HISTORY OF THE PORTUGUESE WATER DOG

The modern day Portuguese Water Dog’s ancestors are thought to have originated in central Asia around 700 B.C. and may have been used there to herd livestock.  It is believed that these dogs were taken to Portugal by a group of migrating Visigoths sometime in the fifth century.  As the breed spread along the Atlantic coast of Portugal, fishermen began using the dogs on their boats.  The dogs were often taken in trawlers to the frigid fishing waters off the coast of Iceland, where fleets of Portuguese sailors caught saltwater codfish to take home.  The Portuguese Water Dog worked as a courier from ship to ship, drove fish into nets, guarded fishing equipment on shore, and retrieved broken fishing gear from the ocean.  The breed was well suited for these tasks, as the dog is an excellent swimmer, seafarer, and is capable of diving to retrieve underwater items.       

The Portuguese Water Dog found its way into recorded history in 1297, showing up in a monk’s report of a drowning sailor who had been pulled from the sea by a dog with a “black coat, the hair long and rough, cut to the first rib and with a tail tuft.”*  The Portuguese Water Dog became known as the “lion dog” due to the appearance of this particular clip.  Although there is no supporting evidence for the theory, some believe that the Portuguese Water Dog made its contribution to history in the sixteenth century, working on board the ships of the Spanish Armada.  By the early twentieth century, the breed was facing extinction.  A decrease in the number of fishermen working and the invention of marine technology eliminated the usefulness of the dog.   

Known as “Cao de Agua,” the dog of the water, in Portugal, the breed is also sometimes called the Portuguese Fishing Dog, the Diving Dog, or the Sea Dog.  In the 1930’s, friends introduced “Cao de Agua” to Vasco Bensuade, a wealthy Portuguese shipping line owner with an interest in dogs.  Although there were not many dogs of this breed left, Bensuade eventually came to acquire one, whom he named Leao, or lion.  Bensuade moved the Portuguese Water Dog out of the realm of mere working animal and into the realm of the dog fancier; he also helped to revive the breed in Portugal, using Leao as the founding sire of his kennel, Algarbiorum.  Leao would become the Portuguese Water Dog that the original breed standard was based on. 

In the 1960’s, two Americans by the names of Deyanne and Herbert Miller, Jr. became interested in the Portuguese Water Dog.  They acquired their first Portuguese Water Dog from Algarbiorum Kennels, which had been passed on to Conchita Branco, a former lady bullfighter, after Bensuade’s death.  The Millers named Leao’s descendent Renascenca (renaissance) do Al Gharb and set about saving the breed--now down to twenty-five known dogs in the world--from extinction.  In 1972, the Millers, along with fourteen other people, formed the Portuguese Water Dog Club of America, Inc. (PWDCA) to do just that.  The club members gave themselves the mission of reviving the breed, using only strong, healthy foundation stock.  Today there are over five thousand Portuguese Water Dogs in America alone.  The breed was admitted to the American Kennel Club’s (AKC) Miscellaneous class on June 3, 1981 and became eligible to compete in the show ring on January 1, 1984.