dog would be killed if he was found in any of the fields around our house.

It doesn’t matter about good recall or not because in a field of sheep no dogs should be off the lead anyway. Unfortunately dog walkers seem to think that footpaths through these fields mean that this is not the case and they have a perfect right to exercise their dogs freely.

My dog chased a sheep once (I posted about it on here, it was on an open moore where I've never seen a sheep before, hidden by a dip). Dog took chase. It lasted seconds and I was able to get him back on lead before he made contact but I knew that he meant business. This will sound awful but I would have shot our dog myself if it was the only way to stop him.

Of course the farmer was right. Poor sheep. My relative used to put young dogs in a ram pen for an hour to help prevent sheep worrying. Farmers were always happy to make a ram and pen available and it seemed to work. Probably wouldn't be allowed now.

[quote YerAWizardHarree]@Covidchameleon the owner has said that as the dog is a husky it's natural for her dog to want to chase sheep and it's beyond her control to stop it.
[/quote]
See I have a real problem with this. There seems to have been a trend in recent years maybe Game of Thrones and the like for big powerful and sometimes aggressive dogs, which is fine if you are a disciplined owner who trains and exercises your dog, but there are too many owners who don't really know how to manage for want of a better word such a powerful animal.