#wolfdog misrepresentation

This is a really great question and I think to best answer it we have to look at the history of Czechslovakian wolfdogs as a breed. The breed started as an experiment in the 1950’s, when the Czechoslovakian military was looking for a new breed of dog to patrol their borders during the Cold War. They aimed to hybridize German Shepherds with wild Carpathian wolves to create an animal with the physical characteristics of a wolf but the temperament and trainability of a dog. The first (F1 and F2) hybrids of these pairings were for the most part far too unruly and unsuitable for training, so the hybrids were painstakingly backcrossed with dogs for more than 25 years to select for individuals that looked like wolves but behaved like dogs. It took a lot of time, but by the 80’s Czechoslovakian wolfdogs were officially declared their own breed!

Although they do look more like wolves than most dog breeds, CSWs are genetically much closer to a dog than a wolf. This is due to the extensive genetic backcrossing with domestic canines that happened early on in their breed history. A study comparing the genetic makeup of the Czechoslovakian Wolfdog to both Carpathian wolves and German Shepherds found that the so called wolfdogs are, genetically speaking, really just dogs. I personally don’t mind calling these dogs “wolfdog” because as you said, the word is right there in the name of the breed, and it does pay homage to their interesting origins! However, I do think it is good to make it very clear to people that these pups are truly NOT wolves. They are dogs that have been carefully bred to look like wolves while maintaining the behavioral traits of domestication, and this is what separates them from true wolfdog crosses that we see today.

For reference, here is a picture of a Czechoslovakian wolfdog and the study that I mentioned (excellent read!)

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Hey everyone, in case you haven’t seen this already please look. Here’s another reason why misrepresentation is dangerous; dogs getting falsely labeled as wolfdogs in places where owning one isn’t legal, because people don’t know what a real wolfdog looks like anymore.

Meet Capone. Capone is most likely a shepherd/lab mix who got out on February 24th, and was picked up by animal control in Aurora, CO. He was labeled as a wolfdog by the “experts” in the city’s animal control division, which are completely illegal to own in the city. When asked what “wolf traits” he has, the family was told Capone was aggressive and “has physical and behavioral traits of a wolf” without any further explanation. Capone now faces the very real possibility of being euthanized, or possibly re-homed/rescued and never seeing his family again. They’ve had Capone for 10 years, adopting him as a shepherd/lab mix, and he has never had a history of aggression that the animal control officers claimed. Right now his family is taking it very hard, as the children are used to sleeping with him every night. A DNA sample was sent to UC Davis for testing, which will determine Capone’s fate.

Please click here to sign the petition to show your support for getting Capone back.

Read more here, here, and here.

It’s Karma the husky all over again. As long as people continue to misrepresent their dogs as wolfdogs, people will continue to have a loose understanding of what an actual wolfdog is, and mislabel dog-dogs. We will continue to see these cases so long as people put their egos before their animals’ safety. This is why fighting back against misrepresentation is so important. It’s not to put people down, it’s to save lives. Wolfdogs are not legal to own everywhere, even if it’s legal in your state, as demonstrated by this case. Wolfdogs are also not legally protected as far as rabies is concerned; if they bite someone, they will be euthanized and tested for rabies whether or not they have had the rabies vaccine. Wolfdogs cannot be adopted out from shelters, and may be euthanized before rescues can get them. Wolfdog rescues are likewise constantly overflowing with requests to take in new animals, whether it’s a mislabeled dog or an actual wolfdog, which are very difficult to re-home due to both legalities and the minimum requirements for owning a wolfdog.

Today I had to teach two people about how wolf dogs actually work, the Russian fox thing not being a domestication experiment, and that chihuahuas are not related to Fennec Foxes.