He showed up at my house last night. I’m looking for his owners but what should I call him in the meantime?
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Pilgrim
Elijah (the prophet who asked the widow for food)
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He shouldn’t be there long. You can see he is obviously loved and cared for.
“Hey you”, “dog”," boy" are all ones we have used for temporary house guests 
No need to get attached.
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I hope you’re right. He’s a bit thin but is clean and is wearing a collar and flea collar. He’s young, about a year in my estimate. He acts like he’s been in a house. I live in a rural area and thought I knew most of the dogs in my neighborhood. I figured he and my pit mix had been playing together and he’d go home last night but he’s still here and shows no inclination to leave. I’m a bit worried about him as he looks remarkably like a coyote and we’re currently in rifle deer season.
Oh dear. He may have chased a deer and be quite far from home, or been dumped. You might need to name him after all!
My in laws kept a stray that was young and thin but it is obvious he had ( at one time) people that loved and trained him. We never found his family.
Did you feed him?
Hard to tell in the photos, but he doesn’t look “skinny” But his coat could be hiding that.
I would try to get him to a vet or someone that can check him for a microchip.
Since there are a few different types/frequencies of chips out there, if you can use a scanner that checks for all types of chips or try a few different ones.
He is cute.
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I wouldn’t be quite so quick to name him.
He looks (& sounds to be acting) like somebody’s pet.
IIWM, I’d call AC to report him found.
Can you house him until owners get the word he’s been found?
If not in your house, an outbuilding?
I had a lovely Golden show up at my farm.
Very friendly, no collar, but did not object to one I cobbled from baling twine.
I walked him about 1/2 mile down my road, but noone seemed to know him.
He overnighted in my garage with water & in the morning I drove him to AC.
He was fine with a car ride too.
The minute I walked him in, staff said they’d just got a call from someone who was missing a Golden.
He’d walked a good 5mi+ from where he lived.
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@2DogsFarm, there is no animal control where I live. We have ac (barely) in the city limits but out here, nada. I have a couple of ideas about where he might have come from but neither of those places have come looking for him. He might have come from my dodgy neighbors but they drive by my house daily and would have seen him. If that’s where he came from I’m not inclined to send him back. I haven’t had time to go check at the other place. I don’t have a place to house him but he doesn’t seem inclined to wander. He’s really a sweet dog, isn’t destructive, doesn’t bother the horses and is only mildly annoying to my other dogs. I brought him in the house briefly and he didn’t try to eat the cats. He’s not lifting his leg yet so may not be a year old.
For now, I’m calling him Toby after the ghost hunting dog from the Rivers of London series. It seems to fit.
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Not sure where you live, but you may want to check the laws on keeping an animal that is not yours.
As for not wanting to give him back to (what you think may be) his owner, that’s not up to you.
You can not just keep someone’s dog 
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I’ve advertised him on several public lost pet groups and on my Facebook page. I know those posts have been shared. I’m not concealing him. I texted one neighbor who said he wasn’t hers. I don’t have the other neighbors number. He’s a registered sex offender and I’ve long suspected them of cooking meth. Plus there are some other sketchy looking people living there so I’m not inclined to go knocking on his door asking if he’s lost a dog. If they show up to claim him, fine. I know he doesn’t belong to my Cajun neighbor because I just talked to him. I live in a very rural area. There are 4 houses on my road and I know the neighborhood dogs. I’ve checked with everyone reasonably close. Dumping dogs is a major problem here as our ac/shelter situation is so poor.
I usually let my pit mix out in the evenings to run. I suspect this dog and my dog met up and started playing and this dog followed mine home. My dog never goes very far from the house so new dog had to be fairly close. I’ve checked with everyone within a 2 mile radius except the sex offender.
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It is really up to the owners to be actively looking for their dog. We had a small, tiny little dog show up at our place that I hung onto for it’s own safety. I contacted the vets and the nearby pound. The owners were looking and after a few days I saw a flyer in town and contacted them.
They lived just down the next road.
If the neighbors own this dog and aren’t even looking nearby they may not even care?
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There’s been more than a dozen dogs in great shape (many with collars) that have shown up at my door. None of them were claimed despite flyers, FB, notifying shelters and vets, etc. None were microchipped either. I kept one, but after a few days I had to take the others to the local shelter.
Around here I think many of their owners have passed away and the family just dumps them. One time I was cutting grass by the road and saw a pickup truck stop in the road, put out a half-grown puppy, and speed off. 
