Bergamasco

Bergamasco was once a shepherd dog, now used for companionship and as a decorative dog. His fur is felt in characteristic dreadlocks, and since he is a large animal, his appearance is really impressive. Intelligent, he easily undergoes training, but is sometimes a bit stubborn and independent.

Nature

Bergamasco is brave and confident. He learns quickly. Gentle to people and other animals, he feels good both in a large family and in a herd of dogs. Dogs of this breed also establish an unusual bond with children. They are extremely patient, tolerant and caring. They fulfill the role of a four-legged nanny perfectly.

Skills

In Italy, these shepherds are trained as rubble dogs and are excellent at this job. Typical of the breed distrust of strangers makes Bergamasco the perfect watchman. However, he is not a dangerous beast – he rather warns about the arrival of intruders and deters them with a threatening attitude.

Training and education

Despite the intelligence and willingness to work with a man, this dog is not blindly obedient. Bergamasco’s psyche developed over many years of working with the herd, when he often had to act alone. Careful socialization is important in his upbringing.

Who is this race for?

Bergamasco manages the upbringing of most people, but remember that this dog requires some occupation and a lot of movement. One cannot forget about his specific garment, which is not easy to keep clean.

Advantages and disadvantages

Disadvantages

• a bit stubborn and independent
• coat difficult to keep clean

Advantages

• good family companion
• susceptible to training
• gentle to people and animals
• watchful watchman

Health

Bergamasco is a healthy dog, resistant to weather conditions. There are no known diseases specific to this breed.

Feeding

Bergamasco has no special requirements. You can feed it with ready-made food or food prepared by yourself.

Care

Bergamasco robe does not require special care, it felts naturally, although the dreadlocks need to be “helped” a bit to achieve the desired shape. As a shaggy Bergamasco dog, he doesn’t molt, but he carries a lot of dirt on his long coat. If you don’t have any exhibition and breeding ambitions, you can comb or cut Bergamasco, which allows you to keep your dog more hygienic.

The coat has various shades of gray and fawn. It can also have a matt black color, which often acquires a red shade in the sun. The hair lightens with age and changes the shade depending on the season.

Marbled ointment (gray with black spots) is also popular. As dogs become lighter with age, the marbled individual may become light gray after some time. With this ointment, the iris of the eye is often completely or partially blue.

History

Cane da Pastore Bergamasco, or literally “Bergam Shepherd Dog” (Bergamo is a city and region in Italy) is one of the shaggy shepherds, several breeds of which can be found in different regions of Europe.

His cousins ​​include Catalan Sheepdog, Portuguese Cao da Sierra de Aires , Hungarian poti, bearded collie and Polish Lowland Sheepdog. All these dogs come from a Tibetan terrier, which is only a name terrier, and in fact, is a herding and guard dog.

Bergamasco fans say the origins of this breed date back to 2000 years. They refer to old notes about the shaggy shepherd used in the Alps with a “long, thick and messy” coat. It could have been the ancestor of today’s Bergamasco. This dog was bred to guard sheep and cattle.

Bergamasco is a harmoniously built medium-sized dog, strong, resilient and agile. It seems to be more powerful than it really is thanks to its generous coat. The robe, as it grows, begins to form into dreadlocks. In a few-year-old dogs, they can reach up to the ground and even drag on it. Of course, this applies to show dogs, because in working dogs the coat is often torn out.

A similar coat can be found in two other shepherd dogs – Hungarian komondors and pots. However, in these breeds, she creates thin strings, while in Bergamasco dreadlocks are flat and wide.

Template

Bergamasco Sheepdog (cane da pastore Bergamasco) – Group I FCI, section 1, reference number 194

• Country of origin: Italy
• Character: intelligent, faithful, likes children, distrustful of strangers, excellent guardian
• Size: dogs 58-62 cm, bitches 54-58 cm
• Weight: dogs 32-38 kg, bitches 26-32 kg
• Coat: Extraordinarily abundant, very long, shaped differently on different parts of the body. Rough, goat hair, especially on the front of the body. From the middle of the chest on the entire back of the torso, and on all limbs, the fur – depending on age – either forms or has already formed drooping bands. The hair on the head is not so rough, it covers the eyes. On the limbs, the hair forms evenly spaced strands, falling downwards, so that the front of the dog looks like one mass of hair. On the hindquarters and hind legs, dense webs cover the entire surface. Undercoat short and dense, so that the skin is invisible and greasy to the touch.
• Ointment: Uniformly gray or gray patches, in various shades, from the lightest to almost black (there is a blue marbled ointment, which brightens with time). Acceptable shades of beige and fawn. The uniformly black ointment is allowed provided the black is neither clean nor shiny. A white ointment is not allowed and white markings are tolerated as long as they do not exceed 1/5 of the surface.
• Lifespan: 12-14 years
• Vulnerability to training: high
• Activity: average
• Resistance / susceptibility to diseases: resistant

Interesting facts

In addition to Bergamasco, two Hungarian shepherds have a cord type coat – komondor and pot. Komondor is a large, impressive white-colored dog, endowed with strong territorial and guarding instincts. He worked in the forest (grassy steppe of the Great Hungarian Plain) as a herd guard. A much smaller pot served as herding sheepdog. Easier to drive than a komondor works well as a watchman. Black, white or fawn color in various shades.

The rope robe came from the fact that no one was combing the working dogs, so their hair was felting. In utility dogs, the coat was not that long, because it was ripping out. The exhibition komondors, in turn, have a robe so abundant that they are not allowed to take a bath, because soaked with water would prevent them from moving.

Such a robe was also found in rope poodles. Although they did not form a separate breed of poodles, they had a slightly different type of coat than typical poodles – dreadlocks held on to it better. So molding them on a regular poodle might not have the expected effect.