Hi Barbara, I don't know......., i have a tall, very skinny, athletic 3yr. old male gsd who couldn't "effortlessly" clear a six foot fence from a sitting position if his life depended on it. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />, but i've only met one presa and two mastiffs in my life and they would have had trouble jumping over a curb on the street. lol, but maybe you're remembering the height of the fence wrong, or something, AL

barbara:

your tigger is definitely part mastiff. i've worked in mastiff rescue and seen a number of purebred mastiffs that look just like him.

when you say "testing the protection ability" please elaborate on what you mean. what precisely do you plan to use the dog for? i'm not familiar with what you mean by "nervy" either.

the classic mastiff temperament is calm and dignified, highly tolerant of the bad behavior of children and other animals, but has immense common sense about when protection is called for. usually the owner doesn't even have a clue that he's in a dangerous situation, but the mastiff takes swift action to protect him.

they do not do this by "attacking" in the sense that is often meant here. mastiffs rarely bite. that's the reason the bullmastiff was created. they are not aggressive dogs. but they will trip and sit on an intruder until someone comes to take care of him. they will step between you and someone they don't know. they will pull the sleeve of someone who they feel is getting too close to you. they will knock someone out of the way to intercept an attack. i've seen mastiffs do all these things. even very "soft" mastiffs do these things.

actual biting/violence they do only if absolutely necessary. and they are the judge of that. they are not a breed to train to attack on command. this is wrong for their temperament. it is the reason so many outcrosses of the mastiff have been made by those who want a giant, aggressive dog. a stupid proposition, imo. the bullmastiff is one of these.

possibly you should be looking at the bullmastiff?

"hey are not a breed to train to attack on command. this is wrong for their temperament."

Yes,this is why Afrikaans has the boerboel.
I have seen a bull mastiff on a Swedish mentality test,the dog did nothing,nothing at all.
He did not care about people,did not hunt,did not care about lound noises or scary "ghosts".
Here is the boerboel different.They react ; )

alice,
I've seen several of your posts describing the protective instincts of the mastiff and I'm going to post my fairly extensive experiences with them.

I've owned ten ( 10 ) Old English Mastiffs through out the years and I've competed with them a fair amount to include winning the Mastiff National Specialty Obedience Trial with one of my bitches. I was usually in the top 3 in the Delany ratings in Front & Finish magazine in the years that I competed with them ( and it wasn't like the competition was stiff with this breed, let me tell ya ) and I did attempt to try out SchH with two of them - which ended up a total and complete failure from a temperament standpoint. I'm not posting this stuff as a brag, it's just to show you that I have a lot of experience with them as a breed.

I know over a dozen Mastiff breeders and I've been around *hundreds* of them at different shows and trials, not to mention people's kennels and their homes.
Having said all that, I have never met a Mastiff ( and I've "met" more than most dog people, I believe ) that I would trust to defend it's owner. The "average" Mastiff now has temperament issues and no protective instincts to speak of.

Sorry, maybe your experiences with them are different then mine, but after having owned and trained and seen so many of them, their protective value is nil in my view.

will, i don't doubt your experience and expertise. in fact, i am very interested to hear about it.

remember that i am new to the whole concept of "working dogs" and i suspect you and i mean entirely different things by protectiveness. but i am not sure. that is why i asked barbara to clarify what she meant by it.

based on my experiences with mastiffs, i would trust one to protect me. the only one that hasn't is the pup i have now, and he has never been tested by a threatening situation. until that happens, i won't know if he's protective or not.

you're right that the breed has a lot of issues today. as i said, it took me three years to find a good mastiff breeder.

it is not a dog for someone who wants protection on command. it is a dog for someone who wants a family companion and a watch dog. my idea of protectiveness is that the dog acts to avert an undesireable situation, such as i described earlier. i do not want a dog who will go "off" on a stranger, nor do i want a dog that lacks the good judgement to decide for himself if his intervention is warranted.

mastiffs are known for their lack of patience with and disinterest in "staged" situations. it is one of the hurdles to overcome with them in obedience competition. the mastiff wants a good reason for what he is asked to do and does not like rote repetition. they were bred to think for themselves and make their own decisions. you probably can't know if one has protection instincts until you find yourself in genuine danger. anyone who wants more assurance than this that they would be protected probably should avoid the mastiff.

personally, i trust them to do whatever is genuinely needed, because of my many experiences of having been protected by my mastiffs. but i don't expect anyone else to take that on faith.

When I say testing the protective ability, I mean testing it to see if it's willing to protect in extreme situations,& varied situations. I'll leave it at that, you wouldn't approve.

I'd like the dog for protection, and if possible to do some kind of skilled training with it competitively. My main requirement is that the dog be naturally protective though.

