68/ MAY 2012 THE RIDER


Isolation ...Sometimes a Scary Thing When Living in the Country


By Teri Davidson


In between Christ- mas and New Years Day we had a terrible thing happen in our neigh- bourhood. An elderly


woman who lived alone in her lovely home set back off the road, in our quiet farming rural com- munity, was horrifi- cally murdered. Police have no clues yet and are combing the area, some on horse- back, others with track- ing dogs trying to piece together what happened. They do know it was a


random, stranger attack...not someone the lady knew, which makes her death all the more scary.


I have often scoffed at clients who say they are afraid to be so far back off the road or so isolated when they look at properties to pur- chase. They are rare as most people are looking for the privacy and free-


dom from close neighbours. My response has always been to those who are frightened of the isolation is to get a dog. A big dog.


But the lady who was mur- dered not far from us had two big dogs. German Shepherds. The dogs were fine after the attack according to the media reports. Which leads me to believe they had been contained somehow during the time when their owner was killed.


We also live on a property back in off the road. We also have German Shepherds. I have just recently started breeding King German Shepherds and plan on my first litter this spring. Three puppies have already been spoken for. The breed is popular as they are the old fashioned straight backed working dogs...intelligent, beautiful and over sized. The King Shepherd is a registered German Shepherd but where a standard male Shep- herd weighs in at about 85 lbs the King weighs from 110 to 145 lbs. A great deterrent for anyone looking to break into my house or come onto the property. Or so one would think.


But I have been thinking “deterrent” only, as most people would think. Not so much “pro- tection.”


This incident down the road from us has made me re-think why we have dogs on farms and if deterrent is enough. I don't know any of what happened with the woman and her dogs but I do know if someone comes to my door I will put my dogs away, thinking that their barking fright- ens whoever happens to be at the door. This is not a good thing. If someone were here to harm us, the dogs have now been put away into their kennels where they can't defend us if need be. Two weeks ago we met a


new neighbour while we were looking to find different boarding facilities for our daughters horse. They have a gorgeous equestrian facility with stables and indoor arena but have soured about hav- ing boarders on the property after a bad time with previous clients. While we were talking with them they mentioned that we should stop by on a Sunday morning and watch them doing a new venture they've gotten into...Schutzhund dog training. This training involves obedience, tracking and protection or attack training. I was skeptical about the protec- tion training thinking I didn't want to involve our dogs in any training that taught them to bite people. We joined the group on the next Sunday morning, went without our dogs, just to watch and learn. We were there for three hours! Very interesting stuff, very professional and very impressive. All of the dogs being trained that morning were Dober- mans, all different ages and both males and females. High quality registered dogs who were friend- ly, energetic and intelligent. The only time that changed was if they were given the command to attack. The result was instanta- neous. The dog protected its owner from the would be attack- er. Sounds scary but it actually wasn't. This is, I think, what we want from our canine friends. A well rounded, well trained animal who is kept safe because he or she is well trained and who can also keep us safe if the situation arises where we need to be kept safe. I am sure that the time for keeping us safe will rarely, if ever, surface but good to know it's there if we need it to be. I plan on taking all three of my dogs to the training sessions. If anyone comes to my door instead of putting the dogs away I will order them to “down”


where they will lay quietly til we see what the person at my door is looking for and where they are free to give help if the people coming in are up to no good. It is still a good deterrent to have the dog just look out the window or bark but in the extremely rare circumstance that you need more the dog can give extra protection if needed. I still believe living well back off the road with seclusion and the prettiness of mother nature surrounding you is what most people desire but my new comment to those who are fearful about the isolation will be to get a dog but I will add the words “well trained” dog to my response.


Teri Davidson has been a licensed real estate broker for almost 36 years. She is the Broker/Owner of Associate Realty Brantford Inc. and also owns and operates White House farm along with her hus- band Brian and family in Ancast- er Ont. where they breed and raise quality registered Quarter horses and Paints as well as regis- tered king size German Shepherd dogs. Call Teri at 519-758-7307 or email at teridavidson@rogers.com


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