Best Dog Breed for My Situation???

[fullhouse]

I love Newfoudlands. That will be my next dog.

 

[gaited horse]

a mutt

 

[MagsC]

I weighed in on this in another section, but if I was going to do this, I would get one of the old "pioneering" breeds of dog, like a Mountain Cur, Blackmouth Cur, Texas Blue Lacy, Catahoula etc. Of course any pup/ dog needs training but these dogs are very versatile.
Supposedly the story "Old Yeller" was written with one of these in mind.

 

[EngieKisses]

I have a golden retriever outside, and we have made the runs and coops as prey resistant as possible and the only prey we have to worry about getting the chickens is the dog. She keeps the other animals away, but only because she want the chickens for herself. She loves them......for dinner. Sporting dogs are bred to chase, or retrieve birds, not guard them. My English Cockers do not have the opportunity to go near the chickens because they are aware of them. Plus, they are a little better at reasoning than the outside dog. They would figure a way past any barrier to get what they want.

 

[tiki244]

Annotolian Shephard or Great Pyranese

 

[freshegg]

my friend swears bye donkeys as her gaurd dog.

 

[kbarrett]

I have a mutt, black lab + golden retriever. He abandoned all of our hard work training him as a pup on the boundries of our underground electric fence to chase the neighbors cats. He would happily take the shock to give chase then sit on the other side and would be afraid to come back across it. Now he can't be out by himself unless supervised. He would love to have my flock as dinner! His saving grace is that he adores my son

and would protect him at all costs. I love the stupid mutt too, he just makes me want to pull my hair out sometimes

 

[gritsar]

Quote:
I agree and would add irish wolfhound, although they are very large and harder to find. My Charlie is a wolfhound and I will never ever own anything but. She has helped raise children, cats, puppies, and now chickens. She did pick up a 10 day old chick once, but didn't harm it in any way. I think she figured it was okay to mother it since she was allowed to mother the cat and the other dog when they were very young. She ignores all the chickens now.
She brought home a young coyote that she had (presumbably) killed one night. I wasn't thrilled, but she was very proud of herself.
There are rescue organizations for all three breeds, annotolian, pyranese, and wolfhound. You can find them thru an internet search. Way less expensive than a breeder.

 

[mom2jedi]

Quote:
I have a Catahoula, he is the best dog with our kids and even our cat. He's never been around chickens so we'll see what happens when we get ours but he's so gentle I can't imagine he would do anything. He's not too big (70#s) but he has a big bark. He definitely protects everyone in the family. He's not a huge herder but he does watch over the kids. In fact, we usually have to keep him in the laundry room when we have a birthday party with lots of kids because he wears himself out trying to keep track of everybody and keep them in the same place. It's pretty funny, he just kinda leans into your legs till you move where he wants you to go. Most people don't even notice it till they've been moved to the other side of the patio!

Good Luck!

 

[Anny]

Adopt a dog from an animal shelter that temperment tests it's dogs.

A good animal shelter is one that test all it's dogs to make sure they are matching the right dog with the right family. The test will determine how to dog does in different situations. The test are not 100% but they are pretty good.

They test the dog with babies (baby doll), how they would react to the way a toodler might handle them (touching tail ears paws and leaning on the dog) They test the dog with other dogs, larger and small, and with cats. They test the dog with food and treats as well, and how well the dog reacts to having these things taken away from them.


The shelter I worked at used a mix of the ASPCA test and sue Sternberg temperament test.

I believe most ASPCA and state shelters do the test, beware of pounds they don't test.

The rate the dogs in colors.

Green: being the best (anyone can own this dog, good for first time dog owners, and good with small childen)

Yellow: meaning the dog is alittle hypers or may have an issue (aka no cats, or no other dogs, or no children under 5 or something like that, it could be the dog is just large and they want some one who knows how to handle a large dog)

Red: most shelter will not adopt out RED dogs, as this means they need a very strong owner who knows what they are doing.

the ASPCA test also has a "canineality" like personality test. Which will give the dog s lable like "couch potato", "busy bee ", or "teachers pet" to help you know more about how the dog acts and it's energy level. I believe the ASPCA also has a little test you can take to match the caninality to your personality and your life style.

Good luck!

Personally I think the shelter dogs are best, and I am a huge lover of older dogs. Since older dogs have such a hard time getting adopted.

Don't brush off adopting an older dog simply because you have chickens or children. Older dogs are easier to teach to get along with these others things as long they you make sure the dog is a good match for your family from day one (IE don't adopt a husky and think it's going to get along with chickens, they have a crazy pray drive...I live with one who will go after ANYTHING that moves)


Adopting a shelter dog saves a life!!! ( can you tell I've worked in shelter for a few years haha)

Many shelter get pure breed dogs in, if you have your heart set on a pure. Or you can even fine pure breed resuce groups where the dog live IN some one home in foster care. These are good situations to adopt from as well since the dog is in a home and not in a shelter you see more of it's true personality and how it will act at home.