One breed, one standard, three sizes. The dachshund’s sizes are told apart not by height at the withers, and not by weight, but by the circumference of the chest — a habit left over from the work the breed was made for. Underground, a dog’s worth depended on the tunnels it could follow, and the chest is what has to fit. Kaninchen is German for rabbit. The name is the job description.
Measured at the chest
FCI Standard N° 148 — the breed’s international standard, held by Germany — separates the three sizes by chest circumference, taken with a tape from the highest point of the withers to the lowest point of the chest, on a dog no younger than fifteen months. The bands are these:
| Males | Females | |
|---|---|---|
| Standard | over 37 cm, up to 47 cm | over 35 cm, up to 45 cm |
| Miniature · nano | over 32 cm, up to 37 cm | over 30 cm, up to 35 cm |
| Kaninchen | from 27 cm, up to 32 cm | from 25 cm, up to 30 cm |
Chest circumference per FCI Standard N° 148, English version of 14.03.2022. In the Italian studbook the three sizes are registered as standard, nano and kaninchen (ENCI).
Everything else in the standard is written once, for all three: the same proportions, the same construction, the same temperament — “friendly by nature, neither fearful nor aggressive, with even temperament”. Three sizes across three coats give the breed its nine varieties. A kaninchen wirehair is not a diluted standard; it is the same dog drawn at a smaller scale.
A size is confirmed, not promised
The size on a puppy’s papers is provisional. In the Italian studbook a litter is registered at birth in the mother’s size, and the definitive size is assigned later, when a judge measures the adult chest — since 2021, at fifteen months at the earliest. A championship depends on that confirmation. This puts a quiet limit on what anyone can promise about a ten-week-old puppy: the studbook itself waits more than a year before certifying a size. A serious breeder can tell you what the parents and the line suggest. The tape measure has the last word.
You ask. We answer.
“Will my puppy stay kaninchen?” It is registered in its mother’s size and confirmed only when the adult chest is measured. We tell you what we expect from the parents and the line — and we call it an expectation, not a certificate.
“Is a smaller dachshund more delicate?” The standard asks the same construction of every size — the same back, the same proportions, the same even temperament. A well-made kaninchen is a small hunting dog, not an ornament. We watch construction, not centimetres.
“Which size suits our family?” We start from your days — stairs, children, other animals, how much garden there is — and from the puppies we actually have. The conversation usually settles it before the tape measure does.
From the house
The affix took its final form after a remark about size. When Francesca was looking for a name for the kennel, her son Gabriel described the wirehaired dachshund as “un piccolo giustiziere” — a small avenger, always vigilant, out to prove to itself that “le dimensioni non contano”: size does not count. Her own idea of the breed, written down years ago, runs the same way: short in the loin, straight in the back, not too high on the leg and above all not too big — and against any morphological exaggeration, because exaggeration can put a dog’s health at risk. The compliment she paid one of her males, Briatore, is the house’s view of the sizes in one line: “a true standard dachshund in a kaninchen body”. The whole dog, at whatever scale. The dogs of the house are being written up, name by name.
Choosing well begins with a conversation
Size is the easiest question to ask and rarely the one that decides. Read about the character these dogs share at every scale, and the wire coat they all wear. Then write to us about your family and your days, and we will talk about the dogs we actually have. The centimetres come last.