I love this fluff pet, but while i was researching them in real life I came across an error. The dog you are calling a Wire Hair Retriever is actually an English Setter. WHR look quite a bit different, and they don’t have Dalmatian colors or patterns.
You think that's bad, you should see all the mis-names of the martial arts techniques the Monks and Bruisers use.
Tails are docked on "gun" dogs. That is why. Different breeds get their tails docked and ears cropped very early in life. For example, the Doberman is unrecognizable to some people, if they've never seen one with their full-length ears and long curl tipped tail. There are a few German wirehaired/retriever (lab and golden) mixes in rescue shelters which would make a "wirehaired retriever". Maybe one got lucky, was rescued, and became the inspiration for the fluff pet. My personal opinion (not even worth a grain of salt) is that the summoned fluff pet is a cross between a Coldain white warhound and a northern direwolf and has been professionally soothed and trained by a dwarven druid after Bertram Fiddledeegrak sent the poor creatures through his Port'em Sheenery, which would account for the strange wirehair blotches.
Amen. Why do it in the first place? To keep the ears and tails from getting shredded in the field (or in a fight, for guard dogs)? Doesn't seem to bother our Lab and golden retrievers; at most, I've seen the goldens clipped short, hair-wise. I've seen Caucasian shepherds/ovcharkas with uncropped ears, and apparently that's okay with the breed standard. :-/ There should be more breed standards like that. Uwk
There is such a thing as a longhaired Dalmatian, and it looks just like the in-game version: https://wildearth.com/blogs/dog-knowledge/long-haired-dalmatian
Hnh! Will wonders never cease! Actually, I think that's where our dog came from, that we had for almost a decade; his mom was a pure black Lab, his littermates were all pure black Lab-looking, at least, but about the only thing he had in common with them was a black head...the rest was long hair on an obviously Dalmatian-colored coat (and shorter legs, relatively, than a Dalmatian or maybe even a Lab, but not as scrunched as a Corgi or Keeshond). I wasn't sure where the long hair part had come in, but it's possible his dad was one of those! But it's not a "wire hair retriever" like in the game...actually with a name like that, two words instead of one or hyphenated, I was half-expecting some Gnomish creation ("Worry no more about hair loss, friends! With our new, patent-pending, wire hair retriever, it'll track down, find, and re-attach any lost hairs by means of implanted wires! ")... Uwk
Wow, you’re right, that does look a lot more like our pupper, I’ve never seen one of those before. Lovely breed too.
Wirehaired (single word) is a fur type. If it is a Bertram Fiddledeegrak expeirmental species (he did say he was going into animal husbandry) I am glad the dogs are not wandering aimlessly like the chickens. Kudos to the summer festival merchants who gathered up the dogs and making them available to us, for a price. I hope Bertram is a responsible breeder of animals, as he practices his animal husbandry and doesn't discard pups (and kittens) that don't live up to breed or design expectation. Many pups (and kittens) are discarded, tossed out into the wilds, or put down because they don't match the breed, or design. That is one of the reasons long-coat Dalmatians are rare and is part of their history. Also, sometimes purebreds can wind up in a shelter because they just don't look like they are expected to look if they aren't up to pedigree standard and can be assigned an incorrect breed mix. If there is an inspiration dog that was rescued, thank you, whomever, for sharing your love for the dog with the rest of us. It is these touches that make EQ2 so enjoyable.
