Best kinds of dogs if you want chickens too?

[Nalu]

I have two big dogs. One is a heeler/pointer mix male,(hunting breed but never trained to hunt), and the other is a yellow lab/german shephard mix female. Neither of which is probably the best breed with chickens, however, I spent ALOT of time with them training and have had no problems. I think the key is letting the dogs know the chickens are now part of "the pact". I did that when we got 2 kittens too and it worked. Both my dogs are 3 years old, young but not puppies. For the first several weeks I let them all out side together, but didn't let the dogs out of my sight. I didn't let the chickens freerange until they were full grown about 7 months. I got them as chicks and had them inside in a box. I let the dogs sniff them periodically and they watched them grow up. When I first let the chickens out, the dogs got excited, mostly the pointer/heeler. But more because they thought they had new friends to play with, like the cats, than a malicious sort of thing. I followed the dogs like a hawk and scolded when they got too close. On the third day, the pointer got out of my sight briefly as I answered the phone, and I found him mouthing the chicken. He certainly could have killed it, but he was sort of scooting it, like he was playing. I scolded him strongly, gave him a time out locked in the garage the rest of the day, and "he got it". No more episodes. This was aboout a year ago and I now leave them all outside together and the dogs seem oblivious to the chickens. Once in a while The heeler/pointer will "herd" a loose chicken that gets separated from the others back to her flock, but that's a heeler's nature to "herd" things. I've heard a lot of theories like "You can never train a bird dog to not to kill a chicken", but I think it is possible especially if you start with baby chicks and teach the dog they are now part of the "pact". That's my experience.
Aloha, Angela