Laekenois - Page 1

Any forum posters have experience with Laekenois?  Comparisons to Malinois and Dutch Shepherds?  My impression is that they are more herding dogs than sport/protection dogs, but I don't really know much about them. How do you think they would do in non-protection sports (agility, flyball etc). Interested to hear first hand accounts of the breed.

Also, the Groenendael.  Basically just curious about the other Belgian Shepherds and how they are similar to or different from <alinois.

Dunno if it still exists but we did have a Display Team in South London
a while back that was exclusively Malis and Groenendahls.  Both breeds
were very agile, although neither seemed to be very disposed to be at
all friendly to the strangers in the 'audience'. (One handler literally was
warning ppl off trying to speak to or touch the dogs).  ?

My other experience of Groenendahls has been of Show dogs (at Shows),
although I admired them and read books about them in the past.  Those
I met at Shows tended to be generally ok temperament wise, but quite a
few seemed a bit windy / hand-shy even so.   Whether this is about "turning
a sheepdog into a pet / exhibition animal" I prefer not to comment.

Most of my experience of Belgian Shepherds is concentrated on Teurvurens,
where I have known / met breeders and owners on a more frequent basis.
These are not generally used in any sport / working context, probably because
of the long coat ?  Maybe because they are not hard & fast enough ?  They
generally seem to have more outgoing personalities, though.

Can't comment on Lakenois, never had my hands on one.  Have just seen them
at a distance occasionally, or as photos.

I saw one at a dog show I had to go to because I made a promise, nerve bag. The dog's tail was so far between his legs, it tickled its nose. It also had aggression issues...random ones. He went after the handler, people around him, his family, etc.
Steward Hilliard owned one years a go, very nice dog and the last nice one I have seen.

the only ones i have seen were conformation show line, they had very little drive, but then again so do alot of show line mals.

I've seen and worked around the Groenendael, Teurvurens ans Mals. Never even see a live Laekenois. So i have no comment on them. All 3 are way too flighty, freaky and unstable of my own personal liking. (I'm not a herder person can you tell?) I've never met any of these i would ever consider taking home. Mals are probaly the better of the bunch because people demand working ability from them. None of the Belgan breeds seem at all friendly. Never met a happy one they always seem worried about something. Mostly i see mals in sports work, police,  protection, agility, obedience and such. The long coats i've see in conformation and obedience. I've even see a few black mals (short coated Groenendael)
If they are going to have any luck their temperment issues will need some work. But i hear they are placing the Lakes in AKC?
Fry

We have two Groenendals/Belgian Shepherds in my flyball club and they are NOT what I think of as high drive sport/protection type dogs but I think they are both show-bred (AKC).  One is low drive, the other more medium drive but quite hectic.  That's not to say there aren't some that can really work, since after all these are varieties of the same breed, but I think that the black ones have morphed into show dogs.  I just don't see people using them for work and sport (like SchH or sports that involve some courage and pressure).

there aren't very many Laekens in the United States, not sure what the numbers are but probably in the low 100's, I doubt they are even 1000 throughout the entire US.  I've met a few, an adult working dog who had a stable temperament, I don't remember if it was friendly or not but it wasn't spooky around people.  A friend just imported a puppy, very outgoing and confident.  Not sure what the drives are like.  The others I've met were Mal x Laken breedings, funny looking but overall nice dogs.

With all the Belgians you will find a range of temperaments in terms of friendly to aloof and confident to less then.  In terms of drives you will tend to find higher drives in the Malinois then the other varieties.  If you don't like an intelligent, reactive, high energy dog a Belgian isn't a good idea.  If you do like that type of dog, the breed might be worth looking into.

Thanks for the replies. I'm not looking for another pup, my Mal is a great dog but keeps me busy!  Except for a couple of Tervurens I have not seen any of the other varieties in person so I was curious how similar or different from the Malinois they were. 

They would not be my first choice of the Belgians for protection sports or police work, the Malinois would be.

Can you find ones that work, yes.  One of the first ones I met was a very nice working dog.  But it's a very small gene pool, and just a small pool of dogs overall.  From what I've seen the focus in breeding has been more on the conformation/herding/agility/obedience end of things, with some Schutzhund focus, but I don't know if anyone is focusing on breeding dogs for police, Ring, etc.