Credit people coming together for a common cause, national pride, and the power of the Internet for establishing the Danish-Swedish Farmdog in the United States. The small working breed, often called the “DSF,” was also known as the Little Big Dog. They eliminated vermin and served as watchdogs on the family farm. Today, this friendly, easygoing breed enjoys participating in all performance events and knows when to settle down with its people at home.
The Danish-Swedish Farmdog’s Viking Beginnings
Although the breed’s exact origin is unknown, dog skeletons found in Viking burial sites from the Middle Ages resemble Farmdogs. According to Norse mythology, the Vikings valued their canine hunting companions and believed that burying their dogs with them helped guide their passage through the afterlife.
Typical Danish-Swedish Farmdogs may have originated in old Denmark, in the southern County of Skane, part of the historical region of Skaneland. This region includes the southernmost Swedish provinces of Blekinge, Halland, and Scania.
All-Around Farm Worker
The breed has worked alongside farmers on small rural farms in Scandinavia for centuries as a multipurpose barnyard dog. Although herding was not the dogs’ primary function on the farm, they could move stock around,” says Carey Segebart, 2025 President of the Danish-Swedish Farmdog Club of America.
The DSF performed multiple jobs around the farm. It was a hunting companion and a watchdog, alerting the family with a single bark when an intruder wandered onto the property. The dog announced a stranger’s presence rather than chasing the person away. Breeders maintained the dog’s friendly, outgoing, tail-wagging temperament without reservation or shyness.
Lively and easy to train, the breed doubled as a circus performer as the clown’s sidekick. Until 1960, this compact breed appeared throughout Denmark and southern Sweden.
The breed specialized in keeping vermin away from stables and houses and serving as loyal family companions. “At the end of the day, the farmer would take the dog inside the house,” Segebart says.
Once known as the “Danish Pinscher,” the DSF belongs to a group of German dog breeds developed to pursue and catch vermin on the farm. The word “Pinscher” comes from the French words, “pincer”, which means “to seize” and “to nip,” or “to bite and to grip.”
Before 1987, Danish-Swedish Farmdogs were called the “Skansk Terrier” in Denmark.
Near Extinction in Scandinavia
Industrialization began in Denmark in the 1870s. This meant fewer small farms and more families moving to the cities. Danish-Swedish Farmdogs were no longer needed, and the breed’s population drastically declined.
Fortunately, some people continued breeding these dogs in small numbers. In the 1980s, Danish Kennel Club members realized that the hard-working breed generations had depended upon was on the verge of extinction. Joining with the Swedish Kennel Club, the two clubs worked together to save the little farmer’s dog.
Registering the First DSFs
To register dogs, the Denmark and Sweden’s Clubs worked together to certify the dogs as a DSF. “If the dog didn’t have a pedigree, it needed to exhibit the qualities of the breed’s appearance based on structure, breed type, and temperament,” Segebart says.
The clubs registered these dogs as Danish-Swedish Farmdogs and in 1986, 100 dogs were approved and recorded in the Swedish Kennel Club. In 1987, the first 130 Farmdogs were registered in the Danish Kennel Club’s registry. The breed was shown for the first time at the World Dog Show held in Denmark in 1989.
The two clubs worked cooperatively and gained Federation Cynologique Internationale (FCI) recognition on a provisional basis in 2008. The breed was fully recognized in 2019 with the FCI.
DSFS in the U.S.
When families emigrated to the U.S. from Scandinavia, they likely brought their dogs, including DSFs. Melody Farquhar-Chang of Cupertino, California, was one of the first to import a Danish-Swedish Farmdog to the U.S. in 1998. Helene Riisgaard-Pedersen of Wyoming followed by importing “Javika’s Prinsesse Madeleine” from Denmark in 1999, and Brita Lemmon of Seal Beach, California, imported “Gonzo’s Folmer (Vago)” from Denmark in 2000.
Lemmon’s breeder, Lilian Christensen, introduced her to Farquhar-Chang and later Riisgaard-Pedersen. They shared their passion for the breed over the Internet, and their email friendship led to the formation of a DSF Club in 2003.
The three women maintained contact with the breeders who helped them acquire their dogs.
The club ushered the DSF’s entry into the AKC Foundation Stock Service (FSS) in 2011. A second club was formed, and the two merged as the official AKC Danish-Swedish Farmdog Club of America. In 2021, the breed joined the Miscellaneous Class and received full AKC recognition in the Working Group in 2025.
The DSF frequently appears in folk and fine art paintings, prints, illustrations, and stock images. “When people see a Danish-Swedish Farmdog for the first time, they usually ask or assume it’s a Rat Terrier, Beagle, or a Jack Russell Terrier,” says Aimee Parramore Kincaid, former President of the Danish-Swedish Farmdog Club of America. “The DSF is not a Terrier, but a Pinscher-type dog most likely descended from Pinscher-Fox Terrier crosses,”
From an all-purpose farm dog to an all-around performance dog, the Danish-Swedish Farmdog is passionate about all sports.
“My dogs can participate in Conformation, AKC Obedience, dock diving, tracking, herding, AKC Rally, and AKC Agility,” Segebart says. “Our only limit is running out of time to do everything, but the dogs are versatile and always ready to do it all.”
