Heroic Georgia dog fights off coyote pack preying on flock of sheep
If anyone has earned the title of very good boy, it’s Casper, a 20-month-old Great Pyrenees from Decatur, Georgia, who single-handedly killed eight coyotes trying to prey on his owner’s sheep.
Last week, a pack of 11 coyotes attacked the flock of farmer John Wierwiller, according to a report from a local television station, WAGA-TV. Casper defended the sheep furiously in a fight that left some of his skin and part of his tail torn off, Wierwiller said.
The heroic sheepdog killed eight of the coyotes and chased the three remaining off the field of battle, but he didn’t immediately come home, so Wierwiller put out a call for help in finding Casper on social media, CBS News reported. Two days later, Casper returned on his own to the household for which he was willing to put his life on the line.
“He was kinda looking at me like, ‘Boss, stop looking at how bad I look, just take care of me,’” Wierwiller said. “It looked like a coyote grabbed his skin and peeled it right off.”
Wierwiller wrote on Facebook that he took Casper to emergency veterinarians in critical condition. The vets closed an open neck wound, and were hopeful that treatment would limit the potential for infection.
Casper has been “a little tentative about everything” since his brush with death, Wierwiller wrote, but the vets have said that with a little bit of luck Casper may not even require any skin grafts.
“It really is a remarkable bit of news and we are celebrating,” Wierwiller said.
More than $15,000 had so far been raised for Casper’s hospital bills through a GoFundMe campaign as word of his bravery has spread. Dogs generally don’t fare well against coyotes, whose paths they can cross in rural areas in the US and suburbs developed near woods or swamps.
It is rare but not unprecedented for coyotes to attack humans. Media in California reported last week that a toddler was dragged outside her home by a coyote before her mother threw a rock at the animal and scared it away.