About HundeWelt

HundeWelt

HundeWelt is Germany's oldest dog magazine, published monthly by the Minerva Verlag in Mönchengladbach and in print since 1917. Aimed at dog owners and breeders, it combines practical knowledge about dog keeping with contributions from veterinary specialists, professional trainers, breeders and therapists, covering everything from puppy training and nutrition to veterinary medicine, behavioural science and dog sport. With twelve issues a year and a broad, service-oriented editorial concept, HundeWelt has accompanied generations of German dog lovers through more than a century of changing attitudes to the human-dog relationship. The magazine is the flagship of the Minerva Verlag's pet publishing programme, which also includes the titles Our Cats, Dog's Avenue and the specialist sports magazine HundeWelt Sport.

Overview

HundeWelt presents itself as the dog magazine with broad basic knowledge, and its editorial formula has remained remarkably consistent over its long history: each issue delivers practical guidance for everyday life with a dog, grounded in the expertise of recognised specialists. The contributors include specialist veterinarians, experienced trainers from all disciplines, from police and rescue dogs to hunting, detection, protection and guide dogs, as well as experienced breeders, dog physiotherapists and homeopaths. This breadth of expertise allows the magazine to address both beginners and experienced dog owners, and both family pet owners and readers involved in breeding, working-dog disciplines or dog sport.

The magazine appears twelve times a year, monthly, in German, and is sold by subscription and at newsstands as well as through specialist bookshops. Its print ISSN is 0018-7682. The readership consists primarily of dog owners and breeders seeking a platform for exchange and new ideas to deepen the relationship with their animals. The editorial tone is accessible and advisory rather than academic, with the aim of helping readers understand their dogs better and keep them in a species-appropriate, healthy and happy way.

HundeWelt is published by the Minerva Verlag, a Mönchengladbach-based media company with a history of more than a hundred years, specialising in magazines and books on nature, animals and people in both print and digital form. The publisher's pet portfolio is built around the relationship between humans and their favourite companions, dogs and cats, and includes the cat magazine Our Cats alongside the HundeWelt family. The brand's digital home is hundewelt.de, which extends the print offering with online content and community features.

History

HundeWelt has been published since 1917, making it the oldest continuously published dog magazine in Germany. Its origins lie in the early twentieth century, when organised dog breeding and dog sport were establishing themselves in Germany and a growing middle class was discovering the dog as a companion animal. The magazine was founded to serve this emerging readership with reliable information about dog keeping, breeding and training, at a time when such knowledge was otherwise available only through breed clubs and personal networks.

The early decades of the magazine coincided with the professionalisation of cynology in Germany. Breed clubs were founded, stud books were established, and dog shows became popular public events. HundeWelt documented these developments and provided a forum for breeders, judges and trainers, helping to shape the standards and practices of German dog breeding. The magazine survived the upheavals of two world wars and the division and reunification of Germany, adapting its content to changing social attitudes while maintaining its core mission of practical dog journalism.

In the post-war decades, HundeWelt grew with the rising prosperity that brought dogs into ever more German households. The 1970s saw the magazine established as an independent journal for all aspects of the dog world, connected with the sporting and breeding press of the time. The Minerva Verlag of Neuss and later Mönchengladbach developed the title into the centre of a publishing programme devoted to the human-animal relationship, adding book publishing and sister magazines to the portfolio. The launch of HundeWelt Sport as a separate title gave the growing dog-sport community its own dedicated magazine, while the main HundeWelt continued to serve the general dog-owning public.

The twenty-first century brought new challenges and new topics: changing animal-welfare legislation, the debate about list dogs and breed-specific regulations, the rise of animal-assisted therapy, advances in veterinary medicine and nutrition science, and the digital transformation of the media market. Through all of this, HundeWelt has maintained its monthly print rhythm and its identity as a magazine of practical basic knowledge, a continuity that few German specialist magazines of any kind can match after more than a hundred years.

Content and Sections

The content of HundeWelt is organised around the practical needs of dog owners, with each issue delivering new basic knowledge about successful dog keeping. Training and behaviour form a central pillar: the magazine publishes guidance on puppy education, obedience training, problem behaviour and the methods of experienced trainers from the various working-dog disciplines. Articles explain learning theory in accessible terms and give step-by-step advice that readers can apply in everyday life, supplemented by reports from the world of professional dog training, from police and military dog units to search-and-rescue organisations.

Veterinary medicine and health are the second major area. Specialist veterinarians contribute columns and features on disease prevention, vaccination, parasite control, nutrition and first aid, and the magazine presents the latest veterinary and behavioural research findings with the help of recognised experts. Nutrition coverage addresses feeding concepts from conventional complete feeds to raw feeding, with an emphasis on evidence-based guidance. Breeding topics, including genetics, mating planning, whelping and puppy rearing, serve the magazine's breeder readership, while breed portraits introduce the characteristics, needs and histories of individual dog breeds.

The magazine also covers the human-dog relationship in its broader dimensions: legal issues affecting dog owners, from liability insurance to local dog regulations; travel with dogs; product tests of equipment, food and accessories; and reports from dog shows, sporting events and the world of animal welfare. Reader interaction, through letters, questions to the experts and community features, reinforces the magazine's role as a platform for exchange among dog lovers. The overall editorial mix is designed so that every issue offers both immediately usable advice and deeper background knowledge, a combination that has sustained reader loyalty across generations.

Publisher and Organization

HundeWelt is published by the Minerva Verlag, based in Mönchengladbach in North Rhine-Westphalia. The publishing house has existed for more than a hundred years and publishes magazines and books on nature, animals and people in print and digital form. Its programme reflects a long-standing editorial commitment to the relationship between humans and animals, with the dog and the cat as the central companion animals of its readership. Alongside HundeWelt, the publisher produces the cat magazine Our Cats, the lifestyle-oriented Dog's Avenue and the specialist sports title HundeWelt Sport, which appears six times a year and is the only regularly published German-language magazine devoted broadly to all aspects of dog sport, from agility to dog dancing.

The main HundeWelt magazine appears twelve times a year, monthly, in German, with the print ISSN 0018-7682. It is available by subscription and through retail channels, with subscription prices listed from around 44.90 euros. Detailed current information on the editorial leadership is not publicly confirmed in the sources consulted; the publisher's imprint carries the legally required editorial responsibility details. The Minerva Verlag's long history and its specialisation in the animal and nature segment give HundeWelt a publishing home that understands its readership and its subject matter, a stability that has helped the magazine maintain its identity through more than a century of media change.

Digital Presence

The digital presence of HundeWelt is centred on hundewelt.de, the magazine's website, which extends the monthly print edition with online articles, news and service content for dog owners. The site carries the magazine's practical advisory journalism into the digital space, with articles on training, health, nutrition and the dog world that complement the print issues. As a long-established print brand, HundeWelt has developed its online offering gradually, maintaining the editorial values of the print magazine while adapting to the reading habits of a new generation of dog owners.

The publisher is also active on social media, where the HundeWelt brand reaches dog lovers with current content, community interaction and visual storytelling. The combination of the monthly print magazine, the website and the social media channels gives the Minerva Verlag a cross-media platform for the German dog community, attractive to advertisers from the pet food, pet accessories, veterinary and pet insurance industries. In a media landscape where much pet content has migrated to influencers and video platforms, HundeWelt's century-long editorial authority and its network of veterinary and training experts remain its distinctive assets, and the magazine continues to serve as a trusted source of knowledge for Germany's community of dog owners and breeders.