This blog feature amusing and heartwarming stories about our late Leonberger dog Bronco, as well as other Leonbergers. It also has a lot of information about the Leonberger breed, the history, care, training, Leonberger organizations, etc. I also wrote a Leonberger book, which I am featuring in the sidebar.
This post is just an announcement. For Black Friday throughout the weekend and Cyber Monday the Kindle version of my book, “The Life and Times of Le Bronco von der Löwenhöhle”, stories and tips from 13 years with a Leonberger, will sell for only $2.99.
If you would like to learn about more about my book and find out where to buy it, click here or here.
If click you on any of the images below you will be taken to the Kindle version of my book.
Our Labrador Baylor was a stealthy, opportunist and quick food thief. Food tended to disappear around him as if it never was there. Our German Shepherd on the other hand never stole food and took it upon herself to guard the entrance to the kitchen to the chagrin of Baylor. If she could have spoken, she would have said “you shall not pass”.
Our Leonberger Bronco was our biggest dog, and he could eat a lot. Once we had prepared a big plate with five pounds of roast beef for a dinner party. Bronco finished those five pounds of roast beef with astonishing speed. I saw him do it, but I was not quick enough to stop him. Luckily, he thoughtfully left us the carrots, the broccoli and the dip, so the guests had something to eat. All our dogs were, and are, great dogs, but many dogs have this vice, food theft. I should say that Bronco often willingly shared his loot with other dogs. He was not selfish. Below I am including a few excerpts from my book concerning food theft.
Labrador food theft stories
In addition to his hatred for mailmen, Baylor had one more vice, and that was stealing food. He was always hungry, and he was pretty good at culinary theft. On one occasion, I was standing in the kitchen holding a sandwich in my hand. Suddenly the sandwich disappeared from my fingers as if it had been teleported. I didn’t feel a thing—no pull, no touch, no wet nose. It just vanished. I turned around, and behind me stood Baylor, swallowing something. He looked at me, wagging his tail. Was he innocent? Did Captain Kirk beam my sandwich to another dimension? How could I be mad at him when I didn’t have proof?
On another occasion, Baylor jumped up on top of the kitchen table using a chair as a step stool and cleared it of the desserts that Claudia’s grandmother had brought for the kids and the family. That’s how I learned that she had a swear-word vocabulary—and that it was substantial. Fortunately, the kids weren’t nearby. On yet another occasion, Baylor emptied a tray of baklava that had been sitting on the kitchen counter.
His most notable food raid was probably when he stole the Thanksgiving turkey and ran off with it. We salvaged most of it, but knowing that Baylor had been all over it, we decided not to eat what he left us. It wasn’t very appetizing.
Leonberger food theft stories
I believe dogs have empathy, and sometimes they want to share, at least Bronco did. There was a time when we were in our home eating take-out food and Bronco stole one of our dinners, including meat, vegetables, and a baked potato. He started eating the meat, then he glanced at Daisy, who was sitting in the middle of the floor looking sad. Immediately he took the baked potato in his mouth and carried it over to her and dropped it right at her feet. I was going to get mad at him for stealing, but when I saw his kindhearted and unselfish act, I let it be.
On another occasion, Rachel made a gingerbread house and left it on the kitchen counter. I had forgotten to lock the kitchen gate, and the photograph above shows what greeted me when I got home. Guess who ate half the gingerbread house. I should say that Bronco shared some with Daisy. He was always very generous.
On yet another occasion, Bronco got hold of a box of chocolates in the shape of small gnomes. Each gnome was filled with liquor—some with gin, some with vodka, some with whiskey, and some with rum. It was a gift from Rachel, who had just come back from a visit to China. She had bought the present for us at the airport in Hong Kong. But Bronco ate the entire thing—tinfoil wrappers, chocolate, liquor, and all. We were afraid he might get very sick, and we carefully monitored him, ready to rush him to the emergency clinic if necessary. Fortunately, nothing happened, except he threw up a little bit of tinfoil. I guess he had a stomach of steel.
