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Monday 30 April 2018

Bad news first, then some good news, then some exciting news for me!

I am very sorry to have to tell everyone that my Precious Ebony has crossed the Rainbow bridge. I discovered her gone at 3:00PM on Monday. Both Mark and I saw her earlier in the day and she seemed normal as ever. Except she was up earlier than usual. She generally liked to sleep in. She did not seem to have been in any pain. My belief is she died from a broken heart. And there truly is such a thing. You sometime hear couples who have been together for many decades, dying in very close proximity to one another. They often refer to that as Broken Heart Syndrome. Ebony was the life long mate of my recently passed stud dog Merlin. She lived with him for 10 years in a large yard they shared with no other dogs. After Merlin passed, she was not the same. Ebony would not stay in her yard but found every hole she could escape from. She had never wanted to escape before his passing. I believe she wanted to go find him. I tried putting in other buddies but she just ran them out of town. She had no tolerance for anyone else. She wanted her Merlin and that was that. I believe she finally realized that he was not returning and therefore had no reason to live. She didn't give up eating. She was a good weight, not too thin and ate the morning of her passing. I actually think she and a local squirrel were sharing from time to time. But when I came out at 3:00 I saw her laying flat out at the gate and I knew something wasn't right. I hope she is running in a field with Merlin, enjoying the freedom of a young dog again. Most haven't heard much about Ebony as she was never in my breeding program. She was an Isis puppy but for whatever reason could not give us puppies. And me, being me, couldn't just toss her off because of that so she lived out her life her with us, as part of the pack. Those who have been here would have met her but she didn't have her own page on my site. Regardless, she was loved by everyone here and will be missed greatly.

This has not been a good year for us with the passing of both Merlin and Ebony. And unfortunately I don't think either Isis or Indy will see another winter. They are 15.75 years old. An extraordinary age for a German Shepherd. Indy is doing better than Isis, but still doing well for her age. That could possibly mean losing 4 dogs in a year. And that is devastating to me.


For those of you waiting with deposits on the next litter, you already know that Fia finally came into heat in April. She was bred to Rommel on April 11th which means we are hoping to have puppies around mid-June. The breeding wasn't as good as I could have hoped as they did not tie. But that is not necessarily a bad thing. I've had many females catch without ties. And if you don't know what I mean by "tie" you'll have to google it as this is a G rated blog!

And my exciting news is I'm off to Australia! I am in search of a new stud dog to add to my breeding program as Merlin's passing has left a spot to fill. I need an unrelated male to keep my two individual lines going. There are some pretty darn good dogs in Australia so here's hoping! I'm leaving in a couple of days and will not be back until the 25th of May. Mark is going to hold down the fort here with the help of my daughter and two other dog knowledgeable friends who have offered their assistance. So wish me luck everyone!

Mary Ann

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