The Kennel Club of Montenegro has banned the participation of dogs with cropped ears and docked tails in its shows
The Kennel Club of Montenegro, an organization that brings together kennel clubs in Montenegro, issues pedigrees and championship certificates for dogs, and is the main organizer of dog shows and purebred competitions in the country, has published a striking notice on its website kscg.co.me stating that cropped and docked dogs cannot participate in dog shows in Montenegro.
This marks a major change in their previous practice, as for many years dogs with cropped ears and docked tails appeared at these events as participants and even as award-winning competitors.
The Montenegrin Animal Welfare Act, in Article 10, prohibits performing certain procedures on animals. Specifically, it is forbidden to carry out procedures on animals for the purpose of changing their appearance or identity, concealing physical defects or age, or performing partial or complete amputation of certain parts of the animal’s body. These procedures include tail docking for all animals (except piglets younger than eight days) and ear cropping.
Article 35, which concerns the protection of animals used in circuses and other performances, explicitly prohibits the participation of animals in exhibitions or competitions if any of the procedures listed in Article 10 have been performed on them after the entry into force of this law, that is, since 2008.
The Montenegrin Animal Welfare Act explicitly forbids the participation of animals in shows or competitions if any of the prohibited interventions have been carried out, including ear cropping and tail docking
The Korina team has so far submitted several initiatives, urgencies, and complaints to the veterinary inspection regarding violations of this article of the law by the Kennel Club of Montenegro at shows it organized in various cities across Montenegro. However, we have never received a firm guarantee that these reports resulted in the Kennel Club being fined or otherwise sanctioned. On the contrary, it seemed as though the veterinary inspection (which operates under the Administration for Food Safety, Veterinary and Phytosanitary Affairs) was either unwilling or unable to put an end to such practices.
Due to the conduct of the competent inspection authorities, the association earlier this year initiated an inspection procedure before the administrative inspection. In the meantime, the Kennel Club has published this notice on its website, and at the shows we visited during that period, we did not see any dogs with cropped ears or docked tails. Although we cannot confirm that the initiation of this case before the administrative inspection is directly related to this development, we welcome the Kennel Club’s stance — as the largest and most important canine organization in Montenegro — and believe that it can significantly contribute to the depopularization of a practice that, despite being legally prohibited, still persists.
Korina | 21/10/2025