So, for this Thanksgiving watch your dogs so they don’t run off with your Turkey
Happy Thanksgiving to all who celebrate
On this blog I’ve reviewed several good Leonberger books including:
Note the books above are Leonberger books that I do recommend. I can add that the first book Leonberger by Caroline Bliss-Isberg is a masterpiece, but it is very expensive.
However, I’ve also read Leonberger books that have substantial issues and that I therefore cannot recommend. This blog is about them.
The problems with the books I am presenting below include that the author has never owned a Leonberger, the book is full of factual errors, it’s full of grammatical errors, spelling errors and other typos. In addition, two of the books were copy and paste operations. What I mean by that is that the author wrote a book about how to train a dog, any dog, for example a Pug, and then changed the word Pug to Leonberger (copy and replace) to create a Leonberger book. Of course, they needed to add a few Leonberger facts, that may or may not be correct. Repeat the process for 65 breeds, or 167 breeds. You can write hundreds of books in one day using this procedure. The last book was written by a Russian who obviously did not speak English and probably rammed Russian text through a mediocre translation app with comical results. Parts of the book was unreadable. None of the books had any photos or illustrations to make them more interesting.
They say that you should not slam the competition. It will come back and to haunt you. That’s true. However, I don’t think these authors are my competition because they are not “Leonberger people”, and they are unlikely to ever read this. Below I am presenting and reviewing three books which I have given three stars, two stars and one star respectively on Amazon.
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It was published July 4, 2019
The paperback is 112 pages
ISBN-13 is 978-1078136211
Weight is 6.2 ounces
The dimensions : 6 x 0.28 x 9 inches
The price of the paperback is $8.00
Prcie of Kindle version is $2.99
Kindle unlimited is of course $0.00
Review below
A brief Dog Owner’s Manual with some Leonberger specific information, plus comical typos
This is a very basic book, about 14,000 words, no pictures or photos (other than the front page), and no diagrams or graphs, just text. However, considering that the printed version is eight dollars and the kindle version is free that is to be expected. The book should be judged accordingly. It is a simple and inexpensive book. The book description here on Amazon may not be entirely helpful. According to the “Final Thoughts” on the last page the author is planning to publish “multiple other dog care manuals …”. He is associated with the Dog Care Professionals organization. Based on the focus of the book and from what I can “read between the lines”, I am fairly certain the author has never owned a Leonberger and that he is not very familiar with the Leonberger breed or the community. For example, I don’t think he is part of the Leonberger Club of America. Maybe he can correct me if I am wrong.
However, where the author shines, is in his knowledge regarding the training of, and caring for dogs. I assume he is a professional dog trainer or a dog care professional. The book may not be a true Leonberger book, but it is useful for Leonberger owners none the less. We would have been helped by reading this book while training and caring for our Leonberger, or our German Shepherd, or our Pug, or our Labrador, or our Japanese Shin, or our Australian Shepherd, you get the picture. Therefore, the book is useful to Leonberger owners but may not be the best book for those specifically interested in the Leonberger breed.
I found the typos in the book a bit distracting. On page 74 he is giving a “Breif overview” and he is urging us to contact our local “Keenle Club” (my guess is that was supposed to be Kennel club), and “Heir on the side of safety” I can’t even guess what that means. That’s just one page. On page 15 he claims that the Leonberger will stand between 25 to 31 inches (? To ? cm) tall at the shoulder and weigh between 120 to 170 pounds (? to ? kg). He could have used a calculator or Wikipedia to complete page 15 without question marks. Better still, hire an editor. Question marks in the text looks sloppy. Also, the 25 to 31 inches refers to the withers, not the shoulders, it is close, but not the same thing.
From a training and caring for your dog perspective this is not a bad book. In fact, I found it to have a lot of useful information. The author is without doubt a skilled dog trainer professional. Hiring him to train our Leonberger would have been a good idea. Hiring him to spell our dog’s name, not so much (Le Bronco Von Der Löwenhöhle). Leonbergers have fancy names. Intimate understanding of Leonbergers seem to be missing in this book, and the editor is missing too. Therefore, I cannot give this book a five star rating.
