The Japanese Akita Inu comes in a variety of beautiful colors, from aka (red) and goma (sesame), to shimofuri (silver) and shiro (white). In their native country of Japan, the colors are divided about 60%, 30%, 10%, but one mustn’t forget the breed’s famous “urajiro,” (oo/ra/gee/ro) which is essentially a description meaning undersurface white. The Nippo Standard calls for all Shibas to have urajiro on the sides of their mouth and cheeks (which, insiders tell us, is really more “omotejiro” than “urajiro”),  the under-section of the jaw, neck, chest and stomach, and the forechest, extending to the shoulder joint, but not extending onto the shoulder itself.

This isn’t a recommendation by Nippo, it’s required. 

The Akita Inu’s coat also consists out of three types of hair: The outer guard coat (a bit longer than the regular coat and it needs to stand out like soldiers saluting), the regular coat, a tough, rough coat that double duty by protecting the dog against injuries and serving as a water-repellent. Finally, the wooly undercoat that is fine, thick, and oh-so-soft become luxuriously thick during the winter and in so doing, provides extra insulation.  Some veteran Akita owners complain that the breed’s coat has gotten entirely too soft and flat, a problem that leads to the dog getting wet to the skin during snow and rain. We’ll leave that discussion to breed experts, but we do invite our Japanese Akita Inu readers to share photographs of their kirei (beautiful) dogs!

Japanese Akita Inu/Deposit