Best Homestead Dog?

I'd say, rather than focus on a breed, look at the characteristics you want in a farm dog and take it from there. To me, I'd look for things like a short coat (easier to get ticks out of, to identify injury, easier to comb), one that is protective but doesn't possess a killer instinct, one that doesn't like to wander, one that is long lived and free from inherited problems such as hip dysplasia, and one with a loud enough bark to let you know if something's amiss.

These aren't necessarily my definitions of a favorite dog, but I'd think they'd be a decent starting point for a homestead dog.

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'Waiting for the Great Leap Forward'

no you just misread the drift in the thread.
My reply wasn't to the OP (Otter covered that just fine), it was to Ravenlost who said "the best dog for ANY situation is a MUTT you rescued from the shelter." If she had said the best dog for the OP's situation, or the best for her own situation, then I probably wouldn't have posted anything. But she made an absolute statement that was absolutely wrong. Allowing it to stand unchallenged could very well lead some people to believe it. With your experience, you know as well as I do that trying to force a square peg dog into a round hole job results in misery for dog & owner until the dog is either put down or dumped at the pound.

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

I have an OCD toddler on speed. He is a hand full. Love him to death, such a sweet dog when he decides to come home. He showed up one morning and has adopted me to feed him and give him a safe place to sleep. I also have a beagle she is a sweet killer the best mouser I have ever had, she catches mice and eats them and the poops way down on the bottom land out of the way. Then comes home and cuddles and wants her tummy rubbed. I also have her off spring a 55 gallon drum with legs. He is something else.
And of course my two old girls, boxers. They are almost 11 years old. And one kat just to keep Oggie happy.

I keep them all inside at night as the coyotes are getting real bad here. I came home the other night around 8PM and had three in my driveway and saw two more tails disappearing on my skid road. I am carrying my Ruger mark 3 pistol with CCI Raptors just in case I come on the coyotes.

One of the neighbors was attacked by coyotes while he was on his ATV he ran over two of them. He went home and got his gun but they were gone.

As far a which is best I agree with Otter except I don’t look for any dog they just show up and I do the best with what I get.

We have a Lab/Cheseapeake/? mix, now 10 years young, great homesteading dog!!! I was just looking at pictures of him lying on our front deck, with chickens all around him. They had no fear of him as they knew he wouldn't hurt them. One even stood on top of him. Our Sam is also wired, very fast still, and no one can tell how old he is. He is just like your dog, stays home, barks when people walk onto our property or drive in, doesn't bother our pets, but likes to play with our cats on occasion (they do likewise). I really like the fact he look so sweet and loveable, which is very misleading to people. Any threat and that dog changes instantly into a very aggressive protector. Purposely, we only have one dog. When Sam gets a few years older, we will get another to keep him company until he is gone.

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Christie Acres
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She looks like a border terrier and that's her dominate trait, but I seriously doubt she's pure bred. Like all my dogs, they are mixed breed mutts, taken out of bad situations or homeless and they work their rears off out here protecting chickens and the homestead.

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Our website promoting the use of Missouri Herbs. www.MissouriHerbs.com

Sorry Folks You CAN get any dog you want from a shelter or free, you just cant get it WHEN you feel like it it takes a bit of time,the rarer the longer of course.
As for those that think they need a purebred, have you never heard of Hybrid Vigor?

I haven't yet read the other replies so if this is somehow a repeat then sorry about that.

If I were you I'd go to the local shelter and see if there's a mutt that looks like Old Yeller. We don't own a dog like this but our neighbor does and it's a great dog that pulls double duty on protecting the premises by barking and keeping strange stuff at a distance. She shows up here almost every late afternoon and stays until well after dark, barking at anything that shouldn't be here. We really appreciate the way she has assumed guard dog duty here. I think she knows we needed a part time dog and was happy to oblige.

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There are endless combinations of truth.

