In an earlier post from today, some of the comments alluded to how mastiffs might attack and how they use larger size, rather than their dexterity, to attack.
I think I’m going to repost this video on dog attack styles from a dire wolf documentary on National Geographic. Yes, they spell “shepherd” incorrectly. The weights seem off to me. And they don’t identify which breed of mastiff they are testing here. A Fila?
But this is still worth watching.
Essentially, mastiffs are supposed be like male lions. They are built to use their massive size to bring down their targets. They are not built for speed or efficient movement at all.
Neapolitan mastiffs were used in southern Italy in a way that simply did not require anything special in terms of conformation other than large size, a large head, and powerful jaws.
The dogs lived very close to the house. Some were allowed to run loose, but the dogs didn’t go very far. At night the dogs would either be tied up to the back door on long chain or released onto the property.
If a thief showed up, the dog’s dark color would hide it in the shadows, and then it would pounce. It would throw its weight around and tear into the intruder with its teeth.
If you knew that such an animal could be lurking anywhere on a property, I don’t think you would want to be sneaking around there at night.
And that’s why they were such effective estate guards.
The guardian mastiffs are built more on the lines of a big cat than a normal domestic dog. When the Spanish and Portuguese colonizers brought war mastiffs ls into Amazonia, many of the native thought they were some kind of jaguar. Even today, the word for European dog in many of these languages is in some way related to their word for jaguar– which also tells you how the Spanish and Portuguese used these dogs on the native population.
I would still take a Dutch Shepherd over a mastiff.
I would have been happier if they’d weighed the dogs. The Dutchie seems too heavy. The Mal is at the upper end of working weight. My own Belgian Sheepdogs average 50 pounds I have one bitch at 40, one of my 24″ males is 51. This is based on scales at the vet’s. These are working weight dogs who are used in herding. The “protection” line dogs tend to be a bit heavier, but too heavy results in less agilty and speed. I think a 70 pound dog seems to be about “ideal” in the Ring competitions. The high speed those long legs (and Belgians are built a bit like coursing dogs) provide yield a fair amount of inertia when the dog hits. The slower dogs — not just mastiffs, but the Rottweilers, Bouviers, etc, use greater mass. For home protection, the dog only needs to keep you out of the house or get to you before you regain the property wall. And not every thief is as skilled or fit as a trained soldier.
Peggy Richter.