By nervy, I mean weak nerves. A dog who has temperament issues. A typical symptom is fearfulness that's often disguised by unwarranted aggression because the dog is scared and trying to bluff the object of it's fear. In a serious situation where the dog is called to defend, if the going gets too rough, the dog will leave you for dead if it has weak nerves. Sometimes a dog will appear protective, but if it isn't tested you really don't know for certain.

A mastiff typical of the 1800's would be ideal, but they don't exist anymore. That's why people outcross them now. To bring back their working qualities. Unfortunately, even the bull mastiff is in a similar state as the EM. People aren't interested in testing them properly anymore. The closest thing you can find is a bandog. That's what I will probably end up sticking with.

Al, what your skinny, tall gsd is missing is the rear leg muscle and power the presa had. He stood close to six feet on two legs. He wasn't the typical short, thick, Curto line presa. I wondered sometimes if he wasn't a great dane/english mastiff cross. He was cat like in his movements. You'd have to see it to believe it I guess. If you ever happen to see it someday, remember this conversation <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" />

Will, those are impressive achievements with the EM's <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

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When I say testing the protective ability, I mean testing it to see if it's willing to protect in extreme situations,& varied situations. I'll leave it at that, you wouldn't approve.

how exactly does one test for such a thing? and why wouldn't i approve?

your "naturally protective" and mine might look very different. mine looks like this:

the dog always steps in between me and a stranger. all my mastiffs have always done this. it is hardwired into them. they manage to make it look innocuous, but it isn't.

if someone behaves in a threatening manner towards me, the dog warns him off, either by barking, pulling the person aside, or knocking him out of the way.

i've never been in a situation where more than that was needed. a mastiff is so imposing, no one has ever challenged the dog beyond that. other mastiff owners have told me similar stories. an old one that has been passed around the mastiff club for years was of the mastiff everyone insisted would let burglars walk off with half the house. the dog's owner challenged a friend to try it and see. the friend came back in the middle of the night, opened the dining room window, and was about to stick his head into the open maw of the mastiff, who was quietly waiting for him.

would my dogs have bitten if it came down to it? when i think back on the situations i was in myself, one of which was an averted rape, i do believe my mastiffs would have bitten should my potential attackers have been nuts enough to persist. that is the beauty of this dog--they don't have to do much. they displayed no fear of the offender whatsoever. they remained calm and did what needed to be done, but no more.

i don't know what the temperament of the 19th century english mastiff was. what i have always loved about them is their emotional stability and their docility. if you think they were more like fighting dogs only a century ago, i've never heard that, and i wouldn't be interested.

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I'm curious what your experiences being protected were. wildlife or humans or both.

I've been a decoy for a female mastiff with good obedience and amiable good character. Took some effort to get her onto the sleeve. it was fear, not a problem with "staged" situations. nice dog though.

like i said, i don't think they are a good breed for schutzhund. it runs against the grain of their character. i think it would ruin them.

my experiences of being protected or witnessing the protection of others? here are just a few.

a bunch of neighborhood children standing around, goofing off. female mastiff is suddenly flying through the air, startling everyone. she caught a collie in mid-air and knocked it aside, midway through its flight to attack one of the children. not one of hers.

window washer in my apartment got arrogant with me, didn't want to wash one of the windows, complained in a very loud voice that it was impossible. male mastiff must not have liked the tone of his voice. got up quietly from his bed, came up behind the window washer, grabbed hold of his sleeve, and pulled him back away from me. (window washer just about lost it, he was so frightened.)

i'm alone with a fellow ranger, sam is apparently snoozing off to the side. the man gets up and, towering over me, makes a gesture over my head, his hand raised (must have looked to sam like he was about to strike me). before either of realizes what happened, sam is in the air and knocks the guy out of the way.

argumentative neighbor confronts me on the street and starts yelling. male mastiff snarls in warning, then lunges when the guy doesn't back off. neighbor became almost hysterical with fear. dog didn't need to do anything else.

it doesn't sound like much, but then the mastiff doesn't have to do much. i like their pacifist approach, and even in all the years i lived alone in a big city with a mastiff, i never felt the need for any greater protection than that--and i lived in hell's kitchen. i left my apartment door unlocked when i was home. the bad guys crossed to the other side of the street when they saw us coming. they will pick on someone else.

these dogs were friendly and completely trustworthy with everyone else, including babies and other dogs. but occasionally there was someone they didn't like, and that person was not allowed near me or in my home. they always go to the door to determine if they will allow someone entry. occasionally, entry was denied. always turned out to be good judgment, too.

meant to add:

will, if what i have written sounds unbelievable to you, based on your experience, i would like to hear about it. the last mastiff i had that displayed these protective behaviors was born in 1997. the one i have now was born in 2002. he's the only one i have doubts about protecting me, and it is because i think he does have nerve issues. if that's become common in the breed, that is really too bad.