No you just use 20 dogs to get done all the jobs that could be done by 1 good cur dog. Fact is you don't need a specialist. It doesn't take a whole lot of dog to move a cow or six on ten acres, but it takes a whole lot of well bred dog to round up & move six hundred on ten thousand acres. If you'd ever been involved in that kind of cowboying, you'd know you can't just pick up any cur or heeler from the pound and get that kind of dog. And sure as heck can't do it with some old labXgolden or schnoodle or rottador or what ever the flavor of the month is. Again it doesn't take much dog to chase that chicken killing fox off your ten acres. But it takes a whole lot of dog in a small package to go down a hole and kill him.
Could you find such dogs at shelters? Yes, IF you have unlimited range (everyone will adopt to you no matter where in the country), unlimited return policy (everyone will let you bring back every slightly chewed or beat down dog that couldn't or wouldn't do the job AND continue to let you adopt), unlimited funding (everyone will refund 100% of adoption fees on every return) and unlimited time (you can afford to waste 3months to a year on every single dog that couldn't cut it because getting the job done isn't that important).

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

First, hybrid vigor is mostly a myth. Mutts carry all the health problems common to all common breeds. Only F1 (first generation) crosses between different TYPES produce hybrid vigor. For example a heelerXgreyhound or bulldogXcurdog will suppress health problems of both because they don't have the same problems, but mastiffXdane is just as unhealthy as either because they both have the same health problems. Anytime you get beyond the F1 cross your genes align unpredictably and all the health problems you thought you got rid of show back up. And you NEED well bred purebreds to produce the F1 crosses in the first place.
Second, in order to find exactly what you're looking for at a shelter all of these stars have to align
The breed or cross has to become popular enough in your area to wind up in the shelter instead of resold on Craigslist
The shelter has to be willing to adopt to a working home
And the dog you adopt has to be a worker and not a cull

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

Yes. We rehomed one of our Great Pyrenees because he was not a good guardian dog and was not good with other animals. He went to a home specifically to be a pet with no other animals. So yeah...someone got a beautiful pure bred GP, but not one that was good for guarding.

Ours is awesome as well as you could read on my post in the goat section about being worried.

You guys do know you can get a dog givin to you before it goes to the pound?

When someone needs/wants a dog for a specific purpose, why would they need to wait for someone to discard a dog for whatever reason when they can go to a reputable and established breeder who breeds dogs for the very purpose they need? When you can see the parents and their temperaments, when the dogs have been health tested?

I've adopted shelter dogs as pets, but if someone wants a poodle because they love poodles and they can't find what they want in a shelter, I have no problems with that. When people let dogs and cats indiscriminately breed, yeah...I have problems with that.

We have 96 acres, not 10. We have horses, but you're right...I've never been a cowboy. I'm a farm girl. My Daddy did raise a few Angus for meat when I was a kid, along with pigs, chickens, turkeys, ducks, goats, and a mule for plowing the garden. We had a registered English Springer Spaniel that was given to us because she was gun shy. We also had a lot of mutts growing up. They kept a good eye on the place, were good alarm systems and I'm pretty sure that was what the OP was asking about!

Mutts are trained to be police dogs, service dogs, etc. Just because they're mutts doesn't make them stupid.

My apologies for setting you off with my first post in this thread. I was merely responding to the OP's question. You are now beating a dead horse and I do not understand why you harass me every time I post about dogs. It's happened in other forums and I do not appreciate it. Although you would like to make me out to be an idiot, I'm not. I've had a lifelong (53 years) involvement with MUTTS and you, dear sir, or not an expert on them. Please stop harassing me.

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I'm running so far behind I thought I was first!

http://hickahala.blogspot.com/

Yeah, so far no one in IA or NY has given me a good wolfing July or Goodman. I even KNOW people that breed, hunt and sell them. I did get a greyhoundX for free on the condition that I hunt him. However he turned out to have a horrible run up & blows the turns something terrible. So not exactly the superstar you'd have us believe we can get for free.
The closest I've come to what you're talking about is a dogo breeder in Argentina offering to sell me two pups for the price of one, and a ridgeback breeder offering me a pup at about 70% off as long as it is primarily a hunter. Now I do know other folks that would loan me a dog til I got one raised up and working. But all of that comes from long term relationships. Dogs from free to good home adds are just as much a crap shoot as any shelter, maybe worse because the shelter is more likely to be honest about the dogs' faults.

