Male vs Female Faces?

[kim86]

i think sometimes its hard to tell with some dogs, shelties do have that feminine look about them.i think dog ppl are better at distinguishing the different. and when ppl call ur dog the wrong gender usually they dont take a very good look at them. im pretty good about looking at pix of shelties that ppl post on here and telling which ones are males and which are female. i have one male and female..and they both very much look like there gender. yet my neighbor for some reason can not tell who is who, even though there looks are exactly opposite. daisy has a short coat, tall, and light hair, koda is short, heavy coated and is much darker and he watched him 2 days for me at his house...and he still asks me "now which one is this?" everytime he comes over and is petting one of them.
what annoys me even more is when someone is admiring ur dog/ petting them or whatever and they refer to the dog as a him..and says "whats his name?" and i go "HER NAME IS DAISY" and they continue as if they werent listening and say to her "good boy!" and continue to refer to her as a boy. ppl do that with children too.

 

[MissSuzie]

I think Meggie looks all girl, however I'm not saying I could tell the gender of other dogs. Perhaps if you had a boy and girl in front of me I could tell the difference. But one dog, I doubt my average would be very good.

 

[take4roll10]

So let me get this straight. Girl shelties tend to have smaller features and a slimmer snout. Boy shelties tend to have bigger features like eyes and nose and have a boxier snout?

 

[missjenneygirl]

No, not at all. Dogs should look masculine and bitches should look feminine. Sometimes you will see doggy bitches and bitchy looking dogs. Which of course is fine, but not in the show ring. If I could line up 3 pictures, littermates: Tansy, Noah, and McKinley, I would, so you could see the dogs vs the bitch. Maybe someone out there can do it. All 3 pictures are on the forum. If you look at them side by side, I don't think anyone would get it wrong.

 

[RetiredProf]

Yes, but the "look" is subjective, right? Maybe I just have a hard time with our Shelties cause they're all so beautiful in general.

Perhaps it's easier to discern in other breeds. Of my 4 Dobies, Harley was definitely the male. I was never questioned and on one ever mistook his gender. Ditto two of three girls--finer features and lighter bone structure. Mad Maddy Lou, though, inherited Harley's bone structure, stance and ruggedness. She was often mistaken for a male.

 

[corbinam]

No, not at all. Dogs should look masculine and bitches should look feminine. Sometimes you will see doggy bitches and bitchy looking dogs. Which of course is fine, but not in the show ring. If I could line up 3 pictures, littermates: Tansy, Noah, and McKinley, I would, so you could see the dogs vs the bitch. Maybe someone out there can do it. All 3 pictures are on the forum. If you look at them side by side, I don't think anyone would get it wrong.

I've always heard this "males should look masculine and bitches feminine". I think it must be one of those--once you see it, you know what "it" is. Of course, Bentley was supposed to be a show dog and I feel like he looks rather girly, so who knows. But maybe it's that finer features thing.

 

[Justicemom]

Yes, but the "look" is subjective, right? Maybe I just have a hard time with our Shelties cause they're all so beautiful in general.

Perhaps it's easier to discern in other breeds. Of my 4 Dobies, Harley was definitely the male. I was never questioned and on one ever mistook his gender. Ditto two of three girls--finer features and lighter bone structure. Mad Maddy Lou, though, inherited Harley's bone structure, stance and ruggedness. She was often mistaken for a male.

I think rotties and dobermans have a more male vs female look than shelties. Now if the boy was neutered before 1 yr they are less male looking IMO. They tend to keep the teenage boy look.

 

[BarbV]

When I walk Sadie and Ginny, no one ever doubts that they're girls. But when I walk Milo also, people think he is the girl and that Sadie is the boy, since she's bigger than him.

Here are some photos of the three of them. Can you tell which ones are the girls?

Girl, girl, boy!

(p.s. I'm doing this without checking)

Am I right?

 

[BarbV]

Edan's my little guy who will be stuck with the looks of a gal for the rest of his life. Even in the show ring as a pup judges commented "too bad he's not a bitch".

Here are some pictures, judge for yourself:
http://silaria.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=141
http://silaria.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=794
http://silaria.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=836

http://silaria.net/gallery/main.php?g2_itemId=773 - I think he looks the most masculine in this one.

I'd still say "boy" looking at these pics!

 

[BarbV]

One thing for sure....don't go by the size of the dog.

You can have an undersized male, but still definitely male.

I go by expression on the face, the tilt of the jaw and head....it's not something that I can describe really, and I don't know if I could do it with all colour variations of Shelties. I would find it hardest with Tri's for some reason. Tri's all look like Males to me.

But I think I could nail it 8 times out of 10.

Now, that would be interesting....post ten pictures of unknown dogs and see who can guess? If I have cycles later tonight, I might try this! (of course, that would blow my picture allotment to shreds.....maybe Kelly you should do this instead?)