Live Life Team
The Phalène dog breed is actually the original Papillon dog breed. The big difference between Phalènes and Papillons are their ears. Papillons are famous for their butterfly shaped ears, and the name is actually French for ‘butterfly.’ The ears are semi-erect with long, smooth, and straight fur that hands down from them. Instead, Phalènes have dropped ears although they do have the same length of fur that hangs down from them.
Phalène means ‘moth’ in French.
Although the Phalène version of Papillons have been around for a longer period of time, the butterfly-eared Papillons are not only more popular, but they are also viewed as the breed standard. Phalènes are often considered a separate breed although the American Kennel Club denotes it as a variety of Papillon instead.
Phalène dogs are a toy breed with a very small frame. They average a height of 20 to 28 centimetres. Phalènes also have an average weight between 3 and 5 kilograms. Some dogs of this breed even reach a weight of 16 kilograms but this tends to be rare. Although they can be many colours, they are most often white with some other colour around their face, such as sable, black, liver or silver.
Phalènes are friendly dogs and they love social company. Because of this, it is unwise to leave them alone in a kennel or in a back yard for long periods of time. This can cause shifts in their personality that may result in a bad or unruly temperament.