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

I suppose it depends on if you have more time or money.

Ya gotta get the word out to lots of folks and be patient !

Being mutts doesn't make them stupid, but it sure as heck doesn't make them perfect for every dog job under the sun anymore than any given purebred is perfect for every job under the sun. And every time you (or anyone else for that matter) make a false statement asserting such, I'll call you on it.
I've personally owned, worked or handled at least 300 dogs in my lifetime (over 40 years and more than 35 years of dogging). most were hunting dogs (most of those were cur dogs), pit bulldogs, or cow dogs (also mostly cur dogs). I've only dabbled in sighthounds, scent hounds and nontraditional hunting breeds (like my Dane that I originally got to be a playmate for my greyX). I've volunteered at shelters in VA, NC & TX. On top of my personal experience, I have access to the accumulated knowledge of half a dozen uncles and cousins with more than 400 years of combine cow & hunting dog experience. I also have access to my adopted brother & his dad with a combined 80-90 years of experience raising and training pointers & setters. In my circle of friends I have two guys with about 50-60 years experience in dogo argentinos, a guys with over 20 years hunting ridgebacks, a hogdogger with more than 30 years experience with American bulldogs (including some of the most famous dogs in the breed), a wolfer with more than 40 years in foxhounds & sighthounds and 20 years in terriers for coon, two other wolfers with more than 60 years combined in foxhounds, three other wolfers with more than 120 years combined in sighthounds, an author with more than 45 years experience in sighthounds, a dozen houndsmen with 30-50 years each running cats or bears, a cur dogger with more than 60 years of running cat, fox and bear, a dozen cur doggers with 30-70 years of hunting & cowboying. ALL of them AND myself have turned shelter/free to good home rejects into working dogs. All of us have stories of unexpected but pretty good dogs, but for every story like that we have a dozen or more that simply couldn't make the grade as a solid income producing working dog. But not a single one of us would advocate going to the shelter for dogs to fill a highly demanding specialized job.
On top of that, for the last 15 years I've been discussing cross breeding with over a dozen British lurchermen and Australian & Kiwi hog doggers. From them I've gained a wealth of knowledge of what specific breeds throw in specific crosses.
I don't need to be an expert on horses to know that using a thoroughbred for logging & plowing is a waste of oats. Not that anyone can be an expert on mutts since their scatterbred multibreed background prevents any consistent looks, health, personality or performance.

ETA as far as the OP goes, I agree with you that they can probably find what they're looking for at the shelter.

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

You obviously missed the point. Getting a free dog is one thing. Getting a GOOD free dog in a rustic working breed of a relatively small population requires developing a long term relationship. Most people that need a superior working dog don't have years to wait to develop that relationship and then spend years developing that dog. Most people that need a superior working dog get the next prospect when there are enough good years left in their current dog to train two or three dogs.

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it's not a sport unless the animal can kill you back

be polite, be professional, but have a plan to kill everybody you meet

I'll use my catahoula breed as an example. 1 out of 10 will work hogs/cattle. 1 out of maybe 20 will be extremely driven/obsessed with working livestock. I would say my current dog isn't the 1 out of 20...he's the 1 out of 10. He does need more work exposure to livestock to make a good dog. If you run cattle, then you need 3 cur dogs which is the industry standard. If you like Australian cattle dogs...I would say 1 out of 30 will make a good controllable cow dog. Too many of them bite without thinking or direction. As for pit bulls, you can pretty much go to the shelter and do an evaluation and take home one that wants to catch hogs but you can't do that with American Bulldogs..you have to make sure the pup comes from working parents directly or else, you'll just end up with a pup that is a good guard dog but not much else.

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Ted H

You may all go to Hell, and I will go to Texas.
-Davy Crockett