Tools...Toys...or Recreational Pets?

I really like this discussion and there are some great posts. Good topic!

I rais all puppies like pets. Not in the house and all that, but still like pets. They get to run free until they get to the point they are leaving off in the bottoms in the mornings and stayin gone for hours at a time, then they get put up in a kennel. They get to get out most days and have some supervised play time when I'm feeding cows, or working in the shop, or whatever, but only when Im staying at the house. When they are around six months or so, they can go on a chain to open the kennels up for a bitch thats in heat or more puppies.

All my cur dogs are strictly tools as soon as they start hitting the woods. I have one 5 yr old cur dog, that Ive had for four years, let come with me when Im out of town and she gets to sleep with me when Im not staying at home, but she is still strictly a tool in the woods. She is a loose loose dog and never gets hurt, so I feel like I can get more attached to her and not be too worried about the heart brake.

My catch dogs are pets when at home, one is always outside, one is inside at night because my girlfriend feels safer with him in the house. They are tools when in the woods. I get extremely attached to them, but not until I see that they will lay it all out on the line for me. I think that is what makes me like the cd's so much, because if I could really help it, I wouldn't show any emotion to them because they are a heart brake waiting to happen. But the fact that that dog will stand in its own guts for me, just really makes me love the number 2 out of them lol.

When in the woods, my cd are tools. Even though they are pets at home, I can separate the working dog from the pet dog when hunting. And I ask a lot more of my catch dogs than most people do, like going to bays half a mile away, or being a rcd. Had my male, the one that stays inside, get a nick this past fall and it cut the vein in his shoulder. He about bled out on the hog, we broke him off, tied the hog, carried him out and got him to the vet. He wasn't conscious at this point and didn't really think he would make it, went back to the woods, got the hog out and went and caught the next pigs that the cur dogs already had bayed up. Luckily they got him fixed up and he made it.

So yes, I can keep hunting when something happens to a dog, even if they are a pet. I know its part of the job, and I go in with realistic expectations no matter how I feel about the dog.

I don't think having the dogs as pets clouds my judgment, because they really have to prove themselves before I like them that much. Its just hard for me to get attached to a number 2ty performing animal, weather it be a horse or dog or whatever. Its the performance that makes me so attached to them. In fact, a dog I like a lot because of their personality, can make me despise them for poor performance.

I had a cur dog that I really like, but he was still just a tool. He was a tool to the point that I couldn't even get him to take a T-bone steak out of my hand. I would have to toss it on the ground to him, or he wouldn't eat it, no matter what I was trying to give him. I cried like a baby when that dog got killed.

So I think its really the performance that gets me so attached to the dogs. I don't know, maybe Im way off base here compared to most people. But I don't have any animals that don't serve a functional purpose. If they can't do their job, they can't be a pet either.