Drever Dog Breed Information

The Drever is Sweden’s national scenthound, a short-legged tricolour hound bred to track roe deer and fox at a steady foot-pace tempo through deep forest. The breed is the third-most popular dog in Sweden after the Labrador and the German Shepherd, with around 1,000 Swedish Kennel Club registrations every year. Outside Sweden it is genuinely rare, and in NZ the breed is effectively absent from the pet population: NZKC registrations are minimal across a decade and almost every NZ Drever is an import rather than a NZ-bred dog.

Adults stand 30 to 38 cm at the shoulder and weigh 14 to 16 kg. The build is long-bodied and short-legged in the tradition of the Westphalian Dachsbracke that contributed half the breed’s foundation, but the proportions are more athletic than a Dachshund and the working brief is different. The short, dense, weatherproof double coat is most often classic black-tan-and-white tricolour, with fawn-and-white and red-and-white also accepted; white markings on the chest, feet, tail tip and face are required by the breed standard.

Personality and behaviour

A Drever is friendly, sociable and even-tempered with the household, polite with children, and tolerant of other dogs. The breed was selected to work alongside a hunter and other hounds across full days in Swedish forest, and the wiring shows: most adults default to relaxed and biddable around people, with a steady working temperament rather than a high-strung sighthound edge.

The trait that surprises new owners is the voice. Drevers bay rather than bark, and the bay is deep and carrying for a 15 kg dog. The voice is part of the working spec, designed to let a hunter hear and follow the dog through dense forest, and the wiring is intact. The breed is not a quiet apartment dog; the bay travels through plasterboard and triggers on rabbits, possums, and most outdoor activity.

The second feature is the nose. Drevers were bred to follow scent over hours and kilometres of forest. The same drive that makes the breed a serious hunting tool makes recall in unfenced NZ reserves unreliable for life. Most Drever owners use a long line in unfenced ground and reserve free off-lead work for fully fenced paddocks or remote rabbit-free terrain.

The third feature is the back. The breed shares the long-bodied, short-legged frame that gives Dachshunds their notorious intervertebral disc problem. Drevers are not as extreme in proportion and the IVDD rate is meaningfully lower, but the same precautions apply: keep weight strict, use ramps or steps for the couch and bed, discourage repeated stair-jumping, and lift the dog rather than letting it leap from car or ute height.

Separation tolerance is moderate. The breed prefers company and tends to be calmer when housed with another dog. Long workdays alone produce vocalising and destructive boredom; a midday walk or a working-from-home routine is part of the realistic NZ ownership picture.

Care and exercise

Plan on around 75 minutes a day of structured exercise, ideally combining a steady walk with sniff time and tracking work. The breed is a foot-pace stamina dog rather than a sprinter; long walks across paddock and bush suit it, and the breed is happy to keep going for two or three hours at a comfortable pace given the chance.

Exercise pattern matters for the back. Long, fast, repeated up-and-down stairs and high jumps are the worst exercise pattern for any long-bodied dog. Steady walking, sniff work, gentle scent games and short on-lead tracking sessions are ideal. Avoid:

• Jumping on and off the couch and bed. Use a ramp or steps; most NZ pet stores stock them at NZ$80 to NZ$200.
• Repeated stairs in volume. A few flights a day is fine; a week of multiple daily runs up an apartment building is a disc episode waiting to happen.
• Rough wrestling with bigger dogs that pin them.
• Leaping out of the back of a ute or car at boot height. Lift the dog or use a ramp.

Grooming is one of the easier loads in the dog world. The short weatherproof double coat needs only a weekly rub with a rubber curry mitt; sheds steadily year-round at moderate volume with a heavier two to three week blow-out in spring and autumn. The drop ears need a weekly check and dry-out after wet bush work or swimming; ear infections are the single most common Drever vet visit.

The climate fit in NZ is excellent across most of the country. The breed was developed for Swedish forest in deep snow and is genuinely happy in cold, wet, and rough conditions:

• Auckland and Northland. Comfortable in winter; summer humidity is the practical limit. Morning and evening exercise from December through February. Avoid pavement walks at midday.
• Wellington. Suits the breed. Wind and wet do not bother a Drever. Hill suburbs (Brooklyn, Khandallah, Karori) need stair planning for the back.
• Christchurch and Canterbury. Built for it. The double coat handles frost easily and the breed thrives on long walks across paddock and reserve in winter conditions.
• Central Otago and Southland. Ideal. Snow-tolerant by design. The breed is happiest in cold-weather rural country with room to run.

Dietary care is straightforward. Adult intake commonly runs 200 to 300 g of quality dry food a day depending on activity, split into two meals. The breed is not particularly food-driven for a hound but treats add up quickly on a 15 kg dog. Keep the dog lean; the back and the joints both reward strict weight management.

Where to find a Drever in New Zealand

The honest answer is that the Drever is effectively unavailable through standard NZ pet channels. There is no established NZKC breeding pool, NZKC registrations are minimal across a decade, and almost every Drever in NZ is an import rather than a NZ-bred dog.

Three realistic paths.

1. Imports from Sweden, Canada or Australia. The standard route. Sweden is the breed’s home; the Swedish Kennel Club registers around 1,000 puppies a year. Import costs (transport, MPI biosecurity, quarantine paperwork) add NZ$5,000 to NZ$10,000 on top of the puppy price. NZKC accepts FCI-registered Drever pedigrees on the standard import process.
2. Substitute breeds. Most NZ scenthound households interested in a Drever-style dog choose a Beagle, a Basset Hound or a Smooth Dachshund instead. Beagle access in NZ is excellent through NZKC breeders, breed rescue and SPCA. The Basset Hound covers the long-bodied scenthound profile at slightly larger scale. None is a perfect Drever substitute, but all three are realistic NZ pet dogs in a way the Drever currently is not.
3. Hunting and tracking networks. NZ Deerstalkers’ Association branches and tracking-dog clubs occasionally know of imported working dogs and ex-working dogs. The relationships are personal rather than commercial, and the dogs typically go to households already inside the hunting community.

Avoid any seller marketing a Drever puppy in NZ without verifiable FCI or AKC FSS pedigree paperwork; the breed’s rarity and the visual similarity to a Beagle-Dachshund cross make it an easy target for misrepresentation.