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Dogs

444 photos across 77 breeds

🐕 Dogs have lived alongside people longer than any other domesticated animal — the archaeological record puts the relationship at fifteen thousand years at least, and probably a good deal longer. Everything that followed is selective breeding, which is why a chihuahua and a great dane are the same species.

That range is the point when choosing one. Breed is a reasonable predictor of size, coat and exercise need, and a rough predictor of temperament, but it says less than people expect about an individual dog. A working line and a show line of the same breed can want very different lives — a field-bred English springer spaniel and a show-bred one are barely the same proposition.

🧠 What a breed was made to do is the most reliable predictor there is, and it is the one people discount. A terrier bred to kill vermin will kill vermin. A livestock guardian bred to make its own decisions at three in the morning will make its own decisions. A bloodhound will take its nose over your recall, and a border collie with nothing to herd will find something. None of that can be trained out; it can only be given somewhere to go.

⏱️ Size is not the same as exercise need, and the two get confused constantly. A greyhound is a big dog that sleeps most of the day and wants two decent walks. A jack russell terrier weighs six kilos and will still be looking for something to do at ten o'clock at night. If you are choosing by how much dog fits in the house, you are answering the wrong question.

🧬 The three that actually decide it: how many hours a day the dog will have company, how much coat you are willing to deal with for the next twelve years, and how much dog you can physically handle on a lead when it has decided otherwise. Breed follows from those. Almost nobody regrets thinking about them and a great many people regret not.

Any breedLabrador retriever (18)Afghan hound (3)Airedale terrier (3)Akita (3)Alaskan Klee Kai (3)Alaskan malamute (3)American bulldog (3)American eskimo dog (3)American hairless terrier (3)American pit bull terrier (3)Aussiedoodle (3)Australian cattle dog (3)+168 more — use the search

Dogs, newest first

Frankie, a dachshund

Dachshund

Frankie insists on the deepest snow available and then disappears into it entirely.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Chester, a chesapeake bay retriever

Chesapeake bay retriever

Chester goes in for one stick and comes back out with the largest branch available.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Tank, a bulldog

Bulldog

Tank stands in front of the sprinkler and waits for it to come round again. Every time.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Rocky, a boxer

Boxer

Rocky has been at war with the bubbles since June and is not currently winning.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Bea, a boston terrier

Boston terrier

Bea built the fort, demolished the fort, and is now on her way to tell me about it.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Skye, a border collie

Border collie

Skye jumped straight through the leaves I had just finished piling up, and would like another go.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Hugo, a brussels griffon

Brussels griffon

Hugo stands on the trunk because it makes him taller than the dog next door.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Gus, a bloodhound

Bloodhound

Gus found something by the beech tree this morning and we did not see him again until noon.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Titan, a cane corso

Cane corso

Titan crosses the courtyard after rain as though he owns the building, which he believes he does.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Bianca, a bull terrier

Bull terrier

Bianca has never once caught a bubble, and has never let that discourage her.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Caesar, a bullmastiff

Bullmastiff

Caesar picked the warmest flagstone on the terrace and defends it from the cat nightly.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Bertie, a basset hound

Basset hound

Bertie has picked up a scent, and the ears are simply along for the ride.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Rusty, a australian cattle dog

Australian cattle dog

Rusty is supposed to be helping with the sheep. Rusty is in the river.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Ranger, a black and tan coonhound

Black and tan coonhound

Ranger stops on that rock every morning to check who else has been down to the water.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Nero, a belgian malinois

Belgian Malinois

Nero has never once used the stepping stones.

FrostyOtter · 6 days ago

Before you get a dog

  • Time, not space, is the real constraint. Most breeds cope with a flat and a routine; almost none cope with eight hours alone every weekday.
  • Exercise needs vary enormously and are the most commonly underestimated figure. A border collie or a dalmatian needs two hours and a job; a bulldog needs two short walks and shade.
  • Grooming is a running cost. A poodle needs professional clipping every six to eight weeks for life and a bichon frise every four to six, and a double-coated breed will cover the house twice a year regardless.
  • Flat-faced breeds — bulldogs, French bulldogs, Boston terriers — carry real breathing risk and overheat dangerously fast. It is worth choosing a moderate muzzle within the breed.
  • Ask any breeder which health screening the parents have had, by name: hips, elbows, eyes, heart, and the DNA tests relevant to that breed. A breeder who cannot answer is telling you something.
  • Where the dog comes from matters as much as which breed it is. A puppy that cannot be seen with its mother, in the place it was born, is a puppy to walk away from — and rescue is worth looking at first rather than last, because a five-year-old dog of known temperament is an easier animal than an unknown eight-week-old.
  • Check what is legal where you live. Several of the breeds listed here are banned or licensed in some countries, insurance and rented housing keep their own lists, and none of that is discovered comfortably after the dog arrives.
  • The socialisation window closes early — roughly sixteen weeks — and what a puppy meets calmly in that time it will probably accept for life. It is the one thing that cannot be done later, and it matters more than any obedience class booked for six months' time.
  • Budget for the whole dog, not the purchase. Food, insurance, vaccination, parasite treatment, grooming, kennels or a sitter, and the one unbudgeted veterinary event that most dogs have at some point. The cheapest part of a labrador retriever is the labrador.

General guidance, not veterinary advice. Anything about a specific animal is a question for a vet who has seen it.

Dog breeds worth knowing about

A place to start rather than the whole list. Every name is a page.

  • Labrador retriever

    The most popular dog in most of the English-speaking world, and popular for a reason: biddable, food-motivated and genuinely good-tempered. The catch is appetite — labs gain weight faster than almost any other breed, and a fat lab is a lame lab by ten.

  • German shepherd

    Clever enough to be a problem if underemployed, and the classic case of working and show lines diverging sharply. Ask for hip and elbow scores, and read them against the breed median rather than against zero.

  • French bulldog

    Charming, compact, and the breed that best illustrates why a flat face is a health question rather than a look. Choose the most open nostrils and longest muzzle in the litter, and expect a dog that cannot cope with heat.

  • Border collie

    Two hours daily plus real mental work, which is the part people skip. A collie run for two hours and left with nothing to think about becomes fitter, not calmer.

  • Golden retriever

    Softer and hairier than a labrador, with the same sociability and rather more coat. Cancer rates in the breed are high enough to be worth asking a breeder about directly.

  • Dachshund

    A hound on short legs, with the stubbornness that implies. The long back is the thing: keep it lean, discourage stairs and jumping down from furniture, and know that disc disease is common.

  • Cavalier King Charles spaniel

    As affectionate as any breed going, and burdened with two serious inherited problems — mitral valve disease and syringomyelia. Heart-tested parents are not optional here.

  • Greyhound

    The surprise of the list. Enormously fast for about thirty seconds and then asleep on the sofa for the rest of the day, which makes retired racers one of the easiest large dogs to live with.

Guides for dogs

The subjects that come up on breed page after breed page, written out properly.

All 17 dogs posts on the blog

All 180 dog breeds with photos

Every breed somebody has posted, A to Z.