This is for jenga123 Selection of LGDs starts very early, from the first day that they were born. Bitches are welping, in most cases, in a hole in snow or dirth digged by them. Pups have to survive through those harsh winters and almost constant lack of food. The ones who manage to do that, are then observed by owners. If the pup is shy and easilly scared and winy, the shepherd eliminates it. I've personaly witnessed when a shepherd gave the skin of a freshly killed wolf to 40 day-old pups to play with it and observed what they are doing. For the first time in their lives they scented the smell of blood and smell of beast. Five pups aproached to smell it carefully. One of them started to squeal and then ran off. The four pups that stayed started to bite the skin and to growl. The shepherd then took the pup that ran off and killed it behind his house! When I found out what he did, I wanted to kill him myself, but I knew that I couldn't, it's their rule and right, and above all, he had four sons who would've killed me then. In the next period of the pups' lives, the shepherd observes how those puppies are counteracting with the sheep and how they are learning and taking the knowledge from the older dogs in their pack. If they are not good at it, he decides to sell them or give them away (but that happens very rarely). Then, when the pups are 9 to 12 months old, shepherds test them with wolves, trapped somewhere in the mountains. If the dog attacks the wolf determinatly, he stays in his pack, and if not, he is being killed! In the period before 9 months of age, shepherds usually leave the pups at home when they are going to their mountain pastures, because at that age pups are just another easy prey for wolves because they aren't fully developed. Testing of a dog with another dog is done, as I've already said it in my previous posts here, for determination of dominance of dogs and is done usually when the dog is older then 12 months. This gives the shepherd information about the dogs for mating, 'cause if he doesn't have a dog that is the strongest, bravest and most dominant, he will be pairing his bitches with the one that is, and the winner on those kind of tournaments is the [u]one.[/u]. Aleksa