The question is, should I give it three stars or four stars. I decided to give it three stars. It is an inexpensive book, that is an easy and quick read that is helpful to Leonberger owners, or prospective Leonberger owners from a general dog knowledge and training perspective. However, between the feeling you get of something missing in the Leonberger department and the comical typos, I don’t think it can be highly rated. An editor and a Leonberger (owned by the author) would have guaranteed a five star review from me.
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It was published December 13, 2020
The paperback is 102 pages
ISBN-13 is 979-8580681658
Weight is 5.3 ounces
The dimensions : 6 x 0.23 x 9 inches
The price of the paperback is $11.97
Prcie of Kindle version is $5.19
Kindle unlimited is of course $0.00
Review below
A good dog training manual, but it is not a Leonberger book
This book contains a lot of good dog care and dog training advice. The author describes how and when to feed dogs, brushing, cleaning teeth, health related issues, raising and training dogs, how to train your dog to obey commands, clicker training, hand signals, etc. It is fairly complete and written with some lighthearted humor. I noticed a few typos but not many. As a dog training manual, this is a good book.
On page 5 it says, “Thanks to a British Politician Heinrich Essig the Leonberger was created”. The author got the most basic Leonberger fact wrong. Heinrich Essig was a German businessman, dog breeder, horse breeder, and occasional councilman of the town of Leonberg in the Kingdom of Würtenberg (now Germany). “Heinrich Essig” doesn’t even sound British. The rest of the extremely short two paragraph Leonberger history section was pretty misleading as well and did not do Leonbergers justice.
On page 21 and 22 the author presents a guideline for feeding dogs that starts at 5lbs and ends at 100lbs. The book says; “But keep in mind that the average Leonberger is about thirty-five to sixty five pounds fully grown…”. It is difficult to find an adult Leonberger under 100lbs, unless he starved to death. On another page in the book she says (more correctly) that adult Leonbergers weigh between 90 to 170lbs, thus contradicting herself. A lot of interesting and useful Leonberger information is missing. There’s nothing about their love for swimming, webbed paws, breed characteristics, natural drafting/pulling skills, and the explanations of how and if to get a Leonberger left a lot to be desired. The most important American Leonberger kennel club; the Leonberger Club of America was never mentioned. By the way, they have a ton of useful Leonberger information on their website.
It is obvious that the author has never owned a Leonberger and that she does not know much about them. Considering that her website (or their website) is mentioned several times in the book and the fact that she has written 65 identical looking books on different dog breeds it seems like this book is a quick “search and replace” operation of a dog training manual created for advertising purposes. To me the book looked exactly like she did a search for “your dog” and replaced it with “your Leonberger” (in a few hundred places), and then added a little bit about the specific breed (using google) but without much care for getting it right. You can write 65 books very quickly that way. By the way, she is not the only dog trainer doing this. It is a clever advertising trick. However, as a Leonberger enthusiast this rubbed me the wrong way. She should have written one generic dog training book or taken the time to research the breed better if she wanted to make it Leonberger specific. Therefore, despite the overall good dog training and dog care advice in the book I can only give it two stars.
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The paperback is 145 pages
ISBN-13 is 979-8834953302
Note, the book was deleted from Amazon before I had a chance to write a review so the review below was never published. In fact, all of Nelson Dawson’s dog books disappeared from Amazon. He had written hundreds of books on hundreds of breeds. I suspect Amazon deleted them.
Priceless translation errors
This book has a lot of quality issues. First of all, it contains a lot of incorrect facts. For example, it states that the Leonberger was created in the 1930 and 1940’s (it was 1830’s and 1840’s), that the breeder tried to match the appearance of a mountain lion (it was a lion), that the first Leonberger arrived in Russia 1989 (no they existed in Russia in the 1800’s), etc. The book also contains a lot of grammatical errors, strange sentences, and incorrectly used words. For example, puppies are sometimes referred to as “children”, dogs are sometimes called “cattle”, and crates are called boxes. The word “order” is used instead of “command”, as in: Simple orders include ”Next”, “Fu”, “Give a paw”, and “Tumble”. By the way can anyone guess what the commands “Next” and “Fu” are supposed to be? I think “Tumble” is “Roll over”.
