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Rottie Powers - International Dog of Mystery

© Wendy Smith

I love mystery novels, especially those with a canine twist. And one of my favorite mystery writers is Susan Conant, whose main character is Holly Winter, a writer for a dog magazine who is also the extremely proud owner of two Malamutes. Toward the end of Conant's book "Bloodlines," we find Holly paying a visit to a minor character in the novel. On this visit, Holly finds that, low and behold, this woman has bought a terrier-mix puppy. She complements the cute pup and asks the woman if she knows what type of mix the puppy is. The woman gives Holly (who has been practically raised in the world of show dogs) a condescending look and announces that the pup is a rare "standard Chihuahua" not often seen in this country. Holly decides to just be happy that the woman has found a good companion, and lets the subject drop.

This story might be fictional, but it reminds me of something that does happen with Rottweilers and I'm sure with other purebreds as well. On the Rottie email list that I am a part of, we occasionally hear a story that sounds something like this:

A Rottie person sees someone walking either a Rottie-mix or a very poorly bred dog; it seems that one time the dog in question had long, curly hair. When the Rottie person asks about the dog out of curiosity, the owner gives him or her the same look the woman in the Conant book gives and informs them that the dog is the type of Rottweiler that is bred in another country. For example, a person might say it's a Russian Rottweiler or a South African Rottweiler, about which, for some reason, I've heard about several times.

So, what is the deal with these dogs? Isn't it reasonable that perhaps another country looks for different traits in their Rottweilers than we do here?

Of course it would be reasonable to say that two populations of the same breed of dog, separated by thousands of miles, would eventually start to look different if there was nothing to interfere. Eventually, they might even become two separate breeds.

But, luckily for us, there IS something to interfere and keep Rottweilers looking like Rottweilers, no matter what country they are from.

The Federation Cynologique Internationale (FCI) was formed in 1911 to address just that issue. The FCI is an organization with 79 member countries from across the globe. Russia and South Africa are both members, I might add. It recognizes 330 breeds of dog.