Appearance. In general,
Great Dane is a big-sized dog with balanced appearance, nobility and
proportionality of lines, thus he resembles an antique statue.
The most important proportions of
Great Dane. The body of the dog is almost square, it
especially concerns male dogs. Their slanting length of the body
should not be 5 % more than the height. The bitch of Great Dane
shouldn’t have the slanting length 10 % more than her height.
According to the standard, the male dog’s height at the whither
should be not less than 32 inches (80 cm). For the bitches this
standard is not less than 29 inches (72 cm).
Great Dane’s character. Normally Great Dane is friendly,
joyous, devoted to his owner, especially to children, even-tempered
and restrained with strangers. He is also self-confident enough,
fearless, easy trained and moderately malicious, but without
excessive aggression.
Standard of Great Dane’s head. It
should be porrect, big-sized with perfectly developed superciliary
arches. Lines of the high flat forehead should be parallel to
the snout’s lines. The length of the snout should be
approximately equal to the half-length of the dog’s head. The snout
of the Great Dane is rectangular with strongly marked droopy upper
lip. The lips are dark in color. Jaws are strong and broad. Great
Dane normally has at least 42 white teeth. Eyes are dark brown with
close-fitting eyelids. For Great Dane born after 01.01.1993 the
standard provides uncroped ears. They should be hanging,
middle-sized and without breaks. In countries where ear cropping is
still in practice it’s usually done according to the size and shape
of the dog’s head.
The neck of Great Dane
should be long, muscular, slightly booming from withers to the
torso.
Great Dane’s body. The dogs
of this breed have short, broad and muscular, slightly booming to a
little distinct waist. Croup is sloping and very muscular. Great
Dane’s tail is set on high, broad at the base, gradually convergent
to the tip. The tail is usually hanging freely, but in excited state
is slightly raised over the back’s line. According to the standard
the chest is broad and oval in shape, with voluminous ribs. The
stomach and groin are neat and together with the chest line make
smoothly curved line. Testicles (of male dogs) are average and
dropped into the scrotum.
Extremities. Forelegs are
straight and parallel. The shoulders are muscular with adherent
shoulder blade. The shoulder of Great Dane should be a little bit
longer than the blade. Dog’s elbows are adjacent to the body,
directed strictly to the back. Forearms are long, straight and
sheer. Hind legs of the Great Dane are strong, muscular and
parallel; hips are long and broad; lower thigh is almost as long as
hip and muscular. Great Dane’s paws are short and round. Claws are
dark in color, firm and short.
Step. According to the
standard Great Dane has long, free and springy step, the body isn’t
swaying.
Great Dane’s skin. The skin
is flexible, without folds and perspiratory glands. The hair is very
short, thick and normally without underfur.
Great Dane’s colors.
Pale yellow color consists
of the brightly yellow ground color with black or white spots on the
chest and paws.
Striped color. The ground
color may be between light yellow and red and gold with vertical,
clearly traced lines, evenly arranged all over the body and creating
tiger-like pattern. Evan small white spots on the chest and
paws are undesirable, but acceptable.
Harlequin. The ground color
is snowy white with many black irregular spots all over the body.
Grey and brown spots are undesirable, but acceptable.
Black. The ground color is
glossy black without yellow or grey tint. The white spots on the
chest and paws are acceptable. To this category also belong black
Great Danes with big white spots on the snout, neck, chest, stomach,
paws and tip of the tail, that create the impression of white color
dog, covered with black coat.
Blue. The ground color is
light grey without yellow tint. The white spots on the chest and
paws are acceptable.
Disqualifying taints of Great Dane
are the following:
- cowardice and inexplicable aggression;
- bifid or brown nose;
- undeveloped low jaw;
- blue eyes, ectropium, entropium;
- tail’s breaks;
- monorchism, cryptorchism, too small, undeveloped testicles;
- lower height as compared to the standard;
- harlequin color with light grey ground color, harlequin
without spots or with yellow, blue spots;
- dirty yellow grey ground color.