The book also features many bizarre sentences that I could not figure out what they meant. On page 28 the book states: “It is not advisable to bring two Leonberger puppies into the house at the same time. Representatives of this type are gregarious men who easily make friends with their tribesmen.” Yes, the Leonberger puppies are called “gregarious men”, which is hilarious. On page 30 the book states in regard to teaching the Leonberger a trick: “Leonbergers are true virtuosos who may stomp on the neck of their own song in order to gratify the owner. These individuals are the ones who compete in agility events.” On page 46 the book states: “When you return to work, have someone check on your dog, let him out, play with him, and reshape him with a yummy kong.” In regard to crate training the author states out of the blue: “if your home has battens, you may wish to select wood”. I have no idea what that means.
Since the prices mentioned in the book are in rubles and the intended audience seems to be Russian my guess is that the book was created by running a Russian book through a mediocre language translation application. I don’t think it could have been Google Translate because it is not that bad, not anymore. I believe the author may have taken a large stash of Russian books for different breeds and just rammed them through a translator and then uploaded it Amazon without anyone checking if the English made sense.
In any case, this book has a lot of problems, and I cannot recommend it. One star.
I typically end my blog posts with a promotion of my book that includes a few images and a list of links to places where you can get it. I’ve come to realize that doing this takes away from the blog post itself. One image with a link is not too much but the full length three images and a list with 13 links is too much. This piece of repeated information often takes up half the post. So, I decided to make a book promotion post to which I will be linking to instead of repeating every time. By the way, I will delete this paragraph later on.
This post is a promotion of my book “The Life and Times of Le Bronco von der Löwenhöhle”, stories and tips from 13 years with a Leonberger and it lists the places where you can get the book. I can add that the price of the Kindle version is temporarily reduced to $4.99.
In the book you can read about some of our Leonberger Bronco’s amazing feats: the night he scared away a prowler; the day he performed a hamster search and rescue; the time he stumped the Geek Squad; and the late night he snuck into the kitchen and ate a two-pound bag of dog treats, a box of pastries, a loaf of bread, a grilled chicken, and a Key lime pie, all in one sitting. You’ll also read about his unflappable calm during a north Texas tornado and his stoicism as he endured health challenges in his later years.
In addition to entertaining stories, these pages contain a wealth of practical guidance, including
Bronco’s fearlessness, tolerance, and affectionate nature warmed the hearts of everyone who met him, and his sometimes uncanny adventures with his human and canine companions will bring a smile to the face of every dog lover. The book has a lot of color photos, amusing Leonberger stories, and information about Leonbergers that has been verified.
I can add, I am donating the proceeds from the sale of this book to the Leonberger Health Foundation International.
Below is a list of where you can find the book. Click on the links to go to the respective store. However, if your favorite bookstore is not listed below you can search for it using the ISBN or ASIN numbers.
ISBN number for printed edition: 978-0998084954
ASIN number for the e-book edition: B0B5NN32SR
Today (November 14, 2022) the American Kennel Club is featuring the Leonberger. Click here to go to their Facebook announcement.
This is the AKC Leonberger page.
This is an introduction to the Leonberger breed.
Note: I temporarily lowered the price of the Kindle version of my book to $4.99.
For your information the ASIN number for the e-book edition: B0B5NN32SR and the ISBN number for printed edition: 978-0998084954
Today is Veterans Day, a day with roots in Armistice Day from World War I. Did you know that the Leonberger dog almost went extinct during World War I? Below is a short excerpt from my book.
World War I was tough on the breed. Some Leonbergers were used to pull ammunition carts and small cannons during the conflict, and others were left to wander unattended. Often, these dogs starved to death. But after the war, two Leonberg businessmen, Karl Stadelmann and Otto Josenhans, worked hard to save the breed. They scoured the countryside looking for Leonbergers who were still alive. They were able to find twenty-five of them whose owners were willing to cooperate in reestablishing the breed. Of these, only five were suitable for breeding. None of the Leonberger clubs had survived, so they founded a new one in 1922 called Deutsche Club für Leonberger Hunde (DCLH), and Stadelmann created an updated version of Albert Kull’s Leonberger breed standard from 1895. To find out what a breed standard is click here.
