I wanted to look up what kind of dogs the vikings had in order to make a historically accurate shitpost meme, but while googling “viking dog”, figuring I’d find pictures of some kind of big cool war dogs or dogs used for hunting moose and bear, but instead I found this
the noble vallhund
herder of cows and biter of ankles
This is literally a viking corgi.
The Pembroke Welsh Corgi developed starting roughly 1,000 years ago from a mix of the 3,000yo breed that was the historical Cardigan Welsh Corgi (first brought to Wales with Celtic groups emigrating from continental Europe), and Spitz type dogs that were brought in with the Viking raids 1,000 years ago.
Corgis are a mix of Viking and Celt, and that’s neat. The vallhund is literally very close family to at least the Pembroke corgi.
There are a number of Scandinavian dog breeds that might be also associated with Vikings, most of which are spitzen. The Norrbottenspetz, Karelian Bear Dog, Finnish Lapphund, Icelandic Shepherd, Finnish Spitz, etc.
Special additional shout out for the Norwegian Lundehund, which was developed to hunt puffins. (Lunde means puffin). They look like a generic medium dog at first.
Except they have secret weapons just for clambering over rocks to get puffins. They have six fully-formed and muscled toes per foot, as well as extreme range of motion in their joints.
And there’s your lesson in weird Viking dogs.
The extra-toed puffin dog I only ever heard about in an encyclopedia of dog breeds until now. They’re very rare!
These dogs all fill the “stereotypical dog shape” to a fault.
The dog in the middle, the Entlebucher sennenhund, is the only one not common… anywhere, really. While both the beagle (in America at least) and the lab, are very popular family dogs.
Other than the shape, these three breeds are completely different, with the beagle being a tracking hunting dog/scenthound, the sennenhund is a cattle herder, and the Labrador retriever is a retrieving bird dog.
I think it would be neat if the Entlebucher got more popular, as while it is rather stubborn, noisy and energetic and not for everyone, I’m pretty positive it would make a better companion/family dog than the beagle.
For people who work with dogs: what are your favorite and least favorite breeds to work with?
My least favorite is definitely miniature pinschers and I’d say my favorites are Dobermans and border collies
Least favourite are probably German shepherds or sharpeis. Favourites are basically any mastiff breed
Least favorites: Sharpeis, basset hounds, bulldogs, pugs.
Favorite: “deer dogs” (a popular blend of foxhound, coonhound, large beagle, and whatever else the breeder thought would run deer well), beagles, huskies, German shepherds, jack russells, poodles… Honestly, I just love most dogs
Favorite: funky little mixes like a Brussels/Pug mix who I affectionately call “my little potato” or an unexpectedly sweet Shiba/Sharpei mix; calm doodles that crawl up into your lap; Goldens; beagles; whippets and greyhounds; Boxers; chill small shepherd mixes, big goofy Pits … pretty much any dog with a gentle or just overwhelmingly happy demeanor.
Least favorite: Rottweilers, Shiba Inus, Sharpeis, Chow Chows, Cane Corsos, English Bulldogs, Huskies, smelly and oozy aged Pugs, anything super drooly, anything that Won’t Stop Bouncing or mouthing, anything aggressive and fearful to strangers to a point you can’t even touch them. I’m worried about how the pandemic dogs are going to turn out for sure, behavior-wise.
