English shepherd
Australian cattle dog
I have seen lots of dogs like that with shepherds and their flocks.
Posted on 11/28/2009 4:13:30 PM PST by missycocopuffs
Reporting from Camp Hale, Colo. - As soon as Renee Legro saw the sheep, she screamed.
The herd, 1,300 strong, has been coming for 30 years to graze in this valley on the backside of the Continental Divide. But as Colorado has become an adventure sports destination, the once-empty valley has filled with hikers, campers and mountain bikers like Legro, and she was about to tragically embody the collision of the old West with the new.
Legro, 33, screamed because she knew what came with the herd -- guard dogs. Shortly after she rolled down a hill and came upon the sheep, a dog leaped at her, locked its jaws on her hip and yanked her off her bike.
A second dog pounced as she fell. The two enormous canines, powerful enough to fend off bears, tore at her until her cries drew two campers who drove them off. The emergency-room doctor lost count of how many stitches she required.
To Legro and her husband, Steve, there was one person responsible -- Sam Robinson. One of a dwindling number of sheepherders in Colorado's mountains, Robinson, 54, turned to guard dogs a decade ago, after the state banned the use of traps to prevent mountain lions, coyotes and bears from destroying herds.
"We don't have any other option," Robinson said.
The Legros see things differently. In their years of hiking, biking and skiing the magnificent open spaces near Vail, they have fled from ranchers' dogs several times. "I cannot bring my dog up to the forest and let it run wild and attack people," said Steve Legro, 37. "Neither should anyone else."
They wanted Robinson charged with a crime.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
I cannot say - they are massive, tall and look like they could eat a small person in just a few bites. Hairy as well.
His was white. Kind of looks like a Pyrenese, but not quite as bulky.
I’ve been around a LOT of dogs, working and otherwise. German Shepherds to Labrador Retrievers. Anyone with any Common Sense instinctively knows to stop when she sees a herd of sheep in front of her.
It’s blatant stupidity (and the sheep herder needed a better lawyer) for someone to ride a bike into a herd of sheep.
The Sheep Herder needed a good publicity agent and a cracker-jack attorney to turn this thing into “city girl sissy” acts inappropriately toward “lamb chop” herd.
Unfortunately there wasn’t one of us on that jury.
STUPID woman and she’s already procreated. Dang. She’s probably a ‘greenie’ and won’t have another child. THAT is a good thing.
I dislike dumb people. They make me want to get in their faces and scream at them. “How Can You Be THAT Stupid?”
what I notice glaringly ignored by (nearly) all, is that 1) the organizers failed to inform the herders in the area, like they normally have done in the past; 2) she refused, at sunset, a "sag ride" back to the starting point and insisted upon going forward in the dusk/dark.
A screaming, careering banshee 'attacking' the unsuspecting herd in the dark bodes very ill for said banshee.
3) Since the loss of his dogs, he has also lost 26% of his herd...but the Legros feels like they are the innocent, agrieved party.
Go back to safe, sane Chi-Town, lady, and stick to walking/riding in parks; preferrably alone and after dark.
BTTT
The article says the shepherd is Peruvian. The Peruvians come here as contract labor, they are flown in on commercial flights and the sheepmen fly them back to Peru every year for a vacation and visit. It might be hard to get illegals through Customs twice a year at the airport.
Good Peruvian herders are hard to find, and some sheepmen are using Mongolians.
You know, I had a grandfather who was a shepherd and also great uncles who were. That was all they knew, they were raised to do this job. They were not illegals, although they WERE Hispanic. I do remember going into the Colorado Rockies to visit them in the summer and I don’t remember any dogs. I’m sure they were there though.
Nowadays, my best friend in Texas has sheep and who does she use to guard them? A huge white DOG, like these. The big white Grand Pyranese which will apparently do anything to protect their charges, the innocent sheep.
The herders are probably border collies.
English shepherd
Australian cattle dog
I have seen lots of dogs like that with shepherds and their flocks.
The wilderness just east of the Santa Monica Freeway in Colorado, just went to court.
Huh, you mean the California freeway near Santa Monica?
I would never support putting that into law but I have seen an ever increasing level of stupidity in the woods and fields over the last 20-30 years. Trees hacked up for no reason, fire pits loaded with garbage, roads and trails torn up for no good reason and my biggest gripe campfires left burning when obviously camp had been broken.
Squealing and screaming is NOT something they appreciate. Might as well wave a red flag in front of a bull.
>Thank you - my B I L actually herds sheep, using a set of massive Russian dogs (don’t know the proper name) - but the bloody things are as big as a pony.
Were they Morameas?<
The breed is spelled, “Maremma”. They originate in Italy.
http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/maremmasheepdog.htm
The Russian dogs are probably members of the Caucasian Ovtcharka breed.
http://www.dogbreedinfo.com/caucasianowtcharka.htm
You mean, after the part about it being an ORGANIZED RACE? So, because the woman got scared and screamed you think she deserved to be shredded by the dogs?
Or, the part about campers rather than the "professional Peruvian sheep herders" rescuing the screaming woman?
Btw, FP, did you read post #35?
Found an illegal ‘campsite’, a cluster of about 5 or 6 individual tent sites, on BLM property, about a mile from our former house, while hunting a few years ago. They had abandoned clothes and some camping equipment; had had open fires at the height of fire season; left an several garbage pits/piles, and and hadn't even had the decency to fill in their latrine trenches. They had also left behind a stolen (per the sheriff’s deputy I took to the site) and partially stripped car.
Some years ago, my oldest brother heard several shots near sunset, the weekend before the deer opener. Next morning, he went out to investigate, and found five dead does on the far back of his property, left to rot, just missing their hams and backstraps.
I was up in WA in '97, a summer of devastating fires, and came on a smoldering fire piled with plywood and other flammable stuff. It was minutes from igniting into a blaze. I was livid. Got out and tore it apart all the while cursing at the top of my lungs daring the culprits to come back. Figured they weren't far away, just hastily left because the knew there was a fire ban.
The ring was built with some very big river donies but I hauled each and every one away and tossed them in different parts of the creek. There was no reason not to have a fire ring there but I was so bent about it I was determined to leave no trace of fire or ring. lol
Too bad it wasn’t a mountain lion. They like to hunt at dusk.
LOL! I understand, and have seen/done similar.
I was introduced to the woods/wilds 60 years ago, as a toddler, by my Scout Master father, who had grown up with a ranching heritage. Lived mostly rural, even in SoCal, nearly all my life.
I'm a long haired old hippie now and I spent a lot of time traveling the west collecting medicinal plants. When I wanted to check out the plants on private land I searched out the farmer/rancher and asked permission. Asked if I could do anything for them while I was out there. I offered to pay them what I could for the plants. (which wouldn't have been much)
They never turned me down, never asked for compensation for the plants, never took me up on the offer of help, never needed to know how long I would be there or when I was leaving.
Best people on earth and all they ask is basic respect. They give it back too, I've never really been hassled by farm or ranch folk about being a long hair.
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