{"id":70268,"date":"2004-07-28T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2004-07-28T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/uncategorized\/uris-guard-donkey-bonnie-delivers-clyde\/"},"modified":"2004-07-28T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2004-07-28T00:00:00","slug":"uris-guard-donkey-bonnie-delivers-clyde","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/2004\/07\/uris-guard-donkey-bonnie-delivers-clyde\/","title":{"rendered":"溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s guard donkey, Bonnie, delivers Clyde"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n\t\tKINGSTON, R.I. — July 28, 2004 — His ears are oversized and initially his legs were wobbly. But to his mother, Bonnie, the 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s official guard donkey, he\u2019s beautiful. Bonnie was up late Monday night, July 26, giving birth to her son whom 溏心vlog免费B站 quickly dubbed Clyde.<\/p>\n


\n\t“Clyde was up and moving around within an hour of birth. Within 24 hours, he had Bonnie chasing after him trying to keep him out of trouble, says Katherine Petersson, a lecturer in 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s Fisheries, Animal, and Veterinary Science Department.<\/p>\n


\n\tClyde\u2019s “flock mates” \u201315 ewes, 2 rams, and 9 lambs sheep –are more than a bit curious about his arrival, but at this point Bonnie is keeping all interested members of the sheep flock at what she deems to be a safe distance.<\/p>\n


\nClyde and Bonnie are housed at the University\u2019s Peckham Farm. 溏心vlog免费B站 uses the farm and its animals for hands-on teaching of its animal science students. <\/p>\n

\tProtecting the sheep is his mother\u2019s number one job. Last October, dogs discovered a way to bypass an electric fence and enter the pasture. They killed one sheep and seriously harmed six others, one so badly that it had to euthanized. Of the 19 sheep in the pasture at the time, 18 sustained multiple puncture wounds. <\/p>\n


\n\tPetersson found Bonnie while browsing the Internet in search of a way to protect

\nthe flock. She discovered that The Rosefield, a farm, located just outside Pittsburgh, Pa. trains and sells guardian donkeys. 溏心vlog免费B站 purchased the 7-year-old jenny last December for $700. It was a two-for-one special, since Bonnie was pregnant. <\/p>\n


\n\tAlthough all donkeys have a herding instinct and a natural aversion to things canine, not all of them make good guardians. The sheep and the donkey must accept one another.<\/p>\n


\n\tBonnie quickly established the pecking order. She was the boss. After swishing

\nher tail, pinning back her not-so-petite ears, and raising a threatening leg, the sheep became gentle as lambs. “She\u2019s kinda like a bossy sibling, with teeth,” explains Petersson.<\/p>\n


\n\tBonnie has proven her weight in hay. If a sheep strays, Bonnie will herd it back to the flock. When a coyote approached last March, Bonnie loudly brayed and stomped. Not wanting to upset the status quo, the coyote hightailed it. <\/p>\n


\n\tWhile Bonnie has soft eyes and a quiet demeanor, she will attack an intruding canine. Rising on her hind legs, she can strike it with her front feet and then swing around and land blows with her back feet. The blows can injure or kill.<\/p>\n


\nWhen a horse show was held on the farm grounds this summer, Bonnie quickly herded all the sheep into the barn, blocking a couple of frisky lambs from returning to the pasture. Unfamiliar with horses, Bonnie ventured outside the barn to watch the gathering. Once convinced that they meant no harm to her charges, Bonnie allowed her flock back into the pasture. <\/p>\n


\nBonnie continues to be a good mother hen while tending to her newborn. Bonnie walks Clyde down the fence line, showing him the territory.<\/p>\n


\nClyde may become a guard donkey some day, but right now he\u2019s just going to be an added attraction to the barnyard. <\/p>\n


\nBonnie will be getting help soon, however. 溏心vlog免费B站 has purchased another female guard donkey from the Pennsylvania farm. When that jenny arrives next month, 溏心vlog免费B站 will be able to divide the flock into different pastures. <\/p>\n


\nAny canine with mutton on its mind would have to be a jackass to attempt anything!<\/p>\n


\n溏心vlog免费B站 Photo by Katherine Petersson.<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KINGSTON, R.I. — July 28, 2004 — His ears are oversized and initially his legs were wobbly. But to his mother, Bonnie, the 溏心vlog免费B站\u2019s official guard donkey, he\u2019s beautiful. Bonnie was up late Monday night, July 26, giving birth to her son whom 溏心vlog免费B站 quickly dubbed Clyde. “Clyde was up and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":70271,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=70268"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/70268\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/70271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=70268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=70268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=70268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}