Caucasian
Owcharka, Caucasian mountain dog
One
steppe Azerbaijan Type (Gamper) of Caucasian mountain dog in northwest
of Iran-1996
(Photo: by Cyrus Sattarzadeh-Germany)
This
dog originated from the high mountains around the Black Sea area
and Northern Iran. Today's we can find these dogs in north west
(Azerbaijan province) and west (Fars&Loresan provinces) of Iran.
This location of west Iran, as so far of hundreds of kilometers
from this breed homelands can be explained by this fact that many
years ago some tribes of north Iran together with their livestock's,
have been exiled by the governments to other areas of the country.
For example we can find originally Turks People (from north of Iran)
living in central cities like Fars.
It
seems that for hundreds of years these dogs were used as flock guardian,
and herding dogs with nomads and farmers of Iran beside of other
shepherd dogs. They can be with cropped or uncropped ears.
We can not understand how many percent of these dogs which live
with herders in Iran can be confirmed as pure. Many of these dogs
that are living with other dogs of "Ashayer" (the nomads) could
be crossed and mixed together.
Although this breed have been recognized as Russian breed (as Caucasian
owtcharka) but In fact Russian people didn't know this breed for
a long time. They acquainted this dog many years after when they
conquered Caucasian in 1859 from Iran. The first species of these
dogs were shown in 1930 but its real appearance was in 1960.
Generally the Caucasian mountain dogs of Iran are the steppe types
with shorter coat, smaller bodies size and higher on the legs (like
Azerbaijan type of this breed).
