The work of working dogs

In the upper echelons of the dog culture in this country is the notion of working dogs.  These animals are spoken of as proof of their breeding program's success and further proof of the novelty that form meets function. This of course for most "working" programs is a load of hooey - their programs rarely meets the sniff test. There are thousands of people in this country who claim to breed working dogs - the grand majority of them rarely work their dogs and fewer yet select their dogs based upon that work.

For those uninitiated a working dog is an animal that performs a function in exchange for it's keep. Anything short of this is a pet with a hobby. The depth of the level of that hobby is entirely dependent on the owner.

If one sees a police dog - it is a dog trained to a task. If the dog cannot perform that task it is typically sold, retrained, retired, or euthanized. It is a true working dog with all the selection pressures that should apply to a working dog. Perform or perish

A dog running agility is rarely a working dog - unless it's ability to run agility is how it keeps it's home. It is a more often than not a pet with a hobby.

A dog that herds domesticated sheep around a round pen two days a month is not a working dog. It's feed bill is not paid as a result of the work it does. The dog that does this task day in day out in exchange for a spot on the farm is the working dog.

A therapy dog is almost never a working dog. It is almost always a pet with a hobby. If the dog fails at being a service dog it is rarely if ever a deal breaker on it's home.


If you do not select for a trait it is lost - typically within 2 or 3 generations. This means that dogs who are primarily bred for show are more often than not worthless in their professed fields. One only need looks at what is winning in labs to see a fat dog who has never seen a live bird let alone a freshly dead one. Probably has never heard a gun shot either or sat silently tucked under a soggy bench in a blind waiting for the ducks to answer the call. Most photos with show labs on a bird are labs with frozen dead chukars or quail - which are easily purchased as snake food at any pet store.

So my answer to where to find a working dog for you dear reader is to find someone who actually does with their dog what you are wanting to do and has a breeding program at least partially based on that function and preferably with a side of health testing. Use breed as a footnote to the decision because more often than not the right dog is the right dog irregardless of breed or how many ribbons that breeder has.