 The
dog Beagle is originally developed for hunting hare and rabbit
but today it is even more a popular family dog. The Beagle has
become especially well-known as Snoopy in the comic strip
Peanuts by Charles M. Schulz.
Beagle is a scent dog and as
its relatives it has an impressing nose and can sense a smell
even better than most other dogs.
The Beagle has a friendly
temper and gets easy along with children and it is therefore very suitable as a family dog. It has a reputation of being
difficult - or even impossible - to use for serious training.
This is not true but for sure it needs more consequence than
many other dogs.
Originally the Beagle is
closely connected to England and the English hunting
traditions but today Beagle is a popular pet dog in many
countries and as a pedigree dog even more popular in America
than in its homeland.
Dogs of the same size and purpose
has been known for hundreds of years. Often the origin of the Beagle
breed - and also the scent Basset hound - is connected to the
Talbot Hound brought to England by William the Conqueror after
the Battle of Hastings in 1066. In Medieval times the name
Beagle was used as a more general name for smaller dogs much
less specific than a modern dog exhibition would accept
|
With
the nose close to the ground
|
In
the 18th century the breeds Southern Hound and North Country
Beagle started a process among others involving greyhound - ending up with the modern Beagle and
the foxhound - among others. Beagles as we know it today were
developed in the 19th century and The Beagle Club in England
was founded in 1890.
The name Beagle was also
the name
of the ship H.M.S. Beagle which helped Charles Darwin to collect information about life on
the planet Earth and write the book The Origin of
Species.
 This background also inspired to the
name of the Mars lander Beagle
2, which reached Mars in December 2003. Earlier American
Mars landers had the names Viking 1 and Viking 2.
Read more about Beagle at Dog
Breed Info Center or the very informative WikiPedia description
about Beagle history and breeding.
|
