I have hinted here and there but today our new pups arrived and are looking good.(At about 4 AM-- we had to carry the doghouse inside and move the first pup to the whelping box, with all the other dogs leaping up to get a look and Lashyn growling through the door, because she wanted to go out at 3:40!) Daniela Imre's Lahav, the sometimes- fearsome Muncher of Kin, is the sire. He is a Saudi descended dog of John Burchard's Tepe Gawra line in part, which was Lashyn's breeder Sergiy Kopylets' choice of an "American" dog to breed her to. He is also a coursing champ-- see last pic below-- and still healthy at 10 1/2 (he chased off a coyote this morning!)
They are a pale brindle male with a dark nose and a white blaze; a cream male, perhaps with brindling on his ears; a red (grizzle?) male with black muzzle and white chest; and a dark red girl with same.
Those that choose to cut saluki/ tazi/ aboriginal Afghan/ khalag etc into many (as much as three more than that) breeds may not approve of such a mating, nor will those who don't like brindles. I have a pure Almaty line too, but the breeders there reject brindle, and I see no reason not to go for a mating between two superb, beautiful, effective hunters that also increases heterozygosity in the tazi phenotype. I believe in the maintenance of regional types WITH AN OCCASIONAL JUDICIOUS OUTCROSS.
And these are very deliberate dogs, with more homes awaiting than there are pups. As Lashyn is seven and Lahav ten, it seemed time.
They are a pale brindle male with a dark nose and a white blaze; a cream male, perhaps with brindling on his ears; a red (grizzle?) male with black muzzle and white chest; and a dark red girl with same.
Those that choose to cut saluki/ tazi/ aboriginal Afghan/ khalag etc into many (as much as three more than that) breeds may not approve of such a mating, nor will those who don't like brindles. I have a pure Almaty line too, but the breeders there reject brindle, and I see no reason not to go for a mating between two superb, beautiful, effective hunters that also increases heterozygosity in the tazi phenotype. I believe in the maintenance of regional types WITH AN OCCASIONAL JUDICIOUS OUTCROSS.
And these are very deliberate dogs, with more homes awaiting than there are pups. As Lashyn is seven and Lahav ten, it seemed time.
18 comments:
HUGE congrats to all concerned. Remember - there is no such thing as an excess of puppy (and dam) pictures.
Picture? Lemme guess the obvious: Herb? If only NM jacks ran like that. ;o)
Great news on healthy pups. Can't wait to see them at the hunts.
Who else but Herb? (;-)
Congratulations! Tis the season for pups!
Many congratulations!
I take it this is a first litter?
Dr. Burchard has told me that it is common to wait to breed a coursing bitch until she is six or seven and has thoroughly proven herself in the field.
This surprised me; I'm a huge advocate of waiting for full physical and social maturity to breed, but I tend to define that as three for a bitch. Four is as old as I'd risk for a prima para. Seven was as old as I'd go for a second and last litter. And my guys are from long-lived line of a long-lived breed. Healthy longevity is one of the primary goals of my breeding program.
Then there's the issue of waiting a couple-three years after the first litter to evaluate how they turned out.
Not as limiting for a dog, unless he starts to shoot blanks in old age. (Happened to my first choice of stud for our second litter.)
So what are Lashyn's prospects for another litter?
Not Lashyn's first and probably her last- there are several pups of hers that are successful, including John B's Tigger, and we will eventually probably breed from some of them.
We don't breed until at least two years old, and often later. These are however very long lived and long- functioning dogs-- I believe Ataika's mother in Kazakhstan was 13, and had three great pups including her (Atai is four and I think her mother is still alive). I wouldn't do it but it shows the potential. Atai still may be our best hound.
Congratulations!
Congratulations
Congrats once again! Beautiful dogs. I'd put myself on the waiting list to be on the waiting list ; ) if coursing were allowed here in Nebraska.
Congratulations! At long last! Wonderful photos...
It may not be allowed, but there is a lot of coursing (for coyotes) in Nebraska!
That's what I was going to say. The coyote hunters I know say the jackrabbits aren't nearly as plentiful as they were before the farms switched from alfafa to soybeans.
There's also lure coursing once or twice a year in Fremont, and in neighboring states, amateur straight racing in Council Bluffs, and of course, the annual Fall gathering of the coyote hounds in Loomis.
The gathering of the coyote hounds?!? Apparently I need to get out more, as I'd never heard of this event. (On the other hand, like Steve, I'm a bit ambivalent about hunting coyotes from a this-is-an-awful-lot-like-a-dog standpoint.)
I spoke with the state's upland game manager about two years ago, and we both puzzled over the apparent decline in jackrabbits. Large tracts of good-looking (to us) habitat are empty, or nearly so, but there's little hard data to suggest how serious the decline might be, or what the cause(s) might be. (Changes in land use came up, but I don't recall anything specific about a move away from alfalfa.) Based on those discussions, I put together an article for the Nebraska hawking journal, which I might end up posting over at Flyover Country. Anecdotally, I've heard that jack numbers have rebounded in some areas since that time. (And from what I've seen and heard, populations in neighboring Kansas have been pretty stable even as Nebraska jacks declined.)
Thanks, Dan and/or Margaret, for the leads on longdog events.
Yay!! More puppies! Let me know if someone needs a trip from NM to CA again.
Congrats on the new puppies!! How'd two yellow dogs end up in that last pic?
Paul
The last pic shows saluki Lahav diving to catch a jack ahead of two greyhounds.
Paul.. I can come up with two scenarios.. one is they're free coursing. We always blanket our dogs when free coursing- especially the ones that are the same color as the desert ;o) That's so we can see them when they're half mile away or more. The other possible scenario is a dog getting loose during a course. Only Herb knows for sure! :o) See you next weekend?
I know it's happened to me, rabbit gets up and my dog goes nuts and backs out of his collar and joins the course.
It's the ONLY hunt worth a damn in the coursing world, so hopefully we'll be there.
Paul
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