A giant dog breed is a

breed of dog A breed is a specific group of domestic animals having homogeneous appearance (phenotype), homogeneous behavior, and/or other characteristics that distinguish it from other organisms of the same species. In literature, there exist several slight ...

of gigantic proportions, sometimes described as a breed whose weight exceeds . Breeds sometimes described as giant breeds include the

Great Dane The Great Dane is a large sized dog breed originating from Germany. The Great Dane descends from hunting dogs from the Middle Ages used to hunt wild boar and deer, and as guardians of German nobility. It is one of the largest breeds in the world ...

Newfoundland Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...

, St. Bernard and Irish Wolfhound. These breeds have seen a marked increase in their size since the 19th century as a result of

selective breeding Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant mal ...

. Dog breeds described as giants tend to have more health problems than smaller dogs and have the shortest life expectancy of all dog breeds.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Giant Dog Breed Dog breeds

See also

References