Long Haired German Shepherds

This is an article to explain how we get “long haired” in our German Shepherd litters.

There is a range of coat lengths and fullness in the normal stock hair category.   The normal stock hair German Shepherd Dog  has an outer coat that should be as thick as possible. The individual hairs are straight, coarse and lying flat against the body. The coat is short on the head inclusive of the ears, the front of the legs, the feet and the toes but longer and thicker on the neck. The hair grows longer on the back of the fore and hind legs as far down as the pastern and the hock joint, forming moderate breaching on the thighs. The length of the hair varies, and due to these differences in length, there are many intermediate forms.

The long stock hair coated German Shepherd Dog’s  individual hairs are longer, not always straight and above all not lying close to the body. The coat is considerably longer inside and behind the ears, on the back of the forearm and usually in the loin area. now and then there will be tufts in the ears and feathering from elbow to pastern. The breaching along the thigh is long and thick. The tail is bushy with slight feathering underneath.

The long haired German Shepherd Dog’s coat is considerably longer than that of the stock hair. The undercoat will be found in the region of the loins or will not be present at all.

The important distinction between the correct and incorrect coats (per the German Shepherd standard) is not just hair length, but the pattern of hair growth. The incorrect coats (long hair, long stock hair) have the bushy tufts behind the ears, the big fluffy pantaloons and big bushy round tail, and long fringes along the backs of the legs, and longer hair between the toes. A puppy can often be identified as a Long haired German Shepherd Dog if it possesses ear fringe or tufts. The important distinction is the fluffy long tufts in the ears and around the ears.

It is possible to have two normal coated dogs produce long hairs as each parent must carry the recessive gene. If one parent does not carry the “long hair” gene, and the other does, then no long hairs will be produced in that litter. Sometimes multiple litters will be born with no long hairs in the litters, and other times there could be 1-4 long hairs in that litter. The long stock haired German Shepherd could have the same undercoat as the normal stock hair German Shepherd. The long hair’s can now be shown in the German style show ring. Below are some examples of the beautiful Lundborg-Land long hairs produced over time.