Saving the Norwegian Lundehund: an update from Milo

By Carol Beuchat PhD

Please welcome our guest blogger, Milo Melis, who would like to tell you about a program he is involved in to bring the Norwegian Lundehund, the "Puffin dog",  back from the brink of extinction. Because of an unfortunate history of severe population bottlenecks and job loss (Puffin hunting was banned), the breed was reduced to just a handful of highly inbred and related dogs. Many were sickly, puppy mortality was high, and some dogs died of a horrible intestinal disorder.

The decision was made by the Norwegian Lundehund club to attempt to save the breed with a cross-breeding program. With the help of a team of geneticists, a breeding strategy was developed. They made crosses to several related Nordic breeds. The resulting cross-bred F1s were bred back to Lundehunds, and we now have F2 puppies.

My Norwegian friend Milo Melis has offered to give us an update on the Lundehund genetic rescue project.

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​Hi! My name is Milo!

​I am 11 weeks old and I am a B-Lundehund. What is a B-Lundehund? They told me it means that I am a very special Lundehund puppy because my mother is a Norwegian Lundehund but my father is half Buhund. I think it means I'm a "best-Lundehund!" 

Here I am practicing my fierce "Don't you take my Hippo!" face.

Everybody seems to like my cute toes, like they're something really special. Whatever. I like to use them to play with the funny Hippo toy I got for Xmas from my dad Banzai. 

I'm practicing my Dog Speak. I think this means "Let's play!".

I live in Ranheim, Norway, with Aiko, an 11 year old Lundehund, and a 2 year old black cat named Yuki. And of course there is my human family, Claudia and Tomas and their two kids, Viola and Luca. 

Here I am practicing my best Lundehund pose in my winter sweater.

Aiko is 11 years old. He's teaching me the Lundehund traditions.

Everybody thinks I look a lot like my friend Aiko. He is teaching me all the basic Lundehund stuff like finding mice in the snow and keeping our playground clear of low-hanging branches.

Aiko told me there was a mouse in here. I can't see a thing. Why is he laughing?

​My BFF (after Aiko, but he's really family) is Milli. She is a Staffordshire Bull Terrier. She can be a bit bossy, but she is teaching me to Play Nicely. She's a really great friend. And we both love the snow!

​We live in the beautiful countryside of Norway. The snow goes forever and there are so many places to play and explore! 

Yuhuu! Finally we get to run and play after too many days of leash walks because the weather was bad.

I will write again soon about my fun puppy adventures! I love you all so much!

Your faithful friend in Norway,
Milo

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Oops, I almost forgot. This is a video about my Lundehund ancestors. It shows the little island we lived on and how we hunted Puffins. I hope Aiko and I can go there too when I get older. 

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Many thanks to Dr Claudia Melis for the photos and for helping Milo write his first blog post. 

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ICB is a proud supporter of the Norwegian Lundehund Rescue Project.
​Watch for our article coming out soon in Dogs in Review!

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