|
|
|
|
The swedes "adopted" this little dog and the first standard was approved in the Swedish Kennel Club already 1910, but the story of "The Barking Bird Dog of Norrbotten" was short, as it was thouhgt to have become extinct in the uproars of the World Wars and the studbook was closed in 1948.
The reason for wrong conclusions were mainly lingual and cultural differencies. Some specimens of the breed had been taken to southern Sweden, but the breeding program flattened to none, because the finnish speaking Tornio-river valley people of Sweden could not speak swedish and the big kennelmen could not speak finnish. In addition to this the swedish hunting culture, where there were central-European influence was completely different to that of the finns. It was thought that shooting game that is sitting in a tree from a bark of dog was not elegant enough.
Due to lucky happenings the breed was "found" again during the late 50´s and early 60´s, when at Pajala ("Smithstown") in Sweden there still were these white spotted native dogs as remnants of the finnish hunting culture.
FCI confirmed the new breed standard in 1966 and the official name became Norrbottenspets. The standard was also accepted in Finland in 1973. Following the Swedish Kennel Club´s hopes finns began to search native dogs from North Finland from the outskirts of remote countrysides that matched the standard to broaden the genepool. Surveys and approvals to the breed registry have been made (and are still made) far more than a hundred, alone in the 90´s over 50 individuals. The studbook is still open in Finland. Nowadays the Finnish Nordic Spitz population is nearly one thousand.
We can be proud of our own hunting spitz dog of Northern Scandinavia. Although the breed is officially Swedish, its roots are deep down in Finnish forests. The basic stock of the Nordic Spitz has been collected from the Finnish side of the frontier. We can readily say that the Nordic Spitz is a gift to Sweden from the Finnish wilderness settlement inhabitants and swedes should be very thankful about that.
The Nordic Spitz is slightly smaller (42-45cm ±2cm) and lighter boned than the Finnish Spitz. It is also longer in back, ears a little bigger in relation to the head and the coat smooth, short and lying, the tail is also curled somewhat more loosely than with the Finnish Spitz.
The Nordic Spitz is a jolly, vivid and easily adapted dog, that suits for a hunting companion and also many modern dog activities as agility.
Small, more or less white spotted or piebald multipurpose hunting dogs have lived with the finnish inhabitants in North Botnia (Norrbotten) as well in Finland´s as in Sweden´s side of the frontier, Lappland and Kainuuland as long as there has been wilderness settlements. South of this region lived a more solid coloured spitz dog from which in the late 1800´s kennelmen started to breed the Finnish Spitz, the National Finnish dogbreed. The whitespotted hunting spitz was left out of the breeding program of "The Barking Finnish Bird dog"
| top of the page |