[lalunevide]

One other thing I could add to anyone interested. There is a dog breed that is bred specifically to look wolf-like. I don’t believe it’s an official breed yet, but it is rather beautiful. The NAID. The acronym stands for ‘Native American Indian Dog’. You want something wolfish looking but are looking for a dog? Get one of those. Just a warning though, they get pretty big. At least the girl I saw in person was. SO PRETTY! <3 But I've never owned a dog before and I think that breed requires a more experienced hand so…I'll just stick to looking.

Edit: I don't believe NAIDs are wolf dogs or hybrids. At least, they are not supposed to be. They're supposed to be 100% dog.

Here is a post I wrote about NAIDs in 2005, shortened and edited slightly and with personal names removed. Just as a disclaimer, I have not kept up with NAID news for about 10 years. I am sure there are happy NAID owners out there. However, in the past, these animals were known for being extremely hard-to-handle. I don’t know if the temperament of the NAIDs has been improved at all in the past 10 years, or if there are any serious breeders attempting to standardize and improve the “breed”. From the founder’s website, they still appear to be a random mix of shepherd/husky/mal crosses sold at ridiculously high prices. If the wide variety in their appearance is anything to go by, I would suspect that the temperament, at best, might vary just as widely. If someone is interested in a wolf-like dog and wants to buy from a breeder, I think they would be better off buying from a reputable husky breeder. Anyway, here was the situation as of 2005:

The dogs are fakes; they are not a real breed. They are a mix of akita, GSD, husky, wolf, and malamute.

The ‘creator’ of the NAID and the original “NAID” breeder actually started out with genuine high content wolfdogs (wolf hybrids), and back then they were called wolfdogs, not ‘NAIDS’. However, when wolfdogs were banned in MI, the owner decided to change the name of her wolfdogs in order to keep them from being euthanized (she did this not because she loved her animals, but because she wanted to continue making money off of them). The owner knew though that her higher wolf content animals were still too wolf-looking to pass as “NAIDS”, so she had most of them shot. She took the remaining low-wolf content animals, and inbred them to create the ones with white spots, which she thought would sell better because they looked more ‘exotic’. Most of the other “NAID” breeders out there have NAIDS directly from the founder’s stock.

The information on the NAID web pages has almost entirely been made up. According to the founder, the NAID is a pure bred dog designed after the dogs the Indians had. This claim is false. Her NAIDs and the NAIDs of the other breeders are a random mix of various breeds of dogs, and they have no real standard or consistency in either looks or temperament. Some look like German shepherd dogs, and others just look like Siberian huskies! In reality, they are just mutts. They are not a pure breed! The Indians themselves didn’t even have a pure breed of dog. Theirs were also mixed dogs. With the arrival of the Europeans, these dogs became interbred with dogs from Europe and other countries.

According to the founder, the dogs are hypoallergenic. Little could be further from the truth. There is no such thing as a truly hypoallergenic dog. People are allergic to dogs because of DANDER. ALL dogs produce dander. Aditionally, the NAID founder admits that her dogs were produced by mixing various northern breed dogs, NONE of which are hypoallergenic. If the dogs she used to create the NAIDs were not hypoallergenic, the NAIDs themselves could not be hypoallergenic.

As for temperament… The NAID founder does not breed for it. She breeds for looks. Her original wolfdog stock were notorious for having very poor temperaments, and this was passed on to her NAIDs. I have seen numerous ‘Native American Indian Dogs’ come up needing rescue. Most are skittish, energetic, and extremely sensitive to their surroundings and environment. Most grow up shy of people and almost impossible to handle except by the most experienced of dog owners. Besides being shy and reactive, they are often destructive indoors, great escape artists, and not good around children. A few of her animals DO turn out nice, I have met at least one owner with a dog from her who was the best pet she ever had, but this is not the norm. Personally, I would not risk it.

The other NAID breeds are just as bad. They claim to have “rare white spirit dogs,” rare brindles,” “rare parti-brindles,” and “rare reds”, and other such nonsense. Anything to make a buck.. The brindle came from the Akita, the red from husky, and the white from inbreeding.

I would not recommend buying from any of the NAID breeders. The dogs are not a pure breed of dog, only random mixes. They have very poor and random temperaments, and are often too difficult for the average owner to handle. The NAID founder over breeds her dogs, lies about their temperament and physiology, and she often fails to properly socialize the dogs. The other breeders lie about the rarity of their dogs, and are not much better than the NAID founder herself.

May I ask where your sources come from, and how you know all this? I’m genuinely curious, as I actually have two NAIDs, and have heard a lot about them starting from wolf hybrids – which makes a lot of sense to me. I got them for their hypoallergenic coats (I know a truly hypoallergenic dog isn’t really a thing, but I have horrible dog allergies and have no reaction whatsoever with them). However, at this point down the line, it must be very diluted, and my boys are excellent dogs, though training is of course difficult and they are totally destructive if left alone with full run of the house. I’m an experienced dog owner, however, with access to trainers and animal behaviorists, so it’s manageable and worth it to me for their close bond.

One of my boys, Seneca, who is full NAID (the other is mixed with GSD/Mal), acts like no dog I have ever owned, and he has several traits that remind me of a low-content wolfdog (of course, I take this with a grain of salt, as I know the chances of it are low), such as what looks/feels like a caudal gland, similar build and paw shape, more timid personality, things like that. Something that maybe harks back to a wolf several generations back. I have tried to get to the bottom of the rumor, as no breeder has been helpful on the matter.

Any help would be greatly appreciated 🙂

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