Invictus Sky (Sky) and Casadelcane Narla (Tara)
At present we have five female's in our kennel & 2 stud's, one of which we have bred ourselve's using the finest line's, his name is Boss & is now owned by Kylie & Will of Gisborne, you will find more on each of our dog's in their very own page's. You will find full pedigree's for all our Neo's at the bottom of this page.. At present we have a range of colour's including blue, black, tawny & mahogany.
History of the Neapolitan
Synonymous of the Italian Mastiff, this large breed is the result of at least 3 thousand years of both natural & human selection based on the various descriptions obtained from the past. Different sources say the progenitor of this mastiff is a "Tibetan" dog, which affected the phenotype of the "Persian" Mastiff used in battle by king Porus against the well known Alexander the Great, it was he who saw their strength & took them back to Greece to a region of Epirus named "Molossia" & breed for many year's. "Molossus" is used by roman's to describe this dog & translated to "Molossian" in english. Paolo Emilio the roman emperor took 100 of these dog's home as a war booty. Roman's widely used these dog's for fighting games at the Colosseum ("giochi circensis"). In the time of Julio Caesar, the Greek strain was supposedly bred with the mastiff's encounted during the military campaign in "Britannia" (the actual Great Britain) most likely taken there by Phoenicians. The dog fortunately survived the Medieval Age's & were used for guarding castle's & for wild boar hunting, then a crucial step for the selection of the present phenotype of the Neapolitan Mastiff was the contribution of the Spanish "Perro De Presa" that was bred with the ancient Italian mastiff around the middle of the XV century (1450 A.D). This dog then became the "in breed" for king's & their servent's alike of Aragona & later Borroni. The dog become a common theme in both sculpture's & painting's throughout the southern Italian peninsula. The following centuries saw the breed survive in the countryside around Naple's. Italian's nicknamed the Neapolitan Mastiff owners "Mastinari" & is still commonly used today within breeder's in southern Italy. The official recognition of this ancient dog was in 1949 by the Italian Kennel Club (ENCI) . Following World War II after Piero Scanziani collected some up from the Neapolitan countryside & bred them at the Rome zoo.
Exercise and Training
Mastino being a "giant breed" are not overly active & do not require much exercise, in fact to much exercise can be detrimental to their health, causing unnecessary stress to the heart & joint's. Up until at least 1 year of age they should not be walked excessively, nor allowed to climb stair's or jump continuously as activity such as this can result in damage to crucial joint's & can instigate conditions such as elbow dysplasia - although the condition is certainly primarily genetic. Mastino are not fully mature until around 3 years old although having a large appearance.
Basic training should start as early as possible and 10 minutes a day is all that's required, anymore is ineffective as the attention span of dog's is very short. If you intend to show your dog, begin with lead training using a chocker chain and progressing to "stacking" using "stand" for the command & offer a "treat" and praise after performing correctly, do not offer treat's to "bait" your dog to perform, as this only teaches them to expect food before they have even done anything.
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