Note: I temporarily lowered the price of the Kindle version of my book to $4.99.
For your information the ASIN number for the e-book edition: B0B5NN32SR and the ISBN number for printed edition: 978-0998084954
Below are some Leonberger photos from World War I that I came across. Notice; Leonbergers looked a little bit different back then.
The next few days are going to be interesting. I am participating in an Indy-Author Day tomorrow at a local library, I might be interviewed by a local magazine, and there might be other events coming up related to my book. Because the next few days or weeks are going to be special, I am temporarily lowering the price of the Kindle version of my book to $4.99.
For your information the ASIN number for the e-book edition: B0B5NN32SR and the ISBN number for printed edition: 978-0998084954
I am not lowering the price of the paperback version because it is printed in color and the printing cost make that difficult. All Royalties are donated to the Leonberger Health Foundation International (LHFI). 30% of the $4.99 is Amazon’s cut and 70% is royalty ($3.49). That Royalty is donated to the Leonberger Health Foundation International. $3.49 is less than the $6.29, which was the royalty when the price was $8.99. However, if you wish to donate more to LHFI you are welcome to. Below I am showing an Ad for the Leonberger magazine, the front and back cover of the book, and a few selected pages as they would look like on a kindle with color or as the pdf version of the book. Note: the book snapshots below may be too small to read, but if you can read them, I don’t mind.
Does dog humor exist? Well, this article featuring Leonbergers claim that it likely does. Dogs think it is funny to be a bit mischievous and they special sounds while doing it. You can call it dog laughter. Well, if that is the case, then our Leonberger Bronco laughed on several occasions, for example the time he escaped the leash and had me chasing him around the neighborhood (see story below).
Regarding dog laughter, I am also wondering about Rollo, our mini-Australian Shepherd. He loves lying on his back and getting a belly rub. While you are doing it, he is kicking all four of his legs while turning his head back and forth with his mouth open. It looks like he is laughing, like a giggling baby getting tickled.
A couple of times, Bronco took advantage of the fact that the snap hook on his leash would come loose and detach from his collar. One day this became a big problem. Bronco ran off, and I chased him—across the street, across people’s lawns, across the street again, and back over neighboring lawns. When he ran in circles, I ran in circles right behind him, yelling at him. He would stop and wait for me, and then as soon as I got close, he would start running again. I even jumped to catch him a few times. But he dashed off both times, and I just landed flat on my belly.
Bronco had a lot of fun doing this. I imagined him laughing at me, and I got angry. Dogs can’t laugh, of course, but his tail was wagging in excitement, and it was obviously a game to him—a dangerous game.
So, I asked him, “Do you want to be lost? Bad things happen to dogs who get lost.” I don’t know how much of that he understood, but I had to tell him the truth. Then I turned around and started walking home. I figured I’d never catch him, so it was better for me to go back and get help. (It was 2008, and I didn’t have a cell phone.) Naturally, I worried that Bronco would get hit by a car. I was also worried about the damage an energetic 130-pound adolescent dog could do to the neighborhood.
As I stomped off, I turned around to look at Bronco. He stood still, around a hundred yards away, staring back at me. He seemed confused. I continued walking. After a while, I heard the soft slapping of big paws on the road behind me, accompanied by some distinctly noisy breathing. Then I saw Bronco walking next to me, so I carefully snapped the leash back onto his collar. He let me do it without protest. He was finished playing games. We walked home calmly, and the next day I bought a new and better leash.
This blog post is focused on Ryu one of the dogs that Bronco grew up with.
Around a year after we got Bronco, we got a fourth dog, a Japanese Chin. He was a gift for our daughter, Rachel, who named him Ryu after a Japanese ninja warrior. Ryu was a very energetic dog, quick and brave—except that he was terrified of thunderstorms. At seventeen or eighteen pounds, he was bigger than most Japanese Chins, but he was still a small dog. He got along very well with Bronco.
One of the things that stood out about Ryu was his singing. Japanese Chins are famous for their singing—well, actually, it’s closer to howling, but Ryu’s was a beautiful howl, and he was very proud of it.
