Moving forward with Wheaten Terrier living in the countryside

[jeaux90]

Hi All, some of you very kindly have provided advice on our journey to breed selection. The only thing I am worried about is we live in the country, have a big garden which backs onto open countryside and we get visits from pheasants, woodpeckers etc. I am a bird lover. What are your tips when training to stop the dog barking or preying on birds? Or have I messed up on my breed pick?

With respect, many dog (and cat!) breeds will be interested in game birds, wild birds in general, wildlife such as squirrels.
My dog variously thinks she is a sight hound, terrier, or any other working-type dog; she is none of those. She has never caught a thing, despite living in the country and being quite focused & fast.
What little I can do to make up for this is to feed the wild birds, provide nesting materials if they’re missing, have wildlife corners in the garden etc.
There are many techniques of training dogs not to bark, as well as all the other essential behavioural ones so please focus on these & I’m sure you’ll have a well behaved, happy, loyal friend who runs around the garden without causing any damage to the natural world!

Caveat - never owned a Wheaten but have always coveted one!
Also I’m assuming that your garden is escape-proof; if not, make it so!

Escape proofing in progress! Thank you for your advice. I think I’m wondering whether as a terrier (never owned one, had German shepherds and a very unruly Finnish Spitz) it’s too much of a prey breed. And I do love my birds, feed them etc. We are going to be really intense in the puppy phase if we move forward with this breed, a lot of cattle and sheep etc around so I guess it’s just another step in the process to try and get them conditioned into accepting birds.

It was meeting a local breeder that got me asking this question. She spoke about how hers had never really preyed but knew exactly how to quickly kill a pheasant when the opportunity happened. So it really got me thinking I guess.

I’ve never owned one either but do get some wildlife in the garden. So far my highly prey driven DDog hasn’t managed to catch a thing although she does bark at squirrels and Wood Pidgeons quite regularly.

I have a very prey driven dog who will drive pheasants into cover and then corner them, but even though she's extremely quick and savage, she's only ever managed a couple of pheasants in her life. I wouldn't worry too much about the wildlife, it will be faster than your dog.

Just make sure that your fence is sunk well into the ground, because the little buggers darlings might well dig a hole somewhere you can't see and then be out frolicking over the hillside before you even know they are gone.

Swear to any deity listening that I'm never doing terriers again.

I have a wheaten, but I don’t live in an environment that sounds like yours, but what I can advise on is that they are the best dogs ever!

My previous terrier (not a Wheaten) did manage to kill a couple of pheasants and a couple of sparrows, but my current one has never caught a bird.

The pheasants only died because they have been selectively bred to be slow and noisy enough in take-off for rich people to have a chance of shooting them, so I didn't entirely blame the dog!

With the sparrows, in both cases it was in the garden during the mating season and the birds were flying low in mortal territorial combat, too distracted to exercise normal caution. So one part of the solution is to be aware of the need for special caution at that time of year.

But, more generally, I'd say that these were quite freaky incidents that you can't wholly prepare for. I think it much more likely that a terrier will never in its life kill a bird, even if it has a high prey drive, so I don't think you should worry too much. Livestock and rabbits are the much more likely concern. And perhaps cats. I did use to worry about cats coming into the garden

Swear to any deity listening that I'm never doing terriers again.

I'll swear to all of them that I will never have any dog except a terrier. For all their faults they are the dearest of all dear dogs!

I grew up with terrier breeds. Most terriers will chase birds and any small animals - but the chances of them catching a bird are pretty much zero. One of our dogs brought a dead baby bird in once, but it was so young that it had clearly fallen from the nest and if it wasn’t dead already when she found it, it certainly would have been very shortly regardless as it was too young to fly.

Most terriers are pretty vocal. You’re unlikely to stop them from barking at things that bother them. But a quick bark at a pheasant or when someone knocks at the door isn’t really a problem - barking (with any breed) is only really a problem when it’s prolonged or they do it because of separation anxiety.

my wheaten barks probably 5 times a year and doesn’t give a monkeys about birds etc but isnt a fan of cats i have to admit

@DisappearedI am ok with them chasing off cats being a bird lover and a gardener 🤣

I truly adore her but she's been the hardest work of any dog I've had in my forty plus years of dog owning. I had a terrier crossbreed before her and I thought I knew what I was letting myself in for...

Reader, I did not.

I think it depends on the dog. My bichon frise managed to catch a rabbit and will try and catch wood pigeons in the garden.

My terriers have never managed to catch anything.
x

Out of interest, what kind of terrier is your sweet girl?

My terrier likes to stare at the birds until they fly away, and then she chases them. Not a hope in hell of catching them.

She’s also not that barky - she shouts a little when she eventually stops watching pigeon TV and starts running, but I really wouldn’t classify her as noisy. Our neighbours have a spaniel and a beagle, who are bloody non-stop far more talkative.

Edited to add: she’s terrified of cats and freezes on the spot, trembling, until they stalk off and then she’ll pretend to be brave enough to chase them. And she did once catch a baby rabbit but was utterly flummoxed about what to do with it - she didn’t harm it at all.

Apart from food, her big passion is chasing tennis balls, and we find it’s dead easy to use this to distract her from anything inappropriate.

I have a wheaten. He'll happily chase a rabbit and be interested in an unknown cat, but he completely ignores birds, including birds on the ground. He's also not a barker, and if he does bark he stops when I tell him. I think a wheaten will love your setup!

We had a Wheaton terrier, she was the most amazing dog, we had her 17 fantastic years, she barked but never attempted to killed anything, she was so easily trained . However our other two fox terriers are feral and they can not be trusted or particularly that well trained, but they have character by the bucket load.

I have two Wheatens and a garden which backs onto open countryside. One of ours is quite chilled for a terrier and has never really taken an interest in the wildlife. The other has a higher prey drive and will chase rabbits, birds but has never caught anything in the wild. They tire quite quickly. The only issue we had was when a hedgehog wandered into the garden one night and I let them both out for a wee before bed. One in hunting mode triggered the other and that did not end well. I go out with them now or have a quick check of the garden before I let them out. I love the breed.

We have a hedgehog who visits sometimes. All wees in the dark do have to be on a lead here.

I know, I am late to the game, but one of my criterias when looking for a breed puppy was low prey drive... I did look at Wheatens as they did tick a lot of boxes.

But we settled for Tibetan Terrier instead. They are smaller, just as crazy BUT not a Terrier, just a lovely utility dog.

I have a spaniel and have trained her as we have free rabbits in the garden. She does struggle to not chase squirrels though.

Thank you everyone, really such a wide range of experiences and opinions. And thank you for mentioning hedgehogs, I hadn’t really thought about that weirdly so will definitely do night wee on a lead. We do actually have a local wildlife rescue that also have hedgehogs so might do a bit of socialising. So far I’m thinking that it’s hit and miss and depends on the individual dog, so I guess we will do a lot of early morning sitting outside with it to try and get it to observe birds etc rather than chase.

She's a Patterdale.

Even my very nippy jack Russell fails to catch a bird. She generally doesn’t bother as she knows it’s futile and doesn’t wish to be embarrassed. Might give the odd half hearted chase but no terrorising. Same does not apply to squirrels. She’ll chase and bark at the bottom of trees but has never caught one

Love the tales of our DDogs’ behaviours, such fantastic personalities - and their feelings like embarrassment!