Dear Keiva: I subscribe to Smithsonian Magazine, but missed that article, for which I thank you. But even that article does not mention their being domesticated. If they were, it would be extremely surprising that they were not found throughout America. I have read that the Indians in Northeast were terrified by the colonists' mastiffs. They must have acquired dogs soon after Europeans arrived though. They would have been very valuable for warning of approach of hostile Indians. I have never heard of the Indians using the dogs for hunting. I have heard of them being eaten by the Indians when food was scarce.Actually, I am surprised that small dogs like that would not have been wiped out by wolves. Maybe that was what limited them to the South.