Cairn Terrier PictureInk Drawing Cairn Terrier Picture, By Nick Van Duren
This is actually the first Cairn Terrier I’ve drawn. Other than the most famous Cairn Terrier of all, Toto from the Wizard of Oz, I really had little knowledge of this dog. Not too long ago, while working for an publications company, I met a wonderful lady who grew up with Cairn Terriers. As a benefit of our spirited talks, I gained a new appreciation for this breed. The word Cairn actually means “stone piles” or “rock piles”; hence you’ll see some rock piles in this Cairn Terrier picture. The Cairn Terrier dog was trusted to hunt down rats and other types of vermin hiding under the rocks in Scotland. Oddly enough, didn’t Toto actually “hunt” down the Wizard behind the curtain? The thing that kind of cracks me up though is how they appear as if they have permanent “bed head”. You can see the wired fur I tried to capture while drawing this Cairn Terrier picture. The ink medium turned out to be the perfect medium for this Cairn Terrier picture, because of how easy it is to convey the lines in the fur. This breed is obviously built for hunting down vermin, with big sharp teeth and a “don’t mess with me” attitude, which the dog in this Cairn Terrier picture has. At a recent dog-handling course, it was the Cairns who did quite a bit of growling at each other. They were sweet to everyone else, but hold on! They’ve got the ability to be quite fierce on the hunt, despite their small size and unimposing demeanor. However, the Cairn Terrier dog simply loves it…much as the Norwich Terrier hunts down rats causing havoc in the barn! According to my friend, her dog is so independent that he will stay out in the back yard in search of that elusive gopher for hours on end. In fact, they sometimes have to simply go out there and pick him up, because he won’t come in! I’m sure a lot of Cairn Terrier owners can relate. ;) The funny thing is, how far do you think he’ll go on the road in this Cairn Terrier picture, especially with all those “cairns” to explore! AKC Breed Standard for the Cairn Terrier |