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Dog Man – The Savior of Japan’s Akitas


Pet Travel Tuesday

Dog Man (Japanese Akita)
Destination: Japan

Book: Dog Man: An Uncommon Life on a Faraway Mountain, by Martha Sherrill (2008)

By Pamela Douglas Webster

See Pam’s thoughts about Breeds at Something Wagging This Way Comes. 

Weakened by wars and deprivation, the Japanese people nearly lost a precious piece of their cultural heritage in the early 20th century: their Akitas.

An informal count in 1945 identified only 16 of these primitive dogs in the entire nation of Japan. Starving families in the mountainous, snowy region of northern Japan ate the dogs for survival and sold their pelts to line military officers’ coats. Continue reading Dog Man – The Savior of Japan’s Akitas