Comments on: Top Dog

By: Bryan

Bryan — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 05:10:33 +0000

The only problem with a normal herding German Shepherd is that it will accept children into the flock, but has a tendency not to want them to leave. It’s no fun being treated like a sheep.

By: hipparchia

hipparchia — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 04:27:17 +0000

our family dogs were all of the hunting varieties -- lab, pointer, spaniel, beagles. not because any of us ever hunted, or wanted to, but with neighborhood kids running in and out of the house all day every day, the dogs had to be unfailingly friendly to complete strangers and have very low prey drives. so no german shepherds, elkhounds, airedales, etc need apply, much as we all admired many of those breeds. hipparchia´s last blog post..

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 16:00:16 +0000

In one sense all dogs are “hounds”, because hound is the basically the root Germanic word for dog that morphed through Anglo-Saxon to English, and dog actually was once indicative of males only.

There should be a differentiation between the breeds that merely seek prey, like the setters and retrievers, and those that actually bred to kill the prey, like the dachshunds, wolfhounds, deerhounds, and elkhounds.

I grew up with German Shepherds, so they are my basic concept of a dog, and these were herding dogs, reduced to herding my brothers and me.

By: hipparchia

hipparchia — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 07:13:48 +0000

true, spaniels and setters were the same breed at one time. coat colors for irish setter red and the various livers, chocolates, deadgrass browns, etc are probably different genetically. and no tail docking in any of the setters. spaniels may yowl, but there's just no replicating the true baying of the scenthounds. we had beagles when we were kids, it's still one of my favorite sounds. dachshunds are definitely earthdogs, not hounds, and compete in earthdog trials now [yay!], even if they're still shown in the hound group in the ring. probably some dufus mistranslated the german hund. hipparchia´s last blog post..

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 06:33:51 +0000

I don’t know, LK, I’ve run into a number of dachshunds who have more than their share of attitude. [I know, you would expect they would be in the terrier group, but they got stuck in hound.]

By: Lab Kat

Lab Kat — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 05:30:19 +0000

I always root from someone from the hound group, just because they can never be snooty. Lab Kat´s last blog post..Spontaneous, live stupidity

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 04:50:37 +0000

They can call it “golden liver” but it’s reddish brown, and they dock the tails like other spaniels. Would “muddy Irish setter” make you happier, because they were probably derived from the same breeding stock, like all of the UK breeds.

Leave a spaniel alone for a few hours and you will hear all the yowling you want. Jill.

By: cookie jill

cookie jill — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 03:50:37 +0000

I miss Uno and his baying! OOOOOOHHHHHHWWWWWWWHHHHHHOOOOOOO. cookie jill´s last blog post..What a Nut Job

By: hipparchia

hipparchia — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 03:33:19 +0000

dude! they're way different in looks! starting with coat color. but yeah, that's what i said too, let's hear it for the old guy! hipparchia´s last blog post..