sheep / cow ‘flerd’ and coyotes

when you get your sheep get a guard llama along with them…. one that has been used for guarding… and also NOT an intact male… We have coyotes all over around us… neighbors lose sheep and lambs every year.. .but we have not had one issue here… and our llama was less than $50.00. He came from a place that had used them for large flocks… he bonded with the sheep and the sheep took to him very quickly. Now they run to him if we try to move the sheep with our dogs… so when we herd practice with our border collie we seperate the llama and leave him with the younger lambs… then turn them all out when we are done. He keeps the lambs calm too when the moms are gone”working”
AND llamas aver very low maintenence if you get a minimal wool type!

Another component might be to pen the sheep at night. I would consider nothing else for my birds.

Several points to make here:
1. I live in the UK. In most of Northern Europe, mixed grazing is normal. I understand that in some parts of the USA it’s considered “weird”. In one village near me the farmer keeps horses with a small herd of English longhorn cattle (this breed was crossed with the Hereford in places such as Texas). You’re absolutely right about parasites: mixed grazing is a good way to keep the use of anthelmintics down;
2. Raise the animals together and you shouldn’t have any trouble;
3. There are several ways to guard your livestock. Llamas are good and so are mule or hinny mares. Don’t use males as they lack the instinct to lead a herd. I’ve heard of a Shetland hinny guarding a flock of Merino sheep in Australia against dingos. The mare was smaller than the sheep! If you want to do this, check the mare is OK with sheep as some are aggressive towards them. Keep her away from other equines or she’ll pal up with them and ignore her herd (you could let her mix with equines once in a while perhaps at shows, though, if you knew the herd was safe). The additional advantage to using a guard mare is that during lambing you just need to bring your sheep close to the house (or into a barn) and leave them with the mare. She will act as “midwife” and only call to you out if a ewe has problems giving birth. Another trick may seem a bit bizarre but it works. When you have a crop of lambs, choose a bolshie male and introduce him very early on to your farm dogs. Let them play together. When he’s about to reach puberty, have him castrated ‘proud’ so he still exhibits some of the behaviour of a ram and put a bell on him. If he’s used to playing with dogs, he’ll chase any intruding coyotes, foxes or stray dogs with a view to having some fun. As you are no doubt aware, dogs are terrified of being chased by their “prey”. This was done by a shepherdess in England a few years ago, who was interviewed on TV. It was good fun to see the wether charging at dogs introduced into the field.

By the way, farmers in South Africa that use mule mares to guard their sheep report roughly a 90% reduction in the loss of lambs after doing so.

If you want bold sheep, try Soays.