Anyway, I’d call him Jacob for his coat of many colors!
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This summer we had a cute young dog show up at our house. Seemed to be a border collie cross, black and white with a blue eye and floppy ears. No collar, no tattoo. Very friendly. He was also full of fleas, so I didn’t let him in the house. I thought he would soon be on his way (a lot of local dogs visit and then leave) but he stayed the night under our porch.
I called the SPCA to see if anyone had called about a missed dog (yes, but not this one).
I took him to a local vet to see if he had a chip and to get flea meds for him. Gave them a photo to share with other vets etc.
I called the village’s AC, who came, thought they recognized him, and took him away (he was so sad to leave us! lol). Bingo, he belongs to a local family. I should have started with the local AC, lesson learned.
I certainly would not assume he was from only a mile or two away. Going_gray’s dog has been missing since Saturday, so if you assume a scared dog might travel 3-5+ miles/day without a lot of effort, he might very well be from 5-10 miles away or far more; being a little thin might be his normal weight, or the result of a few days being lost.
“Boy” or “Pal” are certainly appropriate names for now. Definitely let vets and shelters know you have him.
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- He’s stinking cute and if he showed up at my house, I’d probably be trying to figure out how he was going to become mine.
(I would call our local Humane Society/Animal Control, with the preface of “He’s staying here till someone claims him” bc I do believe in karma, though.) - Newcomers are always called “Buddy” as in, “Hey Buddy, where’d you come from?” and “Hey Buddy, whatcha doing here?” Proper names wait till said newcomer is officially a member of the household.
No, I have contacted all the neighbors in the immediate area. I know sketchy neighbor has seen him. I had one response to my lost dog post but it wasn’t the right dog. I haven’t seen any posts about anyone looking for him. I haven’t checked for a microchip but I’d be surprised if he had one. Meanwhile he’s settling in here. I brought him inside yesterday as it was cold and raining. He was good in the crate.
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Out dog club gave all kinds of obedience lessons to the public.
There was a lady that bred gorgeous chows, but most of them had a pet rock temperament.
They were not very interactive, they preferred to sit there looking all fluffy to doing most anything, hard to motivate.
One day long before computers and internet one such grown dog did show up at headquarters, miles from anywhere and had to cross canyons and not very dog friendly wildlife, coyotes, bobcats and the occasional mountain lion, not many pets make it.
We called several town’s ACs, we put fliers and notices in the local newspapers and after a few days someone from 20 miles away claimed him.
Since that time, we found out those dogs were escape artists and just left home and kept on wandering, that was not the first one.
ACs were very familiar with them, they told us.
After some years she quit breeding them and eventually we didn’t see any more of those.
Another time we found on the road a beautiful, elegant, obviously well bred Basenji.
I wanted to keep him so badly, but after contacting ACs, the owner called and we were going to town, so took him by.
They had two other Basenjis and all, human and dogs, were so happy he was back with them.
They had a tall wood slat fence, but somehow he had climbed it, maybe from the air conditioning and escaped. We had found him a good 40 miles from home.
I would feel terrible if one of our dogs was missing and we could not find it, would never keep someone else’s dog without being very sure an owner could not be found.
I too saw once someone stop a red pickup in our country road, open a door and dump a young black lab and take off.
Could not get the pickup number, but the dog came to us.
Took him to the sheriff’s office and they never could find an owner.
The local animal shelter has an outside door open 24/7 to a small room full of cages anyone can drop a dog or cat or whatever critter they found or they don’t want it any more.
TV keeps telling people to use that room, so lost or unwanted animals can be safe until next morning someone attends to them, don’t just dump them!
I would still keep looking for the owner for a few more weeks before assuming I could keep a strange animal and hope someone that found one of mine would do that also.
As for a name, Pilgrim sounds good, but Toby is nice also.
Our critters have a way to name themselves if they don’t already come with a name.
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Honestly, as there was a lost dog in this group where the owners checked multiple multiple multiple places for their dog, it’s really disappointing that you haven’t even had him checked for a microchip. It’s wearing a collar and is clean, and apparently used to a house. This is most likely someone’s missing pet.
Can you get to a vet and have him scanned. Since it’s very easy for a dog to travel a good distance, checking with the immediate neighbors is truly the bare minimum effort if you haven’t already scanned for a microchip. Why are you inclined to think he doesn’t have one anyway?
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