National Party candidate for the new seat of Buninyong Sonia Smith hopes little Lucky may yet prove an answer to a feral animal problem at the Navigators property she shares with husband Wayne Whykes.

Lucky is not exactly your typical working farm dog.

She is a four-month-old fox terrier-whippet cross who is lucky enough to sleep indoors at night. However, she is already learning a trade to earn her keep.

“She is an accidental breed, but my sister has a whippet cross- jack russell, so we knew what we were getting into,” Ms Smith explains.

“She is very fast from the whippet side, but robust and stock from the foxy side. We have been familiarising her with the farm and she is now getting an idea which animals to protect and which animals to chase. We had to tell her not to chase the chickens or the poddy calf. She is like a companion of the poddy calf now.

“She has a very strong instinct but she has to learn which animals are part of the family and which aren’t. They have to learn who their pack is and which animals aren’t, particularly non-native ones like foxes and rabbits.”

Lucky was part of a litter of seven pups.

At present she is the only dog on Ms Smith’s 45-hectare property, which has a number of dorper sheep along with red angus, santa gertrudis and hereford cattle, although Ms Smith says another could be on the way in the not too distant future.

Ms Smith, who was previously an international human rights lawyer, became the National Party candidate for Buninyong on January 22.