As soon as he discovered that he got a lot of attention for it, he started doing it quite often. Whenever we came home, he would sit politely, look at us intently—it seemed like he was clearing his throat too and howl. Like an opera singer, he would slowly turn his head to look at us, as if he were performing. In fact, I think Ryu’s howling sounded just like a night at the opera—especially when the lyrics are sung in Italian.
We would say, “Good boy, Ryu,” and clap, and he looked mighty proud. Other people thought it was cute and wonderful, too, and they gave him lots of praise, and of course he loved doing it and got good at it. When Rachel played the harmonica, Ryu would howl along. They made quite a duo.
“Good boy” might not be the kind of praise Andrea Bocelli would want, but Ryu was perfectly happy with it.
The interaction between Ryu and Bronco was sometimes truly amazing to watch. I remember one instance in which Bronco was sleeping in the house and Ryu was outside in our fenced backyard. The door to the backyard was open. I heard Ryu bark a few times. He had evidently seen something he wanted us to notice—or something he wanted other people to notice.
Then I saw Ryu running in through the back door. He was a fast runner. He ran to Bronco, jumped on his stomach, and barked at him. Bronco woke up, looking drowsy and confused. Ryu waited for Bronco to shake off his grogginess and get up, then he ran out the back door with Bronco in tow. They both hurried to the gate that leads to the street. Ryu yapped, and Bronco barked his loud, booming bark. Ryu had enlisted help to multiply his bark power.
Previously I have not posted any book reviews on this blog. However, there are a lot of great Leonberger books out there, not just mine. I am starting with Leonberger, a comprehensive guide to the Lion King of breeds, by Caroline Bliss-Isberg, ISBN 978-1943824243. You can buy it from Amazon and Barnes & Noble and it exist in both printed version (hardcover) and e-Book (kindle/nook). It is expensive $109.95 for the hardcover version and $34.99 for the kindle version (nook a little cheaper). However, it is a masterpiece. It is 422 pages, in large format (8.5 x 1.25 x 11 inches, 3.62 pounds) and it contains hundreds of high-quality color photographs.
The Leonberger is arguably the most interesting dog breed in the World. As you know we owned a Leonberger, Bronco, who passed away a couple of years ago at the age almost 13. That’s a long life for a Leonberger. Those 13 years were the best years of my life. Bronco was my best friend, so kind, so strong, so brave, so loving towards children and towards smaller dogs. He saved our Pug Daisy’s life from an attacking unleashed German Shepherd, and that’s just one of the amazing things he did. Leonbergers are truly amazing dogs and we are considering getting another one. Unfortunately, they don’t live that long, 8 years on average. Due to his age our Bronco got a longevity award called the Grey Muzzle Award.
What I didn’t know before reading this book was how incredibly interesting their history is. The research that’s been done on the breed, its origins, health, etc., is also fascinating. All of this is described in great detail in Isberg’s book. It was Isberg’s book that made me realize that the Leonberger is arguably the most interesting dog breed in the World. Isberg’s book also dispelled some of the Leonberger myths that I believed. Searching the internet and taking for granted what people tell you will often lead to misunderstandings and erroneous beliefs. For the case of the Leonberger breed this book will help you rectify that. In addition, Isberg’s book also inspired me to write something about Leonbergers myself. My shorter book is more focused on our Leonberger stories, but it also contains interesting Leonberger information.
In addition to history, this book presents the breed standard, how the breed standards have changed several times throughout history, and it feature a critique of how we breed purebred dogs. The how and why is very much part of human culture and history. The book discusses the Leonberger dog in detail, it feature Leonberger dog sports, dog show information, information on breeding, Leonberger organizations and their history, health, and genetics. The research effort that must have gone into this book is astounding. The book features hundreds of color photos, many of them incredibly beautiful. There are drawings in the book that are hundreds of years old, old newspaper clips, research paper excerpts, and full-page color photos of Leonbergers in action. It is an expensive book, but if you are up to paying the price, it is a great investment for any Leonberger enthusiast.
Leonberger Life 