Snow Dogs

My crew and I live in a geographic location near Lake Superior. This means, like many places near the Great Lakes, we get a lot of lake effect snow in the winter. A lot.
I've lived in colder places.
I've lived in more northern locations.
I've never lived in a snowier, or more windy, location.

Birds feeding after the latest storm

Sled dogs love it here in the winter because we have so gosh darn much of the powdery, white, fluffy snow to play in. And cold wind, which ruffles their thick fur. As Gracie runs in and out very quickly, and Lil and Jenny take time to bounce in the snow and enjoy it, I was thinking about the breeds of dogs who really revel in cold.

Today I'll focus more on dogs that I particularly associate with snow. That way, when I miss your favorite northern/mountain/snow breed you can just add it below in the comment section.

Malamute

Chinook sled team

Having lived in a number of communities where dog sledding is popular, I always associate sled appropriate breeds with winter first, particularly the following:

Alaskan Malamute
Chinook

Smiling Samoyed

Samoyed
Siberian Husky

Happy Husky

I next think of mountain bred dogs I associate with cold:


            Bernese Mountain Dog

Caucasian Ovcharka

             

              Greater Swiss Mountain Dog

Pyrenees Mountain Dog

                                            St. Bernard

Tibetan Mastiff









Then I think of the breeds who were bred to hunt or work in the north, either on land or in water.

                                 Chesapeake Bay Retriever

Icelandic Sheepdog







                 Karelian Bear Dog

                                                                                                    Keeshond

Kuvasz










                 Labrador Retriever

                                                                       

                                                                               Newfoundland

 Norwegian Buhund

                                                                 Norwegian Elkhound

Norwegian Lundehund

                                               Nova Scotia Duck Tolling Retriever







Swedish Lapphund

                                                                     Swedish Valhund        

Again, this is obviously not an exhaustive list. There are many other breeds of dogs who can enjoy the cold - like Rough Collies and Golden Retrievers. The above list is more a list of breeds I tend to associate with snow; to me these breeds were designed to be in the snow.

I'm interested to hear what breeds you would add to the list.
And what breeds have you known that really enjoy the snow, like Jenny the Collie, despite the fact that they weren't necessarily specifically bred for cold, northern work.

 



P.S. I decided to add a snow graphic from our region:

Throughout the year people stop to take their picture near our 'snowmometer' which shows the average amount of snow we receive in the winter. I like this pic because someone actually caught another person in the snowbank, providing a better sense of scale. We average around 250 - 275 inches ( 635 - 698.5 cm) a winter, our record year we received 390 inches (990.6 cm.) Thank God I was living in Canada that year!