Hi All -- I came across this post with a search for "Grand Shepherd" and wanted to share our experience with Mingo, the St Bernard / Anatolian cross we got from Michelle (mentioned above) in September 2013. He's wonderful. We wanted a good dog to help protect our 4 kids, 15 acres, and various farm critters. When we went to pick out the puppy, we asked Michelle's kids which one they thought was nicest, and they said they liked Mingo because he was calm and gentle and sweet. We took their advice, and Mingo has stayed calm and gentle and sweet his whole life (he's almost nine now). Here are some things about him, in case it can be helpful to anyone else:
- Even from puppyhood, Mingo was gentle with all our farm animals, including chickens. We never had any issues.
- Full grown (and probably with a few too many scraps) he's ~130lbs. A daunting-looking dog that tends to get a respectful response from any strangers, but one we know is secretly a little shy about them until he knows they're nice.
- Gentle with farm animals, friendly with other dogs, but willing to stake his territory with those dogs if they seem to cross boundaries. He'll stand between them and our farm critters, and occasionally bark/growl if they want something of his. Some friends of ours brought their Aussie to visit for a few days and when she decided to try to eat his food, he literally sat down right on top of her and pinned her to the ground a couple of feet from it.
- He really doesn't like kittens (sharp hissing little things), but is always befriended by them once they become cats. He's embarrassed to be seen doing it, but we're pretty sure they snuggle up with him in the barn on cold nights. And he shares his food with them freely, unless there's a treat, in which case he barks in their faces.
- He's very obedient. He will let the cats eat a treat two feet from him if we tell him to leave it alone. He looks pathetic about it, but restrains himself. (We do give him the first treat, of course, since he's in charge.)
- He doesn't bark much. Very predictably when someone drives up to the property (very helpful), and occasionally at night if something alarms him. Sometimes we hear him barking in succession from different corners of the property, and we assume he's just warning the world he's there. If coyotes are out and far enough away, he sings with them. If they're close, he's fiercely barking.
- In his later years, he has gotten into the trash outside a few times. We find this very annoying, but also realize that we find french fries kind of hard to resist too, and that's when he tends to do it -- when there's some particularly tempting trash in there.
- He's not a big wanderer. He does walk to visit the neighbors occasionally, but they have told us they enjoy it. It's extremely rare for him not to be right around the house or yard.
- He has an inside bed on the rug for evening naps, and stays on it.
He's really just a big, old, faithful, gentle giant now. We couldn't be happier with him.
Note: We initially got two pups from his litter -- a sister as well. She also was very sweet, and had more of a Bernard look (Mingo has a more Anatolian look with the all-black face and isn't as cute that way), but she also had more of the Bernard temperament, I think. Much more energetic, killed several chickens when she was young, and tended to wander. We re-homed her at nine-months because we really wanted to make sure we had a dog that bonded more to our family than to a litter-mate. It was a lesson-learned for us. I think she could have learned and matured, we just didn't have the time and experience to invest in both.
Hope that's helpful!
-- Marsha Michaelis, Northeast WA
