Black Presa Canarios are real and standard color. Black Presa Canarios are not new, and they were not a new concept to be introduced to the breed. A few quick facts:
Black Presa Canario existed in the first official breed standard for Presa Canario. The first original breed standard was accepted in 1989. This is the date Presa Canario started to exist as an official breed.
1996, the breed entered AKC in their FSS program. Black was included with AKC color code 007.
The push towards FCI recognition made Presa Canario Club accept the FCI’s insistence for some changes. The breed was provisionally accepted by FCI under a new name – Dogo Canario. The breed standard with black color was removed, and the weight increased. It was the year 2001.
The same dogs were sometimes issued pedigrees under a few different names for the breed: Perro de Presa Canario, Dogo Canario, and translations of those names in the languages of the countries the dogs resided.
January 1st, 2003 UKC recognized Presa Canario with the original breed standard and black color included. And name Perro de Presa Canario.
Year 2018 – under the ordinance of the governing body of the Canary Islands, seeing Presa Canario as their heritage and symbol of the island of Gran Canaria RSCE and in extension, FCI were forced to bring back the name of Presa Canario as the official one. Further changes to breed standard had to go through a longer process of approval from FCI.
2023 – FCI announces the original breed standard first accepted in 1989 as the only legitimate breed standard for Presa Canario. Black color is included,
You can easily see black was part of the breed from the beginning. And if you had FCI-registered dogs, you obviously couldn’t show black dogs between 2001 and 2023. You also would have problems registering black puppies depending in which country you were issuing pedigrees. You could have kept registering your dogs with AKC FSS or UKC as many people did. You could also use smaller local registries, and as many breeders on Canary Islands you would continue to not register your dogs at all, and keep pedigrees in your own records.
Popularity of the black color when people were disillusioned with the importance of dog shows anyway made some question were did this dogs came from? Did they just show up out of nowhere? No, black dogs did exist among a few people who liked the color and didn’t select for FCI standard. These few black dogs were then used by people wanting to have black puppies, and the majority of the black offspring were retained for future breeding. The population of black dogs quickly grew in an organic way, and only on very rare occasions did somebody forge a pedigree when they hadn’t had access to a black dog for breeding, but they wanted to have black puppy offspring. Actions of this indiciduals should be condemned, but they shouldn’t be held against the majority of the population of black dogs who came from legitimate origins.
I hope this short note will help you understand black Presa Canario is as legitimate as the fawn and brindle. And that they have deep roots in tradition and people fighting for them and for the true, original Presa Canario with true Canarian spirit.
Ewa
